A new game in the Azul family is now available from Next Move Games. It's Azul: Summer Pavilion and it sees players looking to decorate the titular Summer Pavilion with gorgeous tilework. Draft the ti
A new game in the Azul family is now available from Next Move Games. It's Azul: Summer Pavilion and it sees players looking to decorate the titular Summer Pavilion with gorgeous tilework. Draft the tiles you want to add to your pattern. Get the most complete works and score big points. You can pick up your copy now (wherever you might be able to find it, that is. It's selling out fast everywhere).
From the website:
In Azul: Summer Pavilion players are tasked to tile the floors of King Manual’s Summer Pavilion – a building intended to honor prestigious members of Portugal’s royal family. Fans will immediately recognize the core Azul style drafting but will be intrigued by the new scoring mechanisms based on set collection and pattern building. Players will also appreciate the new style tiles found in the box – elongated diamonds and stunning player and scoring boards. Azul: Summer Pavilion is a feast for the mind and eyes!
Designed by the world famous, Michael Kiesling and illustrated by acclaimed artist, Chris Quilliams, Azul: Summer Pavilion invites fans of the Azul to return to Portugal. Azul: Summer Pavilion was designed for artisans aged 8 and older. While building the Summer Pavilion would have taken years to do, a game of Azul: Summer Pavilion typically takes about 30 – 45 minutes.
It's Saturday once more. I just knew it would show back up eventually.I'm currently playing D&D, and you can watch if you want.But I know what you all really are here for are those reviews I know you
It's Saturday once more. I just knew it would show back up eventually. I'm currently playing D&D, and you can watch if you want. But I know what you all really are here for are those reviews I know you so desperately desire. So let's not keep you waiting any longer.
Today we have: Potion Explosion: The Fifth Ingredient, Miremarsh, Ambar, Shaky Manor, Nut So Fast, Jetpack Joyride, Tiny Trees, Azul, and Rise to Nobility.
theMCGuiRE review takes a look at Potion Explosion's brand new expansion, The Fifth Ingredient! Its out at retail and you can already pick this one up. Its a definite buy, if you are a fan of Potion Explosion. This expansion adds a few more mechanics to the base game and a brand new ghostly white marble that can take the color of any other marble in the game! Pair that with new professor abilities and you have tons of possibilities now to make the most potions for the win!
Next to card drafting games, one of my favorite genres has to be dexterity games. I think I love not only the skill involved, but how unique the game play is. Even ones that share mechanics can stand out on their own and providing a completely new and entertaining experience.
Shaky Manor (formally known as the KDJ nominated Panic Mansion) is a dexterity game that will have you shaking a board to try and move random pieces around. Sounds easy enough right? Let’s find out.
You’ll need fast reactions and quick counting skills to play this nutty reaction game from Smirk & Laughter Games. Nut So Fast will test your pattern recognition skills as well as your dexterity. Grab the matching wooden nut tokens or be the first to strike a nutty pose to be crowned the Nut So Fast Champion.
Nut So Fast is a dexterity game for 3-6 players that lasts about 20 minutes. It plays best with 4 players.
There are a lot of things that can attract someone to a certain board game. Theme, artwork, mechanics, or any combination of those things. Many games boil down to gathering resources and fulfilling orders to score points. Ambar uses a lot of familiar formulas, but each with a bit of a unique spin, on top of a medieval-fantasy theme that is brought to life with wonderful artwork.
Players compete to collect precious amber from dangerous forests and use it to create attractive jewelry for the nearby towns. The gameplay uses a press your luck mechanism along with card play and engine building. Ambar plays 2-4 players in about an hour.
Jetpack Joyride was first released as an iOS video game in 2011 by Halfbrick Studios following their hit game, Fruit Ninja. Jetpack Joyride is a side-scrolling, endless runner game in which you are traveling through a laboratory using a stolen bullet-powered jetpack. In this fast-paced video game, you are trying to travel as far as possible through the lab, collect coins, avoid obstacles and hazards, and complete missions. Lucky Duck Games is attempting to capture the same energy and tension of the award-winning digital game and transform it into a tabletop experience with the Jetpack Joyride board game. Have they succeeded in capturing the original spirit? Continue reading to find out.
