Game: Ice Flow

Thread: Re: Swimming to research station

Kubigaruma — 2008-12-02T02:09:13+00:00

That's not exactly correct. If you move from one station directly to another station, you may use a rope or a fish to do so.

Thread: Re: Swimming to research station

Websteria — 2008-12-02T00:26:53+00:00

Kubigaruma wrote:
Yes. No land mass (Alaska, Russia, center island) is considered to have any jagged edges.

My only caveat to that is when moving from post to post in alaska both sides are considered to be jagged... as far as the rules say.

Thread: Re: Swimming to research station

Kubigaruma — 2008-12-02T00:25:06+00:00

Yes. No land mass (Alaska, Russia, center island) is considered to have any jagged edges.

Thread: Swimming to research station

Websteria — 2008-12-01T23:24:09+00:00

Is it permissible to use a fish to swim to the stations in Siberia? If so is it considered 1 fish (smooth surface) or 1 fish and a rope....

Thanks!

(oops, no research stations in this game!)

Thread: Re: Ice Flow Review

i7dealer — 2008-11-13T21:03:45+00:00

You are specifically disallowed in the rules from sending the polar bear back to where it just came from. At least, that's what I remember. Now, that doesn't mean he can't eventually come back if more than one explorer is being harrassed by the bear in a triangular pattern.

Thread: Re: Ice Flow Review

dwrigley — 2008-11-13T19:16:56+00:00

Tatsu wrote:
...you won't typically send a polar bear trucking out to someone that will bounce it back to you, since then it'll just cost you another fish. If you send it to someone without a fish, then there is never any "polar bear ping pong"...

I was sure that no player could send the polar bear back to anyone who had distracted it? ... at least that is the way we have been playing it.

Thread: Re: Ice Flow Review

Tatsu — 2008-11-13T18:28:28+00:00

I just looked at the rules and realized that we had also played that the SAME INCORRECT manner. It must be common, because the revised rules make it much clearer that you are to leave the rope behind. That could speed up the "dead period" near the end of the game, since there would be a lot more resources on the board.

Thread: Re: Ice Flow Review

Joshuaaaaaa — 2008-11-13T18:09:04+00:00

I enjoyed the game when I played it, and my conclusion is similar to yours. 2 guys get over quickly and then its a pain getting the third guy over. As a caveat, we screwed up when we played, and when people used ropes to get over rough edges, we were discarding them, not leaving them behind, and that could really change the game.

I'd play it again, and it would most likely be someone else suggesting it, not me.

Thread: Ice Flow Review

Tatsu — 2008-11-13T17:50:26+00:00

Overview
Ice Flow is a puzzle game about moving three explorers across the Bering Strait from Alaska to Siberia. Between the two are chunks of ice that move around, making an ever changing landscape which you must navigate. To get there, your explorers will used a shared (and limited sized) backpack with rope and fish. The rope helps you move across broken ice and fish for fish. The fish serves to "strengthen" you should you go swimming in the open sea, or to distract the polar bears that are floating along the ice. Polar bears can be distracted by other players onto the ice where your player sits, at which point you must distract the bear yourself, or be sent back to the start.

Each turn a player must do a couple of actions. An explorer action - either they may move one explorer as far as they are able to (or wish to) OR they can use a rope to fish for fish (exchange one rope for two fish). They must also do an ice action - rotate an ice flow, bring new flow onto the board, or move a flow. The two actions can be done in the order that the player prefers, which is where the "puzzle" part of the game lies - figuring out the most efficient use of materials and actions. The first player to get all three explorers across win.

There is plenty of opportunity for player action, as the board is constantly changing, players jostle for limited resources, and the bears move about the board. There is a limit of two explorers per tile, and you can only move tiles if they are empty or have one of your explorers on it. This keeps you from totally hosing the other players, but there are still lots of good chances for screwage.

Components
The components are nice - the ice pieces are especially well done and gorgeous looking. Transparent blue hexes, with some jagged edges and some smooth. The rest of the bits are wood "meeples" - which is slightly awkward for the "rope" since its just a wood stick. The board is nice looking and everything looks great when you are playing.

Pros
- Great looking game
- Fun puzzle game, with plenty of player interaction
- Simple enough to teach in about 5 minutes

Cons
- Its a puzzle game. If you hate this type of game, stay away.
- Its a puzzle game and it will introduce AP

Misc.
In reading the rules and a few other reviews, there was this description of "polar bear ping pong". Essentially, when you distract a polar bear to another flow (with another player), they can then do the same - thus sending the bear all over the place. It sounds really fun and/or funny. In practice, its not as interesting as it sounded. Since there is a three item limit to your backpack and fish allow your explorer to swim, you won't typically send a polar bear trucking out to someone that will bounce it back to you, since then it'll just cost you another fish. If you send it to someone without a fish, then there is never any "polar bear ping pong"...

Conclusion
Ice Flow is ok. It looks great and its fun - to a point. Its just missing something to me. The games I played saw everyone race two explorers over, setting up what was essentially a sudden death. A sudden death that typically started when most of the resources on the board had been exhausted already. So then you get into a dragged out mid-end-game where nobody wants to bring on a new ice flow (the new ones typically have items on them), because the next guy might be able to come steal the items and win. Then out of nowhere, this protracted thing suddenly ends. It just feels weird. Up until this point, the game is pretty fun and AP is pretty under control, but near the end the game becomes much longer than it needs to be. Because of this, I can only give this a 6/10.
**NOTE: Having mis-played TWO rules, I ~~want~~ need to play it again, to see if the protracted ending speeds up a little. If it does, this goes up to a 7 - there is still going to be the AP slowing at the end, but its possible it isn't as drawn out.

