Please enable JavaScript for this site to run correctly.

It's now possible to request a game to be included in the game libray at Shake Battle & Roll, Just search for the game you want and we will endevour to bring it to the next event.

Shake Battle and Roll - Friday 28th March 2025 @ 11:00 - Sunday 30th March 2025 @ 23:00 - Calender Link


NamePlayersThis Age & AboveAvg Playtime
Filter
460.jpg1%: A Game of Strategic Chance2 - 68+10 - 30 mins
View Details
1% - A game of Strategic Chance! All you have to do to win is roll 0 with two 10-sided dice. Sounds easy? The chance is 1%! 1% is a fast and fun card game of strategy and probability, with a touch of misdirection! If you can outlast your opponents, you’ll be rewarded with a choice: Do you roll the dice and try to win? Or do you sacrifice this turn to increase your chances next time? If there is a next time, that is! Take too long, and another player could snatch victory away from you. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card Game

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Push Your Luck
180.jpg1565: St. Elmo's Pay - The Great Siege of Malta1 - 210+30 - 40 mins
View Details
Relive the Greatest Siege in History! A vendetta spanning decades reaches its terrible and bloody crescendo! Suleiman the Magnificent's 30,000 strong armada descends on the 500 beleaguered Knights of St John and the defending people of Malta, with the express purpose of wiping them from existence, and changing the course of European history forever... 1565, St. Elmo's Pay is an asymmetric, competitive, tactical card game, and successor to the award-nominated 1066, Tears to Many Mothers, with which it is fully compatible. Each player, as either Ottoman Turks or Knights of St John, musters troops and resources to overcome the various obstacles in their path before the two armies clash in an epic siege over three fronts on the tiny island of Malta: Birgu, Senglea, and the doomed fortress of Saint Elmo. Every beautiful card in the game is inspired by a real person or event from the time. With a focus on quick, tactical play and a thematic re-imagining of the events of the time, the game is non-collectable, and there is no deck building required. Each player simply grabs their deck and shuffles, then play begins. Note on title: When, after a relentless show of strength, the small fortress of St. Elmo's finally fell to the Turks they butchered the bodies of the Knights and floated the corpses across the bay to the remaining two forts to deter them from resisting further, lest they suffer the same fate. Instead, the Maltese forces chose to fight with 'the spirit of St. Elmo's'. When they eventually turned the tides against the Turks and chased them away the people of Malta chanted 'St. Elmo's Pay' - an expression they still use today to mean 'no mercy.' —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card GameRenaissanceWargame

Mechanics
Hand Management
Solo / Solitaire Game
181.png1944: Race to the Rhine1 - 314+90 mins
View Details
Not enough gas, not enough ammo or not enough time. Not enough to cross the Rhine before the enemy closes all the gaps. You need to form the bridgehead before others do. That’s the only way to Victory and your personal glory. 1944 Race to the Rhine is a new game experience. You can’t win this game without proper planning. Your tanks need gas to move and ammo to fight. But don’t forget to feed your GIs. So what would be your transport priority? Will you follow General Patton’s strategy to discard ammo in order to bring additional fuel barrels along to move boldly forward? Would you risk your prestige and gamble on Market-Garden as Field Marshal Montgomery did? Would you cross the Rhine more quickly than General Bradley did, with the help of your hard work and a little luck? “In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable” (General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe). So, how are you planning your Victory?

Categorys
TransportationWargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Action Points
Dice Rolling
Movement Points
Network and Route Building
Pick-up and Deliver
Point to Point Movement
Race
Simulation
Solo / Solitaire Game
182.jpg19692 - 510+90 mins
View Details
1969 is a push-your-luck style game in which players take the role of the leader of a particular nation's space program attempting the first successful lunar landing mission. Each turn, the players use their income to hire scientists to research technology to improve their chances of success, hire spies to slow other players down, purchase cards to influence their missions and their competitors, or attempt easier, preparatory missions. Players gain victory points for performing well on prep missions, attracting famous scientists to their cause and, of course, how far they got on the Moon landing mission. The core of the game are the mission tests, which consist of rolling five dice. Dice have success, neutral, and failure results, which add respectively to your success rating, do nothing, or subtract from it. The total of your successes will determine the points you earn from the mission and whether you'll get a bonus on the final lunar mission or not. Die rolls can be affected by technology and your success can be influenced by having scientists research relevant tech and by cards played by any player. 1969 combines simple dice mechanics with elements of resource management and even some light engine building to make an interesting lightweight experience. There are some mechanics of player interference (meaning players can disrupt each other's progress), but these elements can be avoided if desired.

Categorys
EconomicIndustry / Manufacturing

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
183.jpg7 Wonders2 - 710+30 mins
View Details
You are the leader of one of the 7 great cities of the Ancient World. Gather resources, develop commercial routes, and affirm your military supremacy. Build your city and erect an architectural wonder which will transcend future times. 7 Wonders lasts three ages. In each age, players receive seven cards from a particular deck, choose one of those cards, then pass the remainder to an adjacent player. Players reveal their cards simultaneously, paying resources if needed or collecting resources or interacting with other players in various ways. (Players have individual boards with special powers on which to organize their cards, and the boards are double-sided). Each player then chooses another card from the deck they were passed, and the process repeats until players have six cards in play from that age. After three ages, the game ends. In essence, 7 Wonders is a card development game. Some cards have immediate effects, while others provide bonuses or upgrades later in the game. Some cards provide discounts on future purchases. Some provide military strength to overpower your neighbors and others give nothing but victory points. Each card is played immediately after being drafted, so you'll know which cards your neighbor is receiving and how her choices might affect what you've already built up. Cards are passed left-right-left over the three ages, so you need to keep an eye on the neighbors in both directions. Though the box of earlier editions is listed as being for 3–7 players, there is an official 2-player variant included in the instructions.

Categorys
AncientCard GameCity BuildingCivilizationEconomic

Mechanics
Closed Drafting
Hand Management
Set Collection
Simultaneous Action Selection
Variable Player Powers
1.jpg7 Wonders Duel210+30 mins
View Details
In many ways 7 Wonders Duel resembles its parent game 7 Wonders as over three ages players acquire cards that provide resources or advance their military or scientific development in order to develop a civilization and complete wonders. What's different about 7 Wonders Duel is that, as the title suggests, the game is solely for two players, with the players not drafting cards simultaneously from hands of cards, but from a display of face-down and face-up cards arranged at the start of a round. A player can take a card only if it's not covered by any others, so timing comes into play as well as bonus moves that allow you to take a second card immediately. As in the original game, each card that you acquire can be built, discarded for coins, or used to construct a wonder. Each player starts with four wonder cards, and the construction of a wonder provides its owner with a special ability. Only seven wonders can be built, though, so one player will end up short. Players can purchase resources at any time from the bank, or they can gain cards during the game that provide them with resources for future building; as you acquire resources, the cost for those particular resources increases for your opponent, representing your dominance in this area. A player can win 7 Wonders Duel in one of three ways: each time you acquire a military card, you advance the military marker toward your opponent's capital, giving you a bonus at certain positions; if you reach the opponent's capital, you win the game immediately; similarly, if you acquire any six of seven different scientific symbols, you achieve scientific dominance and win immediately; if none of these situations occurs, then the player with the most points at the end of the game wins.

Categorys
AncientCard GameCity BuildingCivilizationEconomic

Mechanics
Layering
Open Drafting
Set Collection
Sudden Death Ending
Tug of War
2.png7 Wonders Duel: Pantheon210+30 mins
View Details
A pantheon from several civilizations — including Greek, Egyptian, and Middle-Eastern — gets added to 7 Wonders Duel in 7 Wonders Duel: Pantheon, with each god having its own power to help you or hinder your opponent. During Age I you collect mythology tokens — which allow you to choose which deities have a place in the Pantheon — and during Age II you collect offering tokens, which help you court those deities. Then, during Ages II and III, you can activate a god or goddess in the Pantheon instead of taking a card from the pyramid. To do so, you pay whatever that god or goddess demands from you in offerings, then place it next to your city. With Isis on your side, you can use a card from the discard pile to construct one of your Wonders for free. Zeus, whose nod determines what happens and what does not, enables you to discard any single card from the card structure that you want, as well as any mythology or offering token that may be on it. The Phoenician goddess Tanit, whose people were renowned for trade, fills your coffers with twelve pieces of gold. Enki, the Sumerian god of crafts, technology, and creation, lets you choose one of two progress tokens. Minerva's ability to stop the conflict pawn from moving toward you can assist with a military victory or save you from military defeat. What's more, instead of adding three guild cards to the deck for Age III, you add three of five Grand Temples. Each Grand Temple belongs to a different Mediterranean culture, and if you possess a mythology token from that culture, you can build the temple for free. These temples are worth a total of 5, 12, or 21 points, depending on how many you build. 7 Wonders Duel: Pantheon also includes two new Wonders: the Sanctuary (which gives you an additional turn and allows you to invoke deities at a reduced price) and the Divine Theater (which grants points and access to additional gods).

Categorys
AncientCard GameCity BuildingCivilizationExpansion for Base-game

Mechanics
Open Drafting
Set Collection
312.png7 Wonders: Architects2 - 78+25 mins
View Details
In 7 Wonders: Architects, 2-7 players race to become a leader of the ancient world by completing an architectural wonder that will last through the ages. Players receive an unconstructed wonder at the beginning of the game and must collect resources to build their society, develop military might to navigate conflicts, oversee resource management, research science improvements, and collect civil victory points as they race to leave their mark on world history.

Categorys
Ancient

Mechanics
Open Drafting
Set Collection
Variable Player Powers
184.jpg878 Vikings: Invasions of England2 - 412+60 - 120 mins
View Details
The year is 878. For the past 75 years, Viking raiding parties from Norway and Denmark have been terrorizing the coasts of England with ‘hit and run’ attacks. The treasures and stories gained from these attacks have allowed the Norsemen to raise huge hosts of eager men seeking glory and riches. These armies now stand poised to thunder across England where they will settle and farm the fertile land they conquer. The divided English kingdoms are unprepared for this impending onslaught. The Vikings are coming! In 878: Vikings – Invasions of England, players control the invading Vikings or the English nobles who are trying to withstand the invasion. Viking players either play as Norsemen Viking freeman or as the fearless Viking shock troops known as Berserkers. The English play as the Housecarl, the Kings’ household troops, or as the Thegns who were regional noble Leaders. The English players will also be able to call up the peasant levies, called the Fyrd, to defend their cities. Players for each side strategize together in order to coordinate their strategies. Each side attempts to control Cities on the map to win. The English start the game controlling all of England but a Viking Leader will invade from the sea each Turn. The English players raise reinforcements from cities they control, while the Vikings must wait for a new invasion for reinforcements. The game ends when the Treaty of Wedmore is called and the side controlling the most cities wins the game.

Categorys
EducationalMedievalMiniaturesWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Command Cards
Dice Rolling
Die Icon Resolution
Events
Simulation
Sudden Death Ending
Team-Based Game
Turn Order: Random
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
54.jpgA Dog's Life2 - 66+30 - 60 mins
View Details
A German Shepherd, a Poodle, a Whippet, a Boxer, a Labrador, and a Fox terrier take a break from their masters in order to experience an adventure in town. But they aren't used to taking care of themselves though. They need you, your family, and your friends to care for them! You have to decide when your dog needs to: Beg in restaurants. Search through trash. Deliver newspapers. Fight rival hounds. Drink from fountains. Piddle on lamp posts. Hide from the dogcatcher. Do it right and your dog could be the first one to bury 3 bones in his den and win the game of A Dog's Life!

Categorys
Animals

Mechanics
Action Points
Area Movement
Pick-up and Deliver
Simulation
Variable Player Powers
295.pngA Feast for Odin1 - 412+30 - 120 mins
View Details
A Feast for Odin is a saga in the form of a board game. You are reliving the cultural achievements, mercantile expeditions, and pillages of those tribes we know as Viking today — a term that was used quite differently towards the end of the first millennium. When the northerners went out for a raid, they used to say they headed out for a viking. Their Scandinavian ancestors, however, were much more than just pirates. They were explorers and founders of states. Leif Eriksson is said to be the first European in America, long before Columbus. In what is known today as Normandy, the intruders were not called Vikings but Normans. One of them is the famous William the Conqueror who invaded England in 1066. He managed to do what the king of Norway failed to do only a few years prior: conquer the Throne of England. The reason why the people of these times became such strong seafarers is due to their unfortunate agricultural situation. Crop shortfalls caused great distress. In this game, you will raid and explore new territories. You will also experience their day-to-day activities: collecting goods to achieve a financially secure position in society. In the end, the player whose possessions bear the greatest value will be declared the winner. --gameplay description from @StoryBoardGamer's review: A Feast for Odin is a points-driven game, with plethora of pathways to victory, with a range of risk balanced against reward. A significant portion of this is your central hall, which has a whopping -86 points of squares and a major part of your game is attempting to cover these up with various tiles. Likewise, long halls and island colonies can also offer large rewards, but they will have penalties of their own. Each year follows a familiar pattern of preparation, worker placement, and then meeting the requirements of your feast. The main phase of each year is a worker placement affair. You start with a selection of Vikings, and a large action board with a whopping 61 different options to choose from. Each of these will be arranged from left to right in one of four columns. Each column requires an additional Viking to activate, but they are proportionally more powerful. At the end of each round, you will need to fill a feast table with food, alternating between plants and vegetable matter. You will also have a chance to lay the valuable green and blue tiles into your main hall. The configuration of these tiles must follow certain requirements, but your main goal is to both cover up a line of coin icons to increase your income, while otherwise encircling certain printed icons to generate those. You will build your engine over time, following an alternating pattern of outward expansion and hunting against development and cultivation. It all comes down to how much you’re willing to take on at any one time, and what risks you’re willing to set yourself up with for their rewards.

Categorys
EconomicFarmingIndustry / ManufacturingMedievalPuzzle

Mechanics
Automatic Resource Growth
Dice Rolling
Grid Coverage
Income
Push Your Luck
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tile Placement
Turn Order: Pass Order
Worker Placement
94.jpgA Game of Thrones: The Board Game (Second Edition)3 - 614+120 - 240 mins
View Details
Game description from the publisher: King Robert Baratheon is dead, and the lands of Westeros brace for battle. In the second edition of A Game of Thrones: The Board Game, three to six players take on the roles of the great Houses of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros, as they vie for control of the Iron Throne through the use of diplomacy and warfare. Based on the best-selling A Song of Ice and Fire series of fantasy novels by George R.R. Martin, A Game of Thrones is an epic board game in which it will take more than military might to win. Will you take power through force, use honeyed words to coerce your way onto the throne, or rally the townsfolk to your side? Through strategic planning, masterful diplomacy, and clever card play, spread your influence over Westeros! To begin the game, each player receives an army of Footman, Knight, Siege Engine, and Ship units, as well as a set of Order tokens and other necessary components. Each player also receives a deck of unique House Cards, which are used as leaders in battles against rival Houses. Each round in the game is made up of three phases: the Westeros Phase, the Planning Phase, and the Action Phase. The Westeros Phase represents special events and day-to-day activities in Westeros. There are three different Westeros Decks, and each denotes a different global action, potentially affecting all players. The Planning Phase is perhaps the most important. Here you secretly assign orders to all of your units by placing one order token face down on each area you control that contains at least one unit (Knight, Footman, Ship, or Siege Engine). This portion of the game emphasizes diplomacy and deduction. Can you trust the alliance that you made? Will you betray your ally and march upon him? Players may make promises to each other (for aid or peace, for example), but these promises are never binding. The result is tense and compelling negotiations, often ending in backstabbing worthy of Westeros! During the Action Phase, the orders are resolved and battle is entered! When armies meet in combat, they secretly choose one of their House cards to add strength to the battle. Finally, the Houses can consolidate their power in the areas they control and use that power in future turns to influence their position in the court of the Iron Throne and to stand against the wildling Hordes. In addition to featuring updated graphics and a clarified ruleset, this second edition of A Game of Thrones includes elements from the A Clash of Kings and A Storm of Swords expansions, including ports, garrisons, Wildling cards, and Siege engines, while introducing welcome new innovations like player screens and Tides of Battle cards. Tides of Battle cards are an optional mechanism that brings an element of unpredictability to combat, representing erratic shifts in the momentum of war due to factors such as weather, morale, and tactical opportunity. During each combat, both players draw one Tides of Battle card from a communal deck, and its value modifies the strength of his chosen House card. What's more, such a card may also contain icons that can affect the outcome of the battle...all of which delivers a new level of intensity to your military engagements. Expanded by: A Game of Thrones: The Board Game (Second Edition) – A Dance with Dragons (2012) A Game of Thrones: The Board Game (Second Edition) – A Feast for Crows (2013) A Game of Thrones: The Board Game (Second Edition) – Mother of Dragons (2018) Reimplements: A Game of Thrones (2003) A Game of Thrones: A Clash of Kings Expansion (2004) A Game of Thrones: A Storm of Swords Expansion (2006)

Categorys
BluffingFantasyNegotiationNovel-basedPoliticalWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Auction/Bidding
Auction: Sealed Bid
Card Play Conflict Resolution
Hand Management
Order Counters
Player Elimination
Prisoner's Dilemma
Simultaneous Action Selection
Variable Player Powers
396.pngAfter the Empire2 - 413+60 - 120 mins
View Details
After the fall of Rome, Europe fell into the so-called "dark ages." From the chaos, feudalism arose providing stability to the region over the coming centuries. By the High Middle Ages, the region was prosperous despite much fighting. From your walled city, you are a medieval liege ruling the surrounding lands, settlements, and holdings granted by birthright. This is your fiefdom, and all within it owe fealty and allegiance to you above all others. Each other lord and lady rules a neighboring fiefdom and competes for resources in the unclaimed yet bountiful lands of the countryside between them. Tensions were high and petty feuds common between you and your neighbors until scouts reported a new and deadly threat. Invaders have swept in from the east! Their sizable army is camped on the edges of your realm, and this new common enemy endangers the entire land. Refugees from the fallen eastern lands seek shelter and bring tales of destruction. Old rivalries must be put aside to focus on the onslaught to come and remain unbroken. After The Empire is a worker placement/resource management game set in the middle ages. During each turn, known as a season, players alternate using worker tokens to take actions, such as gathering resources, building advanced buildings and recruiting refugees. Once all workers have been committed, players harvest food from their surrounding lands and then prepare for combat. During each season's combat, invader cards are revealed, with a randomized number of troops and compass direction of attack. Only the wealthiest of castles will draw the attention of larger forces and their siege weapons. You must repair your city and recruit and arm your troops quickly to stand any chance. The winner is the lord or lady who has best preserved their fiefdom and saved up the most gold. Your life, your wealth, your fiefdom, and your legacy must be protected at all costs!

Categorys
EconomicFightingMedieval

Mechanics
Worker Placement
380.jpgAgatha Christie: Death on the Cards2 - 610+20 - 40 mins
View Details
In Agatha Christie: Death on the Cards, which consists of a deck of eighty cards, players work co-operatively to solve a murder, using their detective skills to unmask the culprit and prevent their escape. The twist is that one of the players is the murderer and must work against the group to keep themselves hidden. Players also have dark secrets from their past they want to keep hidden from the other players. Who can you trust? —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card GameDeductionMurder/MysteryNovel-based

Mechanics
Deduction
Open Drafting
Set Collection
Traitor Game
397.jpgAI Space Puzzle2 - 58+30 mins
View Details
AI Space Puzzle is a co-operative board game in which most players take on the role of people who have been evacuated from Earth on spaceships and one player performs as a distressed AI that has partially malfunctioned. Its task is to help passengers during this difficult journey, and to do so it must try to create an effective communication system so that the passengers can be directed to the proper rooms while holding the correct security keys. The AI player uses various tokens to convey the required combination of colors and pawns, but the meaning of the tokens is up to the players to decide. The game includes dozens of scenarios with increasing levels of difficulty, each with new challenges that you must overcome to survive. Beep boop!

