Vengeance

Quite a lot of you are at Gen Con this weekend. But I know that you still want those reviews you so desperately desire. So let's not waste any words.

Today we have: MegaLand, Magic Maze, Vengeance, Mountains of Madness, Ghost Fightin' Treasure Hunters, Dark Souls, The Edge: Dawnfall, The Artemis Project, The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31, Neuroshima Hex, Senshi, Warhammer Champions, and Thunderstone Quest.



One Board Family:

MegaLand Review

We were beyond excited when we first learned that Red Raven Games had a video game inspired board game coming to Target stores nationwide. I’m a big fan of Ryan Laukat’s games and the worlds he creates are so much fun. So does this new world of MegaLand deserve a space on your game shelf? Let’s find out.

MegaLand is a pretty generic video game world that’s beautifully illustrated in the same style as Laukat’s other games like Above and Below or Near and Far. The goal is to be the first to reach 20 coins over the course of the game. Players will press their luck as they adventure to find treasure in the world. This treasure can be traded for buildings or health upgrades for your character.

Learn to Play:

Magic Maze Review

In this video I will teach you how to play including: components,Setup, player actions, and playing the game. I will also give you my thoughts and opinions on the game, and would love to hear yours.

Vengeance Review

In this video I will teach you how to play including: Components,setup, wronging phase, montage phase, combat phase, enemy activation, den clearing, and end game conditions. I will also give you my thoughts and opinions on the game, and would love to hear yours.

Mountains of Madness Review

In this video I will teach you how to play including: components,setup, player turn sequence, end game conditions. I will also give you my thoughts and opinions on the game, and would love to hear yours.

Ghost Fightin' Treasure Hunters Review

In this video I will teach you how to play including: components,setup, player turns, end game conditions, and the rogue ghost expansion. I will also give you my thoughts and opinions on the game, and would love to hear yours.

Dark Souls Card Game Review

In this video I will teach you how to play including: components, setup, enemy activation, player turn, and boss battle. I will also give you my thoughts and opinions on the game, and would love to hear yours.

theMCGuiRE review:

The Edge: Downfall Review

theMCGuiRE review takes a look at the brand new The Edge: Dawnfall board game and this thing is MASSIVE! It offers 3 modes of play: a competitive miniatures game, a fully cooperative multi-player campaign game and a solo campaign experience.

The Artemis Project Review

theMCGuiRE review takes a look at a preview of the brand new Grand Gamers Guild title: The Artemis Project. Here we are are colonizing one of Jupiter's moon's Europa. Love the theme on this one and the game play is smooth and strategic. You really get the feel of building out a colony on the planets moon and trying to survive its harsh conditions. The title offers dice, worker placement, and programming mechanics. Coming to kickstarter on Sept 12th 2018 - you don't want to miss out on this one!

Board Game Quest:

The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31 Review

In The Thing, most players will play a human who want to clear all three sectors of the outpost and then get on the helicopter to escape. Some player(s) will play an Imitation who want to move the Contagion Level up, destroy the outpost before it’s cleared, or to stow away on the helicopter. All roles are kept hidden until the end of the game.

Neuroshima Hex: Iron Gang Hexpuzzles Review

Neuroshima Hex is one of my favorite 2 player games. Although it has rules for 3 and 4 player battles, it really shines as a you-versus-me experience.

Today we are taking a look at the Neuroshima Hex Iron Gang Hexpuzzles. This expansion gives you solo puzzles to recreate the Neuroshima Hex magic even if there is no one else around to play with.

iSlaytheDragon:

Senshi Review

The ailing master is finally dying, and it’s up to his students to prove their worth in order to succeed him. But success isn’t easy. It’s not enough to develop one trait in isolation; you must achieve balance in the four great characteristics of Senshi:

Blue.

Yellow.

Red.

Green.

Can you dominate one trait while not neglecting the others?

Drive Thru Review:

Warhammer Champions Review

Intro (00:00); gameplay overview (01:28); final thoughts and review (14:14);

Board to Death TV:

Thunderstone Quest Board Game Video Review

Thunderstone returns with Thunderstone Quest. Recruit your heroes, arm your party, then visit the dungeon — and the dungeon has new perils not seen in prior Thunderstone releases. All-new dungeon tiles create new challenges and rewards as you explore deeper and deeper in the dungeon. Each quest brings new dungeons as well as new side adventures!