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

james_bond — 2008-11-13T09:13:25+00:00

I like the game and I find it really enjoyable...

Thread: Re: Sorry to lower the tone . . .

tel999 — 2008-11-13T00:08:56+00:00

dougadamsau wrote:
harris_family wrote:
. . . but what does 'golden ice' bring to mind for most people?

Top Gear Winter Olympics special?

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jumatake — 2008-11-12T16:07:31+00:00

Custom made boxcover in Finnish. Copyright and permission Dean Conrad.

Thread: Re: Two questions about Ice Flow

Dean Conrad — 2008-11-10T16:04:34+00:00

Both of these rules have been clarified in the updated rules (v1.03), available as downloads in various languages here:
http://www.ludorum.co.uk/ICEFLOW/rules/index.htm

D.

Thread: Re: Two questions about Ice Flow

madhobbit — 2008-11-10T14:40:06+00:00

Massche wrote:
Are you allowed to move back with an explorer that already arrived in Siberia to help an explorer that is stuck in Alaska?
No, once the explorer arrived he won't go back onto the ice.

Massche wrote:
Can you swim from an ice tile to Siberia? And if you can, do you need rope to climb on land?
Yes and no. You can swim and you don't need a rope.

Thread: Two questions about Ice Flow

Massche — 2008-11-10T12:47:51+00:00

Hey,

Are you allowed to move back with an explorer that already arrived in Siberia to help an explorer that is stuck in Alaska?

Can you swim from an ice tile to Siberia? And if you can, do you need rope to climb on land?

Thanks,

Thomas

Thread: Re: Special Edition FREE prize draws...

Dean Conrad — 2008-11-10T08:53:41+00:00

Rindel wrote:
Does anyone know if the winner of the prizedraw on the website has been announced yet?

Yes, here:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/353634

D.

Thread: Re: Special Edition FREE prize draws...

Rindel — 2008-11-10T08:09:10+00:00

Does anyone know if the winner of the prizedraw on the website has been announced yet?

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madhobbit — 2008-11-07T22:26:04+00:00

One of the engraved golden ice floes

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madhobbit — 2008-11-07T20:27:24+00:00

Oh come on Frank, quit peeing on the ice

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madhobbit — 2008-11-07T20:24:06+00:00

One of the engraved golden ice floes

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madhobbit — 2008-11-07T20:23:19+00:00

One of the engraved golden ice floes

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madhobbit — 2008-11-07T20:20:22+00:00

The golden ice floes

Thread: Re: Polar bear bouncing

Dean Conrad — 2008-11-05T13:34:07+00:00

Hello Marco,

Yes, you are correct. The rules state: "Players affected by the polar bear’s arrival immediately take turns (in clockwise order starting with the active player) to move their explorer(s) out of danger."

Then:

"If an escaping explorer causes a new polar bear bounce, this new bear movement is resolved first." I would say again, in clockwise order, starting with the person who last bounced the polar bear.

After everyone is out of danger, play returns to the player who started all this bouncing in the first place!

Thanks for playing,
D.

Thread: Polar bear bouncing

madhobbit — 2008-11-05T12:43:18+00:00

In our 3-player game yesterday we had some questions concerning polar bears.

Player A send a polar bear over to an ice floe with 2 explorers (of player B & C) on it. Who has to react first? We played that we would just start with the player to the left of the active player. Is this correct?

Next thing that happens is that a polar bear is send over to a ice floe with 2 explorers on it, but now of the active player and another player. Who has to react first? We let the active player decide which was more favorable, but again: is this correct?

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olavf — 2008-11-03T21:15:58+00:00

Box cover

Thread: Re: Video exploration and review of Ice Flow

siberianhusky — 2008-11-01T15:42:36+00:00

Excellent review!
You video definition of AP worth to be separate entry in some video dictionary.

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henk.rolleman — 2008-10-28T21:33:10+00:00

Game Explanation Spiel Essen 2008

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Richard Breese — 2008-10-28T21:14:43+00:00

Designer Dean Conrad (centre back) demonstrating at Essen 2008

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filwi — 2008-10-26T16:01:44+00:00

Ice Flow, closeup of finished game, Essen 08

Thread: Special Edition FREE prize draws...

Dean Conrad — 2008-10-03T15:36:00+00:00

Prize draws for those going to Essen and those who aren't:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/345120

D.

Thread: Re: Ice Flow review

volnon — 2008-10-02T18:08:09+00:00

Great review! I just bought this game 2 weeks ago and pretty much agree with everything you say. I hope to get it on the table tomorrow for another game- the wife has been pretty busy and can't seem to fit another game into her schedule- and she won the last one we played!

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

selwyth — 2008-10-02T08:25:19+00:00

The plastic ice floes are lovely, and a definite step up from cardboard . I heard they were laser-cut? That just gives them more cred. I just wish they were bigger.

Thread: Ice Flow review

dougadamsau — 2008-10-02T07:12:49+00:00

This review was first posted at Kulkmann's G@mebox...