The Demigod of Trees has fallen. Seduced by Maion, the God of Decay, and his promises of power, he has been cast out in disgrace. Now Fisaven, the God of Growth, is looking to fill in the recently vacated position. And he thinks that YOU could be the one. Now it’s time to prove you’re worthy.
Azul is an abstract game for two to four players. Players are trying to collect sets of tiles to fill in empty spots in their mosaics without collecting too much waste. The player with the most points is the winner.
There are things in life that are perfectly understandable. Things like buying German cars because they’re well made and can go round corners; wearing a crash helmet when riding a motorbike; sacking work off to go to the pub and drink in the beer garden because it’s a nice day or avoiding old people on the pavement as they dawdle and you’ve got places to be. There are also things that make less sense. Like Brexit or Donald Trump.
I feel that the subject of this review falls into the latter category, although purely in name alone. Rise to Nobility for me conjures images in my mind of a pleb trying to become more than they are. Earning money, working hard and gaining a title. A bit like Heath Ledger in A Knight’s Tale. What doesn’t spring to mind on hearing the title, is the strife involved to become the next Town Clerk to manage the organisation of inhabitants in a new city in the Five Realms and succeed a particularly bungling, but delightful old chap called Berk. Perhaps “Rise to Administration” would be more appropriate.
But, like a drunk trying remain focussed on explaining the finer points of Quantum Theory, I digress.
It's the weekend! Wooooo! Partaaaaaaaaaay!And by "Party," I mean gaming!Working on getting this Review Roundup and then gonna head out to the LGS to play some Guild Ball.Today we've got: Tiny Epic Que
It's the weekend! Wooooo! Partaaaaaaaaaay! And by "Party," I mean gaming! Working on getting this Review Roundup and then gonna head out to the LGS to play some Guild Ball.
Today we've got: Tiny Epic Quest, Sagrada, Azul, InBetween, BONK, Stop Thief!, Agility, Cast the Ritual, Fog of Love, H.I.D.E., First Class: All Aboard the Orient Express, and Go Nuts for Donuts.
In this video I will teach you how to play Sagrada including: Setup, Player turns, end game conditions, and scoring. I will also give you my thoughts and opinions on the game, and would love to hear yours.
HUGE RULES MISTAKE! CONFLATED TWO RULES TOGETHER! TAKE THIS VIDEO WITH A GRAIN OF SALT! Drive Thru Azul (and review) Intro (00:00); gameplay (00:57); final thoughts and review (34:40)
I can firmly say that I am a massive fan of Stranger Things, the Netflix television series that mixed 80s movies, Dungeons & Dragons and a smidgeon of Cthulhu. What is there not to like? Which is why I was very excited about the new little game form Board&Dice, InBetween. For starters it’s Stranger Things the card game, and is certainly a lot better that that Eleven egg waffles nonsense that was recently announced. Secondly the game was designed by Adam Kwapi?ski, and although he may not yet be a household name, I think he is always one to watch.
From the people who brought us KLASK, we now have another wooden, capitalized game in the form of BONK. Opponents sit on opposite sides of the board in either a 1 vs. 1 or 2 vs. 2 configuration. The goal is to try and get the ball in the opposing team’s scoring area.
Each player is assigned a chute and is given three metal bearings to start the game. Each round starts with a simultaneous high five between all players, after which play immediately begins. You attempt to the knock the ball into the scoring area by dropping a bearing down the chute and knocking the ball around. Once a point is scored, the ball is placed back in the middle and a new round begins. Play continues until one side scores 5 points and is the winner.
Stop Thief! is an app-driven hand management deduction game for two to four players. Players are private investigators trying to catch crooks in order to make enough money to retire. The first player to reach the winning money threshold wins.
Agility is basically a race game, although there are (sort of) two races going on simultaneously. The first race is to adopt the best dogs that can most easily clear the obstacle courses available in the game. The second race is to be the first to get those dogs through your chosen courses. In order to accomplish these goals, you’ll be playing cards, taking the resultant actions, and collecting dog treats which allow you to adopt dogs and complete obstacles.