Thunderstone is a fantasy deck-building game. Each player starts with a basic deck of cards that they can use to purchase, or upgrade to, other, more powerful cards. Thunderstone Quest brings new play modes to the table. The game will tell a specific story with a series of pre-set dungeon tiles, monsters, heroes and support cards. Each will come with a series of mini-adventures and a story booklet that tells players what happens as they progress through the scenarios.

Saturdaaaaaay! It's the best day of the week (in my opinion). What cannot be accomplished with a day like today? Well, I know what can, going to do some gaming. I put together some Guild Ball minis for my friend last night. Today I'll go hang out and play some board games up at the library. But before I can head out there, I need to get you your reviews I know you so desperately desire.

Today we've got: I Am the Fourth Wall, Gravity Warfare, Gruff: Stuff of Nightmares, The Faceless, Lanterns: The Harvest Festival iOS, Vengeance, Clans of Caledonia, Harvest, Flamme Rouge: Peloton, Sakura, Fairy Tile, Pocket Mars, Lords of Hellas, Fog of Love, and Sarissa Precision 28mm Japan MDF Terrain.



theMCGuiRE review:

I Am the Fourth Wall Review

theMCGuiRE review takes a look at I Am The Fourth Wall by Slinky Gibbons Games. This card game follows a traditional Lovecraft theme and feel but offers a great player experience with technically 4 ways to play the game (I see them as grouped into 2 game play modes). 1: you can play co-op/solo - where all the investigators are working together to close all the gates and defeat an AI controlled "Wall" 2: 1 vs. all or Wall player vs all the other investigators (regardless if its one other person or many). Both game modes offer a rich intense experience of game play. Play is quick and enjoyable. I really do like this title and highly suggest it if you are a fan of the Lovecraft theme.

Undead Viking:

Gravity Warfare Review



Gruff: Stuff of Nightmares Review



The Faceless Review



Board Game Quest:

Lanterns: The Harvest Festival iOS Review

Gameplay in Lanterns: The Harvest Festival is very easy to pick up. Each turn will have you placing lantern tiles into the lake, earning matching color lanterns for you and your opponents (depending on which color is facing you). You can use these lanterns on future turns to trade them in for victory points (in sets). There are a few other wrinkles, like gaining extra lanterns for matching colors or getting honor tokens from platform tiles. But that’s the main crux of the game. Place tiles, collect lanterns, trade for points.

Vengeance Review

There is a lot to cover with Vengeance so we’re going to do a high-level overview, but the actual rules are here if readers want them: Vengeance rules.

It’s important to note that Vengeance is made up of Acts much like a revenge movie. The Wronging occurs first, followed by Acts 1-3 which consist of Montages and Combat Rounds until the End for final scoring.

Clans of Caledonia Review

At the beginning of the game, each player drafts a clan, each with their own particular special power. These include being able to sell milk, aged whiskey in barrels to sell for more money, expand over sea spaces, and so on.

During a game round, each player performs their choice of an action, in player order, until all players pass.

Harvest Review

In Harvest, players are trying to plant, tend, and harvest vegetables from their fantasy inspired gardens. There are nine different characters to play all with a different ability and starting resources. Each round you get to place two farmers on the town board or the action cards which change each round.

Throughout the game, you will acquire seeds, water, fertilizer, and magical elixirs. You can plant your seeds with fertilizer to turn them into crops. Once in your field, you can tend to your crops with water to grow additional crops of the same type. Each field can only contain one type of crop, so you will have to harvest your crops at some point to clear the way to repeat the process.

iSlaytheDragon:

Flamme Rouge: Peloton Review

Let’s assume you’re familiar with Flamme Rouge, and you’re here to see if the expansion is worth adding to the mix. If not, I’d start here with my review of the base game.

Peloton adds a slew of new tracks, riders, and variant rules, but as there are no significant gameplay changes I’m going to forgo the usual rules rundown and jump right in.

Sakura Review

Sakura is a simultaneous action selection/hand management game for two to six players. Players are painters who want to be close to the emperor when he smells the cherry blossoms but not so close as to cause their own disgrace. The player with the most points after the emperor stops three times is the winner.