Ice Flow

Author: Dean Conrad, John Streets
Publisher: Ludorum
Players: 2-4

Ice Flow is a boardgame published by Ludorum Games. I first heard of this game while surfing the front page of Boardgamegeek. I began reading about it, and the more I read, the more intrigued I became. I ordered it direct from Ludorum, and eight days later I had a copy in my hands.

Ice Flow is a race game, inspired by the Karl Bushby Goliath expedition (walking from South America to Europe by foot). Players control three explorers, and are trying to be the first to get their team from Alaska to Siberia. Anyone familiar with geography will quickly realise there is a chunk of water in between called the Bering Strait. Players have to move their explorers across the Strait by a combination of swimming and hopping between ice floes.

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Ice Flow creates a positive first impression when you open the box. There are three full colour rulebooks included, in English, French and German. Also included are a colourful game board; custom made wooden pieces featuring polar bears, explorers, fish and rope; a small deck of cards; and the transparent plexi-glass ice floe pieces. When you play the game, you realise a lot of thought has gone into getting the components right, especially the floes, which are remarkable.

The game board is nicely done, illustrated in a cartoon style, yet retaining an attractive appearance. It features Siberia and Alaska, separated by the Bering Strait. A hex grid overlays the play area, regulating movement and stacking of explorers. The Strait is divided into channels, or lanes, which the ice floes move along at speeds between one and three hexes. The lane speeds are also colour coded so even if you can't see the speed arrows, you can tell at a glance how quickly the ice is moving along a particular channel.

On the Alaskan side there are six stations where the explorers depart from. There is an illustration of a rugged adventurer on each of these stations, with a determined look on his face. In the centre of the straits are the Diomede Islands - Little and Big. (Trivia time - the date line passes through here, so depending on which island you're on, it's either yesterday or tomorrow on the other one!). The destination side, Siberia, features four stations representing the finish line for the explorers. Each Siberian station depicts an explorer enjoying a warm foot bath!

Players set up a game by taking turns to place out twelve ice floes on the board. A card is drawn for each floe to seed the floe with some equipment - rope and fish. Sometimes an unwelcome polar bear will turn up on a floe, or one of the two Diomede island cards will be drawn. The ice floes, loaded with equipment, are positioned in the channels at the players discretion. Once placed, the players take turns placing their explorers in Alaska - no more than two explorers per station. The game is now ready to begin.

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Ice Flow is a combination of race game, resource management game, and puzzle game. Once players are familiar with the game, turns are very quick. During a turn each player must take an "Ice Action", and can optionally perform an "Explorer Action".

An ice action consists of doing something with a floe tile on the board. A player can either move an ice floe down a channel one to three hexes, depending on the channel speed, and whether any other floes obstruct the movement. Alternatively, a player can rotate a floe, spinning it in the hex by one hexside. Finally, a player has the option to enter a new ice floe onto the board - drawing a floe card and loading it with equipment (and a possible bear) - and placing it at one of the eight entry hexes on the board. One of the three options must be taken every turn, and this gives the game a nice sense of a body of water in a constant state of flux.

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An explorer action is optional and is limited to two choices. Either move an explorer, or catch fish. Catching fish is straightforward - you hand in a piece of rope and take two fish from the supply - end of action. Movement is more complex... a player on their turn can move one of their three explorers. Movement is free, unless it costs something! Explorers can move from hex to hex for nothing, as long as they have a nice path of ice floes in front of them. However, there are exceptions ... if an explorer moves across a "crinkly" edge of an ice floe tile, it costs one rope to climb the ice wall. If a player enters a floe tile containing a polar bear, they must toss the bear a fish. If a player wants to swim a water hex, it costs them a fish to sustain them.

If a player does move an explorer, they may take one item from the hex they end up in and store it in their backpack. The backpack is a card that sits in front of the player, and is communal. That is, each of your three explorers share the items inside it, regardless of proximity to each other. As the ice floes are usually stocked with stuff, picking up something at the end of movement is a common occurance. However, as the game progresses, resources get used up, and equipment becomes scarce. Players have to carefully watch their equipment - if you are trying to get your last guy to the finish line, with an empty backpack, you'll find it tough going.

Players reaching Diomede Island usually take a breather there. Given there are two cards in the ice flow deck for Diomede Island, it's a good place to gain new equipment - mainly because it's the only hex in the Strait that can't move!

Ice Flow features a light layer of player interaction. The main one to watch out for is not setting up a highway for the player playing after you to milk. This means carefully looking at their backpack to see what they are capable of, and trying to manipulate the ice to benefit you more than them. Sweeping up equipment ahead of trailing players can be annoying for them. Another area of interaction is the locking of floe tiles - once you have an explorer on a tile, noone else can move or rotate it, unless they have an explorer present as well. As stacking on each hex of the board is two explorers, it's quite easy to lock down nicely positioned ice floe tiles. The big area of interaction, though, is moving the polar bears around...

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If you move onto a floe with a polar bear, you must toss it a fish. You then have two options - continue to move your explorer, or move the bear. One of you has to go. If you move the bear, you send it off on a straight line until it exits the board, or lands on another ice floe. Bears moving onto other occupied floes have to be dealt with, via either escaping the tile, or tossing it a fish to keep it moving. You have to be careful here though, because allowing opponents to exit the tile may actually help them - I've even seen a player land in Siberia courtesy of a roaming bear! Ideally though, a moving bear will cause opponents to be emergency evacuated back to Alaska (a.k.a start again!), or help advance one of your other explorers courtesy of a free move.

