Jun 2005 Catalog

MNG-AJM Games and Collectibles

Jun 05 Catalog

While I don’t publish my latest catalog on the internet, this older catalog is available for you to look through to get an idea of the sort of thing I generally have. Please be aware that many of the games in this catalog will have already sold, and if they haven’t then the prices are not necessarily still valid – the prices are only valid in the month the catalog comes out! However, if you do see something of interest email me and I’ll let you know if I still have it. Also getting the monthly catalog by email is free and without obligation, so why not just ask to be added to my subscription list, or ask me to send you the latest catalog by email?

101 Best Family Card Games, published by Parragon. 1998. Book. Excellent. £2.50

Card game book with illustrations. The games are categorised as follows: For The Family With Very Young Children; The War Family; The Authors Family; The Stops Family; The Casino Family; The Rummy Family; Trump Games; The Whist Family; The Hearts Family; Solitaire Games.

1825 Unit 1, published by Hartland Trefoil. 1995. Box. Good. £24

18XX train game in which companies are managed, track built, trains operated and stock traded. The game works by alternating stock dealing rounds and operating rounds. Stock dealing rounds allow players to buy shares. Operating rounds allow the company presidents to build track, run trains & generate revenue for shareholders. Many changes have been made to the 1829 system, whilst retaining the basic game mechanics. A complete game, but one which the designer expanded in (much) later releases.

1829, published by Hartland Trefoil. 1974. Box. Two copies available:

1) Excellent. £34 2) Good. £31

The first of the 18XX series, and way ahead of its time. Train game in which companies are managed, track built, trains operated and stock traded. The game works by alternating stock dealing rounds and operating rounds. Stock dealing rounds allow players to buy shares. Operating rounds allow the company presidents to build track, run trains & generate revenue for shareholders. A real landmark game. This is one of the longer 18XX games.

AD&D 2nd Ed Player's Handbook, published by TSR. 1995. Book. Excellent. £4.50

This edition of the AD&D 2nd Edition Player's Handbook has a fighter wielding an axe breaking down a door on the cover. It has a black background and red and orange writing. Inside the layout format has been modified somewhat to that in earlier versions.

AD&D Battle System, published by TSR. 1985. Box. Good. £6.50

Designed by Douglas Niles. No. players: 2+. Country: American, Desc. by Andy. Special notes: Only 1 metal miniature. I have not counted all the die cut counters, but quite playable even if some are missing.

AD&D supplement which allows large scale battles to be played out in AD&D campaigns, or it can be used as a standalone miniatures game. Includes rules for the use of field artillery, flying, magic, invisibility and illusions. The set contains: 32 page rules book, 24 page scenario book, 16 page guide to miniatures, player aid cards, 2 miniatures, 3-D fold up buildings, army roster sheets and 801 die cut counters.

AD&D Cardmaster Adventure Design Deck, published by TSR. 1993. Box. Mint. £6.50

Unusual crossover game for AD&D 2nd Edition. Rather than providing an adventure scenario a set of cards are provided which can be used to create random adventures on the fly, with or without a GM. There are 108 location cards, 54 treasures and 54 monster cards. The box states it is for character levels 3-6. Probably best used outside a campaign as a one off standalone adventure.

AD&D DragonLance: Dwarven Kingdoms Of Krynn, published by TSR. 1993. Box. Mint. £7.50

AD&D Roleplaying supplement for the DragonLance world. This set details the various dwarven realms in the land of Krynn. The set includes: Songs of the Loremaster booklet with information players may well know about the history of the Dwarves on Krynn; A World In Stone booklet with GM only info; 4 mapsheets in a modular style allowing endless variations of Dwarven Halls etc to be set up.

AD&D DragonLance: Player's Guide, published by TSR. 1993. Book. Mint. £2.50

AD&D Roleplaying supplement for the DragonLance world. This book provides lots of information about the DragonLance campaign setting, including: races of the world, major cities and regions, deities, monsters, and a history of Krynn.

AD&D Forgotten Realms: Elminster's Ecologies, published by TSR. 1994. Box. Mint. £9

Campaign expansion set for the AD&D 2nd Edition campaign world. This set includes 9 booklets, 8 of which describe various ecological niches in the world of Faerun - making each a unique area to adventure in. The last booklet is the Explorer's Manual with encounter tables etc. This set is in the deep box format as it contains a lot of stuff!

AD&D Ravenloft - Castles Forlorn, published by TSR. 1993. Box. Mint. £7.50

Supplement for the AD&D Ravenloft setting. This set includes a 96 page book on The Weeping Land and Castle Tritenoira which rules over it; Melancholy Meetings - a collection of encounters for the GM to use; Eve of Sorrows - an assortment of mysteries and nightmares within the castle itself. A poster map is also provided of this new realm.

AD&D Ravenloft - Dr Mordenheim's Laboratory, published by TSR / Ral Partha. 1994. Box. Mint. £6.50

A boxed set of miniatures making up Dr Mordenheim's laboratory. This includes: A work table, a large rack and machine for making Frankenstein like monsters!, one of said monsters, Dr Mordenheim, a minion (think Igor) and a screaming woman.

AD&D Ravenloft - The Nightmare Lands, published by TSR. 1995. Box. Mint. £7.50

Supplement for the AD&D Roleplaying game, in the Ravenloft campaign setting. This is a campaign expansion boxed set which contains everything necessary to adventure among dark dreamscapes and twisted nightmares of the dream world. As well as rules books it includes new creatures and 64 ready to play nightmares which combine to form a full length adventure.

AD&D Trivia Game, published by TSR. 1991. Box. Good. £7

A game for keen players of AD&D. The players or teams are asked questions of varying difficulty, relating to events which might occur within AD&D. If you have a AD&D Rules Lawyer friend then this would make a great present for them! Alternatively take it along to your roleplay club and be assured of a fun hour or so.

AD&D: Castles, published by TSR. 1990. Box. Excellent - unpunched. £8

Boxed 2nd Edition AD&D Set. This is an unusual item as it includes loads of 'Adventure Fold-Up' pieces which can be used to construct parts of castles: 40+ towers, buildings and walls, 60+ accessories (doors, rooftops etc), 40+ Tools of war (ballistae etc), 80+ floorplan aids. As well as all this it also contains poster maps of 3 fortesses and booklets detailing them and giving rules to use with the AD&D Battlesystem.

Air Baron, published by Avalon Hill. 1996. Box. Good. £14

Players own airlines and try to buy routes and landing privileges in a fiercely competitive world of commercial aviation. Players are trying to gain control of a certain proportion of the market and accumulate money too. Strategic decisions include whether to dominate a hub or spread out to other hubs, whether to deploy jumbo jets for increased profits, take control of foreign markets or even start fare wars. Includes lots of attractive plastic aeroplanes too. I can supply Eamon's House Rules if you remind me.

Air Force, Box. 2 versions available:

1) Published by Avalon Hill. 1980. Good. £8

2) Published by Battleline. 1976. Excellent - only a few counters punched. £10

Popular plane to plane combat system covering the WWII European Theatre. Players take control of single aircraft or a formation of aircraft. All the most interesting aircraft available are represented. Aircraft cards show all the relevant characteristics. Movement is pre-plotted and then executed on the board simultaneously. Hits depend on relative facing, range, and weapons used and use a CRT. Damage is scored against aircraft parts. Rules are also included for air-to-ground combat, different bombing techniques etc.

Air Force / Dauntless Expansion Kit, published by Battleline. 1978. Box. Excellent - unpunched. £8

Expansion Kit for Air Force and / or Dauntless (you can use it with either of these games). This expansion includes 400 counters for additional aircraft, a counter tray, and thirty new aircraft data cards. The new rules give ship characteristics for roughly 50 ships, various new advanced and optional rules, play by mail rules and a solitaire dogfight scenario, air-to-ground combat, different bombing techniques etc.

Dauntless, published by Battleline. 1977. Box. Excellent - unpunched. £10

Dauntless takes the Air Force plane to plane combat system into the WWII Pacific Threatre. This set is standalone and does not require Air Force. Players take control of single aircraft or a formation of aircraft. All the most interesting aircraft available are represented. Rules cover machine guns and cannons, various different bombing methods, light and heavy flak, kamikazes, radar, clouds, recon and industrial bombing missions, etc. The rules booklet is 32 pages long but this includes various scenarios and historical information. The game counters are especially thick.

Auf Achse, published by F X Schmid. 1991. Box. 2 copies available:

1) Excellent - unused. £15 2) Good. £13

Excellent route planning and delivery game. Players drive their delivery trucks up and down Germany and neighbouring countries, competing for contracts which come up at auction. Very nice lorries and goods to put on them. I also have some house rules to reduce the luck of the dice used for movement, which adds to the skill level quite a bit, making it a game I can highly recommend.

Backwords, published by Random House. 1988. Box. Good. £3

Very good game in the Trivial Pursuit, Pictionary, Guesstures type of line. Instead of trivia, the game is designed around people's ability to understand words as they are read out backwards by the question-master that round. Not nearly as easy as it sounds. Components in very good condition, and includes 800 cards with somewhere near 2000 words to play with.

Bali, published by Kosmos. 2001. Box. Excellent. £13

Most unusual card game in which the players fight for dominance over four islands. The Dalang visits the islands and on arrival rewards the players who control the prince and the priest on that island with victory points. Each player has four hands of cards, one associated with each island, but only the hand for the island the Dalang is currently at is in use. Cards are played to challenge other players to become the priest or prince, move cards between hands on different islands, and trade cards with the deck. There is plenty of scope for clever card play, and the game doesn't feel like anything else.

Baseball Tycoon, published by LaForest Productions. 1998. Box. Good. £12. Designed by William D Barber.

No. players: 2-5. Country: American, Duration: 75 mins, Desc. by Andy. Special notes: 1st edition

Baseball business game, where you get to run the club, sign players, do trades, deal with agents, cope with injuries, and aim to field the best team to win the Pennant. Players come in six categories from 'scrubs' to 'superstars'. During the game money is earned according to your TV and licensing deals, the size of your stadium and the quality of your players. The game is driven by rolling the dice and moving around an outer track, but choices are available on most spaces.

Best Seller, published by Gamescene. ca.1985. Box. Good. £7

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-4. Country: British, Desc. by Eamon.