Fairy Tile Review

In Fairy Tile, players act out the scenes of a tale upon the tabletop by moving its characters to various locations around the realm – and forging the kingdom’s borders along the way.

The story begins with three land tiles. These are double-sided and consist of three hexes randomly representing plains, forests and mountains with rivers running through some and a castle dotting the landscape every now and then. These start tiles designate where to place the princess, prince and dragon, respectively. Players are then evenly dealt a hand from a deck of thirty-six pages (cards). These are stacked and everyone draws their first page. Cards have very lovely artwork, a task, a number and flavor text.

The objective of the game is to complete all of your pages of the story by individually meeting the required tasks on each card. These adventures generally stipulate maneuvering one or more characters to a specific location. Or sometimes you only need position an actor so that he or she sees (as in a straight line of hexes) some designated feature. In the case of the dragon or princess, simply flying over a castle or visiting one might be enough to move the plot along.

Polyhedron Collider:

Pocket Mars Review

“Mars is there, waiting to be reached.” - Buzz Aldrin

Mars. The Red Planet. The Roman God of War has hung in the night sky capturing the imagination of man, and drawing the creative mind to it like gravity since it was first gazed upon. In the last few years, the fiction was left behind as science began to catch up, and we now know more about this baron and hostile planet than ever before. Yet, the more we know, it seems the more our imagination runs rampant and so the notion of the colonisation of Mars seeps into our consciousness, filling our screens, bookshelves and of course, our board games. It is in this vein that we explore Pocket Mars.

Lords of Hellas Review

Lords of Hellas is, thankfully, more than just "Dudes on a Map"; one of the major concerns that existed during the campaign. If you've played Kemet or Game of Thrones, this will seem familiar, but in my not-so-humble opinion it's better than both. Different to both too, but superior. Game of Thrones has more politics and Kemet has a base of operations. Neither are present in Lords of Hellas. Despite the heft of the minis (and the Statues are very hefty), the game mechanics are thankfully very light and turns rattle on quite quickly, so there's little downtime.

Drive Thru Review:

Fog of Love Review

Fog of Love Review Intro (00:00); general overview (02:12); final thoughts and review (06:37)

Lords of Hellas Review

Lords of Hellas Review Intro (00:00); general overview (01:02); final thoughts and review (11:48)

Meeples & Miniatures:

Sarissa Precision 28mm Japan MDF Terrain Review

Sarissa Precision Ltd are a company that produce high quality MDF terrain in various scales at a mid-range price. This review is looking at their Japan range of buildings, which are useful for playing games in the Sengoku period – especially rules such as Test of Honour

I have a number of Sarrissa’s buildings in my collection – they actually make up the majority of my scenery that I use for Test of Honour and other games.

It's feeling a lot like Saturday 2: Sat Harder (editor's note: rework that title before publishing) here. Yesterday I spent much of the day at home, hanging out and working on my friend's Guild Ball minis. He moved recently and a bunch of his stuff got jumbled and busted up. Plus, there were some new kits he'd gotten in that he wasn't sure when he would be able to assemble them. Putting figures together is arguably my favorite part of the whole hobby, so I've offered to fix his busted minis, assemble his new ones, and even move some of his other figures over to sculpted bases he'd gotten. There's ~35 minis that are getting some kind of work on them, from assembly, to those bases, to fixes, to green-stuffing the slots. It's been a fun project. Certainly kept me busy. Plus, next time I see them on the other side of the pitch, I don't have to see a bunch of half-assembled and busted figures. :P
But I'm currently taking a break (my hand's cramping from using a pin vice all morning) to bring you those reviews I know you all so desperately desire.

This week we have: Storm Hollow, The Mysterious Forest, Pandemic Legacy Season 2, Vengeance, Gloom of Kilforth, Spoils of War, Santorini, Kerala, Mini Rails, Armageddon, By Order of the Queen, NMBR 9, Coded: Card-Time Strategy, Legend of the Five Rings, Woo-Hoo!, AquaSphere, and Cities of Splendor.



theMCGuiRE review:

Storm Hollow Review

theMCGuiRE review takes a look at Storm Hollow the adventure Storyboard game. There is a ton of content in this system and I am impressed with its smooth mechanics, simple game play, and high level of quality components. It really is a fantastic gaming system for the family and I highly recommend this if you are a RPG'er or have considered getting into something like this with the family. All fairy-tails and stories from this realm are a reality in Storm Hollow. You will go on awesome magical adventures both fun to tell, as the game master, or experience as a player. The introduction is quick for the game master and players will be ready to play and start quickly. It also features a co-op board game experience as well - so if you simply want to set the adventure story mode aside and play a board game like experience, you can do that as well.

