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I have had several customers ask me
if I had ever played a game called Formula De, de
pronounced day. They had asked me because
they knew that I am a formula one racing
fan and Formula De is a French made formula one
racing game. Now I have played and modified
several racing games but had never encountered
Formula De. More frustrating than that was that I
asked several suppliers and they had not heard of
it either. I wondered to myself is this
game might be something only encountered at major
gaming conventions.
On one of the
recent open gaming nights at Norm's Hobby, John
Kenny, one of the semi regulars, brought in one
of the tracks and rules to Formula De. I
was able to play in the first of three games that
night. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and
would have played more but I wanted others to be
exposed to the game. I knew I was sold on
it.
The format of
the game is similar to Speed Circuit with a lot
less writing involved. The plotting for each turn
involves deciding which gear your racecar is
going to be in. Each gear is represented by
a die from 4 to 30 sides. The dice are not
standard 1-4 or 1-30 but have a variety of
numbers to represent different gear ratios.
So the 4 sider has only ones and twos to
represent first gear and the 30 sided die, 6th
gear, has 21 to 30 repeated on the 30 sides with
varied frequency. So you can not roll a one
in 6th gear.
To control
speed in the corners each corner is distinctly
marked with a red border and then beside it is a
little flag with a number, 1 or 2, to represent
how many times your racecar must end a turn in
that corner. This proved to be a very
effective way to control the cars and represent
the feel of a formula one race.
Two wonderful
things happened that night. Everyone who
played Formula De that night had a wonderful time
and there was much talk about playing
again. Even the possibility of running a
full season was discussed. The other great
thing that happened was that with the game in
front of me I was able to see who made it we are
now able to order it. In fact it should be
in the store by now. In fact when I ordered the
game I was able to find out that new dice are
currently being tested with differing frequencies
of the number spread on the die. This to
better represent different ratios of gears used
for a sixth gear in modern racecars.
See you at the
races, good luck, and great racing.
Norm
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