Promotional game, made for the milk delivery firm, Unigate Dairies. Business game of buying and selling groceries. A four stage game. 1) purchasing products, 2) marketing expenditure, 3) selling products, 4) marketing income. An unusual mechanism gives the players a variety of choices of what to buy and sell and at what prices. The marketing phases involve moving around various tracks on the board, with options on where to move next, and choosing how to make the best of the opportunities presented. Unusual item.

Block Mania + Mega Mania, published by Games Workshop. 1987. Box. Good, but see description!. £16

Sci-fi game based on the world of Judge Dredd - Mega City One. Cities have become dominated by individual city blocks, each fighting their neighbours for more space in which to live. As you would expect from this company there are loads of chunky cardboard counters depicting the combatants, special weapons, special locations etc, as well as cards which give all sorts of advantages and extra abilities. This set comes in one box only (the Mega Mania box), and is missing the two block boards from the original game (so can be played by 2 players only as is), but comes with 4 rather than 7 counter sheets (partially punched). For £3 extra I can make copies of and laminate the 2 boards to allow up to 4 to play using the Mega Mania rules.

Blue Line Hockey, published by 3M. 1969. Box. Excellent. £20

Two-player ice hockey game, non-statistical. A good head-to-head game of strategy. In the plastic wrap-around box much favoured by 3M sport games. The game simulates most aspects of ice hockey including player movement, passing, stealing, shots-on-goal, and penalties using a combination of dice, cards, and a lookup table.

Booby-Trap, published by Parker. 1965. Box. 2 copies available:

1) Box Worn. £3 2) Good. £4

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2+. Country: British, Duration: 10 mins, Desc. by Andy.

Dexterity game. Unusually for a manufacturer like this, it comes with a wooden frame, into which are wedged the plastic pieces. They are held in place by a bar on a spring. The object is to remove pieces one by one, without setting off the spring. Good fun and nicely made.

Bowl Bound, published by Avalon Hill. 1978. Box. Good. £7

Special notes: Includes two sets of college teams sheets as well as additional solitaire rules.

A statistical College American Football game, using the Fast Action card system pioneered in Paydirt. The teams are selected from great College sides of the past.

Business, published by Edition Spielbox. 1993. Pouch. Good. £4

A colour folded A3 sheet which acts as gameboard as well as having the rules on the back. You will also need 20 chips per player and two other game pieces. The board shows seven different businesses in which the players take it in turn to invest some of their 20 chips. There are 7 rounds and each player can invest in each business only once. At the end points are awarded for the most, 2nd most etc chips in each business. What makes the game interesting is that there is a 'bad' token and a 'good' token which get moved around the board in opposite directions whenever anyone invests in a business they are standing on. These nullify and double the points for the businesses they stand on at the end of the game.

Cambio, published by Lagoon Games. 1996. Box. Good. £7

Special notes: Also included is a summary of the rules to Quixo which can also be played with this set.

Abstract game with a substantial wooden board and large wooden cube pieces. Each player has a symbol on the cubes, which can be rotated to show different symbols, and be pushed along the rows so that the patterns change all the time as the game progresses. The object is to get five of your symbols in a row. Includes a variant game called Cambio Cross and rules for a 3 player version as well.

Camelot, published by Asmodee Editions. 2004. Box. New. £8

Card game in which the players are Arthurian knights who are competing at a tournament. The cards give strength in five different events: various weapon events, unarmed combat and jousting, each with their own different characteristics. Play involves deciding when you have strong enough cards to try to win an event, and when it is best to admit defeat. The game uses a clever card drawing system which ensures you must manage your hand of cards very carefully. The card mix also includes various special cards which let you change the weapon in the current event, deflect opposing cards etc. Fun and interesting card game - recommended. Originally published as Ivanhoe by GMT.

Campaign Issue 84, published by Don Lowry. 1978. Magazine. Good. £1.25

Wargame magazine, but with articles of more general interest too. The magazine was previously known as Panzerfaust. This issue's articles include: Weserubung: The German Invasion of Norway 1940, Russian Campaign, Designer's Notes on Elric, Grand Army Additions, Dauntless Review, Cosmic Encounter Review, Book Reviews, Short Reviews, Letters.

Carat, published by Queen Games. 1998. Box. Excellent. £11

Skilful abstract tile laying game, with unusually shaped tiles representing different multi-coloured diamonds. Players must place their tiles around numbered discs, and when a disc is completely surrounded it is taken out of play. Play continues until all discs are surrounded. They are then returned to their start position and players score according to how many tiles they surrounded or helped to surround. Scoring is further amended by how many different players were involved in a complete surround of a disc.

Caribbean Cruise Game, published by Worldwide Cruise Line Inc. 2000. Tube. Excellent. £18

Special notes: Numbered and signed copy: 98/100

Limited edition game which comes in a very sturdy polycarbonate tube, with a large laminated board, and laminated ship playing pieces in clay bases. Players sail around the Caribbean and visit various islands where they get to see all sorts of sights and events which come up on the cards. The objective is to be the first player to have visited a predetermined number of islands. The cards all have evocative details of sights you might see in the Caribbean and the game was clearly intended as a promotional item to encourage customers to go on a Caribbean cruise.

Cathedral, published by Lagoon Games. 1986. Box. Box shows wear. £20

Really beautifully produced 2 player strategy game. In this edition the pieces are solid wood, and very chunky, each looking like part of a medieval town - really attractive. The game itself is also very good, players try to surround a neutral cathedral with their own buildings, or failing that surround a single opponent's piece, or failing that cut off areas for their own use. The winner is the player who ends up with the smallest area of unplaced buildings. Surprisingly interesting game, and appeals to those who generally dislike abstracts too.

Chemplay, published by Essochem Europe Inc. 1974. Box. Good. £14

Designer Unknown. No. players: 4-7. Country: British, Desc. by Andy.

Business game based on the petro-chemical industry developed by Esso, apparently for use in internal seminars and staff training programmes. The game has some similarities to Monopoly, with a track around which players move with the opportunity to buy properties, and develop them in order to make more money. However, there are also quite a few extra features, a major one being that there are two types of players: merchant banker players and chemical company players, who obtain money in different ways and can interact. Also, the chemical company players can buy various chemical plants and get income that way as well as by buying property. The board is printed on a clear plastic roll, and the game uses a neat double sided dial for expenses etc.

Chess Board Puzzle, published by Unknown. ca.1950. Box. 1 end of box missing. £0.75

Designer Unknown. No. players: 1. Country: British, Desc. by Andy.

Puzzle comprising of 15 pieces in different shapes, but each piece featuring a number of squares to a chess board. The object is to form them into a regular chess board.

Chinese Chequers, published by Chad Valley. ca.1930. Box. Box poor. £8

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-6. Country: British, Duration: 30 mins, Desc. by Eamon.

Very nice version of this classic - good enough to keep out on your coffee table. The board is made of tin-plate and is attractively coloured, with a Chinese theme. The pieces are plastic pegs, 6 sets of 10. The board

has holes for where the pieces move, and the peg into the board during play. The box is complete, but the glue is failing and it is not in very good condition, though it does have the rules printed on it.

Choo Choo, published by Piggy Toes Press. 1997. Box. Mint - in shrink. £8

A very nice item, most attractive. Not a game, more a book that turns into a toy. Essentially, it looks like a bookcase game, but when you open it out, it forms a pop-up village, and a railway track that runs around it. Inside there is a plastic train (in the style of the old Western trains), and this works by clockwork, so you wind him up, and he will chug round the track. Also has a button and batteries to make a 'Whoo Whoo' noise. This would make a wonderful present if you didn’t want to add it to your train 'game' collection.

Clinch, published by Edition Spielbox. 1993. Pouch. Good. £3

A colour folded A3 sheet which acts as gameboard as well as having the rules on the back. You will also need 6 white and 6 black playing pieces, 12 white counters and 12 black counters. The game is played on a 6x6 grid. The playing pieces start on the board and the objective is to get all your counters onto the board too. This is done by moving your playing pieces like chess rooks, but every space moved over gets one of your counters placed on it if there isn't one there already, and when you place a counter or playing piece on an opponent's counter the counter is returned to your opponent to have to play again.

Comings And Goings / Paternoster, Box. Several copies available:

1) Comings & Goings, published by Gibsons. 1991. Box. Good. £6. Country: British

2) Comings & Goings, published by Gibsons. 1991. Box. Good, but gash on lid has been taped up. £5. British.

3) Paternoster, published by F X Schmid. 1990. Box. Excellent. £6. German.

Superior (and tough) memory game as you try to recall who entered a 'rolling lift' (known as a Paternoster). To make it harder still the lift sections will all go up / down between turns moving the hidden passengers and making this a real challenge. Nice illustrations on the cards.

Competitive Edge - Issue 11, published by One Small Step. ca.1995. Magazine. Excellent. £5.50

Designer Unknown. Country: Canadian, Desc. by Andy.

Formerly known as Game Fix, this followed a similar style, with a complete game in each issue and variations for many other games. Game this issue is Cybernaut, about hackers in a fight for control of the Net by Joe Miranda.

Other articles include: Ancients, Magic The Gathering

Corruption, published by Descartes Editeur. 1999. Box. In shrink. £7

Card game. 112 cards in an entertaining, interactive game of bribery. Players use their cards to obtain lucrative construction contracts by furnishing bribes, but too much means no profit, or too little means no business. As well as standard bribery cards there are special cards which can significantly affect the outcome, but these are one use, whereas the bribery cards can be reused.

Cosmic Encounter, published by Eon. 1978. Box. Box shows wear, 1 corner taped. £48

Country: American, Duration: 1-2 hrs, Desc. by Andy.

Special notes: Base set+Exp 1+2+3+flares only from Exp 4. So 50 alien powers+flares+6 boards and counter sets. Photocopied rules. 3 tokens substituted.

Original edition of this wonderful game. Each player takes the role of an alien race which starts off with 5 bases on its own planets, but each wants to be the first with 5 bases on other races' planets. This is done by making attack attempts and inviting attacking and defensive allies, and playing cards to resolve the attack. However, what makes this game great is that each race has one or more rule breaking alien power, and the way these interact is really great. Every gamer should own a copy of one of the editions of this game in my opinion - highly recommended.

Cosmic Encounter, published by Games Workshop. 1986. Box. Good. £38

Country: British, Duration: 1-2 hrs, Desc. by Eamon.

The only British edition of this wonderful game. 32 of the best aliens from the original American edition and some of the American expansions. Does not include Flares. See also description for Eon version above.