The Mysterious Forest Review

theMCGuiRE review takes a look at The Mysterious Forest from iello games. This is a great kids game which offers memory, group collaboration and tactical execution skill building. Its got a great theme, super high quality components and a low price point. Its a definite recommend from me for the kids and family gaming experiences.

Toucan Play That Game:

Pandemic Legacy Season 2 COMPLETELY SPOILER FREE Review

In this video you can find out my spoiler free thoughts on Pandemic Legacy Season 2 by Z-man Games.

Board to Death TV:

Vengeance Review

Step into the shoes of a hero that has been bashed and tortured by one or more of the four gangs in the game. You win by building up your hero, scouting gang dens to find the baddies who wronged you, then taking bloody revenge through action-packed fight sequences made up of dice based puzzles.

Gloom of Kilforth Review

The land of Kilforth is a perilous domain filled with nefarious monsters, mysterious Strangers and treacherous Locations, and dominated at its centre by The Sprawl, a huge city where intrepid Heroes begin their journey to fame and fortune. Throughout the land various factions vie for power over each other, such as the supposedly noble Order of the Rose or the terrifying Doom Guard. And presiding over the world outside Kilforth is the ever-present Overlord, Masklaw. Over the coming month, a deadly Gloom will descend upon Kilforth,which the Heroes must Battle through to prove their worth, defeat an Ancient evil, and save the land from darkness.
Gloom of Kilforth is a card game of high fantasy with a Gothic edge, playable in 1-3 hours, where 1-4 players, working individually or together, must take their humble adventurers on a journey through a dark world of magic and peril. They will visit strange places, stranger people and overcome powerful enemies in their mission to discover mysterious artefacts and mystical Spells. Players follow their Hero’s tale from modest beginnings through an epic story to an exciting climactic battle for the fate of the world. Gloom of Kilforth takes about 45 minutes per player to play.

Spoils of War Review

The raid is over, and the victorious Vikings gather in the chieftain’s tent to divide the spoils of war! Piled high on a massive oak table are the best treasures taken during the raid: gleaming gems, shiny swords, fine armor, and magical artifacts! Once strong allies, the Vikings are taken by greed, and soon a heated debate ensues — who will get which spoils? Fists pound the table, insults are made, and tempers rise!

Spoils of War is a fast-paced and exciting game of bidding and wagering for 3-5 players. Each round, players roll their dice, then cleverly bluff and bet to outwit their fellow Vikings. The winners of each round get to claim fantastic treasures to add to their collection! With lots of twists and surprises, no one knows who will win until the last treasure is claimed and the spoils are counted!

Santorini Review

Santorini is a re-imagining of the purely abstract 2004 edition. Since its original inception over 30 years ago, Santorini has been continually developed, enhanced and refined by designer Gordon Hamilton.

Kerala Review

Welcome to the elephant festival in the Indian province of Kerala! Colorfully decorated elephants roam everywhere, and naturally players want to participate and make the most magnificent fairground with as many elephants as possible.

In Kerala, each player wants to take at least one tile of each color, and all tiles of one color should be joined together, but of course the players are constantly getting in the way of one another and grabbing the tiles that someone else wants.

Mini Rails Review

Mini Rails distills the essence of the stock-buying and track-laying game genre into a tight experience that can be finished under an hour.

The game includes only two types of actions — “Buy Shares” and “Build Tracks” — and you must carefully decide how to best use them. You must do each action exactly once per round, and which company you choose affects the turn order on the next round.

Armageddon Review

In a post-apocalyptic world, players try to rebuild society. Using the debris, they build new towns for the remaining survivors to live in — but these friendly folks aren’t the only ones still out there. Marauders want to pillage your town and see it burn. Scavenge what you can and build new structures to help you defend against the marauder threat. While you can get more things done in town when you house more survivors there, they all have to have a space to sleep or they might turn against you and join the marauders.

