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The streets of Rook City were overrun by mutant vermin, spreading disease and infection, and the mighty Legacy was reeling from the poison coursing through his veins. Mister Fixer, the kung-fu handyman, was getting tired of having Legacy mistake him for a punching bag, and the Expatriette was about to stop firing at the vile Plague Rat and start in on Legacy. The Wraith, for her part, was just irritated that she couldn't find her utility belt, and had to spend half the fight hiding in the shadows while she tried to remember where she left it.

Plague Rat, of course, was delighted. He wasn't having much luck infecting the other heroes, but they were so distracted that they weren't beating on the rat-man, leaving him free to do all manner of crimes. That worked right up until Expatriette found a cure for Legacy and got him clean, because then Legacy galvanized the whole team into a coordinated attack that landed the disgusting supervillain into a maximum security prison for gross monsters.

That was the story of our first adventure in Rook City. It wasn't our last, and we'll revisit the crime-ridden town again, because man, that was fun. However, Rook City also illuminated a problem with Greater Than Games - they seem to have trouble getting it right the first time.

The initial release of Sentinels of the Multiverse was amazing. It was an amazing, cooperative superhero game that seemed to be thoroughly enjoyed by nearly anyone who played it, but it also had some serious problems. The box let all the cards slide all over the place. You had to have a calculator and notepad handy the whole time. It was incredibly hard to remember bonuses and penalties.

But the re-released, second version fixed all those problems, and even rolled in some new improvements. The game was tight and fast and so much better. It's easily my favorite superhero game, and the only one that really feels like I'm playing out a couple issues of an actual comic book.

A game this awesome needs expansions, and Rook City fits that bill. Two new heroes, four new villains and a couple new playgrounds in which to stage your beatdowns make Rook City a robust and welcome expansion to a really great game.

But it ain't perfect.

The new heroes really are quite excellent. They're not too complicated, but not overly simplified. Expatriette is a sort of Punisher clone, loaded up with heavy-duty firearms and a low tolerance for bad guys in general. Mister Fixer is almost more of a pulp hero, combining mystical kung-fu with a toolbox full of pipe wrenches and crowbars. I love the art on these two new ass-kickers, and have no complaints about the new heroes at all. In fact, I think Mister Fixer is my new favorite to play, and my wife loves Expatriette.

The villains are also pretty great, but here we do run into some problems. Plague Rat is basically a fun guy to beat down, and he's fairly straightforward, but he does require you to remember a lot more than you might be used to doing so far. His abilities key off the infections he's handing out to heroes like a pedophile with a bag of lollipops, and so you'll be constantly having to check around the table to see if there's something that should be affecting something else. All things considered, he's a fun villain to fight, and you can get around the downsides and still have a good time.

The Organization is a different matter entirely. There's the Chairman, the criminal kingpin you have to beat to win the game, and his assassin the Operative, who you have to defeat if you want to throw a beating on the Chairman. Their deck is chock-full of underbosses and minions who will pop out and harass you to no end - at one point, we had ten minions in play at the same time, plus two giant mutated rats and a vat full of toxic chemicals. This is supposed to be a tough villain to beat, so we're OK so far - until we started having questions.

Does an end-of-turn effect trigger if the card appears at the end of the turn?

What do you do when the villain runs out of cards?

How on earth do you beat a guy who summons a chain of six cards at the same time?

We had more. And all those questions are answered quite nicely in an FAQ I found at BGG… which is 32 pages long.

When your game needs an FAQ that is 32 pages long, you may have done something wrong. That, or you're Fantasy Flight Games. Sentinels of the Multiverse is a straightforward game. It should not cause so much confusion.

We did manage to beat the Chairman, but I'm pretty sure we only won because we played completely wrong. I was fine with getting my ass kicked, but it was unpleasant to be so completely bewildered by so many card effects. And I'll tell you right now, it's tough to track end-of-turn effects from ten different cards.

