So I ended up not being able to take any pics of Bearcon, but I had a great time and played many boardgames. My insights on many of them, are below.

Tiki Mountain has a fun premise, the players controlling mask-wearing islanders competing for the honor of sacrificing themselves in a volcano. Its' a great time waster, but at the end of the day its' a random numbers game. Good for casual play, or something to do whilst killing time.

Betrayal at the House on the Hill is a cooperative game with a twist. Players start out as explorers searching through a spooky haunted house, but eventually one of the players is revealed as a traitor, attempting to kill the heros for one of many reasons. From then on, the "Good" players have to work together to try and defeat the traitor, who will often have some sort of supernatural aid to make him much stronger. Fun, tense, and able to take many players. Only played one game, but I loved it.

Khet: The Laser Game boasts an astoundingly creative premise, and executes it well indeed. Players move mirrored pawns around the field to direct the path of their laser-actual beams of light that emit from little plastic sphinxes. The laser dots will bounce off of mirrors, and can "Destroy" Enemy pieces (Or your own if you're not careful) by shining upon non-reflective surfaces. Your eventual goal is to destroy your opponents' pharaoh piece. The egyptian theme is cool and the game is fun. It is, however, a pain to wrap your head around at first, and has the same slow, strategic pace as chess, which may not appeal to some. Play a few rounds before you buy it, but be sure to check it out.

The Settlers of Catan is an all-time classic, one of my favorite strategic board games. Players compete to settle and dominate an uninhabited island by any means necessary. Victory can be achieved by many methods, and the difficulty in obtaining a balanced resource economy to build your infrastructure means that players must trade and compete to get what they need. Get this game, play this game, and get the many awesome expansions. I like it.

Now heres' a fun one. Remember Connect Four, the game you played in fifth grade study hall when it was raining and you couldn't go outside for recess? There exists a variant for it called Speed Four in which there are no turns, and players simply put in pieces as fast as they want, however they want. This is, of course, incredibly chaotic. It is also surprisingly fun. I entered a tournament for this game and it was the most fun I had in a long time. Over a few games, many entertaining things happened. One tense round, my opponent and I simultaneously dropped our first pieces into the cage thing that holds the tiles only to find the cage at the bottom was open. Both tiles fell out, and we laughed for about a minute straight. Another round, I ended up racing my opponent to build a tower of four. We completed our 4-circle high constructions at exactly the same time, creating the first tie in speed four the judge had ever seen. One time we inserted our circle tiles so forcefully that the board shook itself apart and requires post game repairs. I ended up winning the tournament, which also made me like the game. Obviously it requires integrity and calm not to panic or cheat, and the sprit of the game is very important to follow. Even with rules to ensure sportsmanlike behavior and fairness, it had the potential to turn nasty, and I was happily surprised when it didn't. A fun party game, which will make use of your old connect four set and give you something to do with friends in a casual setting.

So thats' it for this round. I'll soon upload my thoughts on a couple more games, and on Bearcon itself. For now suffice to say I had a great time, and am glad to have gone.

Take care!