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game report: Secret Hitler
Aug. 4th, 2024 02:36 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yhlee(The Hitler bit is fairly abstract IMO.)
Today Joe and I went over to a dumpling-and-games night hosted by his coworker Vlad and Vlad's wife, whose name I didn't catch (that is, she's Chinese, so I know how it sounds but not how she spells it. Vlad was EXCITE! that all his stuff had finally arrived from Australia. The dumplings were, as usual, overseen by Sushant, who's Nepali and makes THE BEST dumplings. Anyway, so it was LIGO physicists plus Vlad's wife and me. :)
The game was Secret Hitler, whose existence I learned about at some sf/f or game convention some years ago and whose name made me raise my eyebrows. I was surprised that there does seem to be some kind of gesture toward the dynamics of the rise of fascism in the game design. Also I had not realized that it's mechanically an offshoot of social deduction games like Mafia or Werewolf. It turns out to be extremely fun if you are the kind of person who enjoys not-that-serious social deduction games with a rowdy but friendly crowd. :) ( Read more... )
In any case, the whole "the liberals have the odds stacked against them and have to figure out how to coordinate even to ID each other vs. the fascists" is certainly a vibe and/or comment on Weimar Germany etc., but in general, you could reskin this and the mechanics work pretty well. Vlad was telling me he liked this better than Werewolf because the setup means that you CAN'T have a first-turn win. (I heard of at Viable Paradise VIII, not our year but either a previous one or participated in/witnessed by one of the instructors - someone just was that good at sussing out body language and fingered the werewolf on the first turn.)
We came away having loaned out Scorn's Stockade and borrowing Space Alert (2008) by Vlaada Chvátil on Vlad's recommendation. :) I am EXCITE!
Today Joe and I went over to a dumpling-and-games night hosted by his coworker Vlad and Vlad's wife, whose name I didn't catch (that is, she's Chinese, so I know how it sounds but not how she spells it. Vlad was EXCITE! that all his stuff had finally arrived from Australia. The dumplings were, as usual, overseen by Sushant, who's Nepali and makes THE BEST dumplings. Anyway, so it was LIGO physicists plus Vlad's wife and me. :)
The game was Secret Hitler, whose existence I learned about at some sf/f or game convention some years ago and whose name made me raise my eyebrows. I was surprised that there does seem to be some kind of gesture toward the dynamics of the rise of fascism in the game design. Also I had not realized that it's mechanically an offshoot of social deduction games like Mafia or Werewolf. It turns out to be extremely fun if you are the kind of person who enjoys not-that-serious social deduction games with a rowdy but friendly crowd. :) ( Read more... )
In any case, the whole "the liberals have the odds stacked against them and have to figure out how to coordinate even to ID each other vs. the fascists" is certainly a vibe and/or comment on Weimar Germany etc., but in general, you could reskin this and the mechanics work pretty well. Vlad was telling me he liked this better than Werewolf because the setup means that you CAN'T have a first-turn win. (I heard of at Viable Paradise VIII, not our year but either a previous one or participated in/witnessed by one of the instructors - someone just was that good at sussing out body language and fingered the werewolf on the first turn.)
We came away having loaned out Scorn's Stockade and borrowing Space Alert (2008) by Vlaada Chvátil on Vlad's recommendation. :) I am EXCITE!
