Antique Board Games

[chas]

Bizarre, and a new one on me. At Christmas, many moons ago, my English grandfather would have my grandmother make ye olde English plum pudding coated with brandy for our dessert, along with many other holiday offerings. He'd ritually set it on fire, and it would only burn for a moment or two, with a blue flame aura.

[Tornado]

The popular Victorian party game Are You There, Moriarty? involved no people called Moriarty, but that's, like, the least bizarre thing about it. The game was played with two players wearing blindfolds and lying down on their bellies, left hand in left hand. Each one would be holding a rolled-up newspaper or another suitable hitting apparatus. One player would ask, "Are you there, Moriarty?" and the other would respond, "Yes," like in a dry version of Marco Polo ("dry" as in "on land," not "without booze"). Player 1 would then greet his opponent by seeking his voice and hitting him with the paper, with the goal being to strike him on the head.

If Player 1 was successful, Player 2 was eliminated and replaced with somebody else. Of course, such a sophisticated game involves a lot of strategy. On offense, you could answer yes and then immediately move out of the way to avoid being hit, while on defense, you could use a popular technique called "cheating". It was apparently not uncommon for the Moriarty-seeker to remove their blindfold and pummel their opponent mercilessly -- but in a classy, gentlemanly way, because this was the Victorian era, after all. What's more, the audience was discouraged from alerting Moriarty about the hornswoggling, leaving his increasingly mushy brain to figure it out on its own.

[caps]

Originally Posted by Tornado

The popular Victorian party game Are You There, Moriarty? involved no people called Moriarty, but that's, like, the least bizarre thing about it. The game was played with two players wearing blindfolds and lying down on their bellies, left hand in left hand. Each one would be holding a rolled-up newspaper or another suitable hitting apparatus. One player would ask, "Are you there, Moriarty?" and the other would respond, "Yes," like in a dry version of Marco Polo ("dry" as in "on land," not "without booze"). Player 1 would then greet his opponent by seeking his voice and hitting him with the paper, with the goal being to strike him on the head.

If Player 1 was successful, Player 2 was eliminated and replaced with somebody else. Of course, such a sophisticated game involves a lot of strategy. On offense, you could answer yes and then immediately move out of the way to avoid being hit, while on defense, you could use a popular technique called "cheating". It was apparently not uncommon for the Moriarty-seeker to remove their blindfold and pummel their opponent mercilessly -- but in a classy, gentlemanly way, because this was the Victorian era, after all. What's more, the audience was discouraged from alerting Moriarty about the hornswoggling, leaving his increasingly mushy brain to figure it out on its own.

That sounds like an *awesome* game.

[chas]

First Three Hundred Pages Browsed!

I've now made it through Page 300 of the 732 pages of games on the main boardgamegeek database. Here's my latest list of odd or interesting names:

Resistance Is Not Futile: Warsaw 1943
Rod Gilbert's Violent World of Pro Hockey
Feeeeed Meeeee
The Moose Spotting Game
Confucius and the Succession Crisis of the Wanli Emperor, 1587
Chupacabra
Fairy Tale Road Rage
HiHiHi
Axles and Alloys
Mister Whiskers and the Wrigleybottom Jewel Robbery (1937)
Rival Policemen (1896) "was inspired by a tense period in New York City history when a state controlled police force and the city's police force worked simultaneously (but not necessarily cooperatively) to patrol the city."

Going through these pages has been like visiting a time travelling game store! There was a time there when it seemed like computer games were going to end the enjoyment of physical board games. But that didn't happen, and I'm glad. As long as we still gather together to be social and have fun, there may be hope for us yet...