A game of Ice Flow ends when one player gets their third explorer into Siberia, and claiming victory. Each explorer must end up on a different Siberian station, which forces players to cover a wide swath of the board. It's not as simple as setting up a nice path of floes, and running them quickly across. I've found two player games take around 20 to 30 minutes, which feels perfect. I've had a couple of four player games which have taken an hour, and this feels a little long for a game of this "weight".

I enjoyed Ice Flow, and think it is a good game. It pushes a lot of my buttons - it is easy to teach, looks good, has clear rules, plays quickly, and has good appeal as both a gamer and family game. Downsides? Perhaps some will find it dry, and deep ponderers may bog the game down with careful thought.

For me, Ice Flow is a keeper.

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

emike — 2008-09-30T03:24:35+00:00

hellium wrote:
...set the polar bear on the player who is paralysed by analysis and indecision (I have one in chest freezer in the cellar....)

Remind me not to play any games with hellium-- no way am I going into any freezer....

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

volnon — 2008-09-30T01:05:35+00:00

I for one am VERY pleased with the game. It serves the purpose I bought it it for to a "T". A light/medium game that is easy to explain to others how to play, enough variety to seperate it from a kid's Chutes and Ladders style game, visually attractive, and just plain fun.

As a player of abstracts,as well as regular bouts of chess, I find this game to be perfect for what it is- a game to try to mix the proper amount of offense with defense, while having a good time!

As for the length of the game- I did not find it overly lengthy, but you can always do as the rules suggest if you want a shorter game- play with 2 explorers, not 3.

And I would never give up those plastic ice floes! Cardboard would be so...wrong!

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

Tatsu — 2008-09-29T19:25:19+00:00

Though you took a while to get there - you are spot on.
The game is too long for what it is - a little puzzle game. There doesn't typically exist some grand move - most moves can be planned out before your turn comes around, so turns shouldn't last that long - but they do. It is not a terrible game, but I was (am) disappointed - this sounded so much better.

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

Wittmann222 — 2008-09-29T18:54:56+00:00

I bought this game a few months ago and it regularly gets played with my family. It's a fun game with some added brain-burn which adds nicely to an already appealing theme. As a gateway game IMO it is the next step up from TtR.

My only gripe is I'd like to have seen the polar bears be a little nastier

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

blindspot — 2008-09-29T18:17:45+00:00

Most anything is questionable. Any review is naturally going to contain subjective points of taste and the reviewer here accounts for that by stating his preferences. It's all the better for the purpose of aiding discernment for all readers who both share and do not share those same tastes. But what exactly about this review is "plain wrong"? It would be helpful to all of us if you would point out any fact that the reviewer got wrong.

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

SubPrime — 2008-09-29T17:49:25+00:00

That would be true if half of what he said wasn't questionable, subjective, or just plain wrong (in my subjective opinion).

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

blindspot — 2008-09-29T17:24:03+00:00

Sounds like this game would have benefited a lot if you had been one of its play testers.

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

kentreuber — 2008-09-29T13:02:26+00:00

I played Ice Flow for the first time this weekend. I agree that the game is too long for what it is, although it must be said that we were playing a 4 player game. The other problem was that it was clear that one player was going to win in a couple of turns and there wasn't much any us could do about it. So, the last 5-10 minutes was mostly futile.

A agree with the ice flows. I wish the ice flow tiles had a different coloring on the jagged edge to help them stand out. While I love Litko's stuff (I use their bases for miniature wargaming), I think this is a case where cardboard counters would have worked better.

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

hellium — 2008-09-29T09:47:19+00:00

Having played a couple of times I think the best adjustment has to be in player mindset.
Play really drags as people sit pondering that grand move across the board, the fact is that there is not always a grand move and as a player you need to make small moves often and grand moves far less often.
What you have to do is watch the board, make those small moves and accept that you will gerneally make small moves.
and play at a pace, the game is supposed to be in a dynamic environment,
Perhaps a 30 second timer is the best addition you can make to the game, and give each player two time out cards that gives them a bit longer should they want to ponder.
Finally set the polar bear on the player who is paralysed by analysis and indecision (I have one in chest freezer in the cellar for just such purposes.)

Thread: Re: Against the (Ice) Flow

drunkenKOALA — 2008-09-29T09:18:47+00:00

I'd have tried a 2 player session with you. Most abstracts (or more aptly, spatial perfect information games) are best, and often only worth playing, with two.

Sounds like the game has all the shortcomings of family and abstract games, and none of the strong points of either.

You said abstracts are short. While most of them are short, it isn't the length itself that appeals to me, but the brain burn per time. In other games, for example Imperial (a game I love by the way), there are some deep decisions to make, but you also have lots of accounting work to do: counting the money, moving the armies one by one, etc. Contrast to Go, where you only have to place one stone per turn. It may not sound like much, but it all adds up and the accounting part of the game can be a distraction from the strategizing part. In an one hour game of Go, you may spend 3 minutes placing stones. In an one hour game of Imperial, you may spend 15 minutes on menial tasks. Sounds like Ice Flow has lots of accounting-like tasks, which each one by itself is quite trivial, but over the course of the game it really adds up.

I think Chinese Checkers is quite good by the way. It has the good qualities of a real abstract.

For a good multiplayer, family abstract, look no further than through the desert and arkadia.

