Written by: SuperUser Account
10/4/2008 9:30 AM

Event: IPA Battle of the Minds
Date / Time: Saturday, 4 October 2008, 1.30 pm - 6 pm.
Venue: Settler's Cafe, Singapore Management University
Photos: Click here!

Gaming away! By YOHANS GOZAL and MEGAWATI WIJAYA

Mention board games, and familiar, established names such as monopoly, or snakes and ladder (aka ular tangga) will immediately come to mind. But do you know that there are countless other exciting board games out there?

In an early afternoon of 4 October, twenty-five IPA friends and members gathered at Settler's Cafe, a cozy, spacious eatery located in the basement of Singapore's Management University's city campus on Bras Basah Road. Settler's Cafe is not an ordinary restaurant. As Singapore's first and only board games franchise chain, it boasts 400 board games in its collection to tempt and entertain customers. The people gathering there were not of ordinary crowd either; they were board games enthusiasts ready for a fun-filled afternoon challenging their brain cells and pitting their skills against each other!


Caption: The Settler's Cafe's youth-centric interior with its colorful wallpaper and cosy seating areas.

The participants were divided into tables of 6 players or more, and we all got to try the different board games available. No worries at all if you did not know how to play the games. Our friend, Yopi Hirawan, a self-confessed avid board games enthusiast, was kind enough to be our facilitator of the day. Knowing how to play more than 60 board games makes him the most sought-after individual that evening. If it was not because Settlers’s Café has been accomodative to reserve a private area for us to play, Yopi must have been mistaken by other gamers in the café as one of the staff.



The fun games played certainly prove to be a very effective ice-breaker. Strangers became friends as we all laughed and joked together. On one table that played the game Sitting Ducks for example, the players were required to shoot other players' ducks. The initial polite statement: "Sorry friend, I have got no choice. Gotta shoot your duck," was rephrased into: "Shoot the purple duck, shoot the purple duck!" as time passed by. There were some serious moments, as some preferred games which require brain cells.



But for many parts of the afternoon, laughter was the dominant, free-flowing theme. One table was playing Ca$h 'n Gun$. a game that requires the players to dare, bluff and negotiate their way to win the most money among all other players. Basically at the count of three, the player would point his gun to another player and try to get the other player to chicken out and give up his portion of the game cash on the table. If the player insists to keep playing then they would have to reveal the card they have chosen earlier to be compared to all other player and see who’s got the bigger card to claim the money on the table. It was fun and loud. While playing, IPA friends were also served with scrumptious finger food such as fries and chicken nuggets. Refreshing cool drinks such as ice lemon tea and coke were also available to rejuvenate the throats that have laughed out loudly for the whole afternoon.

By the end of the day each table managed to play in average four games in the given four hours' time. "Kudos to the organisers," said one of the participants, Ronny, a professional working in the insurance field. "But four hours are too short. I would prefer the session to be longer!" We hear you, our friend. We still have 396 more games to try and play. We foresee the gamers to make another trip down the Settler's Cafe one day soon!

(Photos by Ridwan Natakusuma Malaka. Ridwan is an IPA volunteer.)

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