Categorys
DeductionPuzzleScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Cooperative Game
Deduction
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
398.jpgAkropolis1 - 48+20 - 30 mins
View Details
The most talented architects in ancient Greece stand ready to achieve this goal. Build housing, temples, markets, gardens and barracks, so you can grow your city and ensure it triumphs over the others. Raise its prestige with harmonious planning that conforms to specific rules, and enhance it by building plazas. Stone is an essential resource, so make sure you do not neglect it. You’ll need enough quarries so you can build higher up, making your city stretch towards the sky. Choose a tile from the construction site Arrange it in your city to unlock each district's full potential Build on higher levels, increase the value of your districts and win the game —description from the publisher

Categorys
AncientCity BuildingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Auction: Dutch
End Game Bonuses
Layering
Open Drafting
Pattern Building
Tile Placement
290.pngAlchemists2 - 413+120 mins
View Details
In Alchemists, two to four budding alchemists compete to discover the secrets of their mystical art. Points can be earned in various ways, but most points are earned by publishing theories – correct theories, that is — and therein lies the problem. The game is played in six rounds. At the beginning of the round, players choose their play order. Those who choose to play later get more rewards. Players declare all their actions by placing cubes on the various action spaces, then each action space is evaluated in order. Players gain knowledge by mixing ingredients and testing the results using a smartphone app (iOS, Android, and also Windows) that randomizes the rules of alchemy for each new game. And if the alchemists are longing for something even more special, they can always buy magical artifacts to get an extra push. There are 9 of them (different for each game) and they are not only very powerful, but also very expensive. But money means nothing, when there's academic pride at stake! And the possession of these artifacts will definitely earn you some reputation too. Players can also earn money by selling potions of questionable quality to adventurers, but money is just a means to an end. The alchemists don't want riches, after all. They want respect, and respect usually comes from publishing theories. During play, players' reputations will go up and down. After six rounds and a final exhibition, reputation will be converted into points. Points will also be scored for artifacts and grants. Then the secrets of alchemy are revealed and players score points or lose points based on whether their theories were correct. Whoever has the most points at the end of the game wins. Flavor text: Mandrake root and scorpion tail; spongy mushroom and warty toad — these are the foundations of the alchemist's livelihood, science, and art. But what arcane secrets do these strange ingredients hide? Now it is time to find out. Mix them into potions and drink them to determine their effects — or play it safe and test the concoction on a helpful assistant! Gain riches selling potions to wandering adventurers and invest these riches in powerful artifacts. As your knowledge grows, so will your reputation, as you publish your theories for all to see. Knowledge, wealth, and fame can all be found in the murky depths of the alchemist's cauldron.

Categorys
DeductionFantasy

Mechanics
Action Drafting
Constrained Bidding
Deduction
End Game Bonuses
Events
Hand Management
Open Drafting
Turn Order: Progressive
186.jpgAll Bridges Burning: Red Revolt and White Guard in Finland, 1917-19181 - 312+180 - 360 mins
View Details
The year is 1917. Russia’s Tsar Nicholas II has abdicated and Russia slides toward an ever deepening internal crisis. On the western edge of the vast Russian Empire, the uncertainty in Russia is giving rise to a power vacuum in the semi-autonomous Grand Duchy of Finland. For many across the Finnish political spectrum, the turmoil in Russia looks like an opportunity to fulfill the dream of Finnish national independence. Yet the competing factions are unable to agree on a common political vision for the country. By January 1918, a bloody civil war will have broken out in Finland. All Bridges Burning recreates the political and military affairs of the Finnish civil war in a new COIN System volume for three players. The Reds seek to stage a working class revolt and then hold onto their gains, while the White Senate forces seek to reassert control. A third, non-violent Social Democratic faction fights for the survival of moderate leftism and political reform. All three factions must keep the national sentiment conciliatory enough for a post-conflict settlement and national independence. In addition, the non-player powers of Germany and Russia offer military assistance to the Senate and the Reds, respectively. Excessive foreign involvement, however, could quash the dream of Finnish independence and prompt a collective loss of all three player factions. Historical events, asymmetrical action menus, as well as extensive historical design notes familiarize the players with the historical period. A unique sequence of play for three factions poses players – whether veteran or new to the COIN Series – fresh challenges in selecting from the asymmetric commands and special activities. The Reds will find themselves needing to split time and resources between competing tasks of solidifying the Red revolt by creating working organs of civilian administration on the one hand, and fighting an increasingly desperate war against a far more powerful enemy on the other. The White Senate faction, in contrast, has a more traditional war to fight. The Senate will want to enhance their military performance by capabilities such as armored trains, cannons, as well as the Finnish, German-trained 27th Jaeger Battalion. Meanwhile the Social Democrats will be focused on building and maintaining underground networks of information, distributing news across the fronts, and advancing a stagnating political process while fending off retributions from the two warring factions. A simple but effective card-driven non-player system enables the game to be played solitaire as well as in a two-player mode. The structure of the sequence of play, the character of the commands and special activities in the game, the smaller number of players, and compact size combine to enable All Bridges Burning to play fast. The solitaire system has been designed to preserve that speed and fluidity of play. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Civil WarWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Simulation
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Player Powers
399.pngAlpaca2 - 410+30 mins
View Details
Admit it, you've always wanted to farm soft, cute, cuddly, adorable alpacas. This is your chance! Alpaca is a competitive deck-building game that pits players against one another in the competitive world of alpaca farming. Players each begin with an identical deck of alpaca cards and fence materials. Customize your deck with alpacas from the market, and build a strategy to take advantage of each alpaca's special ability. You score points for each alpaca on your farm and any purchased endgame bonus cards. The interaction with other players will get tighter as soon as the rules are clearer... run to buy a new alpaca! —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsCard Game

Mechanics
Deck Construction
305.jpgAnachrony1 - 415+30 - 120 mins
View Details
It is the late 26th century. Earth is recovering from a catastrophic explosion that exterminated the majority of the population centuries ago and made most of the surface uninhabitable due to unearthly weather conditions. The surviving humans organized along four radically different ideologies, called Paths, to rebuild the world as they see fit: Harmony, Dominance, Progress, and Salvation. Followers of the four Paths live in a fragile peace, but in almost complete isolation next to each other. Their only meeting point is the last major city on Earth, now just known as the Capital. By powering up the mysterious Time Rifts that opened in the wake of the cataclysm, each Path is able to reach back to specific moments in their past. Doing so can greatly speed up their progress, but too much meddling may endanger the time-space continuum. But progress is more important than ever before: if the mysterious message arriving through the Time Rift is to be believed, an even more terrible cataclysm is looming on the horizon: an asteroid bearing the mysterious substance called Neutronium is heading towards Earth. Even stranger, the scientists show that the energy signature of the asteroid matches the explosion centuries ago... Anachrony features a unique two-tiered worker placement system. To travel to the Capital or venture out to the devastated areas for resources, players need not only various specialists (Engineers, Scientists, Administrators, and Geniuses) but also Exosuits to protect and enhance them — and both are in short supply. The game is played in 4-7 turns, depending on the time when the looming cataclysm occurs — unless, of course, it is averted! The elapsed turns are measured on a dynamic timeline. By powering up the Time Rifts, players can reach back to earlier turns to supply their past "self" with resources. Each Path has a vastly different objective that rewards it with a massive amount of victory points when achieved. The Paths' settlements will survive the impact, but the Capital will not. Whichever Path manages to collect most points will be the new seat for the Capital, thus the most important force left on the planet...

Categorys
EconomicScience Fiction

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Solo / Solitaire Game
Turn Order: Claim Action
Variable Player Powers
Worker Placement
Worker Placement, Different Worker Types
187.jpgAntike II3 - 613+90 - 120 mins
View Details
Antike II is a challenging strategy game about evolution and competition among ancient civilizations. Ancient nations create cities, build temples, sail the seas, and discover new principles of science and technology. Their legions and galleys open new settlements and defend their people against attacks from their enemies. Two scenarios can be chosen as the game board is two-sided. Every nation tries to win ancient kings, scholars, generals, citizens, and navigators for themselves. The nation that acquires a specified number (depending on the number of players) of ancient personalities first wins the game! Lead one of these nations to victory—but watch out for your enemies as they will want to conquer your cities to destroy your temples. The game depends not on the luck of dice or cards, but on thoughtful plans and skillful diplomacy. Antike II differs from the 2005 Antike in several ways, according to designer Mac Gerdts. To start, players now own city tokens, which allows them some degree of choice as to which resource a newly founded city shall produce. Military units have become more expensive, and the rules for the conquest of cities are considerably easier. The scientific progresses were altered as well. Neutral temples now exist, which may be destroyed, gaining VPs of a general, without harming other players. The game features two new maps in a new graphical design, and a new card named "BELLONA" (the ancient Roman goddess of war) has been introduced to counter the starting player's advantage. Gerdts notes that the main goal of all of these changes was to make the rules for a conquest of cities easier, while also opening more possibilities to win the game without the need to attack other players.

Categorys
AncientCivilizationFightingNauticalTerritory Building

Mechanics
Advantage Token
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Rondel
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
313.jpgArk Nova1 - 414+90 - 150 mins
View Details
In Ark Nova, you will plan and design a modern, scientifically managed zoo. With the ultimate goal of owning the most successful zoological establishment, you will build enclosures, accommodate animals, and support conservation projects all over the world. Specialists and unique buildings will help you in achieving this goal. Each player has a set of five action cards to manage their gameplay, and the power of an action is determined by the slot the card currently occupies. The cards in question are: CARDS: Allows you to gain new zoo cards (animals, sponsors, and conservation project cards). BUILD: Allows you to build standard or special enclosures, kiosks, and pavilions. ANIMALS: Allows you to accommodate animals in your zoo. ASSOCIATION: Allows your association workers to carry out different tasks. SPONSORS: Allows you to play a sponsor card in your zoo or to raise money. 255 cards featuring animals, specialists, special enclosures, and conservation projects, each with a special ability, are at the heart of Ark Nova. Use them to increase the appeal and scientific reputation of your zoo and collect conservation points. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsEconomicEnvironmental

Mechanics
End Game Bonuses
Hand Management
Hexagon Grid
Income
Open Drafting
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tags
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
400.jpgArk Nova: Marine Worlds1 - 414+90 - 150 mins
View Details
Ark Nova: Marine Worlds, an expansion for Ark Nova, introduces multiple new elements to the game, such as sea animals that each have to be played in new special enclosures that must be built adjacent to water. Roughly half the sea animals are reef dwellers, and whenever you add a reef dweller to your zoo, you trigger the ability of all reef dwellers in your zoo. To deal with the dilution of the deck, naturally caused by adding more cards, all sea cards feature a wave icon, and whenever it is revealed in the display, you discard the first card in the row, then replenish. A new fourth university is available on the association board, and if you take it, you claim one of six special universities from the reserve that feature one research icon and one of six animal icons. When you take this registry, you reveal cards from the top of the deck and keep the first revealed card with an animal icon that matches your chosen university. For each of the five action cards, four alternate versions with a little twist will be available. Players draft action cards at the start of play, replacing two of their standard action cards with these new ones, increasing the asymmetry in the game. New bonus tiles and final scoring cards will also be included. Also the expansion will include alternate wooden markers for the 3 tracks and cute animals to mark the conservation projects you support instead of using your regular player markers.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameAnimalsEconomicEnvironmental

Mechanics
End Game Bonuses
Hand Management
Hexagon Grid
Income
Open Drafting
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
188.jpgArkham Horror1 - 814+120 - 240 mins
View Details
The year is 1926, and it is the height of the Roaring Twenties. Flappers dance till dawn in smoke-filled speakeasies drinking alcohol supplied by rum runners and the mob. It's a celebration to end all celebrations in the aftermath of the war to end all wars. Yet a dark shadow grows in the city of Arkham. Alien entities known as Ancient Ones lurk in the emptiness beyond space and time, writhing at the gates between worlds. These gates have begun to open and must be closed before the Ancient Ones make our world their ruined domination. Only a handful of investigators stand against the Arkham Horror. Will they Prevail? Arkham Horror is a cooperative adventure game themed around H.P Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos. Players choose from 16 Investigators and take to the streets of Arkham. Before the game, one of the eight Ancient Ones is chosen and it's up to the Investigators to prevent it from breaking into our world. During the course of the game, players will upgrade their characters by acquiring skills, allies, items, weapons, and spells. It's up to the players to clean out the streets of Arkham by fighting many different types of monsters, but their main goal is to close gates to other dimensions that are opening up around town. With too many gates open the Ancient One awakens and the players only have one last chance to save the world - defeat the Ancient One in combat!

Categorys
AdventureFantasyFightingHorrorNovel-based

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Events
Finale Ending
Hand Management
Lose a Turn
Point to Point Movement
Role Playing
Solo / Solitaire Game
Stat Check Resolution
Variable Player Powers
358.jpgArkosa1 - 413+50 - 100 mins
View Details
In Arkosa, you’ll be developing your bunker, recruiting unique new colonists and trying to keep your population happy, fed, rested and breathing. However, the planet won’t make it easy for you. There’ll be regular attacks from the resident hostiles to contend with, plus a whole bunch of unique events that can occur to your intrepid explorers while they are out in the wastelands. In order to claim victory you’ll need a well organised, productive and happy bunker. But only one colony will win the grand prize... a ticket off the planet. Each player will build and take charge of their own bunker. They will then compete to have the best reputation over the course of 3 rounds. Players will earn reputation points by recruiting new colonists, building new rooms, keeping their colony happy and making successful bribes. The player with the most reputation points at the end of the game will be rescued from planet Arkosa and declared the winner. In the event of a tie, the colony with the highest morale will take the victory. Arkosa is a 1-4 player, tableau and action pool building board game. The approximate playtime is around 25 minutes per player and the game is suitable for age 14+. —description from the designer

Categorys
Science Fiction

Mechanics
Action Points
Hand Management
Set Collection
Storytelling
Trading
189.jpgArmageddon3 - 412+90 mins
View Details
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.

Categorys
City Building

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Worker Placement
282.jpgAvalon212+45 mins
View Details
Avalon is a card-based game where a line of 11 landscape cards form the board and the cards in your hand are made up of Knights and Enchantresses. There are 8 of each in each of five different colors, for a total of 80 cards, which both players share as a common draw deck. The game starts with the landscapes face down, randomly assigned knights or enchantresses on each player's side of the landscape cards, and five knights/enchantresses in each players hand. In the course of the game, if you play knights on your side of the territory and you have at least as many cards on your side before playing the card, you have the option of declaring an attack with that knight. The other player has a chance to respond by defending with a knight of exactly the same color (in which case both knights are left in place). If the attacker is successful, the loser loses all of their cards from their side, and the winner loses an equal number. Then, the winner must lose an additional number of cards from their side or the hand equal to the total number of knights on both sides that were involved in the conflict. Finally, the region is turned face up with the crowns on the bottom facing toward the controlling player. You can only attack up to two landscapes per turn, but you may play as many cards as you would like to on your turn. The max hand size at the end of a round is 5. The object is to control 15 crowns at the end of your turn (number of crowns on a card ranges from 1-3). Two landscape cards have special abilities - Avalon reduces your loss from battles by one once per turn, and the forest with a standing stone allows you to declare an attack on your opponent with an enchantress as if she was a knight. Enchantresses normally will convert enemy knights from their side of the board to yours unless countered with a same color enchantress. The countering player receives the aggressor's attacking enchantress into his hand if he counters an enchantress. When the player is done playing cards, he draws one of the 5 Light tiles or 4 Dark tiles that describe the options for replenishing cards in hand. Light tiles give you their benefit immediately, and Dark tiles give you their benefit at the beginning of your next turn. Each tile is used only once until all tiles have been used, at which point they are all available again. After drawing a replenishment tile, the player's turn is over and the game continues with the next player. Avalon is part of the Kosmos two-player series.

Categorys
Card GameExplorationFantasy

Mechanics
Hand Management
3.jpgAzul2 - 48+30 - 45 mins
View Details
Introduced by the Moors, azulejos (originally white and blue ceramic tiles) were fully embraced by the Portuguese when their king Manuel I, on a visit to the Alhambra palace in Southern Spain, was mesmerized by the stunning beauty of the Moorish decorative tiles. The king, awestruck by the interior beauty of the Alhambra, immediately ordered that his own palace in Portugal be decorated with similar wall tiles. As a tile-laying artist, you have been challenged to embellish the walls of the Royal Palace of Evora. In the game Azul, players take turns drafting colored tiles from suppliers to their player board. Later in the round, players score points based on how they've placed their tiles to decorate the palace. Extra points are scored for specific patterns and completing sets; wasted supplies harm the player's score. The player with the most points at the end of the game wins.

Categorys
Abstract StrategyPuzzleRenaissance

Mechanics
End Game Bonuses
Open Drafting
Pattern Building
Tile Placement
Turn Order: Claim Action
4.jpgBANG!4 - 710+20 - 40 mins
View Details
"The Outlaws hunt the Sheriff. The Sheriff hunts the Outlaws. The Renegade plots secretly, ready to take one side or the other. Bullets fly. Who among the gunmen is a Deputy, ready to sacrifice himself for the Sheriff? And who is a merciless Outlaw, willing to kill him? If you want to find out, just draw (your cards)!" (From back of box) The card game BANG! recreates an old-fashioned spaghetti western shoot-out, with each player randomly receiving a Character card to determine special abilities, and a secret Role card to determine their goal. Four different Roles are available, each with a unique victory condition: Sheriff - Kill all Outlaws and the Renegade Deputy - Protect the Sheriff and kill any Outlaws Outlaw - Kill the Sheriff Renegade - Be the last person standing A player's Role is kept secret, except for the Sheriff. Character cards are placed face up on table, and also track strength (hand limit) in addition to special ability. There are 22 different types of cards in the draw deck. Most common are the BANG! cards, which let you shoot at another player, assuming the target is within "range" of your current gun. The target player can play a "MISSED!" card to dodge the shot. Other cards can provide temporary boosts while in play (for example, different guns to improve your firing range) and special one-time effects to help you or hinder your opponents (such as Beer to restore health, or Barrels to hide behind during a shootout). A horse is useful for keeping your distance from unruly neighbors, while the Winchester can hit a target at range 5. The Gatling is a deadly exception where range doesn't matter: it can only be used once, but targets all other players at the table! Information on the cards is displayed using language-independent symbols, and 7 summary/reference cards are included.