Turns are fairly simple. First, you’ll play one of the training cards from your hand. These cards have both numbers and two kinds/quantities of dog treats on them. The number indicates how many spaces to move the marker around the action rondel. You will take the action on which the marker lands.
As rival wizards, players will be managing a set of cards in their Lab (their hand of cards) that will hopefully contain ingredients needed to power the ritual. Each round of the game is one ritual and three rituals will complete a game. Players who complete a ritual first will get the most points for the round.
The two players in Fog of Love are in a relationship. The game story plays out a romantic comedy through which those characters develop and collide, with the hope that they meet their destiny at the end. However, that’s not really the point.
The setup requires that each player construct a character from a variety of Trait, Feature, and Occupation choices. These form the foundation of the roleplaying for each player-character. There are no hard and fast rules to the roleplaying, but without this, much of the other parts of the game will operate mechanically.
The first part of every round has players selecting a die at random from a black bag and placing it secretly behind their screen. They choose a die face that represents one of the four targets for their mission: satellite, power plant, submarine, or army base. The value of these missions is determined by a display of random intel cards. Every player also receives a Rank card which will later help players win the game.
First Class places players in the roles of rail barons building out trains as they compete for prestige. Players will expand their trains and upgrade train cars, as well as possibly gain points for extending the reach of their trains. The player with the most victory points from a variety of sources wins.
Included in the game are five card modules. By combining two of these modules, players can have different experiences each time they play. The basics of play are all the same, but the way each module works can change scoring opportunities as well as limitations.
The goal in Go Nuts for Donuts is to earn the most points over the course of the game. Each round, a number of cards are dealt face up onto the table (players +1). Each player then secretly selects a card they want. After revealing their choices, any player who was the only person to choose a specific donut collects that card into their score pile. If one or more players chose the same donut card, it’s discarded and no one gets it. A new round begins by filling the holes left in the line of donuts.
After all the donuts have been collected or discarded, the game ends and the player with the most points wins.
It's Saturday. I'm hanging out in the bear's den here. LGS has a huge tourney going on, so I'm just gonna hang out here. So it's me, John Mulaney, and typing up the Review Roundup. Literally Netflix a
It's Saturday. I'm hanging out in the bear's den here. LGS has a huge tourney going on, so I'm just gonna hang out here. So it's me, John Mulaney, and typing up the Review Roundup. Literally Netflix and chill (no innuendo). Everyone needs just some relaxed days occasionally. Anyway, as for the reviews...
Today we have: Deep-Cut Studios Print-O-Mat Service, Monster Lands, Clans of Caledonia, Hoyuk, Renown, AssassinCon, Azul, Charterstone, Great Scott!, Escape from 100 Million B.C., Through the Ages: A New Story of Civilization iOS, Epic Monster Tea Party, Mortals, The Godfather: Corleone's Empire, and Valley of the Alchemists.
Over the last couple of year, game mats have become have become a common accessory for players of all sorts of tabletop games, be it Miniatures Games, Boardgames, Card Games or Role Playing Games, with neoprene backed mats (mousepad material) seen as the premium product choice.
Up until now, these mats have primarily been available as an out-of-the-box product with a fixed format – whether it be a terrain mat for wargaming, marked out pitch for a tabletop sports game or a cool picture for your card mat. Custom printed gaming mats were also seen as premium add-ons for many miniature-related kickstarter projects.
Deep Cut Studio have just launched a new service for printing custom gaming mats – Print-O-Mat.
Monster Lands is a bit of a tease. Its cartoon artwork and cutesy graphic design are nothing but a honey trap, luring you in with the promise of a cute game for all the family but you will soon come to realise that Monster Lands is a meaty grown up game of resource placement and second guessing your opponent. However, even that veneer is misleading because behind Monster Land's euro game appearance is a game where the roll of a die can change everything.
In Monster Lands you must hire a group of mighty warriors to defeat fearsome monsters and conquer lands in the quest for glory and reputation. I'm not going to try and explain every rule and mechanic for Monster Lands, because believe me when I say there is a lot going on in this board game.