Thread: Against the (Ice) Flow

selwyth — 2008-09-29T08:04:30+00:00

Introduction
I had eagerly anticipated the release of Ice Flow, and bought it as soon as it appeared on the shelves of my FLGS. The theme, components and the prevailing opinion of “better than Hey! That’s My Fish!” sold me on the game. I got it on the table within the next day… hmm something was off. I got in another play before the end of the night. Still, something was off. I reflected upon it, and wondered if it wasn’t living up to my expectations. By the end of my third play, my dislike of the game was confirmed.

Before I explain why I have since traded away Ice Flow, let me get some basic rules out of the way, in case that’s what you’re interested in.

What is the objective/theme of Ice Flow?
Get your 3 explorers to cross the Bering Strait from Alaska to Siberia, hopping from ice floe to ice floe (one of the more amusing points in my plays of the game came when we pontificated on why any sane person would want to go from Alaska to Siberia). They will need to use rope to fish and cross ice packs, and need fish to obtain the energy to swim across water. And watch out for polar bears!

What's a sample turn like?
- Perform a mandatory ice floe action and an optional explorer action in any order you choose.
- For the mandatory ice floe action, you can choose to place a new ice floe, move an existing ice floe or rotate an existing ice floe (barring some rules)
- For the optional explorer action, you can choose to let an explorer fish, or move an explorer as far as you want, provided every step of the movement is legal.

What forms of player interaction are there?
- Move ice floes your opponents need out of the way. Or rotate them so that they have to cross difficult ice packs.
- Get a polar bear to show up in an ill-prepared opponent’s face. He’d either have to escape (preferably backwards), give up some of his equipment, or, worst of all, get evacuated back to Alaska.
- “Hitchhike”. If your opponent’s explorer is not careful in covering his tracks and cutting off the route he came from, you can follow him for most of the way to Siberia. Try to get others to pave a route for you.

What skills are needed to do well in this game?
- Puzzle-solving: Every turn in Ice Flow is like solving a puzzle, where you try to push your explorer forward, while at the same time making sure it doesn’t benefit your opponents too much. The solution can often come from an unintuitive source (e.g. moving that ice floe, instead of trying to activate a polar bear).

What game(s) is Ice Flow similar to?
- Chinese Checkers. Trying to get from Point A to Point B, and piggybacking off your opponent’s moves to get there faster.

My take:

Ice Flow is a game with a very nice and cute theme, and the components do very well to immerse you in it. The problem is that the theme wears thin after 20 minutes, and then all you’re left with is an abstract game (abstract as in the genre, not as in no theme). After the initial excitement of collecting ropes and fish, and activating your first polar bear, the game quickly devolves into a mechanical exercise of spatial manipulation with ice floe tiles, and picking when and where to move each of your explorers. Most of the players I played with just said the game became “not fun”, and I agree. The rest of this review explores why the game is “not fun”, yet might hold rewards if you’re a particular type of gamer, or if you stick with it and play it many times.

Ice Flow is a pretty game. The polar bear and fish animeeples are cute, there are interesting explorer meeples, and even the square cards have a certain charm about them, especially the player aids and the “backpacks” you carry your items in. The star of the game, though, is definitely the ice floes, which are blue, translucent and gorgeous. All other hex-based games, including Hey! That’s My Fish! should take notice. However, a big rule of components is for them to not compromise functionality, and I’m disappointed to say that the beautiful hexes aren’t always functional. Throughout the game, you have to pay attention to ice packs, which are little cracks on the hexes. And by little, I mean little. It’s really hard to see ice packs on the hexes, especially when the hexes are covered by fish, explorers and rope, and thus it’s a common occurrence in the game for you to make your move, only for others to point out that there are ice packs you didn’t spot. Or you move that piece of fish away to see if there’s an ice pack underneath it, and give away your plans to your opponents in the process. The hexes should really have been made bigger.

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Can you spot all the ice packs on the hexes in this picture? Picture courtesy of BudsBalkan.

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The square-shaped, nicely illustrated cards are a pleasant surprise from all the identical-looking cards you see in other games, and give the game a unique character. Picture courtesy of itchyrichy

As noted before, one of Ice Flow’s greatest assets, the theme, disappears after the first 20 minutes. This is expected, because Ice Flow, at its core, is really an abstract game. Consider a game of Checkers (or more appropriately, a game of Chinese Checkers), where your objective is to get all your pieces on the other side of the board. In the interim, you can get there faster and more efficiently by jumping over pieces (yours or your opponent’s). And there you have it: a probable first prototype of Ice Flow. Ice Flow is of course more complex than that, but the essence is similar. You’re trying to get explorers to the other side of the board, and a bunch of abstract-like rules allow you to get them there quicker.

I am not the biggest abstract fan, and therein probably lies the reason why I (and several people I played with) am not a fan of Ice Flow. I do like me an abstract sometimes, but usually only after I play it many times and get better at recognizing all the possibilities present to me and to my opponents. And this is the main reason why I concede that my rating of Ice Flow might improve after several plays. But the problem is: do I want to stick through several plays, each lasting over an hour? I do like a quick and elegant abstract, like Ingenious and Hey! That’s My Fish! (quick, so that you can accumulate many plays in a short time, thus learning more lessons; and elegant, because abstract games should exemplify elegance). Ice Flow is neither.