D&D: Champions Of Mystara, published by TSR. 1993. Box. Shrinkwrapped but dented. £6.50

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Supplement. The full title is Champions of Mystara - Heroes Of The Princess Ark. This boxed set is a compilation from the Dragon magazine series of the same name. The Princess Ark is a flying ship which explores the world of Mystara. It includes: 3 guidebooks (total 224 pages), 8 ship recognition cards, 2 25mm scale deck plans for the Princess Ark, 2 mapsheets. As well as many adventure ideas the set covers rules for constructing and operating flying ships and describes the lands to the west of the Known World, and provides a guide to GMs making their own world.

Der Fliegende Hollander, published by Parker. 1992. Box. Good. £15

Interesting game, with wooden pieces, cards, and horseshoe tiles with racks to keep them on. Players set out to make money as merchant traders, but must avoid meeting the Flying Dutchman, who will curse their voyage if they should cross paths. The player who gains the highest value of shares (representing wealth) by the end will win. The Dutchman is controlled by the players throughout the game, but care is needed to use your influence wisely or you will be caught near the end with no influence left just when you need it most. Plenty of decisions to make. Plays especially well with 5-6 players. Recommended.

Desperanto Playing Cards, published by Qui Vive. ca.1970. Box. Good. £3.50

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2+. Country: British, Desc. by Eamon.

Very unusual pack of cards, each card is a regular playing card, but also features an illustration so that the cards will teach the player some of a foreign language whilst playing. The cards feature English, Spanish, French and German. Very nice, unusual item.

Die Pyramiden Des Jaguar, published by Kosmos. 2002. Box. In shrink. £11

Card game in which the players take it in turn to offer their opponent two cards (numbered 1-40), and their opponent takes one and adds it to their pyramid structure and the remaining card is added to the offerer's pyramid. The pyramids are shown on a board and the numerical ordering of the cards in the pyramid is vital. If a player has to place a card onto another card because the ordering provides no gap, then this is permitted but is undesirable. The round ends when a player completes his pyramid and gets a bonus for doing so. A very clever tactical game which is based on the earlier game Pacal.

Die Siedler Von Catan, published by Franckh Kosmos. 1995. Box. Excellent. £19

This is the original game which started the now extremely prolific 'Settlers' family of games. It won the German Game of the Year award in 1985, and has been probably the best selling European style strategy game of recent times. The game itself is excellent, and involves building up from a couple of small settlements on a newly colonised island into a much larger group of settlements and cities. This is done by gaining resources from terrain according to dice rolls, trading these resources with the other players and using them to build more roads, settlements, cities, and other advancements. Very interactive and great fun. Highly recommended.

Die Siedler Von Catan: Das Turnier-Set Zum Kartenspiel, published by Kosmos. 1996. Box. Mint. £8

Settlers Card Game expansion set. This set includes 60 cards which it is intended should be used to enhance and customise 1 player's card selection in the Settlers Card Game, playing using the 'Tournament rules'. However, there is nothing to stop you adding this to the standard (shared set) game for added variety and interest. This is the German version, so there is German on the cards. I am supplying a translation of the cards along with rules from the various theme sets to give extra ideas on how to make use of this set.

Dots, published by Adlung Spiele. 1998. Box. Excellent. £2.50

The cards have a variety of shapes, cubes, rods, cones and spheres floating in space. Cards are dealt to the table and the players must quickly count the number of spheres shown on all cards and then use their number cards to produce this total. First to do this wins the round.

Dungeonquest, published by Games Workshop. 1987. Box. Good. £10

Special notes: This set has photocopied rules, 2 replacement figures, and a few tiles and cards missing, but is still entirely playable despite being incomplete - hence the low price (normally twice as much).

Players explore the ruins of Dragonfire Castle trying to reach the treasure chamber in the center of the dungeon and escape alive with as much treasure as possible. Time pressure forces the players to take risks because anyone left in the dungeon when the game ends dies! The dungeon is created with tiles to produce a maze-like dungeon and ensures no two games are ever the same. Recommended.

Elchfest, published by Kosmos. 1999. Box. Good. £10

Dexterity game with a cute wooden elk for each player, a wooden base platform on which the elks start and wooden stepping stones which the players flick carrom style. Each player gets two flicks in a row and if a stepping stone is close enough for their elk to step onto it then it may. The objective is to get your elk across to your opponent's base platform before they get their elk to yours. Silly but fun. Part of Kosmos' successful 2 player square box range of games.

Eulen Zauber, published by Haba. 1991. Box. Good. £24

Beautifully produced game in which the players each have four owls whose heads have got muddled up with those of their opponents' owls! In addition there is a mischievous black owl as well. The players use movement points from special dice to move around owls with bodies or heads of their own colour as well as the mischievous black owl. When owls land on the same space they swap heads! Once one of your owls has a matching head and body you can then try to get it back to the safety of its nest. A light but amusing game with decisions to make and wonderful bits. Quite hard to find.

Euro Touring, published by Jumbo. ca.1968. Box. Good. £5

Designer Unknown. No. players: 3-6. Country: Dutch, Desc. by Andy.

Family board game in which the players move their playing piece around a large map of Europe. Spaces landed on can either let you try to identify a town from a picture, try to answer a question set by the 'Euro-Disk', which reveals the answer to only one question out of about 100 questions about the various countries, or have to pay money at other spaces. Correct answers get you money and postcards, and enough postcards will get you maps, which are what you need to win the game, along with money at the end.

Excalibur, published by Wotan. 1989. Box. Excellent. £12

Attractive economic and military game set in Arthurian Britain. Players must balance raising troops against building churches against reinforcing castles. Managing the estates and not leaving oneself too thinly spread is important. Though not a wargamer I have to admit to rather liking this game - I think the economic side appeals greatly. It was distributed in the U.S. by Iron Crown Enterprises.

Face-Off Pro Hockey Game, published by Confro Inc. 1985. Box. Good. £15

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2. Country: American, Desc. by Andy.

Special notes: Includes 1985-86 NHL team cards

Statistical ice hockey game. Cards are provided to represent individual NHL players. This is a detailed simulation of the game of professional ice hockey, and with basic, advanced and further optional rules it can be tailored to suit your preferences. The game play revolves around the use of four dice, the Game Chart and the player cards. A roll of the dice on either the Game Chart or a player card will lead to an instruction or code, with that action to be taken immediately. Play involves strategic decisions, so this isn't a pure replay game. Very well regarded by sports game fans.

Famo, published by Alf Cook Ltd. ca.1950. Box. Box poor, contents good. £2.50

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2+. Country: British, Desc. by Andy.

Card game. Subtitled the Historical Card Game. The cards show a number of famous characters eg. Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir Francis Drake, Admiral Nelson etc along with cards showing things associated with each. The game itself is essentially a simple set collecting game.

Fette Autos, published by Edition Erlkonig. 2002. Box. In shrink. £12

Motor racing card game. There is no track, instead it is just the relative positions of the cars that show how players are doing. Cards are used to indicate whether the current track section is a straight or corner (with speed limit), and players have a display of three cards which they add to and take away from throughout the game. How well these cards match the current track determines how well the cars do. Some interesting ideas and a game which takes a play or two to get used to as it is so unusual.

Finale, published by Kosmos. 1998. Box. Good. £9

Soccer card game. The footballers all have good and bad spells during the game which is represented by having different strengths on each side of their square cards. Once used a player must turn to use the next side. Neat idea, and plays well. Part of Kosmos' well regarded 2 player square box range.

Finstere Flure, published by 2F Spiele. 2003. Box. In shrink. £17

Fun game in which each player has 3 or 4 people who need to escape from the dungeons. However, also in the dungeons is a monster, which will kill anyone it encounters. First the players take it in turns to move their people around the dungeon floor, going around, over or behind various obstacles such as pools of blood, stone blocks, teleporters; and then the monster moves. Each round he moves a different amount, and he follows fixed rules which depend on what he can see to guide him, and woe betide anyone in his way. It is possible by clever play to manipulate the monster into finding another player's man, which is especially satisfying if they were about to escape... Unusually it plays especially well with 5-7 players.

Fire And Movement No. 74, published by Unknown. 1991. Magazine. Good. £0.75

Designer Unknown. Country: American, Desc. by Andy.

Includes reviews, summaries, and debates on games. Main articles this issue:

Air Bridge to Victory, Gallant Few, Napoleon’s Battles, Battle of Britain, Computer Wargames, Desert Victories, Carrier War, A Line In The Sand, Best Monster Game from the 70s: Invasion America.

Fische Fluppen Frikadellen, published by 2F Spiele. 2002. Box. In shrink. £23

Designed by Friedemann Friese. No. players: 2-5 (15). Country: German, Duration: 90 mins, Desc. by Andy. Special notes: Version C (this matters only if you want to play the multi-table game).

Very nicely produced trading game in which players move around the board using paths and, when convenient, boats. There are various kiosks around the board at which players can buy and sell various goods. The buying and selling prices are determined by a clever supply and demand system which makes it important not to sell something just after another player has dumped lots of that item. During the game three special items have to be bought and the player who first buys their third special item wins. The game can be played with multiple copies on different tables, in which case a player can move off his board and join play at another table and make use of the different prices on that table. The game takes up to 15 in this way.

Fliegen, published by Lui Meme. 2003. Box. Excellent. £4

Small box game of bluffing and outguessing your opponents. Each player has a handful of flies (yes, little plastic flies) which are used to bid for cards over 12 rounds. However, rather than the highest bid winning, players must guess the total number of flies bid by all players, with a tiebreak being the number of flies bid. The cards give victory points to the winner, allow victory points to be deducted from another player, or give special abilities for future rounds such as Fly Spray which lets you eliminate flies from an opposing bid. Also extra flies are earned by all players correctly guessing the total number of flies everyone bid.

Football Strategy, published by Avalon Hill. 1972. Box. Two copies available:

1) Box shows wear. £10 2) Good, one edge taped. £11

One of the best two-player games ever devised. Non-statistical. One player picks a play, the other a defence and the two results are cross-referenced to get a result. There is a high degree of skill in this because you know what you should call to get the best chance of a result in your favour, the defence know that as well. Will you call it? Will you double bluff? Even if you do not particularly like American Football, this is still a great game.

For Sale, published by Ravensburger. 1997. Box. Good. £8

Card game played in two stages. In the first stage players bid for buildings using money chips in a clever bidding system. In the second stage these buildings are then sold and player who manages to realise the most money at the end of the game wins. Very attractive building cards and a fast playing fun little game.