Categorys
American WestBluffingCard GameDeductionFighting

Mechanics
Hand Management
Hidden Roles
Kill Steal
Player Elimination
Take That
Team-Based Game
Variable Player Powers
190.jpgBattlestar Galactica: The Board Game3 - 614+120 - 180 mins
View Details
Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game is an exciting game of mistrust, intrigue, and the struggle for survival. Based on the epic and widely-acclaimed Sci Fi Channel series, Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game puts players in the role of one of ten of their favorite characters from the show. Each playable character has their own abilities and weaknesses, and must all work together in order for humanity to have any hope of survival. However, one or more players in every game secretly side with the Cylons. Players must attempt to expose the traitor while fuel shortages, food contaminations, and political unrest threatens to tear the fleet apart. After the Cylon attack on the Colonies, the battered remnants of the human race are on the run, constantly searching for the next signpost on the road to Earth. They face the threat of Cylon attack from without, and treachery and crisis from within. Humanity must work together if they are to have any hope of survival…but how can they, when any of them may, in fact, be a Cylon agent? Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game is a semi-cooperative game for 3-6 players ages 10 and up that can be played in 2-3 hours. Players choose from pilots, political leaders, military leaders, or engineers to crew Galactica. They are also dealt a loyalty card at the start of the game to determine if they are a human or Cylon along with an assortment of skill cards based on their characters abilities. Players then can move and take actions either on Galactica, on Colonial 1, or in a Viper. They need to collect skill cards, fend off Cylon ships, and keep Galactica and the fleet jumping. Each turn also brings a Crisis Card, various tasks that players must overcome. Players need to play matching skill cards to fend off the problems; skill cards that don't match hinder the players success. Fate could be working against the crew, or there could be a traitorous Cylon! As players get closer and closer towards reaching their Earth, another round of loyalty cards are passed out and more Cylons may turn up. If players can keep their up their food stores, fuel levels, ship morale, and population, and they can keep Galactica in one piece long enough to make it to Earth, the Humans win the game. But if the Cylon players reveal themselves at the right moment and bring down Galactica, the Humans have lost. Official Site, Rules & FAQ: http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_minisite_sec.asp?eidm=18&esem=4 Unofficial FAQ for really tricky questions: http://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/Battlestar_Galactica_FAQ

Categorys
BluffingDeductionMovies / TV / Radio themePoliticalScience FictionSpace ExplorationSpies/Secret Agents

Mechanics
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Hidden Roles
Once-Per-Game Abilities
Role Playing
Semi-Cooperative Game
Team-Based Game
Traitor Game
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
Voting
191.jpgBattlestar Galactica: The Board Game - Exodus Expansion3 - 614+120 - 180 mins
View Details
Fantasy Flight Games is pleased to announce Exodus, the second expansion for Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game! With three new options to add to your game, Exodus is a great way to expand on the accusations and mistrust that runs rampant in Battlestar Galactica. You can choose to add any combination of the three new options included in Exodus. Crave more white-knuckle space dog-fighting? Incorporate the Cylon Fleet option. The Conflicted Loyalties option introduces new Loyalty Cards that will test even the most trustworthy allegiances. Finally, relive the emotional turmoil of the hit television series with the Ionian Nebula, which pits players against the various conflicting personalities aboard Galactica. The Cylon Fleet option keeps the pressure intense by introducing the Cylon Fleet game board. This board makes sure that every Crisis Card drawn will result in some sort of enemy ship activity. Once the Cylon Pursuit Track reaches the end, the Cylon ships will transfer over to the main game board, surrounding Galactica. There’s little time for rest between assaults, so get out there and protect those civvies, fighter jockeys! Alliances are put to the test in the Conflicted Loyalties option, where the new Final Five Loyalty Cards up the stakes and introduce penalties for revealing your fellow humans’ Loyalty Card. In addition, new Personal Goal Loyalty Cards present players with an incriminating task to undertake. If they don’t fulfill their goal, then they will cause Galactica to lose a resource at the end of the game. Will you raise suspicion by completing the damaging task, or will you lay low and hope your failures won’t condemn the rest of your crew? Finally, with the Ionian Nebula option, familiar faces populate the fleet as allies, and can be encountered by visiting locations on Galactica. But beware! The Cylons can influence these non-player characters, compelling them to produce negative effects when encountered. Manage humanity’s conflicting personalities carefully... or infighting will leave you vulnerable!

Categorys
BluffingDeductionExpansion for Base-gameMovies / TV / Radio themePoliticalScience FictionSpace ExplorationSpies/Secret Agents

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Role Playing
Team-Based Game
Traitor Game
Variable Player Powers
192.jpgBattlestar Galactica: The Board Game - Pegasus Expansion3 - 614+120 - 180 mins
View Details
The first expansion for Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game, Pegasus adds two new supplemental game boards featuring the Battlestar Pegasus and the planet New Caprica, seven new characters, two plastic Basestars, as well as new Destination, Crisis, Loyalty, Quorum, Super Crisis, and Skill cards. The new Pegasus board can be used by itself or together with the New Caprica board to create the game you desire – the Pegasus alone for the additional firepower she provides, or add the New Caprica board to simulate the rebellion on the new human colony, bringing the game to an epic level. New rules introduce the ability to play as a new character type – the Cylon Leader, with a new Treachery Skill card type. From the Box: "On behalf of the officers and crew of the Pegasus, it's a pleasure to see you all. Welcome back to the Colonial Fleet." - Admiral Helena Cain The arrival of the Battlestar Pegasus heralds a new era in the lives of the Galactica crew and the Colonial government, bringing badly needed manpower and firepower to humanity's ongoing fight against the Cylons. However, under the command of Admiral Cain there is no place for compassion or mercy. Now brutal necessity and hard choices erode humanity's moral compass. The Cylons, in turn, are changing as well. The more they are exposed to humans, the more their individual agendas begin to guide their actions. In a time of suspicion and desperate need, the line between right and wrong grows less and less distinct. The Pegasus Expansion for Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game brings players the next chapter in the popular Syfy series. In addition to more Destination, Crisis, Super Crisis, Loyalty, and Skill Cards, this expansion introduces many new card types such as Treachery Skill Cards, representing the underhanded methods used to sabotage humanity's struggles. New characters in the expansion allow players to play as Cylon Leaders, who can win or lose based on their own mysterious motivations. New gameboards allow characters to explore both the Pegasus and New Caprica. Finally, with the New Caprica Objective Card and board, humanity will be subjected to Cylon rule, and must defend themselves from their oppressive overlords until Galactica can return to attempt a daring rescue. "We fight 'em until we can't." - Kara Thrace Expands: Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game

Categorys
BluffingDeductionExpansion for Base-gameMovies / TV / Radio themePoliticalScience FictionSpace ExplorationSpies/Secret Agents

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Role Playing
Team-Based Game
Traitor Game
Variable Player Powers
384.pngBetrayal at House on the Hill3 - 612+60 mins
View Details
From the press release: Betrayal at House on the Hill quickly builds suspense and excitement as players explore a haunted mansion of their own design, encountering spirits and frightening omens that foretell their fate. With an estimated one hour playing time, Betrayal at House on the Hill is ideal for parties, family gatherings or casual fun with friends. Betrayal at House on the Hill is a tile game that allows players to build their own haunted house room by room, tile by tile, creating a new thrilling game board every time. The game is designed for three to six people, each of whom plays one of six possible characters. Secretly, one of the characters betrays the rest of the party, and the innocent members of the party must defeat the traitor in their midst before it’s too late! Betrayal at House on the Hill will appeal to any game player who enjoys a fun, suspenseful, and strategic game. Betrayal at House on the Hill includes detailed game pieces, including character cards, pre-painted plastic figures, and special tokens, all of which help create a spooky atmosphere and streamline game play. An updated reprint of Betrayal at House on the Hill was released on October 5, 2010. ISBN 9780786957170 UPC 653569533450

Categorys
AdventureExplorationHorrorMiniatures

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Map Addition
Modular Board
Player Elimination
Role Playing
Storytelling
Team-Based Game
Traitor Game
Variable Player Powers
291.pngBetrayal!214+120 - 180 mins
View Details
Shortly after Poland was conquered in 1939, Hitler begin urging an immediate attack in the West. The original plans were uninspiring and his generals feared an attritional stalemate. Over the winter the Germans keep taking the measure of their opponents and hit upon a plan was that inspired, risky, and utterly decisive. Ironic of Hitler to assume his remarkable success was simply the new template for all future campaigns. His eyes turned east. But why, exactly, did France fall? Against the Odds 2017 Annual features four top designers all tasked with re-examining the 1940 campaign and answering that very question. 'Betrayal!' is a strategic level game of the German invasion of France, Belgium, and the Netherlands in May 1940. After finishing campaigns in Poland, Denmark, and Norway, Hitler turned to France. The goal was to knock France down and then prepare for the subjugation of Britain and the invasion of the Soviet Union. Pre-war planning, coupled with valuable experience gained in Poland, would lead the Wehrmacht to excel in lightning warfare never before seen on such a massive scale. While the French had re-visited World War One with a static Maginot Line defending their border, the Germans went beyond this and brought in blitzkrieg. There were a few bumps along the way. The smaller British army and those from tiny Belgium and Netherlands tried to help France. The game has two Allied players, one French and one British. They will alternate, depending on initiative, in handling the automata German side. Internal differences between the allies can arise according to their separate and unique victory conditions.

Categorys
WargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Area Movement
Simulation
193.pngBlame Space2 - 612+45 - 90 mins
View Details
Blame Space is a fast-paced card game of luck, skill and sheer bloody-mindedness. In space! For 2 to 6 spaced-out players. Playing time approx. 45 – 90 minutes. The Story So Far... Our mission has failed, The captain has been murdered, Systems are sabotaged, A virus has been brought on board... The ship’s computer is determined to find and punish the traitor who caused this mess. Maybe it's you! There's only one way you’re getting off this ship alive: Blame someone else! On your turn, play Issue cards from your hand onto the Blame pile. You can play up to 3 cards or you may choose to play no cards. Each card played must share at least one Duty icon with the card beneath it. However, if you play a Betrayal or Infected card, you can play no other cards on the same turn (you play 1 card). The number of cards you played determines which action you must take. When someone is blamed, the accuser and accused crewmember go through the Issues in the Blame pile and count their respective Blame points. The one with the most points takes the Blame. The accuser takes it if the points are tied. At the end of the game: count all your Blame points from the Issues in your hand. The more you have, the worse your chances of survival. The game ends immediately when the last card is drawn (or turned over) from the Draw pile. The crewmember who does this must take the Blame!

Categorys
Card GameScience Fiction

Mechanics
Take That
485.jpgBlock Mania214+120 - 180 mins
View Details
A game of tactical combat set in the Judge Dredd universe. Players take on the role of rival neighboring blocks. The residents of each block would like to destroy as much of their rival block as possible. Players control these residents as they use whatever they can to vandalize and destroy: spray paint, guns, flamethrowers and heavy lasers. Expanded by: Mega Mania Happy Hour -Additional tiles and rules for Block Mania appeared in White Dwarf 94. Happy Hour was included in the 2020 edition of the Mega Mania expansion.

Categorys
Comic Book / StripScience FictionWargame

Mechanics
Action Points
Dice Rolling
486.jpgBlock Mania: Happy Hour2 - 414+120 mins
View Details
Additional counters with rules for the Block Mania board game, published in White Dwarf magazine issue 94. The counters are not pre-printed on card, but made up by cutting them out of the magazine and sticking them on to counters from the original game as instructed in the article. Reprinted in the 2020 edition of Mega Mania.

Categorys
Comic Book / StripScience FictionWargame

Mechanics
Action Points
Dice Rolling
487.jpgBlock Mania: Mega-Mania3 - 414+120 - 180 mins
View Details
3-4 player expansion for the 2 player game Block Mania. Expands: Block Mania Republished in 2020 with Happy Hour expansion.

Categorys
Comic Book / StripExpansion for Base-gameScience Fiction

Mechanics
Action Points
488.jpgBlocks in Afrika2 - 414+60 mins
View Details
BLOCKS IN AFRIKA is a new concept game covering the whole North African campaign from 1940 to 1943. Developed on wooden blocks and cubes system, over an astonishing 87x64cm full laminated multicolor map-board, there's not any paper component, but the Manual. All the over 400 wooden/plastic components have been created by the best Italian artisinal industry and painted "A buratto", a technique usually adopted for painting car parts and accessories. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND On June 10 1940, the Italian Fascist Leader Benito Mussolini was convinced that it was the right time to join the war on the German side before it was over and Germany got all the glory. Fascist Italy was unprepared for a World War, but Mussolini thought the war would have only lasted for some weeks and that a few thousand Italian casualties would have given him some credibility at the future Peace Conference. However, as soon as Italian troops crossed the French border, they encountered fierce resistance from the determined French Transalpine Army. Even worse was to come when the Italian Army crossed the Egyptian border to face a well trained and motivated British Desert Force; furthermore, the idea of invading Greece through the Balkans, was not as easy as it looked. It was only thanks to a major German commitment in the Mediterranean that operations swung in favor of the Axis and the name of Rommel became a legend. It was also said that, by having to provide aid to the Italians in the Balkans, Germany diverted manpower that was needed in Russia and hence sowed the seeds of the Axis defeat in the East. However, as soon as America was thrown into the war by the infamous Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the fate of the Axis was written in stone and defeat was only a matter of time. BLOCKS IN AFRIKA recalls, in game form, the most decisive battles fought in the African Theater Front from the Italian drive to Marsa Matruh in Summer 1940, until the collapse of the Italian Regime in Semptember 1943. BLOCKS IN AFRIKA is a game for two players, one controls the Western Allies and the other one controls the Axis Powers. Although based on history, players in command of the two factions can modify the evolution of World War 2 in the Mediterranean Theater. RULES INTRODUCTION The rules are divided into three major sections which can be learned one at a time. The first section is the BASIC GAME RULES which introduces the basic concepts and enables players to start playing the game without too many rules to remember. Then the ADVANCED GAME RULES provide more specific and detailed rules for an enhanced realism, such as the use of Fuel and the Advanced Production System. Finally, for those players who want to get the best out of the game, OPTIONAL RULES can be added as desired. The Optional Rules include Technology Research, Strategic warfare over German factories and U-Boot Campaign in the Atlantic Ocean, Amphibious Invasions, Parachute Assaults… SCALE A hexagon is approximately 53 miles (70 Km) across. A turn is 1 month long. A full strength counter represents 300 planes, 300 Tanks, or 30,000 men, depending on the type unit, equipment and nationality. FOG OF WAR The game must be played with the Fog of War on (wooden blocks are placed on the map in such a way the opponent player can not see them). Language: English, German, French, Spanish and Italian Genre: Operational, Strategic Turns: Turn-Based Complexity: Basic to Advanced, depending on which rules are used and on Scenario Lenght Period: World War II SCENARIOS With over 240 units counters and 200 different resource points of various color, players can enjoy hours of fun by playing one of the ten BIA scenarios, one of the four 7-turn BIE scenarios (in cobination with BITE and BITW) or the gargantuan 1939 CAMPAIGN. 1940 Operation Compass, November 1940 - March 1941 1941 Operation Exporter, June - July 1941 1941 Middle- East Uprising, May - September 1941 1941 Operation Marita-Merkur, April - June 1941 1941 The Desert Fox, March - July 1941 1942 Tobruk, June - October 1942 1942 El Alamein, October 1942 - February 1943 NAVAL BATTLES Punta Stilo, 9 July 1940 Capo Teulada, 27 November 1940 Capo Matapan, 28-29 March 1941 Harpoon, 21 June 1942 Every scenario has different Victory conditions and length, with a playing time from 1 to 2 turns. BLOCKS IN AFRIKA can be played standalone or combined with Blocks in the West and Blocks in the East in one of the four 7 turn long BLOCKS IN EUROPE SCENARIOS: 1941 - LEBENSRAUM 1942 - AXIS HYPE 1943 - TIEBREAK 1944 - DOWNFALL and the gargantuan 1939 CAMPAIGN: from Danzig to Hell Microbadge:

Categorys
WargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hexagon Grid
Secret Unit Deployment
Simulation
489.jpgBlocks in the East1 - 414+120 mins
View Details
On 22 June 1941, under the codeword "Dortmund", the German Wehrmacht and other Axis powers started the invasion of the Soviet Union. Over 150 divisions – ca. 3,6 million troops – of the Axis invaded the USSR along a front of 2,900 km. In addition to troops, Barbarossa involved 600,000 motor vehicles, 750,000 horses, 3350 tanks, 7300 guns, and nearly 2000 planes – the largest invasion in the history of warfare. BLOCKS IN THE EAST is a game of World War II conflict simulation at the strategic level. It recalls the most decisive battles fought on the Eastern Front from the beginning of the invasion in summer 1941 until the dramatic end in Berlin in spring 1945. Although based on historical events and battles, the players in command of the two factions can modify the evolution of World War II. The game is recommended for two or four players: one/two control the Soviet Red Army and the other one/two control Germany and the other Axis powers. In a threesome, one player controls one faction while the other two players control the other faction. The game is furthermore suitable for solitary play: the single player just controls both sides. In this case, a play with Fog of War is suggested. Developed with a system of wooden blocks and cubes and played out over an astonishing 125x87 cm (49"x34") full laminated multicolor mapboard, the only paper component in the box is the rules manual. In total, more than 600 wooden/plastic components have been created by the best Italian artisinal industry and painted "A buratto", a technique usually adopted for painting car parts and accessories. The rules are divided into three major sections which can be learned one at a time: • The Basic Game Rules introduce the basic concepts of BITE and enable players to start playing the game without too many rules to remember. • The Advanced Game Rules provide more specific and detailed rules for enhanced realism, such as the use of Fuel and the Advanced Production System. • The Optional Rules are for those who want to get the most out of the game, with rules for Technology Research, Strategic Warfare with the bombing of Germany and U-boat campaigns in the oceans, Amphibious Landings, Airborne Assaults, and more. In BLOCKS IN THE EAST, a hexagon is approximately 53 miles (70 km) across, a turn is 1 month long, and a full-strength counter represents a major military formation (normally corps size) with 300 planes, 300 tanks, or 30,000 men, depending on the unit type, equipment, nationality, etc. The game can be played with "Fog of War" on (with the faces of wooden blocks hidden from the opponent) or off (all units are visible). Players can compete in the full 1941 Codeword Dortmund Campaign, in one of four six-turn scenarios ("Operation Barbarossa 1941", "Case Blue - The Drive to Baku 1942", "Operation Citadel - The Battle of Kursk 1943" and "Bagration Offensive in Summer 1944"), or one of the shorter, easy-to-learn scenarios ("Road to Rostov", which lasts six turns, or any of these scenarios: "Road to Leningrad", "Road to Moscow" or "Short Barbarossa"). Each scenario has different victory conditions and length, with a playing time from 1 to 49 turns. BLOCKS IN THE EAST can be played standalone or combined with Blocks in the West and Blocks in Afrika.

Categorys
WargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Hexagon Grid
Simulation
490.jpgBlocks in the West1 - 414+120 mins
View Details
Early in the morning of May 10, 1940, under the Codeword Danzig, Fallschirmjäger from the 7th Flieger Division and 22nd Luftlande executed surprise landings at Den Haag, on the road to Rotterdam and against the Fortress of Eben Emael in order to facilitate German Army Group B's feint advance in Belgium, while the main attack was conducted by stronger Army Group A led by seven panzer divisions from the Ardennes, through a terrain believed uncrossable to armor units. France and the UK reacted immediately, activating the Dyle-Breda Plan, and thus committing their best forces directly into the trap. Then in June the evacuation of Dunkirk was a partial success, but the battle for France was over with an astonishing German victory. Four years elapsed before the Western Allies would come back to the continent and thus finally defeat Germany. Blocks in the West (BITW) recalls, in game form, the most decisive battles fought in the European Theater Front from the invasion of France until the collapse of the Nazi regimen in May 1945. BITW is a game of World War II conflict simulation at the operational level. Although based on historical events and battles, the players in command of the two factions can modify the evolution of World War II on the Western Front. The game is recommended for two, three or four players: one/two control the Western Allies and the other one/two control Germany and Italy. The game is imminently suitable for solitary play: the single player just controls both sides. In this case, playing with Fog of War is mandatory. Developed on a wooden blocks and cubes system over an astonishing 124x87cm full-laminated multicolor map board, Blocks in the West includes no paper components other than the manual. All of the over 900 wooden/plastic components/stickers have been created by the best Italian artisinal industry and painted A buratto, a technique usually adopted for painting car parts and accessories. In terms of scale, a hexagon is approximately 44 miles (70 km) across, a game turn is one month long, and a full-strength counter represents a major military formation (normally a corps) of ca. 30,000 men, 300 Tanks or 300 planes depending on the unit type, equipment, nationality, etc The rules are divided into three major sections which can be learned one at a time. The basic game rules introduce the basic concepts and enables players to start playing the game without too many rules to remember. Then the advanced game rules provide more specific and detailed rules for an enhanced realism, such as the use of fuel and the advanced production system. Finally, for those players who want to get the best out of the game, optional rules can be added as desired; these include Technology Research, Strategic warfare over German factories and U-Boot Campaign in the Atlantic Ocean, Amphibious Invasions, and Parachute Assaults. Blocks in the West can be played standalone or combined with Blocks in the East and Blocks in Afrika.

