Asmodee bringing a lot more to Switch than just Carcassonne

Originally published at: http://statelyplay.com/2018/09/14/asmodee-bringing-a-lot-more-to-switch-than-just-carcassonne/

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There was a “Nintendo Direct” last night and I’m a bit embarrassed to say that, until last night, I had no idea what a “Nintendo Direct” was. I still really don’t. I mean, I guess it’s when they announce a bunch of stuff, but I have no idea where or how I’d go about watching one. Luckily, I don’t care enough to learn, so it all evens out. This morning, however, Asmodee Digital sent me a press release about their Nintendo plans, and I guess I should maybe pay more attention to these Nintendo Direct things. We already knew they were bringing their version of Carcassonne to Switch at some point down the road. Turns out that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Apart from Carcassonne, Asmodee announced that they’re also bringing Lord of the Rings LCG, Pandemic, Catan, and Munchkin to the Switch. Carcassonne should arrive this holiday season while the others are slated for 2019.

Of course, we’re familiar with most of these digital titles from their Steam and/or mobile incarnations. Asmodee has released Carcassonne for Android with a shiny 3D interface (the iOS version is still developed by The Coding Monkeys), LotR LCG is currently in Early Access on Steam, Pandemic has been around since 2013 (and is still, unfortunately, very much expansion-less), and Catan has gone through, seemingly, a million different editions over the years before coming to rest in its latest version (from USM, not Asmodee) on Steam and mobile. The only one announced that we haven’t seen yet is Munchkin which, I’m sure, is garnering more yawns that yippees! from our readership. While I haven’t seen the finished version, that opinion may change.

The version of Munchkin we’ll be getting in digital form is not the take-that card game that everyone either loves or loathes. Instead, its a re-imagining of the game as a dungeon crawl or roguelike. It will still be card based, but what we saw at Gen Con sounded far more interesting than the physical card game.

We don’t have a lot more information on what to expect from the Switch versions, but I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that we’re not done hearing of more board games on the Switch. Asmodee’s port of Gloomhaven, for example, looks like it would be a perfect fit for the small screen. Guess we’ll have to wait for the next Nintendo Direct, whatever that is.

https://youtu.be/UsgE0QGZw4s