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More recently, ABBYY moved to a new office. It was certainly the biggest move in the entire history of the company, because the number of employees is growing every day. The process went very smoothly: on day X, all things were neatly packed in special boxes, which some ABBYY-people recruited up to 5 pieces. But at one of the jobs of the movers waiting for a surprise in the form of 30 such boxes.
They were carefully packed collection owned by my colleagues. And not all, but only a part, because the owners transported the most valuable copies themselves.
Meet Maxim Kalenkov ( mkal ), a programmer and co-owner of a collection of more than 300 board games. He will tell you what games are popular with our employees, when they have time to play them, and how this passion began.
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- How long have you been collecting all this? Do you remember how it all began? What game was bought first?
From 1.5 to 2.5 years. In my opinion, the initiators were our employees from among programmers Timur and Dima. Timur brought the "Colonizers", Dima - "Civilization", and then it went on ... At some point, they ordered the huge game "Twilight of the Empire", then I joined the players.
- Tell me where and how often do you play?
We meet every Saturday except holidays, because many leave. Usually we play in the dining room, it happens that in the negotiation room. Sit for 6-9 hours. Earlier, when they were going to be irregular, they did a newsletter, but now we write only if the meeting is canceled. Sometimes even over tea we have time to play some quick game.
- How long does each game take?
Well, the games are different. Now there is a tendency to reduce the time of the party. For example, Twilight Empire takes from 8 to 16 hours, and those games that are released recently have a format from 45 minutes to 1.5 hours per game.
- Mainly on the shelves of the game of foreign manufacturers. Why is this?
Several times I bought the games that we released under license, and always had some problems either with the bundle or with the quality of the translation. In addition, we publish very few games. Interesting things started to appear quite recently, and previously only the most popular ones were available: “Colonialists”, “Carcassonne”, “Cow 006”, “Monopoly” - these are classics with which everyone usually starts. As for some of their developments, they do not stand up to criticism in comparison with Western games.
- By what criterion you choose the game?
We prefer strategies, where the game is based on competition between players and you need to constantly make difficult decisions, calculate situations, make choices, sometimes bluff. The exact opposite is “Monopoly”. Everything is primitive in it. You throw a dice, you go, and you have practically no choice: either you buy something or you don't buy it. Very little depends on the players here, it is childish, in fact. For children's games, it is characteristic that almost everything depends on luck. This is done so that children can play with adults and not much to lose, so as not to lose interest in the game, because it is very important for them to win. And in adult games, almost everything depends on the players, there are games in which there is no chance at all. Actually, I almost did not meet such Russian games.
- Do you play corporate parties?
Here at the last celebration of March 8, we were asked to organize a small game library. Although usually do not play. A bit wrong format of the event. We prefer to play thoughtfully, in a relaxed atmosphere.
- Can you name your favorite games?
It is quite difficult. Tastes change: every month or two there is a new game that becomes favorite for a while. In principle, when such a large collection is difficult to choose, there are many genres, and in each there is a game that you like more than others, and games of different genres cannot be compared at all. Here is the Twilight of the Empire - a large-scale epic game in which there is almost everything, but it is very long. Or “Roboralli” is very fun, and we like that it is about programming.
- Are all the games easy to get or are there any rare ones?
Games that have been published in the past 10 years, you can buy almost everything. There are three or four major publishers, they release 90% of all games and support their presence. But there are games that are very difficult to get. For example, games of the publishing house "Avalon Hill". After its ruin, they were reprinted only once, but at some point we managed to buy, because from old stocks they were sold for a very long time. And now once a month one copy appears on “Ebay” and it sells for 100-150 dollars. In Russia, only maniacs can buy them for such a price. Well, for example, from the rare ones we have the Nexus Ops, even two copies.
- Tell me, what game in your collection is the most expensive?
In general, the average price of a standard-sized game is from 1,500 to 2,500 rubles, if you take it with delivery from America. The dearest? It is hard to say. Recently, the publisher releases the game for $ 30, and then publishes it once a month for an expansion of 10, in the end, if you like the game, you buy all these extensions, and it costs 50-70 dollars. If you count one box without extensions, then the most expensive, it is probably Starcraft and Planet Steam - they cost about 3000-3500 rubles with delivery. We have a few games, which are five extensions, but I'm not ready to say now how much they cost. Usually, if a game costs more than $ 70, then we do not buy it, because these are some sort of collection editions that are of no particular interest. If the game is really good, then it will be published in large quantities, and it will cost less.