Formula One, published by Waddingtons. ca.1967. Box. Good, but 1 corner taped. £13

Old but good motor racing game. Players keep records of their speed, brake-wear and tyre-wear on their personal car dashboards. Dice are only used for testing if corners have been successfully negotiated should they decide to drive too fast around them, and thus take a risk. Tactics cards can be used to advantage, and the rules also cover pitting.

Fossil, published by Rio Grande Games. 1998. Box. Good. £10

Set collection game based on fossil collecting. Each fossil is made up of 9 cards, and players move stones across the board claiming fossil cards each turn. Moves cost points, but collecting cards earns points, and the more complete a fossil is at the end of the game the more valuable it is.

Freight Train, published by White Wind. 1993. Box. Excellent. £26

Unusual train game in which the players shunt around various types of freight between the public holding yards and their own trains which are being formed as well as their own private holding yards. The game is divided into three sections and after each section points are awarded for the largest and second largest freight train of each type, as well as for the longest mixed freight train. The scoring works slightly differently in each section to discourage players from having left over freight in their holding yards at the end of the game. You will need a large table to play this with more than three players.

Friesematenten Expansion, published by 2F-Spiele. ca.1998. Box. Excellent. £3.50

Card game, 60 cards illustrated in colour, in the unique style one now associates with this designer and his company. While this is only an expansion pack the game can be played using it, you just need to provide:

20 markers (to put on cards), some play money / chips and a player marker. The cards have German text on, but I can point you to a translation on the web (it translates all the potential 200 cards, with pictures, which could be in this pack as the cards are a semi random mix). I can print this for you if you wish, but will have to charge extra. I will provide English rules with the game anyway though.

Fuzzy Felt Bees Game, published by Toy Brokers Ltd. 2002. Box. Excellent. £4

Young children's action game. 20 large colourful felt bees are placed on a felt mat and each player has a bee swatter (with velcro strip) and a hive. When the game starts the players try to pick up bees with their swatter by swatting them, and any bees so collected are placed on that player's hive. Once all bees have been collected the player with the most in their hive is the winner.

Games Review - Batch of 3, published by Sladen Publications. 1990. Magazine. Good. £1.75

Vol 2, Issues 5,7,9. This magazine is half role playing games and the other half split between general games and wargames. Highlights in these issues include articles on: Quite a few AD&D supplements, Star Wars roundup, Siege of Jerusalem, Europe Aflame, Star Fleet Battles, Aliens, Kalahen, Railway Rivals, Cyberpunk special, Several MERP supplements, 5th Fleet, Eidelweiss, PanzerBlitz, Deathwing,

Libel - The Game, TORG, Empire In Flames, Fire In The East, Shell Shock, Best of Dragon Games, Space Hulk variants

Get Out!, published by Brooke Bond. ca.1985. Box. Mint. £4

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2+. Country: British, Desc. by Eamon.

Advertising card game, featuring the PG Tips monkeys. Based on Speed (by Pepys), which was also used as the inspiration for Uno. The cards feature photographs of the chimps from the TV commercials (who have names like Kevin, Samantha and Geoff!!).

Gipf, published by Don & Co. 1998. Box. In shrink. £15

Very well regarded strategy game which is based on the classic idea of the players alternately playing a piece onto the board trying to achieve 4 pieces in a row. However, when this is achieved players remove their row of pieces for reuse and capture any opposing pieces which extended that row of pieces. Captured pieces cannot be re-entered into play. The game is also the first in a series of games, which can be combined together in a unique way. The production quality of the game is also excellent.

Grosse Geschafte, published by Bewitched Spiele. 2004. Box. In shrink. £20

German version of Mall World. A giant mall is to be built and the players are supervising the planning. Players obtain contracts to get certain types of buildings placed in groups by the end of the game, and will score for each such occurrence. In addition the players also auction up cards which allow the play of the buildings to the board, and so players must try to obtain contracts and building placement cards which go together well. The game also gives incentives to play contracts both early and late in the game, so making the choice of when to do what quite tricky.

Haggle, published by Galleon Games. 1993. Box. Excellent. £5

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-8. Country: British, Duration: 1 hr, Desc. by Andy.

Negotiation and deal making game in which players buy, sell and barter cars, racehorses, houses, oil paintings, ming vases and shares amongst themselves hoping to get the best deals and end up with the most valuable portfolio at the end of the pre-agreed playing time.

Hare And Tortoise: various editions available:

1) Hare And Tortoise published by Gibsons. 1987. Box. Good. £15. No. players: 2-6. Country: British. 3^rd Edition.

Special notes: One side of the box is a little faded.

2) Hase Und Igel, published by Ravensburger. 1978. Box. Good. £15. No. players: 2-6. Country: German.

3) Britvic Strategy, published by Waddingtons. 1983. Box. 1 box corner taped up. £14. No. players: 3-4.

Country: British. Promotional game, which uses the same system as Hare & Tortoise but with a different

winning condition and a board layout designed specifically for 3-4 players.

Won the German Game of the Year in 1979. Classic race game in which carrots are spent to move forward using triangular numbers, so 1 space costs 1, 3 spaces 6 and 5 spaces 15 etc. Carrots can be regained by moving backwards. This results in a very clever game in which it is possible to win by moving ahead quickly, lagging back collecting carrots for a long time or doing something in between. Brilliant, and highly recommended.

How Ruck!, published by Kosmos. 2002. Box. In shrink. £11

Tug of war game set in the Scottish Highlands. Players play cards showing assorted caricatures onto either end of the rope - good ones on your side, bad on the other, and when a Heave Ho card is played strengths are compared. Various sneaky cards can be played including Nessie, who can either help pull or eat someone! One of the simpler games in the Kosmos 2 player series.

How To Host A Murder: Grapes of Frath, published by Decipher Inc. 1986. Box. Box good, contents unused. £7

Murder mystery evening set designed for 8 people. Archibald Frath, famous champagne producer invites some 'friends' to his yacht in a secluded Mediterranean harbour. However, a murder is discovered and the players must work out who is the culprit. The game includes a cassette tape which is played at various stages during the game, clue booklets, guest invites, and a blue-print of the luxury motor yacht. Costume suggestions and dinner menu (inc. recipes) also included, but both optional. Sadly a real luxury motor yacht is not included.

International Road Racing, published by Lambourne. ca.1985. Box. Good. £9

Special notes: Rider stats provided for 1984 (500cc, 250cc, Sidecar), 1985 Transatlantic Challenge, 1986 (80cc - 500cc).

International Motor Cycle Racing replay game. The system simulates progress through the race by grouping racers and having them gain or lose advantage through the replay and so dropping back or advancing to different groups of riders. Only on the last lap does position within a group really matter. There are various different sets of statistical data available for this system.

Jupiter, published by Edition Spielbox. 1993. Pouch. Good. £4

A colour folded A3 sheet which acts as gameboard as well as having the rules on the back. You will also need six dice, and six counters + a playing piece per player. This is clearly an early form of Reiner's excellent Auf Heller & Pfennig. Players must either roll a dice and place it onto a space on the grid or place one of their counters which immediately scores the value of the dice in its row and and column. When the grid is full the player with the highest score wins.

Kai Piranja, published by Abacus Spiele. 2004. Box. In shrink. £10

Light but fun filler. The cards show three different types of fish which each come in large and small varieties as well as showing hungry and normal ones. Players take it in turn to form a row of fishes, and any which don't match either in type or size must be passed on to another player. At any point a row can be kept, but if a hungry fish is drawn it eats many of the other fish in the row, forming a pile in the centre, though these piles can be won by getting three of that type of fish into your row. The player with the most fish at the end wins. Essentially a game of pressing your luck, but with attractive cards and fast play.

Karten Rallye, published by Fairplay Magazine. ca.1990. Packet. Good. £5

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-4. Country: German, Duration: 45 mins, Desc. by Andy.

Standalone version of Creature Castle. Card driven race game in which you move along the twisting path by playing cards which match the various symbols from a standard deck of cards on the space you wish to move onto. Some spaces require more specific cards than others, and so to pass these spaces will require some good hand management and/or lucky draws! There are also some short cuts which can be taken, but these also require more specific cards, so you will need to collect cards appropriately before taking these shortcuts. I will provide a copy of the rules and some dobbers but you will need a standard deck of playing cards. Distributed at Spiel one year as a promotional item.

Katzenjammer Blues, published by Goldsieber Spiele. 1998. Box. Good. £6

Card game in which players bid for selections of cards using more cards. Bids consist of melds of 1-4 cards, with larger melds outbidding smaller melds. Jokers are also in the mix, but using them is dangerous as the player who uses the most gets penalised. As well as getting more cards the winner of the cards also claims some mice which are VPs. Plays quickly with some interesting decisions to be made.

Knightmare, published by Milton Bradley. 1991. Box. Good. £6.50

TV related, based on the children's adventure game-show, where participants have to get through a series of rooms by solving puzzles, riddles, etc.. The show was inspired by the success of role-playing games. This board game follows the theme of the show, with each player having to explore a network of rooms in a race to find treasure. The main game mechanic is answering riddles, nearly 300 of which are included in a booklet. In addition helm tokens are collected and used at various points to increase your options or chances in combat. The game is packaged and presented as a fantasy adventure board game.

Knightmare Chess, published by Steve Jackson. 1996. Box. Excellent. £9

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2. Country: American, Duration: 1 hr, Desc. by Eamon.

Cards used in conjunction with a chess set. Based on the original French idea, a hand of cards is dealt to each player, and the cards can be played after making a move. The sheer quantity of cards makes each game different. The card graphics are very nice. The effects are too numerous to list but they might, for instance, create a teleporting square, or a black hole square. Certainly livens up chess!

Last Frontier: The Vesuvius Incident, published by Fat Messiah Games. 1993. Packet.

Excellent - countersheet untouched. £11. Designed by Neal Sofge, Michael Wasson. No. players: 1.

Country: American, Duration: 2 hrs, Desc. by Andy.

Solitaire wargame in which the player controls space marines on a rescue mission to evacuate the USS Feynman, which has been overrun by hostile aliens and is in a decaying orbit. The game has feel rather like the film 'Aliens'. The rules are fairly complex, but nothing a wargamer can't handle (about 15 small pages).