We haven't played with the other two villains yet. Before we do, I plan to memorize the FAQ. But that means the next thing to discuss is the new environments.

The two new arenas for staging your fights are the streets of Rook City and the chemical plant (which is in Rook City). Unfortunately, we used the streets for Plague Rat and the factory for the Chairman, and that was backwards. Unlike previous environments, which could feasibly work with just about any bad guy, these environments really make more sense when paired with the correct villain. The factory, for instance, spawns diseased rats - which goes pretty well with a giant rat villain. It did not make sense, on the other hand, for this factory to be overrun with crooked cops, informants and hired guns. Thematically, the environments are great - but you have to pair them up properly for best effect. You didn't have to do that with any of the original locations, and so I was a little disappointed in the new spots.

I want to make sure to emphasize that I still really enjoy playing Rook City, and I'll get back there to take on the last two villains. I have complaints, sure, but this is still an excellent expansion to an excellent game. I would even guess that if they reprint it after a little fixing, it will be even better. The chemical plant and the city streets make outstanding environments, even if they do tend to disrupt the theme if you mix and match them wrong. Sentinels of the Multiverse is still the best superhero game I've ever played, and if you like this box of bad-ass dynamite, it's worth picking up Rook City.

Just go read that FAQ before you play.

Summary

2-4 players

Pros:
New heroes, villains and environments - and they're all cool
Adding new stuff gives you more reasons to play again

Cons:
Some new elements will create rules confusion
Some other new elements can be tough to track

Rook City is worth your money. If you like Sentinels of the Multiverse, get over to Greater Than Games and get one:
http://greaterthangames.com/store/sentinels-multiverse-rook-city

Plaid Hat Games ought to change their name to Bottled Lightning. They seem to be able to package up a hit every time they print something. For a great example of the Plaid Hat magic, check out City of Remnants.

The first thing to discuss is the story you're playing out. In City of Remnants, players each form a gang and try to rise to the top and squeeze out their criminal competition. But these aren't just Crips versus Bloods. These gangs exist because a nasty alien race called the Yugai has enslaved multiple worlds, and brought all the refugees to this one planet and dumped them there. So you've got four-armed aliens, huge monster aliens, bird aliens, and humans. And they're all fighting over the scraps of resources that their alien overlords see fit to drop on them.

At this point, this game could suck and I would still play it. When I can control a gang of alien thugs who can fight their oppressive conquerors, deal drugs, shoot other gangsters, and turf-war for the best properties, I'll play it, and it doesn't even have to be that good. Throw hookers into this game and you've got Grand Theft Spaceship: The Boardgame.

As an added bonus to this totally awesome starting point, the game is simply amazing. It accommodates a wide range of strategies, from bloodthirsty and F Tha Police to shrewd, calculating businessman. You might grab up buildings that provide great income, so you can buy your way to the top, or you might snatch territories that give you the chance to build huge gangs of gunmen. You could be even save your money for recruitment drives, then steal all the buildings you want from the other players. At gunpoint, of course. Otherwise, why even bother.

Turns happen incredibly fast, too. You'll be amazed as you near the end of the game that more time hasn't passed. Partially because you will have had so much fun that you won't realize how long it's been, but partially because you've had virtually no downtime. You're involved in this game all the time, and you're up to your elbows in contraband and illegal firearms.

One thing that makes City of Remnants so tense and interesting is the limited actions you get every turn. Limited actions aren't a new concept, of course, but so many games give you this feeling that you just wish you could have done more. It can be frustrating to play these games and feel like your turn was over before you really got started, but City of Remnants hits a beautiful balance between frustration and indulgence. You have to scheme and play smart, but you don't feel like you're playing while wearing handcuffs (unless you are wearing handcuffs, in which case maybe you should stop playing games and call your bondsman).

Likewise, in a game that sees players build from fledgling gangs to criminal empires, there's a huge propensity to wind up with a game that ends just as it was getting good. Not City of Remnants, though - this is another factor that has been carefully and impeccably designed. The game lasts just as long as it should. Any less, and you would be bemoaning the things you didn't get to do. Any more, and it would just feel sloppy.

