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Memoir '44 by Richard Borg Rating: 9/10 after 5+ plays

Memoir 44 by Richard Borg art Julien Delval publish Days of Wonder players: 2 duration: 45-60 mins. type: Medium board game; war theme PACE: Fairly quick. Actions are limited to cards in the hand, so decision making is boiled down to a simple choice between a few cards. COMPLEXITY: Medium. With intuitive rules that will be understood even by casual gamers, this game does a good job of balancing the unpredictibility of war (through cards and dice) with tactics needed to win on given battlefields. LUCK: HIGH. The cards dealt to you, and the dice rolls can kill or help a player, but not at all unthematic: war is unpredictible. A good players will still beat an average player most of the time...but you just never know. TENSION: HIGH. Watching your forces dwindle as you attempt to punch a hole in an artillery stronghold will have you biting your lip try to get your units (and dice) to work together for success. VICIOUS: HIGH. It's a 2 player war game, you do the math. SOCIAL: MEDIUM. Not so heavy that players can't talk, and gameplay is basically stating attacks and muttering under your breath on bad dice rolls. VISUALS: EXCELLENT. What else would you expect from Days of Wonder and Julien Delval? Wonderful palette, well illustrated cards, dozens of terrain hexes, and awesome thick plastic miniatures of tanks, artillery, infantry, etc. Oh yes, and the board is double-sided with a coast board and a field board allowing for scores of different scenarios. THEME: HIGH. It just doesn't get much higher than this. The availability of cards is like the breakdown in communication as units go to war. The units are well balanced, and the whole game just feels right. GAMER APPEAL: YES. Especially for wargamers who don't have time to play 'real' wargames. This is playable by nearly anyone. It'll be a hit with almost any male around. A little lucky for a gamer game, but I promise it'll work. NON-GAMER APPEAL: PROBABLY. I don't know what the appeal will be for ladies, but most people will find this to be an excellent thematic game. And Days of Wonder appeals to the parakeet in all of us. 2 PLAYERS: YES. REPLAY: EXCELLENT. RATING: 9/10 after 1 play. Good with 2 players. Best with 2 players.

Quick Summary | Nazi Germany versus the Allied attack, only this war game uses 'German' design sensibilities, offering players many choices without bogging down into heavy simulation, yet keeping a distinctive war flavor with individual unit strength preventing it from being a simple dicefest. There are dice, but the tactics you employ based on terrain and troop strength will make a difefrence in this game. And the best part is the double sided board, which allows for the placement of dozens of terrain hexes virtually transforming the board into any one of of dozens of actual WW2 battlefields, which allows for almost unlimited replayability. Combine two sets and play Overlord scenarios involving 2-8 players!

This page by Yirmeyahu Avery