Categorys
WargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hexagon Grid
Simulation
292.jpgBlood Bowl: Team Manager - The Card Game2 - 414+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Game description from the publisher: Blood Bowl: Team Manager - The Card Game is a bone-breaking, breathtaking standalone card game of violence and outright cheating for two to four players. Chaos, Dwarf, Wood Elf, Human, Orc, and Skaven teams compete against each other over the course of a brutal season. Customize your team by drafting Star Players, hiring staff, upgrading facilities, and cheating like mad. Lead your gang of misfits and miscreants to glory over your rivals all to become Spike! Magazine's Manager of the Year! Once a manager has chosen one of the six teams, he has five weeks to groom them into the best in the league, culminating with the Blood Bowl tournament. He does this by competing at highlights, collecting payouts, upgrading his personnel, and drafting Star Players. Managers begin the season with a starting team deck full of basic scrub players. These players are none too bright and have limited talents, but a clever manager can play to their strengths by carefully positioning them to excel on the pitch. Is your team ready to compete against other teams in head-to-head highlights? Highlights are the randomly determined matchups over which players compete. The more highlights a team wins, the more it improves and the more fans it accumulates. The season culminates with the Blood Bowl tournament. After the Blood Bowl, the season ends. Players then tally up their total fans and the manager with the most fans wins the game.

Categorys
Card GameFantasyFightingSports

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Open Drafting
337.jpgBlood Feud in New York2 - 612+180 mins
View Details
On a very large map of New York, including all the suburbs in Queens and Brooklyn, players build up their gangs of thugs, goons and hit men. Move these around the city in limos, speedboats and helicopters, attack your enemies, and take control of boroughs to earn income and hire more gangsters. Kill your enemy's Boss and you control their gang. Buy police protection and move around safely. When your family members congregates in one borough, they are safe, but earn you no income bonuses. Put a family member in each borough and your get bonuses to income, but then they are vulnerable to attack. There are 300 plastic figures for the different characters, buildings and vehicles. The helicopters are very good. The rotors spin when you blow on them. The game has detailed rules with tables for combat but also a set of clear diagrams. You could start playing in a few minutes.

Categorys
EconomicFightingMafiaMiniaturesNegotiationTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Player Elimination
491.jpgBoss Monster: The Dungeon Building Card Game2 - 413+30 mins
View Details
Inspired by a love of classic video games, Boss Monster: The Dungeon Building Card Game pits 2-4 players in a competition to build the ultimate side-scrolling dungeon. Players compete to lure and destroy hapless adventurers, racing to outbid one another to see who can build the most enticing, treasure-filled dungeon. The goal of Boss Monster is to be the first Boss to amass ten Souls, which are gained when a Hero is lured and defeated — but a player can lose if his Boss takes five Wounds from Heroes who survive his dungeon. Playing Boss Monster requires you to juggle two competing priorities: the need to lure Heroes at a faster rate than your opponents, and the need to kill those Heroes before they reach your Boss. Players can build one room per turn, each with its own damage and treasure value. More attractive rooms tend to deal less damage, so a Boss who is too greedy can become inundated with deadly Heroes. Players interact with each other by building rooms and playing Spells. Because different Heroes seek different treasure types, and rooms are built simultaneously (played face down, then revealed), this means that every "build phase" is a bidding war. Spells are instant-speed effects that can give players advantages or disrupt opponents. As a standalone card game with 155 cards, Boss Monster contains everything that 2-4 players need to play.

Categorys
Card GameFantasyVideo Game Theme

Mechanics
Hand Management
Player Elimination
Take That
Variable Player Powers
194.jpgBrass: Birmingham2 - 414+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Brass: Birmingham is an economic strategy game sequel to Martin Wallace' 2007 masterpiece, Brass. Brass: Birmingham tells the story of competing entrepreneurs in Birmingham during the industrial revolution, between the years of 1770-1870. As in its predecessor, you must develop, build, and establish your industries and network, in an effort to exploit low or high market demands. Each round, players take turns according to the turn order track, receiving two actions to perform any of the following actions (found in the original game): 1) Build - Pay required resources and place an industry tile. 2) Network - Add a rail / canal link, expanding your network. 3) Develop - Increase the VP value of an industry. 4) Sell - Sell your cotton, manufactured goods and pottery. 5) Loan - Take a £30 loan and reduce your income. Brass: Birmingham also features a new sixth action: 6) Scout - Discard three cards and take a wild location and wild industry card. (This action replaces Double Action Build in original Brass.) The game is played over two halves: the canal era (years 1770-1830) and the rail era (years 1830-1870). To win the game, score the most VPs. VPs are counted at the end of each half for the canals, rails and established (flipped) industry tiles. Birmingham features dynamic scoring canals/rails. Instead of each flipped industry tile giving a static 1 VP to all connected canals and rails, many industries give 0 or even 2 VPs. This provides players with the opportunity to score much higher value canals in the first era, and creates interesting strategy with industry placement. Iron, coal, and cotton are three industries which appear in both the original Brass as well as in Brass: Birmingham. New "Sell" system Brewing has become a fundamental part of the culture in Birmingham. You must now sell your product through traders located around the edges of the board. Each of these traders is looking for a specific type of good each game. To sell cotton, pottery, or manufactured goods to these traders, you must also "grease the wheels of industry" by consuming beer. For example, a level 1 cotton mill requires one beer to flip. As an incentive to sell early, the first player to sell to a trader receives free beer. Birmingham features three all-new industry types: Brewery - Produces precious beer barrels required to sell goods. Manufactured goods - Function like cotton, but features eight levels. Each level of manufactured goods provides unique rewards, rather than just escalating in VPs, making it a more versatile (yet potentially more difficult) path vs cotton. Pottery - These behemoths of Birmingham offer huge VPs, but at a huge cost and need to plan. Increased Coal and Iron Market size - The price of coal and iron can now go up to £8 per cube, and it's not uncommon. Brass: Birmingham is a sequel to Brass. It offers a very different story arc and experience from its predecessor.

Categorys
EconomicIndustry / ManufacturingPost-NapoleonicTransportation

Mechanics
Hand Management
Income
Loans
Market
Network and Route Building
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
Turn Order: Stat-Based
Variable Set-up
195.jpgBrass: Lancashire2 - 414+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Brass: Lancashire — first published as Brass — is an economic strategy game that tells the story of competing cotton entrepreneurs in Lancashire during the industrial revolution. You must develop, build, and establish your industries and network so that you can capitalize demand for iron, coal and cotton. The game is played over two halves: the canal phase and the rail phase. To win the game, score the most victory points (VPs), which are counted at the end of each half. VPs are gained from your canals, rails, and established (flipped) industry tiles. Each round, players take turns according to the turn order track, receiving two actions to perform any of the following: Build an industry tile Build a rail or canal Develop an industry Sell cotton Take a loan At the end of a player's turn, they replace the two cards they played with two more from the deck. Turn order is determined by how much money a player spent on the previous turn, from lowest spent first to highest spent. This turn order mechanism opens some strategic options for players going later in the turn order, allowing for the possibility of back-to-back turns. After all the cards have been played the first time (with the deck size being adjusted for the number of players), the canal phase ends and a scoring round commences. After scoring, all canals and all of the lowest level industries are removed for the game, after which new cards are dealt and the rail phase begins. During this phase, players may now occupy more than one location in a city and a double-connection build (though expensive) is possible. At the end of the rail phase, another scoring round takes place, then a winner is crowned. The cards limit where you can build your industries, but any card can be used for the develop, sell cotton or build connections actions. This leads to a strategic timing/storing of cards. Resources are common so that if one player builds a rail line (which requires coal) they have to use the coal from the nearest source, which may be an opponent's coal mine, which in turn gets that coal mine closer to scoring (i.e., being utilized). Brass: Lancashire, the 2018 edition from Roxley Games, reboots the original Warfrog Games edition of Brass with new artwork and components, as well as a few rules changes: The virtual link rules between Birkenhead have been made optional. The three-player experience has been brought closer to the ideal experience of four players by shortening each half of the game by one round and tuning the deck and distant market tiles slightly to ensure a consistent experience. Two-player rules have been created and are playable without the need for an alternate board. The level 1 cotton mill is now worth 5 VP to make it slightly less terrible.

Categorys
EconomicIndustry / ManufacturingPost-NapoleonicTransportation

Mechanics
Hand Management
Income
Loans
Market
Network and Route Building
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
Turn Order: Stat-Based
461.jpgBreak the Cube2 - 410+15 - 25 mins
View Details
Break the Cube is the multiplayer puzzle solving game that will let you go brain-to-brain with your friends! To compete, you will need to build the most complex shape possible behind your screen. Your goal is to recreate the shape hidden behind your opponent's screen before they recreate yours using Break the Code's system of questioning and guessing, but now with a 3D shape! The first player finding their opponent shapes initiate the end of the game. Everyone else will get a chance to guess their respective opponent shape to share the victory. If the challenge is not hard enough, spice up your games with additional rules, like only one final guess, or adding another piece to you shapes! Each player starts the game by building a shape with their wooden pieces behind their screens. On their turn, players can: Asking what their opponent sees from the top of one square. Asking EVERY players what they see in a column or line. Everyone at the table, even the one asking it, must answer this question. Trying to guess the shape once they think they recreated. If it is correct, every other player gets a chance to guess their opponents shape. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Deduction

Mechanics
Deduction
Memory
6.jpgBritannia3 - 512+180 - 300 mins
View Details
"Britannia" is a historical Strategic board-wargame that broadly depicts the millennia-long struggle for control of England, Scotland, and Wales. The game begins with the Roman invasion of 43 A.D., continues through the many struggles between Angles, Saxons, Picts, Norsemen, Scots, Irish, and other tribes, and ends with the Norman invasion of 1066. Britannia allows players to re-create this epic history, re-enacting important battles in some cases, altering the course of history in others. The game rules discourage players from making historically unrealistic moves, but also give players the freedom to alter Great Britain’s history in important ways, creating countless interesting “what if?” scenarios. What if Boudicca’s Revolt against the Romans had been more successful? What if the Romans and the Romano-British had repelled the Saxon invasions of the 5th and 6th centuries? What if William the Conqueror had died during the Norman invasion of 1066? In Britannia, the players will determine the destiny of a kingdom.

Categorys
AncientCivilizationMedievalWargame

Mechanics
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Simulation
Stat Check Resolution
Voting
196.jpgCa$h 'n Gun$4 - 610+30 mins
View Details
In an abandoned warehouse a gangster band is splitting its loot, but they can’t get an agreement on the split! It’s time to let the guns talk and soon everyone is aiming at everyone. The richest surviving gangster wins the game! Ca$h 'n Gun$ will make you relive the best scenes of your favorite gangster movies. Fun, bluffing, and tough negotiations are guaranteed, but will you dare to play? It's simply killing! On each turn, a player will assume the role of "The Don", and will call out the steps in gameplay. Before the skirmish itself, an available pot of cash will be laid out before the players. This pot must be evenly split up amongst all of the surviving hoods. After that, the "Don" of the round will ask the players, including himself, to load their guns (in the form of selecting one of three possible cards: "Bang!", "Bang! Bang! Bang!" or "Click! Click!" from a set of 8 cards: 2 "Bang!"s, 1 Triple-"Bang!" and 5 "Clicks!"), and then count down to all of the players aiming their guns (real foam guns). Each player will then take a look at how many guns are pointed at them, and also take a look at the available pot of cash for the round before deciding if they want to "Chicken Out" and remove themselves from the skirmish. If they choose to back down, they will get a "Chicken" token which will deduct from their ill-gotten gains at the end of the game. But all players have to "Chicken Out" at the same time, using a countdown like the aiming. The remaining players will resolve the shootout showing their cards. First, all Triple-"Bangs!" wound the players they are aimed at. If there are still-aiming players with "Bang!" cards, those now wound their targets. "Click!"s are only bluffs and do nothing. A player that is wounded during the standoff does not participate in the split of the cash and receives a bandage (any player that receives a certain number of bandages is eliminated from the game). Now all the used cards are discarded--even those of the players that "Chickened Out". Now the remaining players will finally split the cash. If the cash cannot be divided evenly, the rest is kept on the table and is added to the new pot. The game is played 8 rounds, until all cards were played. Keeping track of the cards is important, since all players have only a limited supply of "real" shots. There are a couple of expansions packed-in with most editions that change some of the mechanics of the game, and also add a new "traitor"-based mechanic, as well.

Categorys
BluffingCard GameFightingHumorMafiaNegotiationParty Game

Mechanics
Player Elimination
Simultaneous Action Selection
Variable Player Powers
333.jpgCalico1 - 410+30 - 45 mins
View Details
Calico is a puzzly tile-laying game of quilts and cats. In Calico, players compete to sew the coziest quilt as they collect and place patches of different colors and patterns. Each quilt has a particular pattern that must be followed, and players are also trying to create color and pattern combinations that are not only aesthetically pleasing, but also able to attract the cuddliest cats! Turns are simple. Select a single patch tile from your hand and sew it into your quilt, then draw another patch into your hand from the three available. If you are able to create a color group, you may sew a button onto your quilt. If you are able to create a pattern combination that is attractive to any of the cats, it will come over and curl up on your quilt! At the end of the game, you score points for buttons, cats, and how well you were able to complete your unique quilt pattern. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsPuzzle

Mechanics
Enclosure
End Game Bonuses
Grid Coverage
Hexagon Grid
Open Drafting
Pattern Building
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tile Placement
197.jpgCanvas1 - 514+30 mins
View Details
In Canvas, you play as a painter competing in an art competition. Players will collect art cards, layering 3 of them together to create their own unique Painting. Each card contains a piece of artwork as well as a set of icons used during scoring. Icons will be revealed or hidden based on the way players choose to layer the cards making for an exciting puzzle. Paintings are scored based on a set of Scoring cards which will change each game. Once players have created and scored 3 paintings the game ends. On your turn you may take an Art card or make a painting. Art cards are selected from a row of cards in the center of play. Each of these cards has a cost associated with their position. After selecting an Art card you must pay its cost by placing an Inspiration token on each of the cards to its left. If you do not have enough Inspiration tokens, you may not select that card. Any tokens on the card you have selected are kept for future turns. The far left card costs no Inspiration tokens to take. If you have three or more Art cards you may choose to make a painting. Select 3 of your art cards, arrange them in any order and then score them by comparing the visible icons on your painting to the Scoring conditions. Once all players have made 3 paintings the game ends. The player with the most points wins! —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card GamePuzzle

Mechanics
Hand Management
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Layering
Open Drafting
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
426.jpgCanvas: Finishing Touches1 - 514+30 mins
View Details
The gallery is seeking new masterpieces! In Canvas: Finishing Touches, complete your works of art and show them off to the world with the new Frames! These Frames add a layer of interaction as players compete to have their work displayed on the gallery wall. Also features: Platinum Ribbons - Grab a Platinum Ribbon whenever your painting is framed in the gallery. New Scoring Cards for puzzling new challenges and added replayability.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCard GamePuzzle

Mechanics
Hand Management
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Layering
Open Drafting
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
427.pngCanvas: Kickstarter Mini Expansion1 - 514+30 mins
View Details
Kickstarter exclusive that includes 10 art cards and 8 award cards (plus a rules cards). The art cards in the mini expansion feature two new icons that are not in the base game. The bonus ribbon gives you straight victory points, but doesn't help you meet any scoring conditions. The x2 icon doubles the icon in the slot that it points to. Each game you can play with a different Award card that has a unique game end scoring rule. These cards add variability and complexity to make the game more replayable, especially at expert levels. Card art descriptions: "…Desires" (human teeth with rainbow gums at top and bottom) "…Dread" (curly, leafless blue tree on the right) "Scorched…" (purple/blue dragon in the upper left) "…Expression" (street artist kneeling on the right spraying red into the center) "Forgotten…" (unstable and overgrown tower ruin on the left) "Simple…" (red, yellow, and blue paper airplanes at the top) "…Imagination" (person riding unicorn with green wings in the upper right) "Secret…" (open treasure chest in lower left with glowing blue contents) "…Mirage" (an orange/purple rock formation seems to be starting to levitate) "Pointless…" (green, red, and purple fireworks in the center)

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCard GamePuzzle

Mechanics
Hand Management
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Melding and Splaying
Open Drafting
Set Collection
428.jpgCanvas: Reflections1 - 514+30 mins
View Details
Paint from a new perspective! In Canvas: Reflections, the artistic puzzle has a new layer -- Mirror Cards! These reversible cards add deeper strategy, and also give you increased flexibility to string together combinations of Elements. Additionally, the new board offers a wider selection of Art Cards that allows you to better plan ahead and presents more choices even when running low on Inspiration Tokens. Also features: Gold Bonus Ribbons - Grab a Gold Bonus Ribbon for lining up a specific Element next to a Gold Bonus icon. New Scoring Cards for puzzling new challenges and added replayability. ​ -description from designer

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCard GamePuzzle

Mechanics
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Layering
Set Collection
198.jpgCanvas: Reflections - Deluxe Edition1 - 514+30 mins
View Details
Paint from a new perspective! In Canvas: Reflections, the artistic puzzle has a new layer -- Mirror Cards! These reversible cards add deeper strategy, and also give you increased flexibility to string together combinations of Elements. Additionally, the new board offers a wider selection of Art Cards that allows you to better plan ahead and presents more choices even when running low on Inspiration Tokens. Also features: Gold Bonus Ribbons - Grab a Gold Bonus Ribbon for lining up a specific Element next to a Gold Bonus icon. New Scoring Cards for puzzling new challenges and added replayability. The Deluxe Edition includes: + 10 More Reversible Transparent Cards + 5 Signature Style Cards + 2 Ribbon Pins + 26 Expansion Wood Tokens This edition will not be available in retail. It will only be sold through Kickstarter!

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCard GamePuzzle

Mechanics
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Layering
Set Collection
7.pngCaptain Sonar2 - 814+45 - 60 mins
View Details
At the bottom of the ocean, no one will hear you scream! In Captain Sonar, you and your teammates control a state-of-the-art submarine and are trying to locate an enemy submarine in order to blow it out of the water before they can do the same to you. Every role is important, and the confrontation is merciless. Be organized and communicate because a captain is nothing without his crew: the Chief Mate, the Radio Operator, and the Engineer. All the members of a team sit on one side of the table, and they each take a particular role on the submarine, with the division of labor for these roles being dependent on the number of players in the game: One player might be the captain, who is responsible for moving the submarine and announcing some details of this movement; another player is manning the sonar in order to listen to the opposing captain's orders and try to decipher where that sub might be in the water; a third player might be working in the munitions room to prepare torpedoes, mines and other devices that will allow for combat. Captain Sonar can be played in two modes: turn-by-turn or simultaneous. In the latter set-up, all the members of a team take their actions simultaneously while trying to track what the opponents are doing, too. When a captain is ready to launch an attack, the action pauses for a moment to see whether a hit has been recorded — then play resumes with the target having snuck away while the attacker paused or with bits of metal now scattered across the ocean floor. Multiple maps are included with varying levels of difficulty.

Categorys
DeductionFightingNauticalReal-time

Mechanics
Grid Movement
Hidden Movement
Line Drawing
Real-Time
Role Playing
Secret Unit Deployment
Simulation
Team-Based Game
8.pngCarcassonne2 - 57+30 - 45 mins
View Details
Carcassonne is a tile-placement game in which the players draw and place a tile with a piece of southern French landscape on it. The tile might feature a city, a road, a cloister, grassland or some combination thereof, and it must be placed adjacent to tiles that have already been played, in such a way that cities are connected to cities, roads to roads, etcetera. Having placed a tile, the player can then decide to place one of their meeples on one of the areas on it: on the city as a knight, on the road as a robber, on a cloister as a monk, or on the grass as a farmer. When that area is complete, that meeple scores points for its owner. During a game of Carcassonne, players are faced with decisions like: "Is it really worth putting my last meeple there?" or "Should I use this tile to expand my city, or should I place it near my opponent instead, giving him a hard time to complete their project and score points?" Since players place only one tile and have the option to place one meeple on it, turns proceed quickly even if it is a game full of options and possibilities. First game in the Carcassonne series.