Ice Flow games last anywhere from 45 to 90 minutes, depending on the number of players and how much time they want to spend optimizing their move. That is a problem, because for people like me who like the theme and the family nature of the game, it only lasts for 20 minutes, and then I have to sit through 25-70 minutes of puzzle-like abstract thinking. My first game, with 3 players, lasted 90 minutes. My second game, with 3 players, lasted 75 minutes, but only because we decided not to think for too long and just go with the (ice) flow. My third game, with 4 players, lasted 110 minutes, and 80 too many, as a traffic jam built up in the middle of the board that slowed the game to a crawl, causing much frustration and disillusion among the players involved. I haven’t tried 2-player, but comments here in the BGG Ice Flow section seem to suggest that the 2-player game is also prone to dragging, especially among people new to the game (and here, I concede another weakness of my review, because abstracts are nearly always only good with 2 players, so I should try it, but I can’t get anybody interested). Ice Flow outstays its welcome for two reasons: the players who like the theme get bored after 20 minutes; and the players who like quick, tense abstracts can find that the game drags too long, especially since the decisions involved are relatively simple (as compared to the decisions involved in 60-90-minute games).

Granted, game length doesn’t matter as long as the game is fun, rewarding or elegant. Judging Ice Flow purely as an abstract, I do not find Ice Flow elegant (fun and rewarding are subjective, of course). Similar to how Ice Flow’s theme and family-game nature suffers from it really being an abstract, the abstract gameplay in Ice Flow suffers because of distractions from the theme and randomness/chaos from the family-game nature. As noted above, Ice Flow can be viewed as a glorified Chinese Checkers game, with much more bells and whistles. The elegance in abstracts is derived from very simple rules and some form of symmetry. Ice Flow has a lot of finicky rules with the rope, fish and polar bears (to be more exact, these rules are too finicky for an abstract, but perfectly fine otherwise), and this detracts from its qualities as an abstract. The theme clouds the abstract gameplay. The same polar bear you thought was cute and exciting when you activated it in the first 10 minutes of the game, becomes a nuisance in Minute 75, when you hope that polar bear you sent onto the runaway leader’s explorer can EAT him (i.e. capture a piece in abstract terms), then he escapes, and you think, “Wait… is this an abstract game…?” You want to trap and destroy your opponent’s pieces in an abstract, but darn it, all you can do is give him a gentle shove with a…POLAR BEAR? Shouldn’t they be tougher than that? It’s all really confusing. Or you can screw over your opponent by pushing an ice floe away…but you get a feeling Somebody Up There did it. Or maybe some sea God down there. You don’t get the satisfaction you get in an abstract when you used your piece to screw your opponent.

Then there is the chaos and randomness inherent in the game, which is a big no-no, since abstract games should feature a minimal dosage of luck. You never know what you’re getting by discovering a new ice floe, because what it has on it is determined by a card-draw. You never know if you’ll get that polar bear you need to screw your opponent over, or you’ll get that rope/fish which you really need. And you never know if you’ll even get to use that ice floe eventually, because chances are it’s far away from you, and your opponents might hijack it anyway. But ice-floe discovery, though random, is an awkward necessity on the game. When supplies are running low on the board, there almost is a need for somebody to “bite the bullet” and waste a turn discovering a new ice floe instead of moving/rotating them. I think the game would have flowed better had discovery of new ice floes being integrated into the game’s mechanics itself (e.g. a new ice floe is discovered after every round of play).

There is another element of chaos: the polar bears, but they are welcome. In fact, I’d say that the polar bears are under-utilized in this game. Half of the game box has a polar bear. The polar bear animeeples are friggin’ cute. The rules for their movement are the major direct source of player interaction you’ll have in an otherwise solo puzzle-solving exercise. But invariably, there are often too few of them on the board, and whatever few are poorly positioned. The root of the problem, and what I believe would be nearly a fix-all for the game’s problems, is that the game board is too big. This is the biggest reason why the game is too long, too loose, and fails to justify the randomness involved. Shrinking the game board will make the game shorter and tenser, and make the polar bears have better range and more impact. This would solve the biggest problem in the game, and make the best part of the game front and center.

In a nutshell, I feel like Ice Flow is trying to be too much at once in catering to abstract and puzzle-solving fans, and also to family game fans, and being inadequate at both as a result. Not to say that this is impossible. Hey! That’s My Fish! is also an abstract and a family game, but it succeeds in what it does, because the game length is short enough to for its strange synchronicity between abstract gameplay and family theme to not outstay its welcome. Try playing Hey! That’s My Fish! with 192 hexes instead of 64, and 4 more penguins per player, and you get an idea about why Ice Flow is a game that starts out with a bang, but fizzles out after 20 minutes (which, incidentally is how long Hey! That’s My Fish! lasts). I would suggest for the playing area of the game board to be made smaller, by stripping away a line of hexes on each side, as this would cut game time, bring the explorers closer to each other, and increase player interaction through the 2-explorer stacking limit, quick development of ice floes and the polar bears. But incidentally, don’t make the board itself smaller, so that the hexes can be enlarged, and the ice packs will become more visible. Ice Flow is an interesting game, and could have been really fun under the right circumstances. It does still have the potential to please certain gamer groups, so you should definitely give this a try. My opinion is that the game either isn’t that fun, or has a learning curve too steep for me to want to climb, if you consider the game length and the lack of fun, non-repetitive decisions during the game.

Thread: Video exploration and review of Ice Flow

snicholson — 2008-09-28T15:59:53+00:00

As an episode of Board Games with Scott, I made an 18-minute video where I teach you how to play Ice Flow.