Everything about City of Remnants is tightly designed and beautifully crafted, including the art. Some people may not care for the rough style used for the illustrations, but you would be insane to complain about the awesome sculpts on the gang member figures. Not only are they fully sculpted, but there are four different sculpts for each color - because, as I mentioned before, there are four different aliens in the city. If you're seriously anal-retentive, you could even match the figures to the kinds of thugs you recruit.

There's so much to love about City of Remnants that if I discuss every possible piece of genius, this review will turn into a novella. And it would be a boring novella with no real plotline and horrible character development. So instead of trying to cover every point, I'll just say that this is one finely tuned machine. Everything works perfectly. It's smooth and clean and easy to play, and also incredibly deep and immensely strategic. It looks great all laid out on the table, offers tons of reasons to stretch your brain muscles, and gives you plenty of really good excuses to kill the bejeezus out of some alien law enforcement officers. This marriage of a thrilling backstory and a fantastic game makes City of Remnants another bottle full of lightning from Plaid Hat.

Summary

2-4 players

Pros:
Totally kick-ass theme
Exciting and engaging
Perfectly balanced and tested
Strategically deep and tactically brilliant

Cons:
Can't think of any off the top of my head

To get your mitts on City of Remnants, or just to read more about it, you can run over to the Plaid Hat site, right here:

http://www.plaidhatgames.com/games/city-of-remnants

For those of you who knew Duff, and who live in the DFW area, and who felt like you miss him enough to go to a memorial service, it's... at a game store.

Yes, a game store.

Duff loved driving out to Plano to go to the Dallas Games Marathon. It was this thing where you went and played a ludicrous number of games. But it was an hour away, and there was a cover charge, so I never went myself. I'm not a huge fan of driving an hour to pay money to play games with people I don't know.

But Duff was, and he loved that place. So Sunday, March 10, they're having a special, commemorative meeting of the Dallas Games Marathon to celebrate Duff's life. The goofy sumbitch had an awful lot of friends, so I figure there will be lots of people there. I will be there.

Here's the details:

This shindig is a potluck. If you wanted to bring food, you can. One of Duff's friends is setting up a Facebook page to handle the whole thing, so that we don't wind up with 20 plates of hash brownies and no stroganoff. I'll have to update that part once I find out where you can find that particular Facebook page, but I'm working on it.

There will be drinks and chips, but I'm not sure if they're charging at the door. I kind of hope not, but I'm going either way. If I find out the details on that one, I'll update this post.

DGM is in Plano. The actual address is 930 West Parker Road, Suite 530, but that's probably not much help unless you can GPS and drive at the same time. So instead, here's a link with a map:

http://dallasgamesmarathon.com/location

The thing kicks off at 3 in the afternoon on Sunday. If you can't make this one, don't sweat it. There's another one a week later at Truman Middle School in Grand Prairie. Like I said, Duff had lots of friends. I'll probably go to that one, too.

OK, so there are some facts, so you can plan your weekend. Once I get more info, I'll update this page. And allow me to be profusely apologetic to anyone reading this from a location outside North Texas, because I know you could not care less about a memorial thing I'm doing this weekend.

Oh, one last thing. If any of you decides to have a wake for me after I die - and I'm not saying you have to, I'm just saying if you do - have it at a bar. I like games, but I also like bars. You don't have to bring strippers, but they would make it more awesome. Your call.

My friend Duff died last night.

The first time I met Greg Duff, he left a hell of an impression. He was large as life and twice as dopey. He was six foot plus and full of muscle, wearing a Hawaiian shirt open to his belly so you could see his shoe-leather skin and curly white chest hair. Fifty-some-odd years old then, his hair was all gone gray, and he had the most ridiculous inch-long ducktail in the back of his hair. He looked like he thought he was an older version of Magnum PI. And he loved playing games.