Categorys
City BuildingMedievalTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Map Addition
Tile Placement
9.jpgCarcassonne: Star Wars2 - 57+35 mins
View Details
Description from the publisher: Carcassonne: Star Wars combines the exciting adventures of the Star Wars universe with the gameplay of Carcassonne, with the known rules of the game being simplified through clever changes that bring an entirely new feel to the game. This is similar to Carcassonne but with Roads replaced with Trading Routes and claimed by Merchants instead of Robbers, Cities replaced with Asteroid Fields and claimed by Explorers instead of Knights and Cloisters replaced with Planets and claimed by Conquerers instead of Monks. There is no farming equivalent. Faction symbols (Empire, Rebel Alliance and Bounty Hunters) provide scoring bonuses regardless of what faction your Meeples belong to. Majority control is determined by dice rolling with the highest result rather than the sum determining the winner, although tiebreaks and defeats still provide some points. A player receives dice equal to the number of his Meeples involved in the majority control plus an additional one for using his large Meeple and one for any matching Faction symbols but this is always capped at three dice. One notable change is that Planets can be conquered by placing tiles adjacent to the Planet tile where the player now has the options of placing a Meeple on the adjacent Planet tile or on the tile he placed. There is also a four player team variant where it is the two Empire colours (black/Darth Vader and white/Storm Troopers) versus the two Rebel Alliance colours (red/Luke Skywalker and green/Yoda). Orange/Boba Fett is not used.

Categorys
Movies / TV / Radio themeScience Fiction

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Tile Placement
10.jpgCastello Methoni3 - 58+30 - 50 mins
View Details
During the Byzantine years, Methoni retained its remarkable harbor and remained one of the most important cities of Peloponnese. The Republic of Venice had its eye on Methoni since the 12th century, due to its location on the route from Venice to the Eastern markets. Rich Venetian traders started to expand their territories with power and money to be a lord of Methoni which must be the promised most powerful throne. In Castello Methoni, players attempt to take over castles, but with money, not military power. On a turn, a player plays a card of a certain terrain, builds a wall on the corresponding place, then places one of their houses and one other house on each side of the wall. When an area is closed by walls, it becomes a domain. When a player builds a domain, then they pay money to the players who have a house in the area. When a player builds a domain adjacent to another domain, they can merge the domains by paying money. The game ends when no more walls remain in the supply. The player who has collected the most points from coins and domains wins. —description from publisher

Categorys
City BuildingEconomicTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Enclosure
359.jpgCat Café2 - 410+30 mins
View Details
Make your corner in the Cat Café the best one possible! Entice cats by literally drawing toys for the cats to play with. Place the toys in the most favorable way possible, and you win by attracting the most cats! Cat Café is a reimplementation and slightly altered version of the Korean game Cat Tower by Mandoo Games. Cat Café is a light roll-and-write game in which players draft one die each round, then use the final unused die as well. Both dice are then used to 1) Draw a particular type of cat toy and 2) Place it on that level of a particular tower. Placing each toy in a particular position is important as it gives a player points in specific ways. Place a bowl next to different and unique other toys, or place a cushion high up so that cats can sleep and watch from high up, or even give the cats yarn to play with, giving you potential majority scoring. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsDice

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Paper-and-Pencil
Push Your Luck
Set Collection
402.jpgCat in the Box: Deluxe Edition2 - 513+20 - 40 mins
View Details
Cat in the Box: Deluxe Edition is the quintessential quantum trick-taking card game for 2 - 5 cool cats, where your card’s color isn’t defined until you play it! Hypothesize how many tricks you will win, and record your bid. Place tokens on the community research board as you play your hand, and connect large groups of tokens to score even more points. Plan your tricks carefully as you cannot claim the color of a card with the same number that has already been declared. Doing so would be pawsitively catastrophic as you have just created a paradox! New Deluxe Edition features: Supports 2-5 players High quality geekbits-style plastic tokens Recessed player boards Recessed Center Research board Score pad And a custom plastic insert to keep Cat in the Box: Deluxe Edition tidy! —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsCard Game

Mechanics
Enclosure
Hand Management
Predictive Bid
Trick-taking
378.jpgCat Tower2 - 66+15 - 20 mins
View Details
“Meow~ It looks so delicious!” Catty Fatty stares at the dried fish hung high on the shelf drooling. All cats are attracted wondering how they can reach the yummy fish beyond their leap. They come up with the idea of stacking on each other’s back so as to grab the fish. Let’s help them make a tower of cats! Seven Cat Cards are dealt to each player. The game starts with the player who owns the most cats. In clockwise order, each player takes a turn to roll the die, and acts according to the image shown on the die result. The game ends immediately when one player gets rid of all Cat Cards in hand. Integrates with Cat Tower Lite Cat Tower Plus

Categorys
Action / DexterityAnimalsChildren's Game

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Stacking and Balancing
232.jpgCataclysm: A Second World War2 - 514+90 - 600 mins
View Details
Cataclysm: A Second World War It is the 1930s and the world is still recovering from the Great War and the Great Depression that followed it. A second world war can break out at any time. Can you stop it? Will you start it? Better yet, can you win it? Cataclysm is not your typical game about World War II. The game begins in 1933, not 1939, and is global in scope. Germany is far from dominating Europe. Japan is on the march in Asia. Every crisis is an unexpected opportunity. There is no hindsight and anything can happen. Truly grand strategic in scope, Cataclysm requires players to lead nations, not just armies or fleets. You must craft a diplomatic strategy, develop political support for your policies at home, shift your economy to a war footing, and build up the forces you need to deter or vanquish your enemies. There is no traditional I-go-you-go turn structure in Cataclysm. Counters representing political actions, military actions, units, and possible events are drawn at random from an action cup. As each counter comes out, the owning player resolves it, and play swiftly moves on to the next draw. You have to make plans to execute when your chance comes up, but you have no idea when, or in what order, events will transpire. A game about global war gives every nation armies, air forces, and fleets. But in Cataclysm, military pieces have no numeric values. You know what forces you have and where they are deployed. To resolve combat, each side rolls up to three dice and compares their single highest die. You can devote more resources to a campaign (generating more dice or bonuses), but that does not guarantee a favorable outcome. Your efforts can lead to triumph… or to disaster. In Cataclysm, you are free to explore alternatives. The Soviets can construct a massive long-range bomber force. Japan can build powerful armored forces to overrun Siberia. Germany can invade Britain, or France can take Berlin, provided you craft a strategy that gets you there. When you play Cataclysm, you write your own history of a second world war. "This is my most anticipated wargame of 2018." --Ananda Gupta, co-designer of Twilight Struggle. "I WOULD EAT A KITTEN FOR THIS GAME" --Kuhrusty

Categorys
PoliticalWargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Chit-Pull System
Dice Rolling
Movement Points
Simulation
11.jpgCatan3 - 410+60 - 120 mins
View Details
In CATAN (formerly The Settlers of Catan), players try to be the dominant force on the island of Catan by building settlements, cities, and roads. On each turn dice are rolled to determine what resources the island produces. Players build by spending resources (sheep, wheat, wood, brick and ore) that are depicted by these resource cards; each land type, with the exception of the unproductive desert, produces a specific resource: hills produce brick, forests produce wood, mountains produce ore, fields produce wheat, and pastures produce sheep. Setup includes randomly placing large hexagonal tiles (each showing a resource or the desert) in a honeycomb shape and surrounding them with water tiles, some of which contain ports of exchange. Number disks, which will correspond to die rolls (two 6-sided dice are used), are placed on each resource tile. Each player is given two settlements (think: houses) and roads (sticks) which are, in turn, placed on intersections and borders of the resource tiles. Players collect a hand of resource cards based on which hex tiles their last-placed house is adjacent to. A robber pawn is placed on the desert tile. A turn consists of possibly playing a development card, rolling the dice, everyone (perhaps) collecting resource cards based on the roll and position of houses (or upgraded cities—think: hotels) unless a 7 is rolled, turning in resource cards (if possible and desired) for improvements, trading cards at a port, and trading resource cards with other players. If a 7 is rolled, the active player moves the robber to a new hex tile and steals resource cards from other players who have built structures adjacent to that tile. Points are accumulated by building settlements and cities, having the longest road and the largest army (from some of the development cards), and gathering certain development cards that simply award victory points. When a player has gathered 10 points (some of which may be held in secret), he announces his total and claims the win. CATAN has won multiple awards and is one of the most popular games in recent history due to its amazing ability to appeal to experienced gamers as well as those new to the hobby. Die Siedler von Catan was originally published by KOSMOS and has gone through multiple editions. It was licensed by Mayfair and has undergone four editions as The Settlers of Catan. In 2015, it was formally renamed CATAN to better represent itself as the core and base game of the CATAN series. It has been re-published in two travel editions, portable edition and compact edition, as a special gallery edition (replaced in 2009 with a family edition), as an anniversary wooden edition, as a deluxe 3D collector's edition, in the basic Simply Catan, as a beginner version, and with an entirely new theme in Japan and Asia as Settlers of Catan: Rockman Edition. Numerous spin-offs and expansions have also been made for the game.

Categorys
EconomicNegotiation

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hexagon Grid
Income
Modular Board
Network and Route Building
Race
Random Production
Trading
Variable Set-up
12.jpgCatan Card Game210+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Catan Card Game bears only a slight resemblance to The Settlers of Catan, the original game in the Catan series. There are six resources: wool, wood, bricks, grain, ore, and gold. Before beginning the game, the players receive six square cards showing the resources, with a different die number on each card. In addition, the players start the game with two village cards and a road card connecting them. There are card stacks of more roads and villages, as well as cities, to be purchased during the game. With each new village or city comes two new resource cards. Villages and cities give victory points. When the number die is rolled, instead of collecting more cards, the players rotate the corresponding card 90 degrees to indicate a gain of one more of that resource; i.e., the brick card shows a picture of one brick on one edge of the card, two bricks on the next clockwise edge, three bricks along the third edge, and zero bricks on the fourth edge. There is also an event die, with five possible outcomes: a reward for the player with more knight points or more 'windmill' points (a picture of a windmill on some cards), a bonus resource, an attack if a player has too many resources, and one of six special events - civil war, conflict, master builder, plague, productive year, or progress. There are 62 expansion cards in six stacks in the center of the table. Before beginning the game, players choose one stack, go through it, and choose three cards to hold in their hands. Forty-two of the expansion cards require spending resources to be put into play, gaining civic improvements or knights. Every civic improvement serves some useful function or adds victory points or both. Twenty of the cards are actions benefiting one of the players or harming the other. After a player pays to put a card down or uses an action card, he blindly draws a replacement. Unwanted or unusable cards can be traded in future turns. Some of the cards have flags on them, indicating victory points. Whoever first has twelve victory points wins the game! The Anniversary edition of this game (Jubiläumsausgabe edition) can be found under a separate game entry.

Categorys
Card GameCity BuildingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Open Drafting
Trading
13.jpgCatan: Cities & Knights3 - 412+90 mins
View Details
Adds several new aspects to Settlers of Catan but the two major ones are creating knights to protect the land from invading barbarians and building city improvements that confer benefits upon that city's owner. Adds tactical complexity to the game and game length. Belongs to the Catan Series. The game changes the base game in three main ways: First, there are 3 new commodities in the game, distinct from resources - paper, cloth, and coins, which can be acquired from Forest, Meadow, and Mountain spaces, respectively. Cities that would normally produce two of one of those resources instead produce 1 resource and 1 of the corresponding commodity. (To make commodities easier to obtain, each player starts the game with 1 city and 1 settlement on the board.) These commodities allow players to build city improvements that confer various advantages and eventually points. Second, the deck of development cards is replaced by three different decks, each corresponding to one of the commodities. Building city improvements gives players a chance to draw these cards with every roll of the dice. Building more improvements will increase these chances, but cards cannot be bought directly in any way. These cards are similar to the development cards in the base game, but with a wider range of effects. (Some cards are balanced better as well - the new Resource Monopoly card, for example, can take no more than 2 of the named resource from any one player.) Finally, players can also build knights on the island along their network of roads. These knights can be used to claim certain intersections and move the Robber (taking the place of Soldier cards), but are also used to defend the island from periodic barbarian attacks. If the island is successfully defended, the player(s) with the most knights are rewarded. If not, the player(s) with the fewest knights each have a city downgraded to a settlement.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameMedievalNegotiation

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Memory
Modular Board
Network and Route Building
Trading
462.pngCATAN: New Energies3 - 412+90 mins
View Details
It's the 21st Century, and Catan is at a crossroads. Long gone is the agrarian society of the island's Viking ancestors. Today's Catanians need energy to keep society moving and growing, but pollution is wreaking havoc on the island. You must decide: Invest in clean energy resources, or opt for cheaper fossil fuels, potentially causing disastrous effects for the island? CATAN: New Energies is a new standalone game rooted in classic CATAN mechanisms of harvesting, trading, and building. New gameplay elements including power plants, energy tokens, and environmental events that add new strategies and stories to a familiar foundation. —description from the publisher

Categorys
CivilizationEconomicEnvironmentalTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Hexagon Grid
Modular Board
Trading
Variable Set-up
429.pngCATAN: Starfarers3 - 414+120 mins
View Details
Twenty years ago, the settlers started into the depths of the galaxy to discover unknown planets, the undiscovered universe lying before them. Maybe they'll find planets with good ore or carbon deposits — or perhaps only barren ice planets. They might encounter alien folks and start lucrative trading, with pirates and wormholes being a constant challenge for them. Catan: Starfarers is a new version of Starfarers of Catan, originally released in 1999, that contains completely revised graphics and game materials, revised rules, and (most importantly) a variable game board that brings even more variety to the exploration of space. Changes to the mechanics include -If you are lower in the points you get cards on your turn regardless of what you roll. Two random cards initially, then one, then none as your victory points go up. This is a nice touch. No matter how unlucky you are you still get something. Plus if a player rolls a seven, the person can take a card from any other player, but their opponents now draw a random card from the deck. - Market Trades: Since you have no roads you no longer need ports so, since you no longer have ports you can trade with the market for any resource on your turn; provided you have the right cards. Additionally the ratios aren't bad, Any resource for 3:1, i.e. three of one for one of any other type. Goods (a type of resource) trades for 2:1. This plus no road blocking allows you to trade for resources and keep playing. - There are NPC races that can give you benefits, some of which are +1 resources whenever you get a resource of the same type. But you have to get there early. Now there is a new dynamic to the game, going out into space becomes a strategy on its own. - Negotiated trades: Since the resources are more readily available there are less negotiated trades. They still exist and someone can still trade 1:1, 3:1, etc... but it is no longer a singularly driving force in the game. Unless you have a big move and you're missing that one card. - Resource (set collection) becomes part of your strategy without being limited to negotiation and luck of the die. I think this actually works better. Colonization: You colonize to claim planets in a system. This is the same as building towns in Catan. But how many can be in a system (hex) depends on player count. In a three player game you're only allowed two colonies per system. In a four player game each system only holds up to three players colonies. If you got blocked out early from the closest systems, reach further into the stars to other systems. Who knows you might meet pirate and you'll have to fight, or traders, perhaps a race of Travelers who will open a worm hole to anywhere on the map.

Categorys
ExplorationNegotiationScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Hexagon Grid
Modular Board
Trading
Variable Set-up
430.pngCATAN: Starfarers Duel212+75 mins
View Details
In CATAN: Starfarers Duel, you explore the vastness of space, fly to distant planets, buy and sell resources, found colonies, and establish trade relations — all while keeping an eye out for pirates who threaten mischief. Perhaps you also want to arm your spaceship to be in good shape against threats... The game, which has been extensively revised from 2001's Starship Catan, includes five entry missions and features a variable set-up.

Categorys
Space Exploration

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Resource to Move
14.jpgCatch the Moon2 - 66+20 mins
View Details
All you need in Catch the Moon are a few skillfully placed ladders, a good sense of balance, and a touch of imagination. The moon waits impatiently for your arrival, but she's a sensitive lady and the smallest mistake can make her cry. The right mix of skill and luck will help you become the most agile dreamer...

Categorys
Action / DexterityPuzzle

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Stacking and Balancing
15.jpgCaverna: Cave vs Cave1 - 210+20 - 40 mins
View Details
In the two-player game Caverna: Cave vs. Cave, each player starts the game with only two dwarves and a small excavation in the side of a mountain. Over the course of eight rounds, they'll double their workforce, open up new living space in the mountain, construct new buildings and rooms in which to live, and dig for precious metals. In more detail, each player starts the game with an individual player board that's covered with a random assortment of face-down building/room tiles and only one space. Some tiles are face up and available for purchase at the start of play. Four action tiles lie face up as well. At the start of each of the eight rounds, one new action tile is revealed, then players alternate taking actions, with the number of actions increasing from two up to four over the course of the game. As players excavate their mountainous player board, new building and room tiles are added to the pool; some rooms can be used immediately when acquired, whereas others require the use of an action tile. After eight rounds, players tally their points for buildings constructed and gold collected to see who wins.

Categorys
EconomicFantasyFarming

Mechanics
Tile Placement
Worker Placement
199.jpgCaverna: The Cave Farmers1 - 712+30 - 210 mins
View Details
Following along the same lines as its predecessor (Agricola), Caverna: The Cave Farmers is a worker-placement game at heart, with a focus on farming. In the game, you are the bearded leader of a small dwarf family that lives in a little cave in the mountains. You begin the game with a farmer and his spouse, and each member of the farming family represents an action that the player can take each turn. Together, you cultivate the forest in front of your cave and dig deeper into the mountain. You furnish the caves as dwellings for your offspring as well as working spaces for small enterprises. It's up to you how much ore you want to mine. You will need it to forge weapons that allow you to go on expeditions to gain bonus items and actions. While digging through the mountain, you may come across water sources and find ore and ruby mines that help you increase your wealth. Right in front of your cave, you can increase your wealth even further with agriculture: You can cut down the forest to sow fields and fence in pastures to hold your animals. You can also expand your family while running your ever-growing farm. In the end, the player with the most efficiently developed home board wins. You can also play the solo variant of this game to familiarize yourself with the 48 different furnishing tiles for your cave. Caverna: The Cave Farmers, which has a playing time of roughly 30 minutes per player, is a complete redesign of Agricola that substitutes the card decks from the former game with a set of buildings while adding the ability to purchase weapons and send your farmers on quests to gain further resources. Designer Uwe Rosenberg says that the game includes parts of Agricola, but also has new ideas, especially the cave part of your game board, where you can build mines and search for rubies. The game also includes two new animals: dogs and donkeys.

Categorys
AnimalsEconomicFantasyFarming

Mechanics
Automatic Resource Growth
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tile Placement
Turn Order: Claim Action
Worker Placement
200.jpgCentury: Spice Road2 - 58+30 - 45 mins
View Details
Century: Spice Road is the first in a series of games that explores the history of each century with spice-trading as the theme for the first installment. In Century: Spice Road, players are caravan leaders who travel the famed silk road to deliver spices to the far reaches of the continent for fame and glory. Each turn, players perform one of four actions: Establish a trade route (by taking a market card) Make a trade or harvest spices (by playing a card from hand) Fulfill a demand (by meeting a victory point card's requirements and claiming it) Rest (by taking back into your hand all of the cards you've played) The last round is triggered once a player has claimed their fifth victory point card, then whoever has the most victory points wins.

