There I was, reading my web comics as usual when my eye caught a pointer to the Kickstarter project for a new edition of Ogre, Steve Jackson's (the US variety, if you share my background you'll know what this means) classic sci-fi tank game.

I used to play Ogre in high school with a friend of mine during skip periods. I got a locker from the school under the pretense that we were going to store a chess set there -- ha! In went my then pristine copy of Ogre Deluxe.

I also got other games in the series: G.E.V. Shockwave and Battlesuit but the basic Ogre game got the most playtime. I guess it's one of those cases where the simple elegance of the game gets muddled with additions. Though there's still a special place in my heart for Battlesuit's concept of altitude levels...

Later, I did try out the Ogre Miniatures game but for some reason it never really took off. I got the feeling that the original game being developed for a hex map lost something in the translation to the open movement miniatures table.

So, back to present day. I checked out the Kickstarter page but the price levels for international delivery were just astronomical. I'm not blaming SJG, I know very well shipping boxes this heavy individually just doesn't make sense. Fortunately they are also going to offer the limited print run to normal distribution channels.

So I contacted an old friend who works for the premier gaming shop in Finland asking if they were going to get any copies. Silly me! In true FLGS tradition these people know their audience. They were going to get copies, so I quickly filed my pre-order.

Now, for the interesting bit. The new game comes with fabulous components -- for a boardgame. Some of the bigger pieces are going to be 'models' a bit like those 3-D plywood dinosaurs you can buy at the science center. Still, in my opinion they are just fancy chits.

But I did dabble with Ogre Miniatures. Even though I didn't stick with it, I did buy out my local store's remaining stock of the minis back in the day. And they've just been sitting on my shelf, waiting...

...waiting for Project O.

maxxon