Friday, October 17, 2008

Board Game Review - Key Largo


For a short time, Titanic Adventure Vacations is offering a fun-filled and exciting tour of scenic Key Largo. The Caribbean storm season approaches, so we are pleased to provide a whirlwind two-week exploration of sunken pirate ships and the lovely island around which dozens of wrecked pirate ships await the intrepid adventurer! (please note that Titanic Adventure Vacations has no reasonable explanation for why so many completely unplundered ships would be just sitting around untouched at the same time)

Our tour only lasts for ten days before the weather around Key Largo tends to get a little rough (Titanic Adventure Vacations adopts no liability for damage to property or person if you don't get off the island before hurricanes turn the entire island into an uninhabitable wasteland). With such a short amount of time, you'll want to make the most of your time, and we provide several different ways that you can spend your day.

Our rustic tavern is a popular stomping ground for some of the best divers money can buy - and we'll even pay for your first diver! The patrons of this fascinating locale can often by counted on for tales of buried treasure, and all it will cost you to hear their stories is a few rounds of drinks. (Titanic Adventure Vacations denies claims that thieves are also for hire, though we do recommend that all adventurers secure theft insurance. Sadly, no theft insurance is available through Titanic Adventure Vacations, so you'll most likely just lose treasure and have no recourse at all)

After a visit to the tavern to hire a diver, you may want to visit our affordable equipment shop to buy the hoses, tridents and weights that your divers may need. Our prices are quite reasonable, and the gear is kept in top condition (please note that Titanic Adventure Vacations does not actually own the store, and the presence of multiple adventurers in the store at the same time has been known to drive up prices, so we recommend that you attempt to visit the store while nobody else is there).

Once your divers are equipped, you're ready to explore the various wrecks around this beautiful vacation spot. These derelict ships can be found at many different depths, and can easily be explored by nearly any diver, provided he has adequate equipment. The shallow wrecks are some of our most accessible treasure troves, though they tend to be a bit picked-over. The medium and deep wrecks are far more prosperous, but recommended only for divers with adequate gear. (Titanic Adventure Vacations is not aware of the presence of monstrous kraken, but just in case, we are not able to reimburse adventurers if their divers are eaten by monsters of the deep. We highly recommend you equip your divers with tridents to fend off these beasts, which for some reason seem to be easily defeated by even the most inept of divers, provided they are carrying their underwater pitchforks)

After a hard morning searching for sunken treasure, you'll want to return to our convenient and completely fair buyer's market, where you can exchange the gold, goods and artifacts you've discovered for what we assure you are fair market prices (prices tend to fluctuate depending on the number of sellers. This is what is called a free market economy. Complaints can be lodged with Titanic Adventure Vacation's customer service hotline, where they will be promptly ignored and you will be openly mocked by our less-than-friendly operators).

If you get tired of hunting for treasure, you're more than welcome to take advantage of our lovely Dolphin Bay, where gawking tourists are delighted to pay you to take them dolphin-watching. You'll earn money just for sailing around the bay, and while you may not earn as much as if you sell treasure, you might also meet interesting and delightful people who can help you in your hunt for sunken gold! (Titanic Adventure Vacations does not suggest that you take advantage of your customers, even if they do offer to sabotage your fellow adventurers or deliberately drive up prices. All relationships between adventurers and their contacts are outside the business consideration of Titanic Adventure Vacations)

As the gentle autumn storms roll in at the end of our ten-day tour, you will have discovered untold treasure, and possibly recovered enough to pay for your trip! Feel free to compare your findings with those of your fellow adventurers - after all, there's nothing wrong with a little good-hearted competition (Titanic Adventure Vacations recommends hopping around your beaten opponents like an ill-behaved wide receiver doing a ridiculous endzone dance).

So schedule your vacation now - space is limited, and time is critical! Come out once, and you may find yourself making our sunken treasure expeditions a regular occurence. You'll have so much fun, you'll want to come back again and again.

(The following text is provided by the Key Largo Committee for Fair Play, and does not imply endorsement by Titanic Adventure Vacations:

Key Largo is fun and easy to explore. It requires some tricky planning to make sure you don't try to hire a diver or buy equipment when every other diver is also doing the same thing. You will need to plan your dives to beat the other adventurers to the best treasure without acting rashly and losing perfectly good divers to tentacled monsters, and you will need to time your sales so that you get the best prices for the treasure you haul up from the deep. While meeting contacts and hiring thieves are optional activities, Key Largo is much more interesting when your tour includes them. You may find that two or three visits to Key Largo will be plenty, and you may not find good reasons to revisit regularly, but Key Largo is still clever, challenging and fun enough to occupy a family of adventurers for the occasional game night... er, adventure vacation.)

Summary

Pros:
Rules work great - you can't do the same thing twice in one day, and timing is everything
Graphics are brilliant and funny
Components are top-notch
Easy to learn
Very clever
Thoroughly polished - everything works like clockwork

Cons:
A little low on replay value

Key Largo is a fun family game from Titanic Games. You can get your copy here:
http://paizo.com/titanicGames/v5748btpy7ymg

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Very cool review, I like seeing a different style of writing from you, and it is still very funny.

The small print is a bit to small for my old eyes, but beisdes that, very cool.

Being a diver myself I may just have to get this one!

Anonymous said...

Sounds like it could be a fun game to try on some of my friends. Thanks for the review.