You can watch it at:
http://www.boardgameswithscott.com/?p=88

or through Vimeo:
Vimeo Video

Thread: Re: One Player Action

Dean Conrad — 2008-09-26T17:27:19+00:00

It must be nice to have a wife that you have a chance of beating (in a gaming sense, you understand).

Thanks for playing.

D.

Thread: Re: One Player Action

volnon — 2008-09-26T14:24:48+00:00

(Laugh)
No, not really, but I guess it does read like that.

I play to win, and that usually means upsetting my wife's plans to win- therefore she gets upset. We are both highly competitive on the field of game board battle.

Great game, by the way. Already a favorite of mine. Very playable, and I love the way the floes move along the board.

I can see why this game is selling so well.

Thread: Re: One Player Action

Dean Conrad — 2008-09-26T05:37:03+00:00

volnon wrote:
...tomorrow night I play it with my wife- I am sure she will get pretty upset when I move ice floes out of the way to break up her easy paths to Siberia, but what the hey! That’s why I game!
You game to upset your wife?

D.

Thread: One Player Action

volnon — 2008-09-26T02:52:08+00:00

As was said in the movie “Escape From L.A.”, I took one look at the Ice Flow box and muttered, “I thought you would be taller”.

I received my game order from the usual online store and tore it open- it had been Talk Like a Pirate Day and I ordered Jamaica and Pirates Cove, along with Ice Flow. Maybe that was the problem. Both of these pirate games were heavy and thick (Jamaica was larger than I thought it would be!) and this created a big contrast when the boxes were viewed next to the skinnier Ice Flow box.

Still, I believe in the old adage that good things come in small packages, and opened the Ice Flow game first. It was, after all, the game I was most curious about.

I checked to make sure the parts were all there (they were) - and still had that “I thought you would be taller” feeling when I looked at the smallish board. Those plastic blue ice floes sure were nice, though, and I accepted the smallish board as a good trade off.

I set up the game on the kitchen table to play a solo game, as I am prone to do to learn a new game’s rules. I was happy to see the well illustrated 4-page rule book made everything very clear, and before you know it I was scampering about on the ice, evading polar bears and swinging across ice ridges with bright red rope.

The rules were very clear, but two things confused me and took a bit of rereading.
1. I did not know how far I could move my explorers. I started out moving them one space at a time, but realized this was way too time consuming. With a quick reread I saw that I was allowed to move one explorer as far as I could (supplies and terrain allowing).
2. Where to send polar bears after feeding them a fish? I figured it out with another reading that they, in essence, swam to the next nearest ice floe you wanted them to go to.

I played as a 2-player game and had a great time- tomorrow night I play it with my wife- I am sure she will get pretty upset when I move ice floes out of the way to break up her easy paths to Siberia, but what the hey! That’s why I game!

After all was said and done, I must admit the game WAS taller than I had initially thought. It had grown in my eyes as a helluva sweet game. At least 6’3 or more.

For a good time, call 1-555-ICE-FLOE.

Thread: Re: Sorry to lower the tone . . .

dougadamsau — 2008-09-25T23:32:32+00:00

harris_family wrote:
. . . but what does 'golden ice' bring to mind for most people?

Top Gear Winter Olympics special?

Thread: Re: Sorry to lower the tone . . .

r3gamer — 2008-09-25T17:20:57+00:00

(insert Butthead laugh)

uh huh huh, huh

Thread: Sorry to lower the tone . . .

harris_family — 2008-09-25T16:39:27+00:00

. . . but what does 'golden ice' bring to mind for most people?

Apologies if it is *just me*.

Simon

Thread: Re: Two Player game, and thoughts

Cornbread46 — 2008-09-25T15:16:26+00:00

volnon wrote:
LHIM wrote:
I liked the bit about fish to ward off polar bears. I recall a show (Qi?) that stated the way to avoid polar bears was to shed your clothing and keep moving. The bears would stop at your clothes while you beat it

I suddenly have this mental image of a bear or two wandering about the ice wearing explorer clothing while checking out the contents of the pockets...

I had a vision of a couple of polar bears picking their teeth, with a big pile of clothes & Gear 50 feet away.
The polar bear looks to the other one and say, "These are so much tastier without the peel..."

Thread: Re: Two Player game, and thoughts

volnon — 2008-09-25T12:04:12+00:00

LHIM wrote:
I liked the bit about fish to ward off polar bears. I recall a show (Qi?) that stated the way to avoid polar bears was to shed your clothing and keep moving. The bears would stop at your clothes while you beat it

I suddenly have this mental image of a bear or two wandering about the ice wearing explorer clothing while checking out the contents of the pockets...

Thread: Re: Two Player game, and thoughts

dougadamsau — 2008-09-25T04:08:32+00:00

LHIM wrote:
Side note: I thought the game premise was just off the wall but in fact based on some guy's multi-year, multi-continent trek which includes or included crossing the Bering Straits on the ice floes... Hope they have ropes instead of sticks!

Yes, I was looking at his website over lunch - amazing photos crossing the Bering Strait.

I liked the bit about fish to ward off polar bears. I recall a show (Qi?) that stated the way to avoid polar bears was to shed your clothing and keep moving. The bears would stop at your clothes while you beat it

Thread: Re: Two Player game, and thoughts

LHIM — 2008-09-25T04:03:10+00:00

Having played a 2 and 3 player game and my SO a 4 player, we are pretty much in agreement that more is better. That's not to say a 2 player game cannot be fun - more makes it a much larger challenge.