Clans of Caledonia is a Euro in the purest form. There’s no dice, little randomness and it’s all strategy. Your task is straightforward – sell your clan’s goods overseas for money and imported goods in order to score points to win the game. Of course, Clans isn’t that simple and there’s a myriad of other aspects to the game to earn its classification of medium euro. It’s certainly nowhere near as hefty as Ave Roma, but there’s more to it than Cavern Tavern. But Clans isn’t a worker placement – it’s actually an economic game with a couple of other elements chucked in.
Hoyuk is a tile placement area majority game for two to five players. Players are leaders of ancient clans trying to be the most remembered tribe. The player with the most points wins.
Renown: The Game hopes to revive one such treasure. It is a reskin of Schnapsen, a once ubiquitous, primarily 2-player game in Austria that has fallen from its glory days. Renown: The Game implements a small tweak that ends up making a big difference, adds some play options reminiscent of contracts found in many other trick-taking titles and modernizes the classic with action cards.
At its core, Renown: The Game is a point trick-taking game with trumps. The main difference in play between it and its inspiration is that Schnapsen does not require players to follow suit until the stock (draw deck) closes or is empty. In Renown: The Game you must follow the lead card’s suit or play trump if otherwise unable to. If you have neither, then you may discard any card to the trick. The highest trump, or the highest card of the led suit, wins the trick and the winner leads to the next.
At the beginning of each round, players will get a random colored deck filled with A, B, and C movement cards and will determine which color assassin they will be playing this round. Players will then pass their target cards to the person on their right or left, and the round can begin.
Each turn of the game will have three phases that players will complete simultaneously. First, players will select a card from their deck for their movement that turn. If you are playing with any dummy players, add a card from their deck as well. The movement cards for this round will be shuffled to hide players’ identities. Players will resolve all movement for the six assassins on the board and then move to the elimination phase.
Azul is played over 5 or more rounds. Players will alternate turns taking tiles from one of the available factories or from the center pile. The number of factories scales with the number of players and each factory is populated with four azulejos tiles at the beginning of the round.
As this is a legacy style game, I’m only going to give you a brief overview of the rules for the first game (You can download a PDF here if you want more info). Any additional rules will be up to you to discover. The rulebook has space for 29 rule boxes, but you only begin with about half of those in play.
Charterstone is a worker placement game where the goal is to earn the most points each game, with a campaign winner being declared after the 12th game. Each player takes charge of one 6-plot charter in a shared village.
The goal of Great Scott! is to amass the most points at the end of 3 rounds.
Each player will start with 6 Commendation cards. Players will then setup the 3 Concept Decks and split the Asset Deck into 2 piles. Players will select 2 cards from each Concept and Asset Deck, starting with 10 total cards.
Escape from 100 Million B.C. is a cooperative thematic adventure game for 1-4 players. It plays best with 3 players and for that player count it takes about 90 minutes.
Through the Ages is a civilization-building game where players develop resources and technology, starting in Antiquity and going right up through the modern age. You can send your population to work, helping increase your production in food, resources, science and culture. While you do this, you must keep your happiness up to not incite a revolt. You must also maintain a strong enough military to combat other players.
theMCGuiRE review takes a look at Epic Monster Tea Party a brand new game from Playco Games and currently on Kickstarter. In this game you play 1 of the 4 included monsters and drink hero's in your cup of tea or smash them and take advantage of their unique abilities. So be careful to drink your hero's when best positioned to or loose them in a spill!
theMCGuiRE review takes a look at Mortals Decent of the gods a new game coming to kickstarter from Partial Arc, pretty much now! This is a fun simple title that has great character design, funny real world items, doom clock, big bad guy at the end and all the minions and monsters along the way! You are trying to close all the seals before the round counter runs out or you will have to fight an ultimate evil. What I like about this title is the tactical decisions you have to make each turn and you really have to think it out or you will get overrun. It scales nicely with the board management aspect and battles are not as easy as they may look sometimes. Its also difficult sometimes to keep everyone alive until that final battle (unless you can close all the seals)!
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