Categorys
Card GameEconomicMedieval

Mechanics
Action Retrieval
Contracts
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Hand Management
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Open Drafting
Set Collection
16.jpgChaos in the Old World3 - 413+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Chaos in the Old World makes you a god. Each god’s distinctive powers and legion of followers grant you unique strengths and diabolical abilities with which to corrupt and enslave the Old World. Khorne, the Blood God, the Skulltaker, lusts for death and battle. Nurgle, the Plaguelord, the Father of Corruption, luxuriates in filth and disease. Tzeentch, the Changer of Ways, the Great Conspirator, plots the fate of the universe. Slaanesh, the Prince of Pleasure and Pain, the Lord of Temptations, lures even the most steadfast to his six deadly seductions. Yet, as you and your fellow powers of Chaos seek domination by corruption and conquest, you must vie not only against each other, but also against the desperate denizens of the Old World who fight to banish you back to the maelstrom of the Realm of Chaos. Chaos in the Old World features three ways to win, and gives you an unparalleled opportunity to reshape the world in your image. Every turn you corrupt the landscape, dominating its inhabitants, and battle with the depraved followers of rival gods. Each god has a unique deck of gifts and abilities, and can upgrade their followers into deadly foes. Summon forth living manifestations of Chaos, debased and hidden cultists, and the horrifying greater daemons - beings capable of destroying near everything in their path.

Categorys
FantasyFightingHorrorMythologyWargame

Mechanics
Action Points
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Events
Hand Management
Role Playing
Take That
Variable Player Powers
17.jpgChaos in the Old World: The Horned Rat Expansion3 - 513+90 mins
View Details
Game description from the publisher: Below the Old World's cities sprawls a vast network of tunnels, caves, and underground roads. Verminous Skaven skulk within this Under Empire, waiting for the perfect opportunity to rise from the warrens and destroy their enemies for the glory of their sinister god, the enigmatic Horned Rat. Even as the Ruinous Powers work to corrupt the Old World, the Skaven are ever scheming to further their own dark agenda. The Horned Rat expansion for Chaos in the Old World introduces a fifth player to the race toward corruption! Armed with a legion of Skaven followers, the Horned Rat player uses numbers and subterfuge to his advantage, scoring points by spreading the Skaven's teeming masses across the Old World. Players of the existing Ruinous Powers can meet the foul vermin head on with a host of new gameplay options, including alternate upgrade and Chaos cards. Meanwhile, veterans will find engaging challenges with new expert-level Old World cards and gameplay variants. Prepare to join the battle for dominance!

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingHorror

Mechanics
Action Points
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
18.jpgChaos Marauders (Second Edition)2 - 413+30 mins
View Details
Here the players find themselves as Orc War Chieftains on their way to fight those intolerable forces of the Empire. Only problem is that several Orcish clans have run into each other so inevitably they start to squabble over the carcass of some unfortunate Elf that is roasting over a campfire. In the time it takes for the sun to move from up to just a little more up the Orcs are at it and it’s each Orcish War Chief for himself. Each player is trying to create armies, which are placed into 3 battle lines or formations. Each line must have one musician and one standard bearer and each of these must be placed on the far left or right of each line. Each line can be up to 12 units long but a player can create a shortened battle line by placing the two required units closer together. Each turn a player will draw one or more cards from the deck. Units drawn must be placed whilst other cards are discarded for their effects. Once a battle line has a musician and a standard bearer and all spaces in between the two are filled )with units or loot), that line can go to war and attack the battle line of another player. All units are worth a battle rating. Both sides simply add up their ratings for all units and the highest total wins, although the roll of a fate dice can still mix things up. The winner can take any loot present from the defeated player's line and this is in truth the main aim as loot is worth points that are tallied up at the end to determine the winner. Chaos Marauders also allows for players to try and construct larger units made up of multiple cards such as War Machines. See also: Summary of differences from the first edition of Chaos Marauders.

Categorys
Card GameFighting

Mechanics
19.jpgChicken Caesar3 - 612+90 mins
View Details
In Chicken Caesar, players represent aristocratic ancient Roman chicken families trying to create a legacy for their family name. Each family has several eligible roosters eager to jump into the world of politics, getting rich and creating a legacy by any means necessary. Roosters gain renown for their families by occupying various political offices. Low-ranking officers don't yield much fame, but they hold both the purse strings and the power of the sword. A few roosters in the lower offices of Aedile and Praetor, together with the votes of a few well-paid (and temporary) allies, can clear a path to the luxury and recognition that come with the titles of Censor, Consul, and even Caesar. Being Caesar isn't easy, though: fail to bribe and bargain to ensure the welfare of the whole coop and today's Caesar is tomorrow's Coq au Vin. Dead roosters don't earn any more points, but they do offer opportunities for their surviving relatives to exaggerate their accomplishments. All that matters, in the end, is history's judgment, and history can be rewritten. Mechanically, players gain and maintain areas of influence through negotiation and voting. The game features a Suffragium marker that players pass after voting to either promote a Rooster to a higher office, or throw him to the fox. Players can also strategically demand bribes for their votes or even refuse to vote (pass) to gain a later advantage. Murder, betrayal, votes for cash, fragile alliances, and bloody vendettas will separate the legendary families from the forgotten ones in the struggle to become – and remain – Chicken Caesar!

Categorys
AncientHumorNegotiationPolitical

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Bribery
Voting
201.jpgChurchill1 - 314+60 - 300 mins
View Details
The players in the game take on the roles of Churchill, Roosevelt, or Stalin as they maneuver against each other over the course of 10 Conferences that determine who will lead the Allied forces, where those forces will be deployed, and how the Axis will be defeated. The player whose forces collectively have greater control over the surrendered Axis powers will win the peace and the game. Churchill is NOT a wargame, but a political conflict of cooperation and competition. While the game focuses on 10 of the historical conferences from 1943 till the end of the war these and much of this design should not be taken literally. Before and after each conference small groups of advisors and senior officials moved between the Allied capitals making the deals that drove the post war peace. Each conference sees one of a group of issues nominated for inclusion in the conference. The issues categories are: Theater leadership changes, directed offensives, production priorities, clandestine operations, political activity, and strategic warfare (A-bomb). Each of the historical conference cards independently puts some number of issues such as directed offensives or production priorities metaphorically put on the table, while the players nominate an additional 7 issues. The game display for this is a circular conference table that the three players sit around behind their 'seat'. Each player has a staff deck of named personages, such as Secretary Stimson and Anthony Eden that are randomly drawn to make your conference hand. A pre-conference round of cards gives leverage to the winner who then moves an issue toward their side of the table equal to the value of the card played. Play then proceeds with the conference where each player in turn plays a card on one of the issues in the center of the conference table moving it the value of the card toward his side of the table. Each card is a historical personage and they often have bonuses if played on a particular category of issue. Contesting an issue has you move an issue away from an Ally toward your own. At all times each player has his Head of State card (Roosevelt, Churchill, or Stalin) that can weigh in on any issue once per conference by discarding another card. Each use of your personage has a bonus and a potential penalty. Each time Roosevelt is used he may die and be replaced by Harry Truman. Churchill can have a heart attack and miss the next conference, while Stalin's paranoia may cause a mini-purge and reduce his side's effectiveness for the remainder of the conference. The net result of the conference play is players will 'win' various issues with the player who won the most issues gaining leverage in one of the bilateral global issues (UK versus USSR global issue is Free Europe versus Spheres of Influence). The game then moves into a post-conference phase where players implement the issues that they now control. These actions impact three basic game functions: clandestine operations, political activity, and military offensives. Clandestine operations has players try to establish political networks in conquered countries and colonies. Using a very simple mechanic of placing a network or removing an opponent's network, the historical ferment that occurred in Yugoslavia, France and across the world is simply simulated. A country or colony can only have one dominant side's network at any given time, and during political activity players can emplace friendly governments in exile that can be subsequently undermined and replaced if the supporting networks are later neutralized by one of your allies. Once this has all been sorted out, the military portion of the game keeps the score. There is a separate display that abstractly represents the major theaters of war, Western, Eastern, Mediterranean, Arctic (Murmansk convoys and Scandinavia), CBI, SW Pacific, Central Pacific, and Far East. Each of these tracks has a Allied front for which I am looking for some kind of 3D tank piece that advances toward Germany, Italy, and Japan. Using a very simple combat mechanic, each front tries to advance with Axis reserves deploying to oppose the various fronts. A successful offensive advances the front one space, although with overwhelming superiority a two-space breakthrough is possible. Naval operations are simply handled by requiring a defined level of support to advance into an amphibious entry space such as France (D-Day). When a front enters Germany, Italy or Japan they surrender, shutting down military operations, although clandestine and political activity continues until the end of the game. In the background is the development of the A-bomb and Soviet efforts to steal its secrets. If the A-bomb is available Japan can be forced to surrender sans a direct invasion. As I stated this is not a wargame, but a three-player excursion into power politics. The game takes around 3 hours to finish, but I will be including a short and medium scenario. All scenarios end with Potsdam, but you will be able to start later in the war if you only have 1 or 2 hours to play. In addition the game can be played with 3 or 2 players plus solitaire. I am very excited about the new Churchill and large scale playtesting will commence by the end of the month. More to follow...

Categorys
PoliticalWargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Dice Rolling
Negotiation
Tug of War
20.jpgCitadels2 - 810+20 - 60 mins
View Details
In Citadels, players take on new roles each round to represent characters they hire in order to help them acquire gold and erect buildings. The game ends at the close of a round in which a player erects his/her eighth building. Players then tally their points, and the player with the highest score wins. Players start with a number of building cards in their hand; buildings come in five colors, with the purple buildings typically having a special ability and the other colored buildings providing a benefit when you play particular characters. At the start of each round, the player who was king the previous round discards one of the eight character cards at random, chooses one, then passes the cards to the next player, etc. until each player has secretly chosen a character. Each character has a special ability, and the usefulness of any character depends upon your situation, and that of your opponents. The characters then carry out their actions in numerical order: the assassin eliminating another character for the round, the thief stealing all gold from another character, the wizard swapping building cards with another player, the warlord optionally destroys a building in play, and so on. On a turn, a player earns two or more gold (or draws two building cards then discards one), then optionally constructs one building (or up to three if playing the architect this round). Buildings cost gold equal to the number of symbols on them, and each building is worth a certain number of points. In addition to points from buildings, at the end of the game a player scores bonus points for having eight buildings or buildings of all five colors. The expansion Citadels: The Dark City was initially released as a separate item, but the second edition of the game from Hans im Glück (packaged in a tin box) and the third edition from Fantasy Flight Games included this expansion and can be recognized by its rectangular box (not square). With Dark City, Citadels supports a maximum of eight players.

Categorys
BluffingCard GameCity BuildingDeductionFantasyMedieval

Mechanics
Action Drafting
Closed Drafting
Lose a Turn
Set Collection
Turn Order: Role Order
Variable Player Powers
21.jpgClacks: A Discworld Board Game1 - 48+45 - 30 mins
View Details
Clacks: A Discworld Board Game is based on the "Clacks" semaphore messaging system — the fastest (non-magical) messaging system on the Discworld — featured in Sir Terry Pratchett's novel Going Postal. Using a semaphore system of shuttered lamps on top of high towers, the Grand Trunk Semaphore Company has revolutionized long-distance communications on the Discworld. Their network of towers covers most of the Unnamed Continent, but now the old postal service is fighting back. Driven by the determination of newly "volunteered" Post Master Moist Von Lipwig, the Ankh-Morpork Post Office has challenged the Clacks operators to a race from Ankh-Morpork to Genua. Play against your friends and claim the title of Fastest Clacks Operator on the line, or play together as a team to win the race across the Discworld and prove that Clacks is here to stay. In more detail, Clacks: A Discworld Board Game contains rules for a player vs. player game, a co-operative race game against the Post Office, and a children's introductory game.

Categorys
Abstract StrategyNovel-based

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Pattern Building
Pattern Recognition
Take That
22.jpgClaim Pocket210+25 mins
View Details
The King is dead! What happened? Nobody really knows, but he was found face down in a wine barrel this morning. It could have been either foul play or his own thirst that did him in. Regardless, the King is dead without any known heirs, so it's up to the five factions of the realm to decide who will be the new king: Will it be you or your opponent? Do you have what it takes to win over the realm's factions? Claim is played in two distinct phases. In phase one, each player gets a hand of cards that they use to recruit followers. In phase two, they use the followers from phase one to compete and win over the five factions of the realms. Each faction has a special power that effects play, and powers can be different in each phase! At the end of the game, the player who has the majority of followers of a faction wins that faction's vote, and whoever wins the vote of at least three factions wins the game! Note: This edition contains the Ghosts expansion.

Categorys
Card GameFantasy

Mechanics
Trick-taking
202.jpgClash of Cultures: Monumental Edition2 - 414+180 - 240 mins
View Details
Clash of Cultures: Monumental Edition brings back the classic game of exploration, expansion, and development with the Clash of Cultures base game and the Civilizations and Aztecs expansions in one box! Grow your civilization, advance your culture and tech, and leave your mark by building wonders, with this edition of the game including fully-sculpted miniatures of the Seven Wonders. In Clash of Cultures, each player leads a civilization from a single settlement to a mighty empire. Players must explore their surroundings, build large cities, research advances and conquer those who stand in the way. The game features a modular board for players to explore, 48 distinct advances, seven mighty wonders, and loads of miniatures and cards. The winner will create a culture that will be remembered and admired for millennia.

Categorys
AncientCity BuildingCivilizationEconomicTerritory Building

Mechanics
Action Points
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Hand Management
Modular Board
Trading
Variable Player Powers
23.jpgCodenames2 - 814+15 mins
View Details
Codenames is an easy party game to solve puzzles. The game is divided into red and blue, each side has a team leader, the team leader's goal is to lead their team to the final victory. At the beginning of the game, there will be 25 cards on the table with different words. Each card has a corresponding position, representing different colors. Only the team leader can see the color of the card. The team leader should prompt according to the words, let his team members find out the cards of their corresponding colors, and find out all the cards of their own colors to win.

Categorys
Card GameDeductionParty GameSpies/Secret AgentsWord Game

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Memory
Push Your Luck
Team-Based Game
24.jpgCodenames: Deep Undercover4 - 818+15 mins
View Details
Two rival spymasters know the secret identities of 25 agents. Their teammates know the agents only by their CODENAMES. In Codenames: Deep Undercover, two teams compete to see who can make contact with all of their agents first. Spymasters give one-word clues that can point to multiple words on the board. Their teammates try to guess words of the right color while avoiding those that belong to the opposing team. And everyone wants to avoid the assassin. Codenames: Deep Undercover' can be played as a standalone game or combined with other Codenames titles.

Categorys
Card GameDeductionMature / AdultParty GameSpies/Secret AgentsWord Game

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Memory
Push Your Luck
Team-Based Game
334.jpgCodenames: Disney - Family Edition2 - 88+15 mins
View Details
In Codenames, two teams compete to see who can guess all of their words correctly first — but those words are hiding in plain sight in a 5x5 or grid that includes the words of the other team, neutral words, and an game over card that will cause you to lose the game immediately if you guess it. One person on each team is a spymaster and only these two know which words belong to each team. Spymasters take turns giving one-word clues that can point to multiple words on the board. Their teammates try to guess words of the right color while avoiding those that belong to the opposing team — and everyone wants to avoid the game over card. This version also comes with 4x4 grid cards with no game over spot to make it more accessible for families and children. The Disney Family Edition of Codenames combines the hit social word game with some of Disney’s most beloved properties from the past 90 years. Including both pictures and words, it’s family fun for Disney fans of all ages.Codenames: Disney Family Edition keeps the Codenames gameplay, while featuring characters and locations from over 90 years of Disney and Pixar films..

Categorys
Card GameDeductionMovies / TV / Radio themeParty GameWord Game

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Memory
Pattern Recognition
Push Your Luck
Team-Based Game
279.jpgCodenames: Duet211+15 - 30 mins
View Details
Codenames Duet keeps the basic elements of Codenames — give one-word clues to try to get someone to identify your agents among those on the table — but now you're working together as a team to find all of your agents. (Why you don't already know who your agents are is a question that Congressional investigators will get on your back about later!) To set up play, lay out 25 word cards in a 5×5 grid. Place a key card in the holder so that each player sees one side of the card. Each player sees a 5×5 grid on the card, with nine of the squares colored green (representing your agents) and three squares colored black (representing assassins). Three of the nine squares on each side are also green on the other side, one assassin is black on both sides, one is green on the other side and the other is an innocent bystander on the other side. Collectively, you need to reveal all fifteen agents — without revealing an assassin — before time runs out in order to win the game. Either player can decide to give the first one-word clue to the other player, along with a number. Whoever receives the clue places a finger on a card to identify that agent. If correct, they can attempt to identify another one. If they identify a bystander, then their guessing time ends. If they identify an assassin, you both lose! Unlike regular Codenames, they can keep guessing as long as they keep identifying an agent each time; this is useful for going back to previous clues and finding ones they missed earlier. After the first clue is given, players alternate giving clues.

Categorys
Card GameDeductionSpies/Secret AgentsWord Game

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Cooperative Game
Push Your Luck
25.jpgCodenames: Pictures2 - 810+15 mins
View Details
What are these strange symbols on the map? They are code for locations where spies must contact secret agents! Two rival spymasters know the agent in each location. They deliver coded messages telling their field operatives where to go for clandestine meetings. Operatives must be clever. A decoding mistake could lead to an unpleasant encounter with an enemy agent – or worse, with the assassin! Both teams race to contact all their agents, but only one team can win. Codenames: Pictures differs from the original Codenames in that the agents are no longer represented by a single word, but by an image that contains multiple elements.

Categorys
Card GameDeductionParty GameSpies/Secret Agents

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Memory
Push Your Luck
Team-Based Game
203.jpgColonial: Europe's Empires Overseas2 - 614+120 mins
View Details
Colonial: Europe's Empires Overseas is a board game about colonial times, from the Renaissance to the Industrial Revolution. In Colonial players are the rulers of mighty European states and send their ministers to explore the earth, establish missions, ascertain scientific supremacy, and trade in exotic goods. These commodities will have to be exploited on an industrial scale and resold in Europe or in the colonies. Set against an epic historical backdrop and using a branded Character Card-driven system, conventional dice and custom dice, this fast-paced board game requires careful management, knowledge, diplomacy and a degree of luck to lead to victory in the race for prestige.

Categorys
CivilizationEconomicExplorationNegotiationPoliticalTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Dice Rolling
Simultaneous Action Selection
452.jpgConcept4 - 1210+40 mins
View Details
In Concept, your goal is to guess words through the association of icons. A team of two players – neighbors at the table – choose a word or phrase that the other players need to guess. Acting together, this team places pieces judiciously on the available icons on the game board. To get others to guess "milk", for example, the team might place the question mark icon (which signifies the main concept) on the liquid icon, then cubes of this color on the icons for "food/drink" and "white". For a more complicated concept, such as "Leonardo DiCaprio", the team can use the main concept and its matching cubes to clue players into the hidden phrase being an actor or director, while then using sub-concept icons and their matching cubes to gives clues to particular movies in which DiCaprio starred, such as Titanic or Inception. The first player to discover the word or phrase receives 2 victory points, the team receives points as well, and the player who ends up with the most points wins.