Ludoviel, published by Bewitched Spiele. 2003. Short Fat Tube. New. £13

Country: German, Duration: 45 mins, Desc. by Andy.

A collection of eight games designed specifically to appeal to games collectors! This set includes wooden cubes, dice, an egg timer and 119 cards (in English and German). The cards each have a property that a game might have eg. 'At least one animal is involved' or 'Bridges, ships or rafts are included'. Play revolves around being able to think of games which have these properties. For example in one version of the game a player states the name of a game and the others knock if they have a card which fits that game. In another players must deduce what game a player is thinking about when playing a series of cards.

Magdar, published by Fantasy Flight Games. 2003. Box. Excellent. £10

Fantasy themed game which clearly takes its ideas from Tolkien's works. The dwarves have delved too deep in their mines, and have woken Magdar, a terrible magma demon. The playing area is set out using boulder tiles placed in four rows. The players move dwarves from boulder to boulder and can mine gems and mithril. The longer spent in one place mining a gem the more valuable it becomes, however each turn Magdar moves and destroys a bit more of the mine, so any dwarves dawdling too long are likely to be destroyed along with their part finished gems. At the end of the game only gems which have a matching piece of mithril score.

Maginor, published by Fantasy Flight. 2001. Box. Excellent. £10

The Wizard's Council needs a new High Wizard and the players vie for that privilege. This is done by going to various Oracles and securing votes. Each oracle will choose its favoured candidate in turn, but noone knows exactly when each oracle will make its choice, only the order they will choose in. Thus players have to decide when and where to spend their time gaining votes. Smaller oracles will need less persuasion, but their choice carries less weight. Also each oracle provides a one off special power to its favoured candidate. The game pieces look rather odd, sort of cogs into which vote tokens slot.

Makhbusa - Persian Backgammon, published by Orda Industries Ltd. 1969. Box. Good. £6

This game is played on an 8x8 grid with an extra 8 numbered spaces for the playing pieces of each player to start on at the edges of the board. The two dice used are special, one being a direction dice and the other showing the numbers 1-4 and two wild sides. Players alternate moving one of their pieces using the roll of the dice trying to get to their opponent's side of the board, scoring points (2-5) depending on the space they manage to get to. Landing on an opponent's piece blocks that piece, and two or more pieces of the same colour on the same space cannot be blocked.

Masquerade, published by Cheatwell. ca.1995. Box. Good, 2 corners taped. £7

Designer Unknown. No. players: 3+. Country: British, Duration: 1 hr, Desc. by Andy.

Deluxe party game of mime and charades, but with the twist that you are miming situations rather than book titles or whatever. So you tackle subjects like "A cannibal inviting his friends round to dinner", or "A squirrel hiding his nuts", or "Talk a lemming out of suicide". The game comes in a large triangular box and has sturdy card dispensers and a good chunky sand timer.

Maya, published by Abacus Spiele. 2003. Box. In shrink. £15

Card and board game in which players vie to contribute most toward building 4 Mayan pyramids in order to win the favour of the gods. Firstly cards are played at the quarries to claim building blocks, and gain special actions and then the building blocks are built into pyramids. There are a number of clever rules to give additional tactical decisions and bonuses for majorities in either quarries or pyramids as well as special rules you need to keep an eye on in the pyramids lest your blocks collapse and become useless.

Business Game / Mine A Million – several versions available:

1) Business Game, published by Gibsons. 1972. Box. Good. £4

2) Business Game, published by Waddingtons. 1972. Box. Good. £4

3) Mine A Million, published by Waddingtons. 1965. Box. Good. £4

Designer unknown. No. players: 2-6. Country: British, Duration: 90 mins, Desc. by Andy.

Players mine for ore, then have to get it to the sea, and finally, get it abroad where they can turn it into dollars.

Interaction provided by the fact that there is always hot competition for the various modes of transport available. One player will hire a barge (say), but others can still make use of it, but must pay for the privilege.

Miniature Wargames Issue 15, published by A.E.Morgan Publications. 1984. Magazine. Good. £1.25

Nicely produced 48 page magazine with some colour pictures. Covers the miniature wargames hobby and related topics. Articles this issue: Storming The Schellenberg, Warriors & weapons of the Chariot era, Kamikaze in miniature, Fiasco 84 report, English tactics in the hundred year war, Battle of Worcester, Two ladies of old Japan, Book reviews, The infantry platoon in Normandy.

Molly & Lore!, published by Descartes Editeur. 2002. Box. In shrink. £9

Published as War & Sheep for the English speaking market. Neat game in which each player has a small flock of sheep and must use it to eat as much grass as possible. However, not all patches of grass are the same. Some are normal, some are very potent (high scoring) but the sheep must retire for a long rest, while others are of little nutritional value but give their player a special ability card, while other patches of grass hide a waiting wolf! Once discovered a wolf can wreak havoc, but sheep can hide from a wolf. Should a player lose all his sheep then he also loses the game, so playing too aggressively can be dangerous. The special abilities are suitably fun. Nice game - recommended.

Monopoly - France 1998 World Cup Edition, published by Waddingtons. 1998. Box. Excellent. £20

The classic game, released for the 1998 World Cup Football Finals. A beautiful version of the game, with a unique FIFA World Cup metal playing token. Instead of buying properties, you buy international football teams,

but still in the familiar groupings by colour. It includes stadiums and hotels, silver-coloured pewter playing pieces (all related to football of course), and a special box insert to act as a Bank tray during play. All this housed in a special collectable box.

Monopoly - German Edition, published by Parker. . Box. Good. £2.50

German edition of Monopoly, with rules in German only, and the property names all German. It is in a square box, so smaller and easier to store than most monopoly sets.

Morisi, published by Cwali. 2000. Tube. Excellent. £17

Resource management game played on a different layout each game. The playing surface consists of hex tiles each producing one type of resource. Players move a piece from hex to hex collecting a resource from the new hex. These resources are then spent to build a network of roads between city tiles, and at the end of the game the player with the best connected network of roads will win. Recommended.

Move Out! Batch of 21 Issues, published by Leeds University. ca.. Booklets. Good. £4.50

A batch of 21 issues of this board wargaming and postal games zine. Each issue is roughly 24 pages long and contains some reviews, some game variants and some postal games stuff. While the latter is unlikely to be of any interest the former articles are potentially well worth a read. These issues date from Sept 1987 - July 1989.

Murder A La Carte - Un-Happy Hour, published by Bepuzzled. 1994. Box. Good. £6.50

Murder mystery dinner party kit for 6-8 players. Includes invitations, place cards, cassette tape, character booklets, party planner booklet and secret clues. This mystery is set in a Chicago bar, with Dexter Doyle being shot when the lights go out.

Mutiny, published by Fantasy Flight. 2003. Box. Excellent. £10

Pirate themed in which the players represent different factions of the crew on a pirate ship, on which the captain is no longer capable. However, his officers are still loyal. Players vie for the favour of these officers to gain various privileges in order to be the first faction to organise an armed mutiny. This is done by bidding with money and rum. The various favours include: getting more money or rum, getting weapons (needed for a mutiny), controlling the spyglass (to break ties as you wish) and deciding where to sail next - different places favour different officers.

Mythos Miskatonic University Boosters, published by Chaosium Inc.. 1996. CCG. Mint. £0.50 each.

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2+. Country: American, Desc. by Andy.

Call of Cthulhu based CCG, Mythos expansion, 'Expeditions of Miskatonic University'. Limited edition boosters.

Napoleon At War, published by SPI. 1975. Box. Good - partially unpunched. £16

Special notes: The plastic case is showing its age and cracking around the edges.

An SPI Quad game, with four separate games using the same basic system, and with exclusive rules for their exact situation. Games are Battle of Nations (by Edward Curran), Marengo (by David C Isby), Jena-Auerstadt (by Thomas Walczyk), and Wagram (by Irad B Hardy). Each hex represents about 600m, and each point of strength about 750 men. Each game turn represents 1-2 hours.

Napoleon's Last Battles, published by SPI. 1976. Box. Box excellent, contents mostly unpunched. £16

Wargame quad which simulates four late Napoleonic battles: Ligny, Quatre Bras, Wavre, and La Belle Alliance. All these battles use a base set of rules with different maps, setups and counters for each battle. Also included is a set of campaign rules. The system is an operational level game and each hex represents 480m, each strength point around 500 men, and a game turn 1 hour.

North Sea, published by Waddingtons. 1975. Box. Good, but box taped. £6

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-4. Country: British, Desc. by Andy.

Promotional game made by Waddingtons for Shell and the Robert Gordon Institute of Technology in Aberdeen. Players move round the edge of the board preparing to search for oil in the oil fields in the centre of the board. The objective is to finance two productive oil fields and pay off all loans. Spaces landed on give options of performing various actions, with some spaces giving many options to choose from. Concessions need to be bought, then explored and then developed. A shorter version of the game is also detailed. Includes chunky plastic oil rigs and plastic ships. Note this is not the same as 'North Sea Oil'.

Nuggets, published by Winning Moves. 2003. Box. Excellent. £10

Placement game played on a 5x8 square grid. The board starts with 8 gold mines valued from 4 to 8 each, and players take turns either putting one of their claim markers face down onto an empty space (they are valued 1-4), or placing two dividers between spaces. The dividers allow the board to be chopped up into separate claims, none of which can be less than four spaces in size, and it is this that makes the game interesting, as it is quite possible for some claim markers to get separated from all the gold mines, and so have no effect in the scoring at the end of the game.

Ohne Furcht Und Adel, published by Hans Im Gluck. 2000. Box. Excellent. £9

Special notes: This set includes extensive player aids in English.

Card game. Each turn, every player chooses a 'job', such as soldier, priest, merchant, thief etc, each of which gives certain special abilities for that round. The object is to collect gold in order to construct buildings in your town. These buildings also have attributes which make selection of particular jobs more profitable thereafter, and a few give special abilities. Lots of clever ideas, and good interaction. Highly recommended.

Oi! Dat's My Leg!, published by Games Workshop. 1989. Box. Good. £9

One of a line of four Games Workshop games aimed at kids. In this one the players move their goblins around the board collecting troll parts left behind by hapless trolls, with the objective of being the first to build two complete trolls. Players can add junk (eg. old sofas) into opponent's half constructed trolls, and sometimes get the chance to steal bits too. A troll also moves around the track and penalises any goblins he lands on. Also includes a cassette with daft songs sung by trolls!

