Marvel Monday on Wednesday. On Great Games, and Ghastly Casting

It's Marvel Monday, on Wednesday. Last week was a bit of a Marvel week for me. I played Legendary: A Marvel DeckBuilding Game (LAMDBG) and I took in the premiere of Agents of Shield on Tuesday night. I intended to write a post about the experience on Monday, labeling the words, Marvel Monday, but it didn't happen.

Let's talk about the good news first. LAMDBG supplanted Resident Evil as my favorite deck building game. First, let me lay the background on you. I'm underwhelmed with Dominion. Certainly not a bad game, I can see why it sold a bazillion copies. It's simple, yet engaging, and better still wives play it with their husbands, or vice versa, or whatever. I don't like it because there isn't any combat in the game. I mean why have knights if they can't lop

This is what Skye should look like.

someone's head off? Resident Evil fixed that. Lots of weapons, lots of combat, and lots of fun.

Yet despite its combat, Resident Evil is still standard deck-building fair. You buy stuff, place it in the discard pile, draw a hand, and hope for the best. Although LAMDBG follows a similar format, the victory conditions are varied depending on the scenario. Another interesting feature is the march of the bad guys across the table. At the start of his turn, each player draws one card. If it is a villain, it is placed on the right hand slot of the five-slot villain track. If that position is occupied, all the villains move one position to the left. If this bumps a villain off the track, it usually counts against victory. Hence, the game is cooperative. All the players work together to prevent the villains from exiting the track. Yet despite the cooperation, each villain eliminated awards the eliminator victory points. If the good guys and gals win, the hero/player with the most victory points wins the individual contest. It’s a neat mechanic, and one of many that makes the game interesting.

Less interesting was my other Marvel endeavor of the week, Agents of Shield. A spin off from last summer’s surprisingly good Avengers movie, Agents of Shield is poorly plotted, poorly acted, and even more poorly cast. It's hard to believe that Stan Lee said, "That's EXACTLY what I envisioned." 

In the first episode, Shield’s agents, who look like also-rans from a Gossip Girl casting session, must save a hooded hero from his own super powers. They do this by firing a high-powered medicine bullet into his head. I’m not making this up. 

The acting is little better, Grant Ward, who is supposed to be the obligatory loner-tough-guy, comes across as a pretty boy who can’t shut up. And the casting? Suffice to say that Skye, an underground hacker, looks more like a debutante. Bad stuff all around. The type of show that gives us geeks a bad name. As if we need help with that.

See you tomorrow.