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        Arimaa >> Arimaa Buzz >> Mensa Judges view of Arimaa
        
(Message started by: omar on Dec 6^th, 2010, 2:42pm)

Title: Mensa Judges view of Arimaa
Post by omar on Dec 6^th, 2010, 2:42pm

Although Arimaa didn't win the Mensa Select Game award, it's quite flattering what some of the Judges thought about it.

Shortly after the judging event was over I had received this private message:

Quote:

You might be interested to know that I heard many positive comments about Arimaa at the Mensa Mind Games competition in San Diego in April. I'm the Chief Judge for that event and was able to introduce a couple people to it over the course of the weekend. A few even rated it as their top game. I think most people realized that it was far too deep to fully understand in just one or two plays.

Recently another judge has posted his reviews of all the games in the contest. Here's what he said:

Quote:

I first heard of this game years ago, and was very surprised and gratified to see that a middleweight publisher has decided to take the risk of putting out a commercial version of it.

I think this is very much the sort of game that non-Mensans expect to win "Mensa Select": it's cerebral, well-balanced, easy to learn and hard to master. What non-Mensans don't realize is that the judging pool for Mensa Select doesn't weight those attributes as highly as you might think; "fun" is perhaps even more important. (In other words, having intelligence is not the same as enjoying the use of said intelligence.) People asked me several times at the event what I thought would win. My response regarding Arimaa was that "I feel it deserves to win, and I voted for it, but I don't think I would be willing to bet on it winning. It will make Mensans look stupid if it doesn't win, though, because among all the games submitted, this one is the most likely to still be around in 1000 years."

http://www.ofb.net/~whuang/gp/mmg2010/index.cgi?sort=ranking&game=ari

Title: Re: Mensa Judges view of Arimaa
Post by rbarreira on Dec 7^th, 2010, 4:24pm

Nice! But I wonder how Arimaa would score with a group of high-IQ people who actually achieved anything else than joining a high-IQ club :P

Title: Re: Mensa Judges view of Arimaa
Post by Fritzlein on Dec 7^th, 2010, 8:25pm

Mensa has debased the "Mensa Select" seal by awarding it to some very weak games over the years. As I understand it, Mensa decided to trade on the power of their name to get game publishers to give them entry fees and free games. Those entry fees and free games allow Mensa to throw a nice annual party for their gaming members. The annual gaming party was designed for the enjoyment of Mensa members, not for the purpose of distinguishing good games from bad games to any meaningful degree.

I doubt there will ever be the will inside Mensa necessary to make their seal of approval on games into something valuable. Even though "Mensa Select" is a laughingstock among hard-core boardgamers, there will always be a large segment of the population who knows little about games and is willing to believe that a game must be good because the smart-people club approved of it. Trading on customer ignorance is sometimes more profitable than trading on vendor excellence, and I am afraid that this is one of those situations. :'(

The Spiel des Jahres award, in contrast, has consistently gone to excellent games throughout the years. It is awarded by people who take it as a serious calling to be game critics, including (for example) playing a game more than twice before pronouncing judgement on it. Unfortunately, the Spiel des Jahres is an explicitly German award, so Arimaa will not be eligible for consideration for it until a German-language version of Arimaa is published, which may never happen.

Title: Re: Mensa Judges view of Arimaa
Post by megajester on Dec 8^th, 2010, 4:22pm

on 12/07/10 at 20:25:16, Fritzlein wrote:

Unfortunately, the Spiel des Jahres is an explicitly German award, so Arimaa will not be eligible for consideration for it until a German-language version of Arimaa is published, which may never happen.

Oh I dunno, there are after all more German grandmasters than in any other nation bar Russia. "Das Arimaaspiel" anyone? :)

I'd say we've got the best of both worlds. The smart people club said nice things about Arimaa without giving it their "award" (read kiss of death). Joe Bloggs is impressed while hard-core gamers' laugh-spittle is averted. Win!

Title: Re: Mensa Judges view of Arimaa
Post by Fritzlein on Dec 8^th, 2010, 5:16pm

You make a good point that Arimaa has very positive buzz in its own way. In some sense it is for the best that Arimaa is gaining traction as a game that could endure for generations rather than as a hot new fad. That perception makes a boom-bust cycle less likely, and tends to attract the sort of people who will like Arimaa anyway, as in this review (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/584590/arimaa-a-reluctant-review), rather than attracting people with short attention spans who would think Arimaa is boring and badmouth it. We don't have a movie star endorsement, but in some sense a movie star endorsement is a bad thing. As long as we can avoid a boom, there might never be a bust, just slow and steady growth indefinitely.