Lots of gamers go through life a little smaller than other people. We participate, but we're not as willing to be noticed. We know we're the fringe, and for many of us, that makes us wary. But not Duff.

Duff was loud to the point of being obnoxious. He had the manners of an ox, and I don't know how many times I had to wipe up food that had flown out of his mouth when he started laughing after rolling particularly well - or particularly poorly. He never noticed, of course. He was busy laughing and being obnoxious.

I've never known anyone who got as much out of playing a game as my friend Duff. He was all in, all the time. I played games with Duff two days before he died, and even as the pulmonary fibrosis that finally kicked his ass was sucking all the oxygen out of his lungs, he was living and dying on every die roll. We kept having to take breaks so he could check his oxygen levels, because he was so excited about every naval battle that he kept hyperventilating. We're lucky he didn't die right there, come to think of it.

Another funny thing about Duff was the crazy shit he used to say. He never introduced himself as Greg. It was always Duff. He insisted on it. And that was good, because he also referred to himself in the third person a lot. If you came at him, he would stomp a mudhole in you, and tell you that you asked for it because you came to see The Duff. That saying - 'came to see The Duff' - is going to have to be retired now. It just doesn't work with anyone else.

Duff was tougher than a bag full of nails in a steel box, but he also had a heart that was too big for his own good. I don't remember how many times he would leave our game days early to go build a chicken coop for his ex-wife, or drive his grown daughters to the mall so they didn't have to use their own gas. He looked out for the people he loved, and since his compassion was married to a lack of common sense, he pretty much loved everybody.

You could see how big Duff's heart was when you considered what he did for a living. Duff worked at a high school, teaching mentally disabled kids. That's not a job I would do in a million years, because I don't have enough compassion for it. But Duff never quit giving whatever he had to help whoever needed it, and if there was a job that summed up Duff, it was looking after those often-ungrateful, routinely violent, troubled kids. He could take one down if he had to - he did it more than once - but they were never hurt in the process. Duff, on the other hand, was always getting bruised and beat up.

But he never let up. Duff was a bad-ass son of a bitch. Two days before he died, he was still talking about all the stuff he was going to do to keep fighting. He had me check out the sign he had made, the one that said he and God were going to put the kibosh on his disease. His room was decorated with posters of Patton and John Wayne and the Terminator, because if there was a ever a man who was over the top about being a man, it was my friend Duff.

Last night Duff just expired in his sleep. He went to bed and never woke up. If I had to pick how Duff went out, that's the second way I would have picked. The first way was never practical - he should have gone out swinging a giant axe, yelling battle cries at the top of his lungs, the blood of his enemies spattering his beard (he didn't have a beard, but he should have). He would have killed a mountain of lesser men before he went down, and if there was a hot woman to impress in the process, he would have killed another dozen, just to show off.

I'm going to miss the shit out of Duff. I loved that goofy bastard. He was inappropriate and ill-mannered, but I've never known anyone like him, and I doubt I ever will again. He had a tough life, but he never backed down and he never gave up. He was a giant of a man, body and soul, and now that I think back on it, I cherish every stupid minute I ever spent with that giant jackass.

Somewhere in Valhalla, Duff is arm-wrestling some Viking asshole out of his beer, running off with the women, and playfully daring some douchebag warrior to try and beat him at some ridiculous contest. And that warrior is going to get his ass kicked.

Because he came to see The Duff.

RIP, you big lug.

If we ever needed evidence that the Oscars are a load of crap, we have it now. A movie about a fake movie runs off with the awards, and Battleship never even got nominated.

Of course, it might be that Battleship was not nominated because it was simply dreadful. Perhaps it could have been helped a little if it had been joined by that Hunger Games chick, but I doubt it. The best way Battleship could have been improved is if someone found the original hard drive on which the movie was stored, and lit it on fire.

