Cynical Boardgame About Archaeology : Aardvarchaeology

Image via WikipediaCynical Boardgame About Archaeology : Aardvarchaeology

From Martin Rundkvist's translation of a portion of the Swedish rule book:

The players travel as archaeologists through Europe to gather needful knowledge for their fieldwork expeditions. With the aid of assistants, the players must get hold of equipment and services for the expedition. Thus equipped, the players travel to Egypt, Crete or Mesopotamia to dig for treasure, which will garner them fame and improve their reputation in the form of Victory Points. Players who can arrange exhibitions and attend conferences will improve their reputation (Victory Points). But all of this costs time, and time of course a scarce resource. The one who plans his excavations and exhibitions best will earn the most Victory Points and win the game.

Oh yeah, we're gonna need this one. I think if one of our group of friends acquires it, I may have to live blog the game play.

The comments on the post are cracking me up too, because I am a snarky bitch. Especially:

As my husband likes to say: archaeology is just a bunch of really smart people digging in the dirt.

Apparently, he's worked with different people than we have. I said "I think there are some unnecessary adjectives there." Tom remarked that he's not sure he'd even go so far as to classify them all as "people."  (In reality, the majority of people I've worked with have been delightful, the exceptions however, have been spectacular.)

Also, I think for added verisimilitude the game really needs pointless bickering, back-stabbing, insane feuds and random nutbaggery from academic departments and funding agencies.
There needs to be weird, possibly adulterous relationship drama as well.  And crazy power trips.