Natalya Varhacheva
ABBYY Russia
They were carefully packed collection owned by my colleagues. And not all, but only a part, because the owners transported the most valuable copies themselves.
Meet Maxim Kalenkov ( mkal ), a programmer and co-owner of a collection of more than 300 board games. He will tell you what games are popular with our employees, when they have time to play them, and how this passion began.
')
- How long have you been collecting all this? Do you remember how it all began? What game was bought first?
From 1.5 to 2.5 years. In my opinion, the initiators were our employees from among programmers Timur and Dima. Timur brought the "Colonizers", Dima - "Civilization", and then it went on ... At some point, they ordered the huge game "Twilight of the Empire", then I joined the players.
- Tell me where and how often do you play?
We meet every Saturday except holidays, because many leave. Usually we play in the dining room, it happens that in the negotiation room. Sit for 6-9 hours. Earlier, when they were going to be irregular, they did a newsletter, but now we write only if the meeting is canceled. Sometimes even over tea we have time to play some quick game.
- How long does each game take?
Well, the games are different. Now there is a tendency to reduce the time of the party. For example, Twilight Empire takes from 8 to 16 hours, and those games that are released recently have a format from 45 minutes to 1.5 hours per game.
- Mainly on the shelves of the game of foreign manufacturers. Why is this?
Several times I bought the games that we released under license, and always had some problems either with the bundle or with the quality of the translation. In addition, we publish very few games. Interesting things started to appear quite recently, and previously only the most popular ones were available: “Colonialists”, “Carcassonne”, “Cow 006”, “Monopoly” - these are classics with which everyone usually starts. As for some of their developments, they do not stand up to criticism in comparison with Western games.
- By what criterion you choose the game?
We prefer strategies, where the game is based on competition between players and you need to constantly make difficult decisions, calculate situations, make choices, sometimes bluff. The exact opposite is “Monopoly”. Everything is primitive in it. You throw a dice, you go, and you have practically no choice: either you buy something or you don't buy it. Very little depends on the players here, it is childish, in fact. For children's games, it is characteristic that almost everything depends on luck. This is done so that children can play with adults and not much to lose, so as not to lose interest in the game, because it is very important for them to win. And in adult games, almost everything depends on the players, there are games in which there is no chance at all. Actually, I almost did not meet such Russian games.
- Do you play corporate parties?
Here at the last celebration of March 8, we were asked to organize a small game library. Although usually do not play. A bit wrong format of the event. We prefer to play thoughtfully, in a relaxed atmosphere.
- Can you name your favorite games?
It is quite difficult. Tastes change: every month or two there is a new game that becomes favorite for a while. In principle, when such a large collection is difficult to choose, there are many genres, and in each there is a game that you like more than others, and games of different genres cannot be compared at all. Here is the Twilight of the Empire - a large-scale epic game in which there is almost everything, but it is very long. Or “Roboralli” is very fun, and we like that it is about programming.
- Are all the games easy to get or are there any rare ones?
Games that have been published in the past 10 years, you can buy almost everything. There are three or four major publishers, they release 90% of all games and support their presence. But there are games that are very difficult to get. For example, games of the publishing house "Avalon Hill". After its ruin, they were reprinted only once, but at some point we managed to buy, because from old stocks they were sold for a very long time. And now once a month one copy appears on “Ebay” and it sells for 100-150 dollars. In Russia, only maniacs can buy them for such a price. Well, for example, from the rare ones we have the Nexus Ops, even two copies.
- Tell me, what game in your collection is the most expensive?
In general, the average price of a standard-sized game is from 1,500 to 2,500 rubles, if you take it with delivery from America. The dearest? It is hard to say. Recently, the publisher releases the game for $ 30, and then publishes it once a month for an expansion of 10, in the end, if you like the game, you buy all these extensions, and it costs 50-70 dollars. If you count one box without extensions, then the most expensive, it is probably Starcraft and Planet Steam - they cost about 3000-3500 rubles with delivery. We have a few games, which are five extensions, but I'm not ready to say now how much they cost. Usually, if a game costs more than $ 70, then we do not buy it, because these are some sort of collection editions that are of no particular interest. If the game is really good, then it will be published in large quantities, and it will cost less.
Natalya Varhacheva
ABBYY Russia
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/93970/
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