Categorys
DeductionParty GameWord Game

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Team-Based Game
204.jpgConquest & Consequence2 - 312+240 - 360 mins
View Details
Conquest and Consequence brings the Triumph & Tragedy system to the Pacific/East Asia theater during the same 1936-1945 time period. Like T&T, it is designed for three players, maintaining the three-sided dynamic that adds so much variety and intrigue to the system. Those three sides are: Militarist Japan, the first Asian power to modernize, which seeks to replace the European colonial empires in East Asia with a true "all-Asian" empire, with itself as the natural leader. The Communist Soviet faction, which is comprised of the Siberian USSR and the Red Chinese revolutionaries. The Capitalist USA faction, which consists of the United States, the British Empire, and the struggling regime of Nationalist China. The game begins in 1936 with the Militarists in control of Japan and expansion on the agenda. Its [war] industry is well-developed, but it is weak in population and particularly resources. Its battle-hardened army has easily overrun resource-rich Manchuria, and a weak China awaits. Japan (like Germany in T&T) has the early initiative due to its well-prepared military. Will it: Move south into China? Take the "Northern Road" into resource-rich east Siberia (as favored by the army)? Pursue the "Southern Road" to the oil-rich Dutch East Indies advocated by its navy? Or bide its time, seeking a better position via diplomatic arrangements with neutrals including independent Chinese warlord states? Japanese aggression in China will likely irritate the sleeping giant that is the USA, but it is far away across the wide Pacific, and Japan has special naval abilities that allow it to compete at sea. The Red Chinese have just completed their Long March and re-established their base in inland Shaansi, far from areas of Japanese (or Capitalist) interest. The Red Chinese are very weak militarily but have a secret weapon: Partisans. These are non-military "political" organizations (represented on-map with cardboard counters) that are difficult to eradicate, multiply if ignored, and can be converted into military units when desired (this being ill-advised without sufficient concentration). The Soviet Union, also acutely aware of Japanese expansionism, is desperately fortifying eastern Siberia, which is otherwise thinly defended. Nationalist China is aware of the Japanese threat but must also deal with the internal Communist threat. The United States is disarmed, disinterested, and distracted by the Great Depression. The British Empire is woefully under-defended and overconfident. The USA alliance must build up its economy while somehow improving the military capabilities of the British Empire, Nationalist China, and itself. The game combines the Pacific naval war and the land war in Asia (including the Chinese Civil War), both equally weighing upon victory. The naval war is dramatic, featuring short, decisive battles and expanded roles for airpower and island bases. In the tradition of Triumph & Tragedy, the three-sided aspect features negotiation, diplomacy, and subterfuge within a multitude of strategic possibilities. Like T&T, the game allows players freedom to diverge from the inclinations and policies of the historical actors and plays in 4-6 hours of constant tension and involvement. —description from the publisher

Categorys
EconomicPoliticalWargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Alliances
Area Majority / Influence
Movement Points
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
403.pngCoral1 - 48+10 - 20 mins
View Details
In Coral, players develop a coral reef together, whilst vying to position their own species closest to the top, where they can soak up the life-giving sunlight. Together - as much as against one another - you'll build a unique, magnificent 3D structure out of gorgeous wooden pieces. This represents a coral reef growing and living in a complex, competitive harmony. Move around the table to find the best spots to grow your species, whilst blocking your opponents! At the end of the game, the player with the most pieces visible from above the reef is the winner. --- Coral includes a bespoke solo puzzle mode and several multiplayer game modes, for exciting games for 1 to 4 players. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Abstract StrategyAnimalsEnvironmentalTerritory BuildingVideo Game Theme

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
End Game Bonuses
Grid Movement
Modular Board
Pattern Building
Pieces as Map
Solo / Solitaire Game
Stacking and Balancing
Three Dimensional Movement
Variable Player Powers
463.jpgCosmoctopus1 - 410+60 - 90 mins
View Details
Welcome, devotees! The celestial gaze of the Great Inky One falls upon you; do you have what it takes to be the most dedicated follower? Cosmoctopus is an engine-building, tentacle-gathering board game for 1 to 4 devotees. Guide Cosmoctopus through the Inky Realm, a flexible configuration of tiles, to gather resources and obtain powerful cards that represent relics, scripture, hallucinations and constellations. Harness the power of these bizarre objects and experiences, craft potent card combinations and be the first to gain 8 tentacles to win! Your turns are simple; the game’s excitement and depth lie in working out how best to use an ever-powerful hand of cards. Unlike some other engine-builders, you’ll be straight into the fun, upgrading your engine from turn one. With variable setup, easy ways to alter difficulty and optional solo and co-operative modes, Cosmoctopus offers a versatile tabletop experience, whatever your gaming tastes. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AdventureFantasyHorror

Mechanics
Area Movement
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Modular Board
Open Drafting
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Set-up
26.jpgCOU+20821 - 512+120 mins
View Details
In the 1970s, the governments of the world faced unprecedented demand for energy, and polluting power plants were built everywhere in order to meet that demand. Year after year, the pollution they generate increases, and nobody has done anything to reduce it. Now, the impact of this pollution has become too great, and humanity is starting to realize that we must meet our energy demands through clean sources of energy. Companies with expertise in clean, sustainable energy are called in to propose projects that will provide the required energy without polluting the environment. Regional governments are eager to fund these projects, and to invest in their implementation. If the pollution isn't stopped, it's game over for all of us. In the game COâ‚‚, each player is the CEO of an energy company responding to government requests for new, green power plants. The goal is to stop the increase of pollution, while meeting the rising demand for sustainable energy — and of course profiting from doing so. You will need enough expertise, money, and resources to build these clean power plants. Energy summits will promote global awareness, and allow companies to share a little of their expertise, while learning still more from others. In COâ‚‚, each region starts with a certain number of Carbon Emissions Permits (CEPs) at its disposal. These CEPs are granted by the United Nations, and they must be spent whenever the region needs to install the energy infrastructure for a project, or to construct a fossil fuel power plant. CEPs can be bought and sold on a market, and their price fluctuates throughout the game. You will want to try to maintain control over the CEPs. Money, CEPs, Green Power Plants that you've built, UN Goals you've completed, Company Goals you've met, and Expertise you've gained all give you Victory Points (VPs), which represent your Company's reputation – and having the best reputation is the goal of the game ... in addition to saving the planet, of course.

Categorys
EconomicEnvironmentalIndustry / Manufacturing

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Open Drafting
Semi-Cooperative Game
Solo / Solitaire Game
Worker Placement
498.jpgCoup2 - 613+15 mins
View Details
You are head of a family in an Italian city-state, a city run by a weak and corrupt court. You need to manipulate, bluff and bribe your way to power. Your object is to destroy the influence of all the other families, forcing them into exile. Only one family will survive... In Coup, you want to be the last player with influence in the game, with influence being represented by face-down character cards in your playing area. Each player starts the game with two coins and two influence – i.e., two face-down character cards; the fifteen card deck consists of three copies of five different characters, each with a unique set of powers: Duke: Take three coins from the treasury. Block someone from taking foreign aid. Assassin: Pay three coins and try to assassinate another player's character. Contessa: Block an assassination attempt against yourself. Captain: Take two coins from another player, or block someone from stealing coins from you. Ambassador: Draw two character cards from the Court (the deck), choose which (if any) to exchange with your face-down characters, then return two. Block someone from stealing coins from you. On your turn, you can take any of the actions listed above, regardless of which characters you actually have in front of you, or you can take one of three other actions: Income: Take one coin from the treasury. Foreign aid: Take two coins from the treasury. Coup: Pay seven coins and launch a coup against an opponent, forcing that player to lose an influence. (If you have ten coins or more, you must take this action.) When you take one of the character actions – whether actively on your turn, or defensively in response to someone else's action – that character's action automatically succeeds unless an opponent challenges you. In this case, if you can't (or don't) reveal the appropriate character, you lose an influence, turning one of your characters face-up. Face-up characters cannot be used, and if both of your characters are face-up, you're out of the game. If you do have the character in question and choose to reveal it, the opponent loses an influence, then you shuffle that character into the deck and draw a new one, perhaps getting the same character again and perhaps not. The last player to still have influence – that is, a face-down character – wins the game! A new & optional character called the Inquisitor has been added (currently, the only English edition with the Inquisitor included is the Kickstarter Version from Indie Boards & Cards. Copies in stores may not be the Kickstarter versions and may only be the base game). The Inquisitor character cards may be used to replace the Ambassador cards. Inquisitor: Draw one character card from the Court deck and choose whether or not to exchange it with one of your face-down characters. OR Force an opponent to show you one of their character cards (their choice which). If you wish it, you may then force them to draw a new card from the Court deck. They then shuffle the old card into the Court deck. Block someone from stealing coins from you.

Categorys
BluffingCard GameDeductionParty GamePolitical

Mechanics
Hidden Roles
Memory
Player Elimination
Take That
Variable Player Powers
205.jpgCrown of Roses2 - 40+300 mins
View Details
(from GMT website:) Crown of Roses is a 3-hour block game set during the turbulent years of the Wars of the Roses in 15th Century England. This 35-year long conflict saw the extinction of a large number of noble houses, and would eventually set the house of Tudor upon the throne. In Crown of Roses, players take on the roles of the dynastic giants - the House of Lancaster and their Beaufort cousins, and the House of York. The four player game adds in the powerful House of Stafford, and the ever-scheming Richard Neville and his son, Richard of Warwick, the 'Kingmaker'. Using intuitive mechanics, Crown of Roses offers players a historical feeling with tremendous strategic depth and excellent replayability. Unit starting locations vary with each turn and even with each game, and the use of blocks creates the "fog of war" of limited intelligence on enemy strength and deployment. Random game events throw a touch of the chaos of the era into the mix, and the multiple uses for the player action cards leads to a level of uncertainty where enemy plans are concerned. During each game turn in Crown of Roses, players will play cards to perform actions such as improving their armies, influencing the locals to support them, collecting supplies or prestige, moving to attack enemy forces, to recruit new houses to your cause, calling another Royal Heir into the fray, or even changing the nature of the conflict through the use of player events. Unit blocks rotate to show strength, and each army can have a variety of experience levels and combat capabilities. A novel roll to hit-based system is used to determine combat results, with better experienced forces scoring hits more often in battle. Kill all of the enemy heirs, and you can rule England unimpeded! In Parliament, players can try to gain a favorable posting or take control of the crown itself by gathering enough noble support. Gather enough votes for enough years and the nobles of parliament will welcome you as their sovereign! And if you can create enough influence with the local gentry, your economic might will sway the common folk to support you as their chosen monarch! And the four player game of Crown of Roses allows all of this and more without the sacrifice of the unique fog of war aspect that the unit blocks provide. With each player having up to three ways to win, who knows who will be the next King of England!" TIME SCALE Variable MAP SCALE Area Movement UNIT SCALE Noble houses and mercenary factions NUMBER OF PLAYERS Two to Four DEVELOPERS: Andy Young and Kevin Bernatz ART DIRECTOR/PACKAGING: Rodger B. MacGowan MAP ART: Knut Grünitz CARD & COUNTER ART: Charles Kibler

Categorys
MedievalWargame

Mechanics
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Dice Rolling
Secret Unit Deployment
Simulation
207.jpgCrusader Kings1 - 514+180 mins
View Details
You are a crusader King, striving for wealth, political power, religious influence, and military might across the continent and across generations. Reshape the history of medieval Europe in your own image — if only that dimwitted son of yours set to inherit the throne doesn't spoil your grand plans... The board game "Crusader Kings" captures the essence of the Crusader Kings video game experience in a physical tabletop format. This is a strategy game at heart, but with a special focus on characters, intrigue, and drama. It's a big, beautiful game centered on a map of medieval Europe, using cards for actions, characters, and events and well-crafted plastic miniatures to represent knights, armies, castles, and more. In this game, your goal is to spread your influence over medieval Europe and lead your dynasty to triumph over its rivals. To do that, you need to groom your family over the generations, build and develop your dominion, be shrewd in the realm of diplomacy and intrigue, and use your vassals wisely to grow your wealth and military power, while at the same time fulfilling your duty to partake in the crusades to the Holy Land. To win, you need to survive invasions, plots, crusades, and even marriage! Or at least have children or siblings standing by to take over the throne if your regent dies. Failure to raise a suitable heir can mean the end of your dynasty. —description from the publisher

Categorys
MedievalNegotiationPoliticalVideo Game ThemeWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Events
Hand Management
Open Drafting
Role Playing
Simultaneous Action Selection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Team-Based Game
Trading
28.jpgCry Havoc2 - 410+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Cry Havoc is a card-driven, asymmetric, area control war game set in a brutal science fiction setting. Each player commands one of four unique factions with varying abilities and units. The game includes 54 custom miniatures, a large format board, and over one hundred unique cards, all with stunning new artwork.

Categorys
FightingMiniaturesScience FictionWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Auction/Bidding
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Events
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
Variable Player Powers
Victory Points as a Resource
208.jpgCuba Libre1 - 414+180 mins
View Details
In December 1956, paroled rebel Fidel Castro returned to Cuba to launch his revolution with virtually no political base and—after a disastrous initial encounter with government forces—a total of just 12 men. Two years later, through masterful propaganda and factional maneuver, Castro, his brother Raúl, and iconic revolutionary Che Guevara had united disparate guerrillas and exploited Cubans’ deep opposition to their dictator Fulgencio Batista y Zaldívar. Castro’s takeover of the country became a model for Leftist insurgency. Castro’s Insurgency Following up on GMT Games’ Andean Abyss about insurgency in modern Colombia, the next volume in the COIN Series, Cuba Libre, takes 1 to 4 players into the Cuban Revolution. Castro’s “26 July Movement” must expand from its bases in the Sierra Maestra mountains to fight its way to Havana. Meanwhile, anti-communist student groups, urban guerrillas, and expatriates try to de-stabilize the Batista regime from inside and out, while trying not to pave the way for a new dictatorship under Castro. Batista’s Government must maintain steam to counter the twin insurgency, while managing two benefactors: its fragile US Alliance and its corrupting Syndicate skim. And in the midst of the turmoil, Meyer Lansky and his Syndicate bosses will jockey to keep their Cuban gangster paradise alive. COIN Series, Volume II Cuba Libre will be easy to learn for Andean Abyss players—both volumes share the same innovative Series: COIN (GMT) system. Like Volume I, Cuba Libre is equally playable solitaire or by multiple players up to 4—and with a shorter time to completion than Andean Abyss. But Cuba Libre’s situation and strategic challenges will be new. A deck of 48 fresh events brings 1950s Cuba to life and includes … • The Twelve: The first wave’s escape to the Sierra Maestra—inspirational legend or harbinger of defeat? • El Che and Raúl: Brilliant in the field, or bungling hostage-takers? • Operation Fisherman: Can the rebels pull off a second invasion? • General Strike: Urban disruption or rebel embarrassment? • Radio Rebelde: Are the masses tuning in, or just the Army direction finders? • Pact of Caracas: Can the rebels unite? • Armored Cars: Mobile striking power, but in whose hands? • Rolando Masferrer: Brutal pro-government tactics—will they help or hurt? • Fat Butcher: Can the Mob’s enforcer protect its casinos? • Sinatra: Frankie’s Havana show a boom or bust, and who collects? … and much more. New twists match the COIN Series system to the situation in 1950s Cuba: • It’s the insurgents who build lasting capabilities, while the Government is limited to fleeting bursts of momentum. • The Syndicate’s bases are Casinos—expensive to build, but so important to Cuba no army will destroy them. • Syndicate special activities include calling in the “muscle” of Government troops and police to protect mob assets. • Stacks of Syndicate cash awaiting launder can fall in anyone’s hands—even the corrupt Government’s. • The Government has its own terror tactic—reprisals—and can skim a portion of Syndicate profits. • The eroding US Alliance with Batista overshadows all Government actions, not just through aid levels but also through the day-to-day ability of troops and police to operate. • Even if Batista flees, the struggle may not end—the counterrevolutionary government may even become stronger! Multiplayer, 2-Player, Solitaire Cuba Libre provides up to 4 players with contrasting roles and overlapping victory conditions for rich diplomatic interaction. For 2- or 3-player games, players can represent alliances of factions, or the game system can control non-player factions . Or a single player as the Cuban Revolutionaries can attempt to topple Batista and seize power for themselves. The non-player sides will fight one another as well as the players, but too much power in the hands of any one of them will mean player defeat. More COIN Series Volumes to Come Andean Abyss and now Cuba Libre present a game system on modern insurgency readily adaptable to other conflicts, particularly those featuring the interaction of many sides (thus the name COunterINsurgency Series). A rich and under-represented history of guerrilla warfare beckons, as modern insurgency offers virtually unlimited, under-gamed topics for the COIN Series. Volume III is A Distant Plain—Insurgency in Afghanistan. Volume IV is Fire in the Lake—Insurgency in Vietnam.

Categorys
EconomicModern WarfarePoliticalWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Player Powers
29.jpgDakota3 - 510+90 mins
View Details
a 60- to 90-minute game for three to five players ages 10 and up. It’s inspired by the conquest of the American West, and employs linear mechanics. Players take control of a group of settlers or a tribe of natives and then cooperate and compete with the other players for natural resources, which have different values for the different types of players. The mechanic allows for unequal numbers of settlers and native players.

Categorys
American West

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Worker Placement
455.jpgDecrypto3 - 812+15 - 45 mins
View Details
Players compete in two teams in Decrypto, with each trying to correctly interpret the coded messages presented to them by their teammates while cracking the codes they intercept from the opposing team. In more detail, each team has their own screen, and in this screen they tuck four cards in pockets numbered 1-4, letting everyone on the same team see the words on these cards while hiding the words from the opposing team. In the first round, each team does the following: One team member takes a code card that shows three of the digits 1-4 in some order, e.g., 4-2-1. They then give a coded message that their teammates must use to guess this code. For example, if the team's four words are "pig", "candy", "tent", and "son", then I might say "Sam-striped-pink" and hope that my teammates can correctly map those words to 4-2-1. If they guess correctly, great; if not, we receive a black mark of failure. Starting in the second round, a member of each team must again give a clue about their words to match a numbered code. If I get 2-4-3, I might now say, "sucker-prince-stake". The other team then attempts to guess our numbered code. If they're correct, they receive a white mark of success; if not, then my team must guess the number correctly or take a black mark of failure. (Guessing correctly does nothing except avoid failure and give the opposing team information about what our hidden words might be.) The rounds continue until a team collects either its second white mark (winning the game) or its second black mark (losing the game). Games typically last between 4-7 rounds. If neither team has won after eight rounds, then each team must attempt to guess the other team's words; whichever team guesses more words correctly wins.

Categorys
DeductionParty GameSpies/Secret AgentsWord Game

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Targeted Clues
Team-Based Game
30.jpgDice Forge2 - 410+45 mins
View Details
Heroes, stand ready! The gods are offering a seat in heaven to whichever hero defeats their rivals. Your courage and wits will be your most precious allies as you use divine dice to gather resources along the road to victory. Your divine dice are exceptional, with removable faces! Customize your dice to make them more powerful as the game progresses. Sacrifice gold to the gods to obtain enhanced die faces. Upgrade your dice to produce the resources you need. Overcome ordeals concocted by the gods to grow in glory and earn rewards. Skillfully manage the luck of the dice and take charge of your destiny. Only the greatest will ascend to the heavens! Dice Forge is a development game featuring innovative mechanics based on dice with removable faces. In this dice crafting game, players build their own dice. Roll your dice, manage your resources, complete ordeals before your opponents and explore multiple winning strategies. Now you control the luck of the dice!

Categorys
AncientDiceFantasyMythology

Mechanics
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Dice Rolling
Open Drafting
Random Production
31.jpgDice Forge: Chimera2 - 410+40 mins
View Details
This card replaces another one from the Hydra deck. This card has no effect, you only gain victory points. During the setup, if you are playing with the Hydra cards, replace one of the Hydra cards with the promotional card in question. The cards will be placed in the pile in ascending order: Hydra > Harpies > Chimera > Mother of monsters This card is given out by the publisher during official initiations to Dice Forge.

Categorys
AncientDiceExpansion for Base-gameFantasy

Mechanics
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Dice Rolling
Open Drafting
32.jpgDice Forge: Rebellion2 - 410+40 mins
View Details
Dice Forge: Rebellion, the first expansion for Dice Forge, adds two different modules that can be added to the game: thirty exploit cards as well as new die faces, new boards, and an expansion to the sanctuary box are added to offer players new challenges, greater interaction, and more replayability.