The plot of Battleship is pretty straightforward - we are invaded by aliens, who try to send a message home to their planet to send more spaceships, and the US Navy fights them off. And in the end, they use a battleship. It actually would have been kind of lame if they had not used a battleship, but because the Navy doesn't use battleships any more, they had to drag the USS Missouri out of retirement. Otherwise the movie would have been called Aircraft Carrier, and that is a dumb name for a movie. Actually, come to think of it, Battleship is also a dumb name for a movie.

Along the way, we get to see filmmakers doing things so stupid that only a drooling ignoramus would find them palatable. Anyone who has any experience with, well, anything, would find huge pieces of idiocy that should have shamed the creators of this ridiculous movie into scrapping the entire script and just making soft porn.

For example, at the beginning of the film, the main character (who starts out a real loser) breaks into a convenience store through the ceiling, steals stuff, causes considerable property damage, and then breaks back out again. The police catch up to him easily, and hit him with the tazer.

And in the next scene he's at his brother's house.

I admit to a degree of ignorance with respect to legal statutes, but I'm pretty sure breaking & entering, burglary, vandalism, and evading arrest are heavy enough that there would be a felony in there somewhere. And you don't get to go home before your hangover wears off if you have committed a felony. But it gets even better, because in the scene after that, the same criminally stupid asshole is now a Naval officer. And not just any officer, he's a Lieutenant. In the Navy, that takes a while. Also, they don't let convicted felons just become officers because their brothers say that would be cool.

But let's assume that some grievous oversight has allowed a slack jackass with a propensity for criminal mischief to become the officer in charge of the weapons room on a huge Naval vessel. And then let's pretend a giant spaceship flies into the ocean and just floats there, so the Navy sends three people out on a boarding party mission. I still find it difficult to believe that instead of Marines (you know, the fighting guys they put on Naval vessels to do stuff like, say, boarding parties), they would send the officer in charge of the weapons room and the chick who fires the Tomahawk missiles using a computer. But I suppose it was necessary to use that crew, because one of them was the star of the movie, and the other was Rihanna (she was taking a break from letting Chris Brown beat the crap out of her).

I could continue - all the other officers aboard die, and a lieutenant junior grade is suddenly the highest-ranking officer on the ship. The USS Missouri, after having been entirely retired and turned into a museum, sails great and has working shells on board. The tsunami detection system can be used to turn the entire area into a grid, so they can fire attacks by calling out letter and number coordinate after their radar quits working. The number of stupid things was so enormous, it almost overshadowed the biggest problem - the fact that the aliens had to call home if they wanted to invade.

Seriously, the entire movie hinges on the fact that the aliens have to be able to call home if they want to invade the planet, and so our heroes have to stop them. As if this starfaring race was capable of traveling hundreds of light years in the matter of a few weeks, but they weren't allowed to start any fights until they called their mothers for permission.

I will concede that the people doing the effects for the alien ships were capable. The aliens themselves were just humans with spiky beards and lizard eyes, but the ships were bitchin.' Not their weapons - they relied primarily on firing giant soup cans and sparkly yo-yos - but the designs of the ships themselves were nifty. It was a little stupid that they could fly all the way across the galaxy, but once they landed, they turned into boats that could only maneuver by jumping around like frogs on a hot plate. But they looked cool.

It seems pretty obvious to me that Liam Neeson's career has taken a downturn in recent years. Twenty years ago, he was making Schindler's List. Now he's in this utterly irredeemable turd of a movie designed solely to help Hasbro sell a boring kids' game. Alexander Skaarsgard I get - his biggest role to date has been as a hunky vampire on HBO. And Rihanna - sure, she needed something else to do besides be a horrible role model for young girls everywhere. But Liam Neeson has done things! He was in Taken, and Batman, and A-Team! OK, that last one was a bad example.

If you're looking for a movie so bad that you wish you could reclaim the last 132 minutes, you should definitely check out Battleship. It will completely ruin two hours of your life, unless you really like to do that MST3K running commentary bit where you mock everything about a movie while you watch it. For anyone who actually wants to enjoy what they watch, you need to avoid Battleship at all costs. Seriously, even if it's free.