Side note: I thought the game premise was just off the wall but in fact based on some guy's multi-year, multi-continent trek which includes or included crossing the Bering Straits on the ice floes... Hope they have ropes instead of sticks!

Thread: Two Player game, and thoughts

dougadamsau — 2008-09-25T01:40:48+00:00

I ordered Ice Flow from the http://www.ludorum.co.uk/ICEFLOW/index.htm website last week, and the game turned up from the UK a week later. Not bad for Australia.

My wife and I spent 15 minutes moving some pieces around to understand the rules (which aren't that difficult), then started a two player game. Diomede Island came up twice in the setup, meaning it was stuffed with items and made a temping target. Two polar bears were floating around near Siberia, waiting for us.

We really enjoyed the game. I started my 3 explorers in Wales and Ikpek Lagoon (2), while Janet started in Granville (2) and Mitletukeruk.

I got my two explorers off Ikpek Lagoon and onto a passing floe in the first two turns of the game, leaving Janet's two explorers at Granville stranded. She quickly entered a floe up in the extreme north east of the board to get her going. Janet's explorer from Mitletukeruk moved swiftly across the straits, stopping at Diomede Island and tooling up. This explorer made it into Nanken, Siberia first, after about ten minutes of game play.

Meanwhile, I was trying to keep all my explorers moving in a cluster, my reasoning being if I'm on a floe, it's "locked" from Janet moving it around to her advantage. That sort of held up (I guess it will be less likely in a four player game with more floe sharing), until a polar bear was moved onto my floe near Alaska. Fortunately, I could slip away to an adjoinging floe for no cost.

While Janet was still stranded with her two explorers up near Granville, I finished one at Nanken. I got the other two into Diomede Island, and manipulated the pack ice floes into a nice orientation giving me three free hops, costing neither rope or fish. I got my two explorers one hex away from the coast, and drifted the flow down to the southern Siberian stations. I spent a turn catching fish, then two turns finishing the game, landing my two explorers at Chini and Ponten for the win. Janet finished her second explorer in the same round.

Thoughts? We both really like this one. Bit hard to classify it - a resource gathering, puzzle solving, race game, I guess! Turns are very quick, it's not too taxing on the brain, and I can see both gamers and more family gatherings enjoying this one. The components are top notch - the ice floe tiles are exceptional.

Thread: Re: 'New' ICE FLOW rules...

Dean Conrad — 2008-09-24T16:06:22+00:00

This has been sorted now. The turn order for the ice floe tile placement in the setup phase should have read 'clockwise', not 'anti-clockwise'. This solves the problem, and leaves the Starting Player as the last to place an explorer (a balancing element).

This has been corrected in the latest English and German downloads available at: http://www.ludorum.co.uk/ICEFLOW/rules/index.htm

I think you've earned your free copy of the printed version, Ben!

D.

Thread: Re: 'New' ICE FLOW rules...

Dean Conrad — 2008-09-24T08:56:29+00:00

Yup. Well spotted, Ben.
I hope we can get to the printers in time.

We have decided that our next game will have no published rules at all. Thus we will eliminate the single most frustrating aspect of game publication.

Phantomwhale wrote:
Really like the new rulebook layout - would be great if there was some way of getting a published print copy (for a nominal fee).
Thanks. I'm sure we can come to some arrangement. Will you be at Essen? We will be; details here: http://www.ludorum.co.uk/ICEFLOW/con-spiel.htm

D.

Thread: Re: 'New' ICE FLOW rules...

Phantomwhale — 2008-09-24T08:39:36+00:00

Really like the new rulebook layout - would be great if there was some way of getting a published print copy (for a nominal fee).

However I think there is an error in the set up phase. With the caveat that it's early (pre-coffee O'clock) still, I will spell out what I can see, and hopefully explain why I think the set up description is wrong.

Lets say the players, Alice, Bob and Charlie are still in that order, such that Bob is seated to the left (e.g. clockwise) of Alice, and Charlie is to the left of Bob. Alice does a superb polar bear impression and is the "starting player".

For Ice floe setup it says "beginning with the starting player" and then "taking turns anti-clockwise", so the ice flows are played by Alice, then Charlie, then Bob. Each plays 4 ice floes, with Bob playing the last one.

Then for explorer setup it says "beginning with the last player to place an ice floe" and "take turns anti-clockwise". So this means Bob places an explorer first - but then going anti-clockwise would mean Alice places her explorer second, then Charlie places last. This contradicts the point made in the rulebook that "The starting player will be the last player to place an explorer".

I suspect the fix here is that explorer or ice floe placement should be done clockwise, surely ? Given that the play order will be clockwise (Alice, then Bob, then Charlie) I suspect explorer placement SHOULD be anti-clockwise - whoever is last in the turn order probably deserves to be first in the explorer placement.

Therefore I imagine the best fix would be for ice floe placement to be altered to CLOCKWISE, meaning the last player to play an ice floe would be Charlie, and everything else would work, presumably, as intended ?

I can imagine this being quite confusing for new players to this game if not fixed. I had to explain the set up ordering a couple of times (using the old rules) to my non-gamer brother and wife, who seemed initially puzzled why we went round one way and then the other (familiar though such play is to us "euro gamers"). So when I get them their own copy it - which I will, they really loved the game - it would be ideal if this bit was spelt out to them correctly

Ben