Oraklos, published by Splotter. 2002. Box. In shrink. £10

Country: Dutch, Duration: 20 mins, Desc. by Andy.

Pattern recognition game in which a large number of coloured cubes (with holes in two sides) are thrown onto the table, and cards are turned over to indicate what must be spotted. The patterns are of the form of four cubes forming a rectangle and being of the right combination of colours, none with holes upwards and the rectangle must include no other cubes. Players each have their own target patterns, and get to choose some of the cubes which will be used that round, hopefully making their pattern more likely to occur and those of their opponents' less likely.

Outwords, published by Perfect Games. 1988. Box. Good. £5

Word game in which players take it in turn to be the caller. The caller determines the word to be used that round from a card and gives the other players a letter from the middle of the word and the length of the word. The other players take it in turn to request an extra letter at the start or end of the word and may make make guesses at the word, scoring for a correct guess and being penalised for an incorrect guess.

Pass The Bomb, published by Gibsons. 1994. Box. Good, 2 box corners taped. £12

Fun and exciting family / party game based on a simple premise, whoever is holding the 'bomb' when it goes off, loses. The timer is a spherical black bomb shaped device with a fuse attached (you don't light it - it is an electronic device). It can go off at any time from 10 seconds to 2 minutes and you cannot tell when it will be which makes play frantic. Players must name words using letters on the current card but cannot repeat a word in the same round, so if the person before you uses the word you were thinking of you can find the ticking makes your mind go quite blank. The bomb makes a disturbing ticking, and a satisfying Boom! Won the Daily Telegraph's Game of the Year award. Recommended.

Penalty, published by Edition Spielbox. 1993. Pouch. Good. £3

A colour folded A3 sheet which acts as gameboard as well as having the rules on the back. You will also need twenty money chips, and three counters. Ice hockey themed game split into three periods. In each period the players have some chips which are used in a series of sealed bid auctions. The winner of each auction advances the puck one area towards the goal. However if a player uses 3 or more chips more than his opponent then he has committed a foul and his opponent gets to advance the puck. More chips are given out at the start of each period. Most goals wins.

Phoenix, published by Eurogames. 2003. Box. In shrink. £12

Strategy game for two with a pleasant mix of luck and skill. At the start of the game six rainbow coloured wooden blocks are laid out at random in a line in the centre of the board. Each player has a line of 10 pawns in the same colours which are also set up randomly. The players take turns playing cards which rearrange the order of the pawns and in a few cases the coloured blocks so that their pawn sequence matches the sequence of the blocks. Three rounds are played in half an hour to even out the luck of the card drawn. Rather nice game.

Pictionary - Mini Game, published by Hasbro. 2000. Box. Excellent. £0.50

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2+. Country: British, Duration: 1hr, Desc. by Andy.

One of the most popular party / after dinner games, where players have to draw the subject matter for their team-mates to recognise. In this 'mini' edition, there is no timer, so one player must use a watch to time 1 minute for each round. Comes in a very small box (10cm x 10cm x 1cm), with a much smaller number of different cards than usual - very portable though!

Piratenspiel, published by Unser Lieblingsspiel. 1989. Box. Good. £9

Trick taking card game in which winning tricks allows you to move your ship on the board, with the objective being to get to the treasure island and claim the treasure. Various spaces have different features meaning that there will be times when you particularly want to win a trick and times when you are not so fussed, thus giving you extra things to think about during the card play. Attractively produced.

Playing Cards, published by Octopus Books. 1973. Book. Excellent. £8

Hardback book covering the origins and development through the centuries of playing cards. There are many colour and black and white plates showing various of the fascinating card designs described in the book. The book is divided into chapters as follows: Origins; Italian and Spanish Packs; German Packs; French & Belgian Packs; English Packs; American & Russian Packs; Special Packs. Fascinating read for anyone interested in the history of playing cards.

Pocket Trivia, published by Hoyle. 1984. Box. Good. £0.75 each.

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2+. Country: American, Duration: 20 mins, Desc. by Andy.

Card game, 53 cards and a rules card. Each card has 16 questions. Players try to answer a question on a card and will get a point for doing so correctly. Ideal for playing on the move, eg. in the car or on a plane. Owning multiple sets will allow a wider variety of questions to be asked.

1) Pocket Trivia Teens Game - This set covers general knowledge which should be known by teenagers.

2) Pocket Trivia World Trivia Game - This set covers general knowledge from around the world.

Politika, published by Mox Srl. 1996. Box. Mint. £5.50

Card game that could only have come from Italy! Based on their politics, players try to form the government, and when they do, they try to pull in as much cash as possible, through advantageous laws or just plain corruption and bribery. Other players hamper this in any way they can, and, if they win a vote of no-confidence, hope to take over the government. Not to improve it of course, just to do the same as the previous one.

Popular Card Games, published by W. Foulsham & Co Ltd. ca.1950. Book. Good. £3

Paperback book but with a dust cover. The book covers 20 of the favourite card games of the time. which includes Nap, Whist, Brag & Poker, Contract and Auction Bridge, Solo, Euchre, Pontoon, Baccarat, Bezique, Piquet, Glewstone Donkey, Pelmanism, Pounce, Black Maria, Rummy & Coon-Can, Fan-Tan, Cribbage and Canasta. 96 pages. Includes hints and tips on good play.

Pro Tennis, published by Avalon Hill. 1983. Box. Excellent. £12

Statistical tennis game that allows for fast play so that entire tournaments like Wimbledon can be replayed. You can pit the great tennis players of the early eighties against one another in both singles and doubles, men and/or women. Each player is evaluated in terms of the level of skill he or she possesses in different areas of play.

Players can employ strategy on the court in the battle to defeat their opponents. 100 top tennis players are rated.

Quest / Gran, published by Ravensburger. 1985. Box. 2 versions available (same game, different name):

1) Quest. Good. £8 2) Gran. 1 Box corner split. £7

Fantasy game with nice components. Players are knights who move across the board trying to deliver a magic ring to three cities in order to gain favour in that city. Players are trying to be the first to gain favour in all cities. During the knights' travels there are various obstacles to overcome and a dragon to be slain before a ring can be obtained. Dice are used to resolve conflicts. Special locations allow obstacles to be placed or moved to clear your route or hinder others.

Red Star/White Star, published by SPI. 1972. Box. Good - mostly unpunched. £8

Special notes: The plastic case is showing its age, with the edges cracking, and one side is flaking badly.

This wargame covers hypothetical combat in the 1970's, between US + West German forces against Soviet troops. The map depicts a generic part of Southern West Germany. The one strength point represents one US Platoon / one Soviet company. Each hex represents 300m and a game turn around 6 minutes of real time. The rules cover 10 pages.

Ricochet Robots, published by Rio Grande Games. 1999. Box. In shrink. £17

This is one of those games you will either love or hate. The board shows a factory floor with various walls dotted around and some target spaces with symbols. 4 coloured robots are placed on the board and then a token turned face up. This token indicates which robot must be moved to which space. The players then all study the board simultaneously seeing how they can move the robots around the board to achieve this goal. Once a robot starts moving in a straight line it only stops when it hits something, so sometimes it can take many moves in the right sequence to get a robot to a particular location. Very intense game.

Ritter Ohne Furcht Und Tadel, published by Euro Games. ca.1997. Box. In shrink. £12

Game of medieval knights participating in a jousting tournament, with wooden pieces, masses of dice, and colourful counters. The title translates as Knights of Honour without Fear. Knights have differing defence and attack ratings and prefer different attributes in their ladies (hair colour, thin or well rounded etc), and this will affect which lady each knight seeks the favour of. The game plays as a series of challenges between pairs of knights, and between bouts the knights need to recover. Resolving challenges involves the roll of many dice, but a knight who fares badly can yield to save further injury.

Rooster Booster, published by Piatnik. 2004. Box. Excellent. £8

Light and quick card game in which players play 'tricks' using cards showing roosters numbered from 1 to 100. The player of the second highest card in each trick gets to enter a rooster using that card onto the Pecking Order, with the possibility of knocking lesser roosters down a rung or two. At the end of the game points are scored for the roosters remaining in the Pecking Order.

Royal Comette, published by Oxford Games. 1996. Box. Excellent. £5.50

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2+. Country: British, Desc. by Eamon.

Facsimile of very old card game, with a deck of cards that looks like a copy of a 19th century deck (or older). The board is sectioned into compartments into which players place their stakes (plastic betting 'sticks' are included), and the game mechanics are very similar to playing card games like Newmarket and Pope Joan

Royal Flush, published by Edition Spielbox. 1993. Pouch. Good. £3

A colour folded A3 sheet which acts as gameboard as well as having the rules on the back. You will also need a pack of cards and a couple of playing pieces to play. The game is essentially a cross between Liar's Dice and Poker. Players make Poker hands with the cards and then bluff about them, stating a hand which theirs is at least as good as. The next player can either call their bluff or say he has a better hand still.

Schwarz Arbeit, published by Bewitched Spielverlag. 2003. Box. New. £13. Desc. by Andy.

Deduction based card game in which some memory skill is useful. Players employ moonlighters, and have to work out which other employees are also moonlighters, and then denounce them as illegal. The cards show various game designer combo names such as Klaus Knizia and Maureen Moon, who work in the players' game related shops and factories. As well as deduction, quick thinking, memory and some intuition are required to win.

Schwerpunkt Issue 1, published by 3W. 1993. Magazine. Good. £1.25

Designer Unknown. Country: American, Desc. by Andy.

Magazine dedicated to the support and expansion of 3W games. Articles this issue include:

Operation Barbarossa: The Southern Wing, Salvo!, Salvo II, Blitzkrieg in the South, Deisgner Profile: Rob Markham, Starting a Games Company, Raid on Richmond, The Campaigns of Frederick The Great, Clarifications & Errata.

Snit's Revenge, published by TSR. 1978. Box. Good, but box edges show wear. £16

Boxed version of this Tom Wham game. One player takes the role of a single Bolotomus, fighting off an infestation of Snits. The other player commands the Snits. The Snits attempt to ravage the Bolotomus's internal organs while the Bolotomus' immune system tries to fight them off. Originally published in The Dragon Magazine. Includes the Floating in Timeless Space comic strip in the rules.

Sour Grapes, published by Spears. 1980. Box. Box corners battered. £2

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-4. Country: British, Desc. by Eamon.

