After play testing Starr Harold and I found it lacking, so we started playing with the rules and making a few modifications. What we ended up with is, I believe, a game based-on (and very similar to) War, but with a distinctive strategic component. The game also plays faster than War.
Objective
For one player to win all the cards.
Setup
The rules are for two people with a standard 52-card deck. Ranking of cards are A, K, Q, J, 10 through 2.
Jade Empire finally came to PC earlier this year (2007) after being released for two years on X-Box (2005). Unlike other console to PC ports, Jade empire plays smoothly and the controls feel natural. The story is based in a fantastic and mythical China (called the Jade Empire in the game) and the fighting and many elements of the game borrow heavily from the wuxia (pronounced wu-sha) genre of movies, books, and theater. As an action-role playing game based around martial arts and magic, the environment is unique and compelling - I know I couldn't stop playing until I finished the game.
In response to Harold's War Challenge, I present my updated rules for the classic children's game War. Since I can name the game whatever I want, I chose Starr. 5 points to whoever posts a comment correctly guessing the reason for the name. I dunno if these rules will make the game faster or slower to play, but at least there's some mental exercise and decision making involved.
With Season 3 just starting, it's always a struggle to figure out who's who. So, here's my rundown of this season's contestants and what I think (having watched only the first episode).
Aaron, 48, Retirement Home Chef
Although he seems to had an even temperment, it seems that the pressures of the kitchen may be too much for Aaron (crying even before the restaurant doors had opened). I don't know what the job of a retirement home chef is like, but 48 may be a little old for someone not in prime physical shape to be able to keep up in a three star kitchen...
*** POTENTIAL SPOILERS ALERT ***
Time travel as a conceit in writing and plot development is not new. However, the writers often take liberties in how they implement the time travel and very few try to make causality work in any definite way. Often it is left up to the reader or viewer to "make up" a way where causal relationships still hold true. Heroes started off very promising with a time travel character, Hiro, who seems to be bound by strict rules of causality and what I will refer to as Linear Time Travel. Last night's episode - where Hiro travels to a dark future and witnesses...
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