My first game was never finished, at least it ended in an agreed tie.
Basically the Axis controlled the entire Eurasian landmass, the Allies the oceans; and nobody had any idea how to break the stalemate.
Great thread.
I saw the game the first in a toy store. And spent hours in the next few weeks just to stare at the box pictures and figueres. Eventually I bought the game in a book store, but was disappointed that the rules were only in English and the figures less detailed than on the pictures. I was probably around 15 years old and English is not my mother tounge.
Soon I played my first game with a friend. But I’d had the advantage of studying the rules, the game’s goals and map more than him, so it was not all that fair for him. We had hardly understood all the rules, especially I remember we struggled with the rules regulating submarines. We understood the Suez Canal, but in the start we believed an allied party had to control Gibraltar in order to let friendly vessels pass from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic and vice versa. We had no idea what strategies we should use. No one dared to attack on the Eastern front, because of the vast number of forces we eventuelly put there. Most of the fighting took place in Africa and other places far away. We built and dispatched expeditionary forces that would conquer / liberate Brazil, Madegaskar, Australia etc over and over again. My buddy was the Axis powers, and at one point he had more troops in Africa than in Europe. In a moment of clear vision, I took a chance and invaded Germany. He was stunned and lacked enough forces to liberate Germany afterwards. Instead he decided to defend Japan to the last man, and bought only armor to ble placed in Japan for the rest of the game. Both of us were now hooked on A&A and he bought a game for himself next week. He defeated me some games later, and we have defeated each other over and over again after that.
Some of the best moments were when we had 4-5 players. Great atmosphere, loud cheararing, laughing… The Allied players sang “Rule Britannia” at the top of their lungs when the UK player was rolling dice in crucial battles. The Axis players knelt and prayed loudly to God, if He really existed He had to let Germany win World War II. Only for fun of course, and mighty fun it was!
Nice post Herr KaLeunt; enjoyed the read.
I used to look forward to the weekly games at university at the Games Club. More often than not there were more than 5 wanting to play, so I would have to watch and dream of conquests(German ones of course).
@Herr:
The Axis players knelt and prayed loudly to God, if He really existed He had to let Germany win World War II. Only for fun of course, and mighty fun it was!
Early in the movie The Longest Day, there’s a scene in which Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Vandervoort, while talking with a fellow American, mutters to himself “Sometimes I wonder which side God’s on.” Later in the film, Major General Gunther Blumentritt, while talking with a fellow German, wonders exactly the same thing.
I figured my first post should be here, since this game is what hooked me. My first game was in 6th grade when the whole grade had a gaming day, and by chance a group needed one more for their game of axis and allies. I remember being completely overwhelmed by the game, but completely hooked too. My best friend eventually bought the game, and I couldn’t try and count how many games we’ve played since. Our favorite thing was to just have a sleepover at someone’s house and play axis and allies all night. Somewhere down the line we played with someone who actually new the rules correctly, and it was like discovering the game all over again. I’ll always love this game. Too many good memories. On a side note my only copy of this game I found at a thrift store. Only 3 bucks and everything was there and in pretty good condition. By far the best thing I ever found at a thrift store. I couldn’t believe the luck. I think I was in shock when I saw it there on the shelf, though I immediately figured it was probably empty, or at best half full. My excitement must have been easily visible as I sat on the floor of the store carefully looking to see that everything was there. My friend for some reason never liked to bring up the fact that he spent 50 bucks for a game I found for only 3.
Sweet - thanks for sharing, Phleg
Agreed. Thank you for your story.
Dont remember my first ever Axis game, but if that counts, my first Global 1940. Some friends played that before, I came to one evening, curious and duly impressed by that beast of a map. I thought I play it safe and opted to take Germany (the bidding in this group is, say, unsophisticated … we still do it that way, of course), set up my pieces and swoop in with some planes to sink those lonely UK/French ships.
“I am going to scramble three fighters here, and one there”…hm, wtf, scrambling? Whats that?
“Oh, and I use my secret UK national advantage” (also something new to me, one of Ozteas ideas that I came to like later, but not exactly at this point)…hm, wtf, Enigma, you knew my ships were coming, retreated with all but one ship and now have a super stack in one sz?
So after I finish G1 I am conspicuously short of German air with not much to show for it. I proceeded with a bit more caution after that, surrendered rather meekly not exactly in a two-digit round and it took some more games before I got over my deep mislikening of Global :)
Back in 1997 ish i used to play on MSN game zone which featured 2nd edition. My name was Zarathustra and Latter Imperious Leader. My partner was some guy named SS oberfuhrer or true lefty, or a number of others. I beat all the other players and especially loved beating the guys who figured they were the best. I only played 4-5 player games because these were more fun. Loved playing the axis and we got a bid of about 5-6. As the Allies, i usually played Russia or USA.
I could count the number of lost games on my fingers. I won every game and played everynight until MSN decided to end it’s run of supporting AA.
I was 17 and my dad forced a cross country family road trip on us kids. I wanted to stay home with my girlfriend at the time. We went to Mall of America on the trip. I saw this game on the shelf of one of the 1,000 stores in that mall. My dad and I have always played Risk and I’ve always been super interested in WW2 so I was hooked BEFORE I even owned the game. I bought the game after 3 hours of walking around the mall and I couldn’t get my mind off it. I opened it at the hotel that night. No one wanted to play with me so I set it up and play vs. myself. Only thing I remember of how the game went was it was over when there was a Panzer in Soviet Far East. When I got home I started watching out for everything A&A related and bought every expansion I could find in a store. Revised came out and OMG there’s special pieces for every country!!!
First game, 1987. I had just been dropped from Navy Nuclear Power School. Another Sailor, also dropped, turned me on to the game. Just found this site today, maybe it will lead to me playing again.
If you’re not already, I suggest you look into playing A&A online - you can download the “TripleA” program and A&A maps for free
www.triplea.sourceforge.net
Look through the Software and Play Games sections of this site if interested
I had heard about the game and was interested immediately. When I was stationed in Germany, we played Risk and Diplomacy…. nothing like the strategy and tactics of A&A!
I played Germany, calculated that the Germans needed Weapons Development, and bought 5 chances at dice rolls for the first round of my first game. Then the unbelievable happened: I rolled 3 sixes and got 3 weapons Developments! Good memories.
Which 3?? :-)
Ha! That was a long time ago and I really can’t remember.
It was 1990, I was 18 years old… I moved to the big city of Toronto and my new friends were gamers who played Risk all the time. I quickly got bored of it and was looking for an alternative game I could introduce to them and I saw on the store shelf Axis & Allies from Milton Bradley “a game of high adventure” and “decide the fate of the world in just a few short hours” (lol). Unfortunately we were all pretty hammered by the end of the night and the only thing I remember of my first game was punching out all the plastic pieces from the plastic stencil racks and all the roundels from the cardboard sheets. it was an instant hit with the whole group and I played it with them religiously for up to 2 years until I moved back home to Peterborough. I brought my game with me and it wasn’t long before I hooked some old high school friends to it, and over the next 8 years I played Classic edition even more than I did before. After that in 2000, I moved back to Toronto where I discovered Spring 1942, then A&A Anniversary edition and finally Global 1940… ironically, I met someone from that first group from the early 90’s almost 20 years later, we accidentally bumped into each other online and we have been playing 1 on 1 1940 Global games every month for the past 5 years.