Memory game. Each player has a unique card on which they place counters secretly at the start. In your turn you take counters from other boards, and if you expose a face (the Sour Grape) your turn ends, otherwise you add the counter to your board, making it easier to 'hide' your Sour Grapes.

Space Race, published by Lotts Toys. 1969. Box. Box shows wear. £18

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-6. Country: British, Desc. by Eamon.

Made by a small British company to cash in on the interest around the Moon Landings that year. A huge three-piece board depicting a base around which you move, collecting components of your rocket, and the rest of this high-quality board features outer space, where your rocket is sent into orbit. The first player to complete a flight plan wins. The playing pieces are plastic rockets, around 2 inches high, and so designed that they can jettison parts of them as they gain speed through space.

Spellfire Reference Guide Vol. 2, published by TSR. 1996. Book. Excellent. £2.50

The ultimate reference book for Spellfire card game fans. This is Volume 2 because the game had changed so much since Volume 1. It includes the complete 4th Edition rules, nearly 1,000 full-colour reproductions of the cards, and a complete index of all the Spellfire cards up to the publishing date.

Spy, published by Kosmos. 2004. Box. Excellent. £10

Card game in which players start with a pile of spy tokens and try to be the first to get them all into play. This is done by collecting cards which each show a symbol (eg. hat, black sunglasses etc) and a continent. Players draw cards and play them to the table revealing some of the cards they have, until they wish to place spies, which is done by discarding a number of cards showing the same symbol / continent and placing spy tokens on the central card showing that feature. However, the more spies already there, the harder it is to deploy more. Essentially a game of deciding how long you can afford to wait before playing a set - the longer you wait the better the reward unless someone beats you to it.

Star Wars Candy Containers, published by Topps. 1997. Box. Mint. £3

Designer Unknown. Country: Ireland, Desc. by Andy.

Unusual item - a display box (still shrink-wrapped), full of plastic figures (looks like Yoda, Chewbacca, C3PO and Darth Vader), in which you keep sweets. Mint is the condition not the flavour (sorry couldn't resist that one). I doubt the candy is still good, but it makes a nice addition to a Star Wars collection.

Star Wars: Rescue On Geonosis, published by Character Games Ltd. 2002. Box. Good. £10

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-4. Country: British, Desc. by Andy.

Star Wars Episode II themed game. The game is set up to form a 3D, 3 level layout of the Droid Factories on Geonosis. The Empire player secretly deploys his forces of droids and other baddies using a wipeable deployment board. The other player or players take on the Jedi Knights who are trying to rescue Obi-Wan Kenobi. As they enter the various areas the secretly deployed forces will activate and try to stop the Jedi. Count Dooku must also be found and stopped before he can escape to plot another fiendish scheme. Combat is resolved with dice, and Jedi can 'sense' nearby enemies who are out of line of sight, and the Jedi player must discover the control centres and use the elevators to best effect to win.

Strand Cup, published by Krimsus Krimskrams Kiste. 2000. Box. New. £6

Beach volleyball themed card game. Players play in two teams, either side of the net, and each side can play up to three cards to get the ball back over the net in as effective a way as possible. Card play is clever and players must act swiftly and may make volleyball style calls to their teammates eg. 'Yours!'. Various special action cards can also be used, such as a dive, which can potentially get anything back into play (but which leaves that player in the sand unable to help), or blocks at the net. A fun game which amazingly manages to capture the feel of beach volleyball.

Stranded, published by Spears. 1981. Box. Good. £2.50

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2. Country: British, Duration: 20 mins, Desc. by Andy.

Attractively produced strategy game. The plastic board has slots, into which you fit plastic walls. Players move 'along' these walls, but always removing from the game the first wall passed over. There are also rules to keep you away from your opponent. The first player unable to move (ie. no walls adjacent to him any more) loses. Note this is not the same game as Isolation, which was also published as Stranded.

Street Soccer, published by Cwali. 2002. Box. In shrink. £15

Five a side soccer game played on a 10x6 gridded board with little wooden men. On your turn you roll a dice to determine your movement points which you can then use to move your players and kick the ball. While getting good dice rolls helps, making good use of your movement points to make the correct passes and position players appropriately is also important. The game plays quickly and moves are quick, keeping the action level high.

Struggle Of Empires, published by Warfrog. 2004. Box. 2 copies available:

1) Excellent. £30 2) In shrink. £32

Players take the roles of the major 18th century European powers, and struggle for dominance in both Europe and the colonies (North and South America, India, and the East Indies). For each of three wars the players bid to ally themselves with some other players while opposing others - attacking allies is not permitted so getting the alliances right is important. Players can then spend their actions bringing new forces into play, moving them and attacking with them, as well as gaining special tiles which give a variety of benefits. Money can be obtained by taxing your populace but this causes unrest which has to be monitored carefully.

Subbuteo Table Soccer, published by Subbuteo. ca.1970. Box. Good. £10

Special notes: 1 flag replaced with a very similar one.

Club edition set. Includes two full teams (one in red and white, one in blue and white), with goalkeeprs on stalks, two goals, six flags, two balls, felt pitch, and rules. This is the well known table soccer game in which players flick the players on round based stands to move the ball around and hopefully score goals. Detailed rules cover all the situations which can crop up in soccer. The game rewards practice as it is possible to become highly skilled.

Sum-It, published by Sum-It. ca.1930. Box. Good. £3.50

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-4. Country: British, Desc. by Eamon.

Card game. First edition. 60 cards, mostly with amounts of money on them. Players try to collect cards totalling an amount shown on your Sum-It card.

Swords & Wizardry, published by Gibsons. ca.1976. Box. Good. £18

Rare game in the same series as L'Attaque, Aviation, Dover Patrol, Tri-Tactics and Stratego. Each player has a fantasy army which interacts in the usual way of these games, although this one has more complex options, as there are monsters as well as various soldiers, siege engines and wizards, and sometimes resolving the combat requires using a dice.

Table Association Football 4-2-4, published by W.H. Boddington Ltd. 1970. Box. Good. £9

Special notes: Several of the figures have come off their stands but have been repaired - they are delicate but useable.

Soccer game of the same general type as Subbuteo. The game comes with a felt cloth playing surface, plastic goals, goalies on sticks and 10 other player figures mounted on wedge shaped blocks. This set has two teams, one in Scotland colours and the other in England colours. The game includes basic and advanced rules as well as examples of play.

Taboo Mini Game, published by Hasbro. 2000. Box. Excellent. £0.50

Designer Unknown. No. players: 4+. Country: British, Duration: 30 mins, Desc. by Eamon.

Excellent party game, where players must describe an object, but are not allowed to use five key words on the card. So you might have to describe an Apple, without using the words Red, Fruit, Pie, Cider or Core. Eamon Bloomfield wrote many of the subject cards for the original UK version. This edition comes in a very small box (10cm x 10cm x 1cm).

Tet Offensive, published by GDW. 1991. Box. 1 Box edge damaged. £12

Simulation of the great offensive effort of the Vietcong in January 1968 directed at the major cities and towns of Vietnam. This proved to be the decisive battle of thre war. Morale plays a major role in the game, and demoralising your enemy is a key strategy. Includes variants, such as a 4 player version. Comes in a larger box than is usual for this company and has striking art work.

The American Civil War, published by SPI. 1974. Box. Good. £8

Special notes: The plastic case is showing its age and is discoloured and cracked around the edges.

Simulation of the American Civil War from June 1861 to June 1865. Combat units are generic ground forces with varying strengths. Also included are single strength permanent garrisons, leaders with various ratings, a special Union naval leader (Farragut), Forts, Railroad Junction and Railroad Repair, Unsupplied, Riverine and Naval units. The game is on a strategic scale, and players alternate moves using their movement allowance with sea support also possible.

The American Revolution 1775-1783, published by SPI. 1972. Packet. Good. £7

Area movement based simulation of the American Revolution. The rules cover 9 pages, and map is unmounted 17" x 22". One strength point represents around 500 men. The game uses immovable Colonial militia, and Tory militia which can be recruited. The British player tries to control regions worth sufficient VPs, whereas the Colonial player wins by winning three major battles or various lesser victory conditions. The game includes various what-if scenarios, which can be used in combination to add to the replayability.

The Chronicles Of Narnia, published by Games Team. 1988. Box. Box slightly indented due to stacking. £3.50

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-4. Country: British, Desc. by Andy.

Special notes: Original rules missing - but printout provided

TV related, based on the BBC television serial, which in itself was based on the series of excellent children's books by C S Lewis. The game involves collecting sets of cards which make up scenes from the TV series. The game is driven by an unusual mechanism - two interlocking cogs, one 11cm diameter, the other 22cm, and players have pegs on the larger of them. These indicate which cards the player has a choice of each turn. Some memory is also required to aid efficient set collection.

The Civil War 1861-1865, published by Victory Games. 1983. Box. Good. £12

American Civil War game which won the Charles Roberts Award: Best Pre-Twentieth Century Game for 1983, and is still popular. This game lets you simulate the ACW in one year scenarios or play out the whole campaign. The map shows the entire theatre of war from east to west. The rules are complex covering around 50 pages, though not all the rules will be needed in all scenarios. They cover ground movement and combat, naval movement and combat, leaders, supply, reinforcements, railroads, armies, cavalry, forts, neutral states, state militias and more.

The Guinness Book Of Word Games, published by Guinness. 1995. Book. Excellent. £10

Difficult to find book with a vast number of word games and mental exercises, which is sure to fascinate anyone who enjoys either word games or the study of words. The book is divided into sections as follows: Spoken Word Games (about 50), Written Word Games (about 50), Proprietary Word Games (Scrabble, Boggle, Lexicon, UpWords, Countdown, Word For Word), Playing With Words (60 pages of interesting word related articles, games and information).

The Heiroglyphs Game, published by Ashmolean Museum. 1989. Box. Various copies available:

1) Excellent. £2.50 2) Good. £2 3) Good, but box base slightly indented. £1.50

Very pretty game made for the famous museum in Oxford. Board illustrated with genuine coloured heiroglyphics and players move a nice scarab beetle piece around the board, collecting ‘letters’ to spell the words on their reference sheet.

The IQ Squared Game, published by Westminster Games Ltd. ca.1992. Box. Good. £6

Board game designed by Mensa members, in which the players move their playing pieces around two tracks and get to answer various IQ-test type questions. The questions fall into several categories: Alphabet Brainteasers, Vocabulary, Anagrams and Word Puzzles, Numerical Challenges, Mental Arithmetic with a Twist, Crafty Codes and Verbal Dexterity. The objective is to score a pre-determined number of points first, and players get the option of hard, medium or easy questions with corresponding point awards. The game comes with over 2000 questions.

