The CheckedTwice founders often look for the private islands where they’ll retire when CheckedTwice goes public. (It’s nice to dream, no?) Well this game allows you to live it, and for only about $30.

Puerto Rico allows you to manage your plantation and in-town holdings to amass greatest wealth and curry favor back in Europe. This turn based game was published originally in 2005 and can be played with 2-5 players. The strategy behind it can be fairly complex, and it has risen to the #4 on BoardGameGeek’s rankings. Here’s their description:

The players are plantation owners in Puerto Rico in the days when ships had sails. Growing up to five different kind of crops—corn, indigo, sugar, tobacco, and coffee—they must try to run their business more efficiently than their close competitors: growing crops and storing them efficiently, developing San Juan with useful buildings, deploying their colonists to best effect, selling crops at the right time, and, most importantly, shipping their goods back to Europe for maximum benefit.

Kid’s week continues at CheckedTwice, and for Thursday’s Game Night we have the perfect gateway game: Catan Junior.

For those of you who don’t know, Settlers of Catan is one of the best selling nerdy board games of all time. The award winning game has oodles of expansions and has become a standard of board game nights everywhere. One problem, though: it’s a little complex for the youngsters.

That’s where Junior comes in. The game keeps elements of the original game (varied resources, strategic building), while simplifying some of the more complex aspects (trade, affect cards). This should be a great way to instill a love for nerdy board games without the tears and gnashing of teeth that would come with the full version.

I think Official CheckedTwice 6-year-old Tester Kate is getting a copy of this one for Swick Family Christmas 2012. Good thing she doesn’t read this blog. 🙂

Kill Doctor Lucky

In the classic board game Clue, you race to be the first to solve the murder.  In Kill Doctor Lucky, you race to be the first to commit it.

Doctor Lucky progresses in a stately fashion through the rooms of a mansion, unaware that all of the house guests are out for his blood.  If you catch him alone in a room, and nobody has a clear line of sight to that room, you can make an attempt on his life.  Of course, then everybody else will try to throw obstacles in your path to make you fail… because they want to be the ones to do the deed.  Why should you have all the fun?

The game is easy to learn, entertaining, and usually quite quick (a rarity in the Games For Grownups genre).  The board represents the mansion.  Cards provide an amusing assortment of weapons (to use on the attack) and obstacles (to stop another player’s attack).

And let’s face it.  When you really get down to it, nothing brings people together like a good old fashioned assassination.  The family that slays together, stays together.