Armageddon is a strategy game that offers many tactical choices and different strategies to claim victory.

By Order of the Queen Review

By Order of the Queen is a cooperative 2–4 player game with a fantasy role-playing game theme. Players take on the role of one of the Guilds of Tessandor, working together to dispatch Heroes to important quests, to combat monsters and to complete the Queen’s Orders themselves.

By Order of the Queen is designed to give players a full fantasy campaign in one 90-120 minute game, by giving players just the highlights of a role-playing adventure.

Players must work together to keep the kingdom from falling apart while trying to complete three Queen’s Orders to win the game.

Board Game Quest:

NMBR 9 Review

In NMBR 9, players are trying to earn the most points by stacking different numbers. The game comes with twenty cards numbered 0-9 (twice) and enough tiles for 4 players.

Each round, the top number card is drawn and each player collects the matching number from the tray, placing it on the table. After the first round, each newly placed number must touch a previously played number. Players can also build up to higher levels, as long as it is fully supported by at least two numbers below it.

Coded: Card-Time Strategy Review

In Codex: CTS, each player starts the game with a set of heroes (one to three), a starting deck, and a binder… err… Codex… of 24 cards per hero. Each turn, a player’s workers generate a certain amount of gold that can be spent to build up a player’s draw deck with the cards from their Codex.

The Legend of the Five Rings Card Game Review

Players construct a deck using cards from one of seven clans, splashing in cards from another clan and generic cards. Each player has four provinces that serve as the staging area for cards coming into play, and are the target for attack by their opponent. Cards on provinces can either be characters, attachments that enhance characters in play, or attachments that enhance the province they are on. Each player also has a stronghold province that provides players with fate tokens each turn and is more difficult to defeat.

Woo-Hoo! Review

Woo-Hoo has two modes of play to choose from to cater to the kids you are playing with, but both share a fairly similar structure. Players will take turns rolling a die and moving the appropriate numbers of steps up of the elephant slide. Once your pawn reaches the top, you can slide down into the sand box. Yelling Woo-Hoo at this point is optional, but encouraged.

Then in the easy version, you will choose one toy from the box and place it in front of you. If you play with the slightly advanced setup you will roll a different die to determine how many toys, between 1-3, that you will collect.

There are 20 toys, five each of four different colors. The game ends when all of the toys have been collected. If you are playing with the basic rules, you can choose the number of toys to include to shorten the game if you’d like. In the advanced game you can also win by collecting all 5 toys of the same color.

iSlaytheDragon:

AquaSphere Review

Aquasphere is a point-salad Euro game for two to four players. Players use their engineer and scientist to program and use robots aboard an underwater station. The player with the most knowledge points after four rounds wins.

Cities of Splendor Review

I was a latecomer to the Splendor love train. When it came out, I looked at it and thought, “That’s it?” Bear in mind, I was in a place in my life where I had time and energy for heavy games and something as light as Splendor was easily dismissed. But life changes. Not long after, everything did a 180 and I found myself with far less time and energy for gaming. I began seeking out lighter games which still possessed some depth, and that search led me back to Splendor.

I fell in love (or at least heavy like) with the base game, yet when I saw there was an expansion on the way, I thought, “Is it a good idea to mess with the simplicity of the original game? Isn’t the simplicity what made it great?” So with some trepidation, I took the plunge into expansion-land. So the question is, did Cities make things better or worse?

We love a good revenge story. Some gang or group wrongs someone, usually leaving them for dead, only to have that person return to exact bloody revenge on the entire organization. Well, now you can recreate that excitement on your tabletop with Vengeance, a new board game that's up on Kickstarter now.




In the game, there are Montage Turns and Action Turns. Like a good movie, you've got Montages. This is where the hero character trains, gets new gear, heals up from their last battle, and searches out the next hive of enemies they plan on taking out. Speaking of taking them out, that's where the Action Turns come in. This is where the hero kicks open the door and goes in guns blazing/swords swinging/fists flying to take out groups of minions, looking for the bosses.

The game has already made it up and over their funding goal. Therefore, it's on to stretch goals for the next 25 days.

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