The Legend Of The Lone Ranger, published by Milton Bradley. 1980. Box. Good. £10

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-4. Country: American, Desc. by Andy.

Special notes: Box corners taped but contents unpunched

TV related, with a very unusual insert that is part of the game because it is, in effect, an adjustable 'Wanted Posters' display board and keeps track of the current reward on offer. Players travel the board looking for Bad Bob, Mean Gene and other notorious outlaws. Play involves collecting wanted posters and confronting outlaws. Each time an outlaw escapes capture the reward on his or her head is increased making it more profitable to go for them.

The Penguin Book Of Patience, published by Penguin. 1980. Book. Good. £5

Special notes: Paperback edition. Front cover has a crease.

Wonderful reference book of hundreds of patience (solitaire) card games by probably the best card games writer. The games are categorised as follows: Closed games, Half Open Games, Open Games, Competitive Games (ie. for more than one player but still essentially solitaire...)

The Stock Exchange Game, published by The Stock Exchange. ca.1987. Box. Good. £9

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-6. Country: British, Duration: 90 mins, Desc. by Andy.

Promotional game, made, I suspect, to cash in on the publicity for the Big Bang in 1986, the transference of share transactions to a computer based system. Very nicely designed, the plastic part trays actually combine to form the board. Includes a 'Guide to Buying and Selling on the Stock Exchange'. Sold with the tag-line "Who Shares Wins". The game mechanics reuse some of those from Monopoly, such as a tracks around which the players move their tokens, and gaining extra money on passing the start space. However, the game involves buying and selling shares rather than developing property,

The Very Clever Pipe Game, published by Cheapass. 1997. Packet. Good. £4

Very nice 'pathways' game, with 120 tiles featuring pipes (of course). Each player tries to complete a layout of pipes without any 'open' ends from which the contents of the pipe might escape. 6 progressively more difficult variations of the game are provided. Not in the usual mould for this designer, and personally I think this may well be his best.

Tichu, published by Abacus Spiele. 1998. Box. In shrink. £7

Designer Unknown. No. players: 3-10 (4). Country: German, Duration: 1 hr, Desc. by Andy.

Card game set with rules to several games, including a game very similar to Kariere Poker / The Great Dalmuti for up to 10 players. However, the main event is Tichu itself which is an excellent four player partnership game played with a standard deck of cards plus four special cards. It is a 'climbing' game, which means that players play a particular type of combination (eg pair or run) to a trick, but subsequent players can only play higher sets of the same type. The highest played wins the trick and leads to the next one with the objective of getting rid of all your cards. Sounds simple, but there are quite a few extras which make this great and a different challenge every hand. My favourite card game so highly recommended.

Titicaca, published by Cwali. 2001. Short fat tube. In shrink. £22

Strategy game in which players try to get their tribes positioned favourably in the countryside around various lakes. Neighbouring tribes can combine into countries as long as by combining both sides get access to additional types of countryside. The game is played on a different countryside layout each game as it is made up of large hex tiles which are laid out before each game. Game play involves bidding for the locations around the lakes using scarce resources and then merging tribes cleverly. Some neat and unusual ideas in a game with neither cards nor dice. Nicely made components for a small company too.

Title Bout, published by Avalon Hill. 1979. Box. 2 copies available:

1) Box shows wear. £3.50 2) Good. £5

Statistical boxing game, and very well suited to solitaire play. Uses a Fast-Action card system that enables you to replay fights very quickly (20 mins using basic rules and 40 mins using advanced rules). Hundreds of boxers are rated, so you can replay famous bouts or your own favourite 'what if' bouts,

Touche, published by Jumbo. 1996. Box. 2 copies available:

1) Excellent. £10 2) Good. £9

Players have a hand of regular playing cards. The board shows card images and some special spaces distributed in a large cross shape. Players take it in turn to play a card and place a marker on one of the corresponding spaces on the game board. The object is to claim spaces which form certain patterns (boxes, lines, crosses, T's). When one of these patterns is formed, the pieces are marked to show the pattern is complete. Players can either play individually or as partners.

Travel Trivia, published by Waddingtons. 1985. Box. Good. £0.50 each

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2+. Country: British., Duration: 20 mins, Desc. by Andy.

Card game, 50 cards plus rules cards. Each card has 6 questions, and there are various ways to play, but in them all players try to answer a question on a card and will get points for doing so correctly. Ideal for playing on the move, eg. in the car or on a plane. Handicapping is also possible so the whole family can play together. Owning multiple sets will allow a wider variety of questions to be asked.

1) Travel Trivia: Birds & Beasts

2) Travel Trivia: People & Places

3) Travel Trivia: TV & Cartoons

Victory Insider, published by Victory Games. 1984. Magazine. Good. £0.25

Designer Unknown. Country: American, Desc. by Andy.

Magazine devoted to printing articles about the products of Victory Games. Notes on each issue below:

Issue 1: NATO: The Next War In Europe, 1809 Designer's Notes. It is not certain this is issue 1 - that is my best guess as it is not numbered.

Issue 2: Allied Strategy in Hell's Highway, New Scenario for Gulf Strike.

Issue 5: Gulf Strike - Tactics & Strategies and Scenarios. It is not certain this is issue 5 - that is my best guess as it is not numbered.

Vinci, published by Descartes Editeur. 1999. Box. Excellent. £16

Excellent game in which the players build up civilisations, expand them and then decline them - during the game each player will get to use several civilisations, and try to maximise each of their potentials. The board shows a map of Europe divided into various regions, having different attributes. Each civilisation while not a real-life civilisation has two special abilities which differentiate it from others. eg. Mining will give extra VPs for holding mountainous areas, Weaponry will make attacking neighbours easier etc. Combat is deterministic, and very neat, and much of the game is about deciding which civilisations to take, when to decline a civilisation and take on a new one, and all this in 2 hours! Highly recommended.

Wargamer Magazine, published by World Wide Wargamers. Magazine. Good. £1.50 each. Desc. by Andy.

Earlier issues originally came with a game (no longer). Even without the game still a good read, and a useful source of articles on other games. Main articles each issue listed below:

Issue 12, 1980. The whole Aces High central section has been removed. Had a game originally, but no longer. Aces High (game for this issue), History Behind Aces High, Principles of War, Panzerblitz, Fortress Europa, Sense Style & Simulation, Comparison of Tactical Carrier Games, Ultimatum, Games Reviews.

Issue 59, 1986. The central section with the Bloody Karen rules etc is missing. Had a game originally, but no longer. Historical Background to Bloody Karen (which is the game for this issue), Malaya & Burma, A Hitchhiker's Guide to Computer Wargames, Korean War, Clarifications and Errata, Battle Hymn Review, Aegean Strike Review.

Vol 2 No. 4,1988. This issue is after they stopped including a game. The Civil War On Water, Shot & Shell Scenarios, Design Forum - Shot & Shell, Patton's Best, Computer Wargames, World Boardgame Team Championships, The South Mountain System, War To End All Wars, Kanev, Pleasant Hill, Manchu, North German Plain, Games For All, Central America, Russian Front Variant, Berg's Review of Games, Shot & Shell Errata.

Where's Bob's Hat, published by Rio Grande Games. 2001. Box. In shrink. £6

Trick taking game which is best with 3-4 players, and in my opinion really shines with 3 players. The cards are divided into 3 suits showing different hats. Before play players secretly indicate which suits they think they will take the most tricks in or if they wish indicate they will win fewest tricks of all. Also winning a card showing Bob's Hat gets you a card showing Bob's hat, and the player who has it at the end of the hand gets either a bonus or penalty (depending on what was decided at the start). Points are scored for making your bids and lost for failing to make them. Nice twist on an old favourite.

Wizard's Quest, published by Avalon Hill. 1979. Box. Good. £8

Special notes: Edge of the lid and one side show damage where tape was removed

Excellent Risk-type fantasy war game with each player searching for treasure on an island over-inhabited by orcs, orcs who breed (!) and frenzy when they run out of living space. The orcs are 'run' by the game, giving you an extra opponent no matter how many people are playing. All of the designer's AH games (Amoeba Wars and Dragonhunt are the other two) have this 'third party' opponent.

World Cup Skiing, published by Lambourne. 1987. Box. Good. £4

Maybe the only statistical skiing game ever. Revised edition with 1986/87 skiers. Replay game in which the Men's downhill season can be replayed. In addition cards for 18 of the all time greatest skiers have been included so you can see how they would have fared against each other. Course cards are used to construct the course to be used. The competitors are rated on different aspects of the sport eg. turning, jumping, gliding etc.

World Formula Grand Prix, published by Racing Games. 1999. Box. Excellent. £13

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-6. Country: British, Desc. by Andy.

Motor racing game, with nice components including egg-timers to time delays when a car comes off the track, and a large sealed spinner device which determines a car's speed each turn. Pit strategy cards determine the number of pitstops each player must make. A dice is used to determine starting speeds and stalls, thereafter a special spinner is used. The spaces on the board have different effects and so players will want to land on the most favourable one possible for their current circumstances. Additional rules cover tyre types, changing lanes, overtaking, and marshall's flags.

X.Net, published by Fanfor. ca.2001. Box. Good. £8

Card game, in which players act as Internet entrepeneurs, supplying different needs to their customers. You must keep your servers and network connections up to date and provide the content currently most in demand. As the game goes on the current demand for different content types will change and so you will need to alter what you provide to keep up.

Zankapfel, published by VSK. 1994. Box. Mint. £14

Players buy and sell apples for profit. The board shows a price grid around which a marker is moved and this lets players buy and sell four different types of apple, as well as changing the prices of these apple types. Players bid secretly when selling or buying apples and the game uses a card system to resolve conflict in these 'Apple Wars'. Has a giant apple playing piece as the turn marker.

Zero Zap, published by Milton Bradley. 1987. Box. Good. £5

Designer Unknown. No. players: 2-4. Country: American, Duration: 45 mins, Desc. by Andy.

Card game, part of the Big Deal Series. Over 100 cards. A rummy variant, with plenty of variety caused by the special cards that influence play, scoring and discards, including the potent 'Zero Zap', which reduces your score to zero if you hold it when someone else goes out, but if you go out with it as your last card you get to reduce someone else's score to zero!

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