Categorys
AncientDiceExpansion for Base-gameFantasy

Mechanics
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Dice Rolling
Open Drafting
464.jpgDice Splice1 - 65+10 - 30 mins
View Details
A dicey game of cunning and balance! On your turn, roll your hand of seven dice and attempt to balance them onto a central hoard of dice towers according to dice splicing rules. There are two ways to win - if you can splice all seven dice in one turn victory is yours (if not you top up your hand to seven for your next turn). As the towers grow, they are more likely to topple - if you are the last sucessful splicer before a collapse you win at the expense of somepoor soul who had to splice dice on a very rickety hoard. Planks may be placed at any time during a turn - they can be used to make the dice tower hoard more stable or to block opponents moves. -description from designer

Categorys
Action / DexterityDicePirates

Mechanics
Stacking and Balancing
209.jpgDie of the Dead2 - 50+30 - 50 mins
View Details
A Dia de Muertos themed dice rolling game for 2-5 players. It's the Day of the Dead and players take the roles of friendly spirits guiding souls from Mictlán, the world of the dead, to the land of the living. The first player to guide souls up the 9 levels back to the land of the living is the winner. To do this players will choose, maniplulate and roll caskets containing dice representing souls. They will have Candles, Incense, Marigolds and the Bread of the Dead to help them, but need to hope for a little luck. Die of the Dead has beautiful Mexican art inspired by the tales and culture surrounding Dia de Muertos. Care has been taken to make the game as fun as possible whilst staying respectful to its roots. —description from the designer

Categorys
Dice

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Memory
210.jpgDinoGenics1 - 514+90 - 120 mins
View Details
DinoGenics is a competitive game for two to five players, in which each player attempts to build and run their own successful dinosaur park. Each player is the head of their own corporation with access to their own private island resort. Each season, players assign agents to the mainland to compete over DNA and other limited resources. Once collected, players can build fences, various park facilities and populate their parks with dinosaurs. Parks with the most prestigious dinosaurs will attract the most visitors. But beware; if dinosaurs are neglected or improperly penned, they will attempt to escape and spread havoc through the entire park. Use all the tools at your disposal; DNA splice mutant dinosaurs, exploit the Black Market or just try to run an honest park, the choices are yours. Do you have what it takes to lead your corporation to victory?

Categorys
Science FictionTerritory Building

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Events
Hand Management
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tile Placement
Turn Order: Stat-Based
Worker Placement
360.jpgDinosaur World2 - 410+60 - 120 mins
View Details
The triumph of science that led to dinosaurs returning to the world once more has become public knowledge. New parks spring up regularly, often beginning operations even before everything has been finalized. There is no shortage of patrons eager to be entertained by these returned species in new and exciting ways. However, as with any form of entertainment, elements of triumph are often accompanied by elements of tragedy. This means it is of the utmost importance that you take every precaution by ensuring each visitor signs the safety waiver before enjoying the wonders of Dinosaur World! Each round in Dinosaur World, you draft a new résumé card to acquire new workers; spend workers to take public actions building your park and acquiring DNA; spend further workers to take private actions improving that park; then drive your jeep around experiencing the wonder and excitement of what you have built! Throughout the game you acquire victory points through a variety of means — and possibly a few visitor deaths as a natural consequence of overly enthusiastic dinosaur encounters. At the end of the game, you lose points if you accumulated too many deaths, then the player with the most points wins!

Categorys
AnimalsCity BuildingEconomicScience Fiction

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Income
Movement Points
Tile Placement
Worker Placement
33.jpgDiscworld: Ankh-Morpork2 - 411+60 mins
View Details
Martin Wallace and Treefrog Games present Ankh-Morpork, set in the largest city-state in Terry Pratchett's Discworld. Lord Vetinari has disappeared and different factions are trying to take control of the city. Each player has a secret personality with specific victory conditions, which means that you're not sure exactly what the other players need to do in order to win. The action takes place on a map of Ankh-Morpork, with players trying to place minions and buildings through card play. Each of the 132 cards is unique, and "the cards bring the game to life as they include most of the famous characters that have appeared in the various books. The rules are relatively simple: Play a card and do what it says. Most cards have more than one action on them, and you can choose to do some or all of these actions. Some cards also allow you to play a second card, so you can chain actions" (Wallace). A team of artists have recreated the city and its residents for the cards, game board and box, with Bernard Pearson coordinating that team. Ankh-Morpork has been sublicensed to Mayfair Games for the North American market and Kosmos for the German market.

Categorys
BluffingCity BuildingDeductionFantasyNovel-based

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Events
Hand Management
Hidden Roles
Interrupts
Roles with Asymmetric Information
Take That
53.jpgDixit3 - 68+30 mins
View Details
2010 Spiel des Jahres Winner One player is the storyteller for the turn and looks at the images on the 6 cards in her hand. From one of these, she makes up a sentence and says it out loud (without showing the card to the other players). Each other player selects the card in their hands which best matches the sentence and gives the selected card to the storyteller, without showing it to the others. The storyteller shuffles her card with all the received cards. All pictures are shown face up and every player has to bet upon which picture was the storyteller's. If nobody or everybody finds the correct card, the storyteller scores 0, and each of the other players scores 2. Otherwise the storyteller and whoever found the correct answer score 3. Players score 1 point for every vote for their own card. The game ends when the deck is empty or if a player scores 30 points. In either case, the player with the most points wins the game. The base game and all expansions have 84 cards each.

Categorys
Card GameHumorParty Game

Mechanics
Race
Simultaneous Action Selection
Storytelling
Targeted Clues
Voting
465.jpgDorfromantik: Expansion Content from Dorfromantik - The Duel1 - 60+0 mins
View Details
The game material for the expansion for Dorfromantik: The Board Game comes in the box of Dorfromantik: The Duel. There are 4 special tiles, 7 new order tiles, 4 more success cards and more counters. The success cards are in German language.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCity BuildingEnvironmentalTerritory BuildingVideo Game Theme

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Cooperative Game
Hexagon Grid
Map Addition
Modular Board
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Tile Placement
Variable Set-up
466.jpgDorfromantik: The Board Game1 - 68+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Rippling rivers, rustling forests, wheat fields swaying in the wind and here and there a cute little village - that's Dorfromantik! The video game from the small developer studio Toukana Interactive has been thrilling the gaming community since its Early Access in March 2021 and has already won all kinds of prestigious awards. Now Michael Palm and Lukas Zach are transforming the popular building strategy and puzzle game into a family game for young and old with Dorfromantik: The Board Game. In Dorfromantik: The Board Game, up to six players work together to lay hexagonal tiles to create a beautiful landscape and try to fulfill the orders of the population, while at the same time laying as long a track and as long a river as possible, but also taking into account the flags that provide points in enclosed areas. The better the players manage to do this, the more points they can score at the end. In the course of the replayable campaign, the points earned can be used to unlock new tiles that are hidden in initially locked boxes. These pose new, additional tasks for the players and make it possible to raise the high score higher and higher. —description from the publisher

Categorys
City BuildingEnvironmentalPuzzleTerritory BuildingVideo Game Theme

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Cooperative Game
Hexagon Grid
Map Addition
Modular Board
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Tile Placement
Variable Set-up
467.jpgDorfromantik: The Board Game - Great Mill1 - 68+30 - 60 mins
View Details
The Great Mill is a mini expansion for Dorfromantik: The Board Game and contains two cards and a mill standee. Unlocking the Mill achievement lets you score additional points for Grain Tasks and Yellow Flags by cleverly placing the mill piece. —description from the publisher (translated)

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCity BuildingEnvironmentalPuzzleTerritory BuildingVideo Game Theme

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Cooperative Game
Hexagon Grid
Map Addition
Modular Board
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Tile Placement
Variable Set-up
468.jpgDorfromantik: The Duel28+30 - 45 mins
View Details
After the great success of Dorfromantik: The Board Game, the next part of the Dorfromantik world is no longer about working together, but about friendly competition. The basic principle of the Spiel des Jahres 2023 is retained, but now both sides continue to expand their own landscape with the tile they have just revealed. Two new types of assignments also come into play with double and all-around assignments, which can also be combined with Dorfromantik: The Board Game. Two independently playable modules also provide more challenge, more variety, more interaction. Four of the new special tiles can also be integrated into Dorfromantik: The Board Game and played cooperatively. Dorfromantik: The Duel allows two players or two teams to compete. And with two copies even up to four people can play. Who will create the most beautiful world of hexagonal landscapes? Who will be better at fulfilling the villager's orders while also mastering the challenge of new assignments? —description from the publisher

Categorys
City BuildingEnvironmentalPuzzle

Mechanics
Hexagon Grid
Modular Board
361.jpgDraftosaurus2 - 58+15 mins
View Details
Your goal in Draftosaurus is to have the dino park most likely to attract visitors. To do so, you have to draft dino meeples and place them in pens that have some placement restrictions. Each turn, one of the players roll a die and this adds a constraint to which pens any other player can add their dinosaur. Draftosaurus is a quick and light drafting game in which you don't have a hand of cards that you pass around (after selecting one), but a bunch of dino meeples in the palm of your hand.

Categorys
AnimalsPrehistoricScience Fiction

Mechanics
Closed Drafting
Dice Rolling
Set Collection
Simultaneous Action Selection
293.jpgDune2 - 614+120 - 180 mins
View Details
Imagine you can control the forces of a noble family, guild, or religious order on a barren planet which is the only source for the most valuable substance in the known universe. Imagine you can rewrite the script for one of the most famous science fiction books of all time. Welcome to the acclaimed 40-year-old board game which allows you to recreate the incredible world of Frank Herbert’s DUNE. In DUNE you will become the leader of one of six great factions. Each wishes to control the most valuable resource in the universe - melange, the mysterious spice only found at great cost on the planet DUNE. As Duke Leto Atreides says “All fades before melange. A handful of spice will buy a home on Tupile. It cannot be manufactured, it must be mined on Arrakis. It is unique and it has true geriatric properties.” And without melange space travel would be impossible. Only by ingesting the addictive drug can the Guild Steersman continue to experience visions of the future, enabling them to plot a safe path through hyperspace. Who will control DUNE? Become one of the characters and their forces from the book and . . . You decide! —description from the publisher

Categorys
BluffingFightingNegotiationNovel-basedPoliticalScience FictionWargame

Mechanics
Alliances
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Auction/Bidding
Bribery
Force Commitment
Map Deformation
Predictive Bid
Take That
Variable Player Powers
495.jpgDune: CHOAM & Richese3 - 614+120 mins
View Details
This expansion adds two new factions, the CHOAM and the Richese, to the Dune boardgame, along with 2 new variants. The Combine Honnete Ober Advancer Mercantiles or CHOAM controlled much of the economic affairs across the cosmos, and had a keen interest in Arrakis above and beyond spice production. Because of its control of inter-planetary commerce, CHOAM was the largest single source of wealth in the Imperium. Influence in CHOAM was a major focus of political maneuvering in the Imperium, both to maximize dividends and also to skim profits. The leaders and bureaucrats of CHOAM were dedicated to controlling vital products that enriched the Great Houses . . . and CHOAM itself. House Richese, just like the Ixians, had a well-earned reputation for ingenuity, and created important technological inventions. But Count Ilban Richese suffered a number of business blunders that threatened to bankrupt their fortunes. After being ousted from governing Arrakis, they were reduced to selling off important creations simply to raise enough funds to continue their efforts to compete. This expansion also introduces Leader Skills, which let you assign a skill like Mentat, Swordmaster of Ginaz, or Prana Bindu Adept to one of your leader discs. It also included Advanced Stronghold Cards, which give you a "homefield advantage" when battling in a stronghold you control. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameScience Fiction

Mechanics
Alliances
Area Majority / Influence
Auction: Once Around
Auction: Sealed Bid
Auction/Bidding
Force Commitment
Variable Player Powers
496.jpgDune: Ecaz & Moritani2 - 614+120 - 180 mins
View Details
This expansion adds House Ecaz and House Moritani, to DUNE: The Board Game. House Ecaz: House Ecaz is ruled by Archduke Armand Ecaz, who is well respected in the Landsraad and keen to strengthen his standing by forging lasting alliances. House Moritani: Led by the ruthless and cunning Viscount Hundro Moritani, the Moritanis did not hesitate to use terror tactics to conquer their enemies, resorting to assassination, sneak attacks, and sabotage. New Game Mechanics: Homeworlds: These allow you to conduct raids on the homeworlds of other factions and interfere with their advantages. Nexus Cards: Nexus cards provide players with incentives and special effects for not joining an alliance. Discovery Tokens: These add new elements to the game on sections of the board that are often bypassed and don’t see much action

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameScience Fiction

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
211.jpgDune: Imperium1 - 414+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Some important links: The Official FAQ, the Unofficial FAQ, and an Automa (solo and 2p) Overview Dune: Imperium is a game that finds inspiration in elements and characters from the Dune legacy, both the new film from Legendary Pictures and the seminal literary series from Frank Herbert, Brian Herbert, and Kevin J. Anderson. As a leader of one of the Great Houses of the Landsraad, raise your banner and marshal your forces and spies. War is coming, and at the center of the conflict is Arrakis – Dune, the desert planet. Dune: Imperium uses deck-building to add a hidden-information angle to traditional worker placement. You start with a unique leader card, as well as deck identical to those of your opponents. As you acquire cards and build your deck, your choices will define your strengths and weaknesses. Cards allow you to send your Agents to certain spaces on the game board, so how your deck evolves affects your strategy. You might become more powerful militarily, able to deploy more troops than your opponents. Or you might acquire cards that give you an edge with the four political factions represented in the game: the Emperor, the Spacing Guild, the Bene Gesserit, and the Fremen. Unlike many deck-building games, you don’t play your entire hand in one turn. Instead, you draw a hand of cards at the start of every round and alternate with other players, taking one Agent turn at a time (playing one card to send one of your Agents to the game board). When it’s your turn and you have no more Agents to place, you’ll take a Reveal turn, revealing the rest of your cards, which will provide Persuasion and Swords. Persuasion is used to acquire more cards, and Swords help your troops fight for the current round’s rewards as shown on the revealed Conflict card. Defeat your rivals in combat, shrewdly navigate the political factions, and acquire precious cards. The Spice Must Flow to lead your House to victory!

Categorys
Movies / TV / Radio themeNovel-basedPoliticalScience Fiction

Mechanics
Card Play Conflict Resolution
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Force Commitment
Open Drafting
Solo / Solitaire Game
Take That
Turn Order: Progressive
Variable Player Powers
Worker Placement
497.jpgDune: Ixians & Tleilaxu2 - 60+0 mins
View Details
This expansion adds two new factions, the Ixians and the Tleilaxu, to the Dune boardgame. Tleilaxu: Led by a small council of Tleilaxu Masters - the fanatic, xenophobic Tleilaxu were tolerated because of their useful genetic engineering superiority. Although underestimated and loathed by others, they hoped to someday dominate all. Ixian: The cyborg, Prince Rhombur of House Vernius, leads the Ixians, masters of manufacturing and technologies only they know how to deploy. Both the Ixians and the Tleilaxu are integral to the economy of CHOAM and the Imperium. The royal family of Ix had once been one of the wealthiest in the Imperium. Because of a successful invasion of Ix by the Tleilaxu and the Emperor’s Sardaukar, and then, after many years, the liberation of Ix by Ixian and Atreides forces, the Ixians and the Tleilaxu are mortal enemies. This expansion also introduces new game mechanics to help you gain advantages over your rivals. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameScience Fiction

Mechanics
Alliances
Area Majority / Influence
Auction/Bidding
Force Commitment
Variable Player Powers
385.jpgEarth1 - 513+45 - 90 mins
View Details
Earth, the soil that supports and sustains our beautiful planet, Earth. Over thousands of years of evolution and adaptation the flora and fauna of this unique planet have grown and developed into amazing life forms, creating symbiotic ecosystems and habitats. It’s time to jump into these rich environments and create some amazing natural synergies that replicate and extrapolate on Earth’s amazing versatility and plethora of natural resources. Create a self-supporting engine of growth, expansion and supply where even your unused plants become compost for future growth. Earth is an open world engine builder for 1 to 5 players with simple rules but tons of strategic possibilities. With its encyclopedic nature and the enormous number of unique cards and combinations, every single game will allow you to discover new synergies and connections, just as our vast and fascinating world allows us to do! —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsCard GameEnvironmental

Mechanics
Contracts
End Game Bonuses
Follow
Hand Management
Pattern Building
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tags
Tile Placement
Variable Set-up
Victory Points as a Resource
404.pngEarth: BoardGameGeek Promo Pack1 - 50+0 mins
View Details
Three promo cards for Earth created for BoardGameGeek and available via the BGG Store as of late 2023. Fauna Card - Side 1: Malaysian Tapir - Side 2: Toco Toucan Climate Card - Side 1: Temperate Monsoon - Side 2: Coastal Uplands Swamp Island - Side 1: Vagar - Side 2: Komodo

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
405.pngEarth: Kickstarter Goodies00+0 mins
View Details
A copy of wooden components and cards included in copies sent to backers of the Kickstarter (and sold after). Includes a wooden active player token, 25 wooden leaf tokens, 75 wooden soil tokens, and a 12 card calendar pack that adds 24 game modifiers (cards are double-sided).

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
55.jpgEclipse2 - 614+60 - 180 mins
View Details
The galaxy has been a peaceful place for many years. After the ruthless Terran–Hegemony War (30.027–33.364), much effort has been employed by all major spacefaring species to prevent the terrifying events from repeating themselves. The Galactic Council was formed to enforce precious peace, and it has taken many courageous efforts to prevent the escalation of malicious acts. Nevertheless, tension and discord are growing among the seven major species and in the Council itself. Old alliances are shattering, and hasty diplomatic treaties are made in secrecy. A confrontation of the superpowers seems inevitable – only the outcome of the galactic conflict remains to be seen. Which faction will emerge victorious and lead the galaxy under its rule? A game of Eclipse places you in control of a vast interstellar civilization, competing for success with its rivals. You will explore new star systems, research technologies, and build spaceships with which to wage war. There are many potential paths to victory, so you need to plan your strategy according to the strengths and weaknesses of your species, while paying attention to the other civilizations' endeavors. The shadows of the great civilizations are about to eclipse the galaxy. Lead your people to victory!

Categorys
CivilizationFightingScience FictionSpace ExplorationWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Hexagon Grid
Map Addition
Modular Board
Player Elimination
Tile Placement
Variable Phase Order
Variable Player Powers
56.jpgEclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy2 - 614+60 - 200 mins
View Details
A game of Eclipse places you in control of a vast interstellar civilization, competing for success with its rivals. You explore new star systems, research technologies, and build spaceships with which to wage war. There are many potential paths to victory, so you need to plan your strategy according to the strengths and weaknesses of your species, while paying attention to the other civilizations' endeavors. Eclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy is a revised and upgraded version of the Eclipse base game that debuted in 2011 that features: New graphic design, while maintaining the acclaimed symbology of the first edition A full line of Ship Pack 1 miniatures New miniatures for ancients, GCDS, orbitals, and more Custom plastic inlays Custom combat dice Fine-tuned gameplay

Categorys
CivilizationScience FictionSpace ExplorationWargame

Mechanics
Alliances
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Area-Impulse
Critical Hits and Failures
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Income
Kill Steal
Modular Board
Passed Action Token
Player Elimination
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
57.jpgEclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy - Galactic Events2 - 614+0 mins
View Details
Content: 8 sector hexes consisting of Nebula, Supernova, Black Hole, and Pulsar. Also, a rules pamphlet is included. This expansion pack contains updated versions of four separate expansions for the original first edition of the game. Each of the sector hexes are optional and may be added individually or in combinations to the base game. The Galactic Events expansion was included in the Worlds Afar Collection - a Kickstarter bundle of a number of expansions and some exclusive content.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameFightingScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Modular Board
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
67.jpgEclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy - Minor Species2 - 614+0 mins
View Details
Content: 9 Minor Species Ambassador tiles and rules pamphlet. 4 Minor Species Ambassador tiles are randomly selected and added to the base game. Diplomatic relations with Minor Species can be formed during an action. The Minor Species expansion was included in the Worlds Afar Collection - a Kickstarter bundle of a number of expansions and some exclusive content.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCivilizationFightingScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Modular Board
Player Elimination
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
469.jpgEclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy - Outcasts00+0 mins
View Details
This upcoming expansion will introduce two new species to play your Eclipse - 2nd Dawn for the Galaxy with, The Exiles and The Rho Indi Syndicate.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
68.jpgEclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy - Rift Cannon2 - 614+0 mins
View Details
Contents: Rules pamphlet, 4 dice, and 12 tiles consisting of: 1 Rift Cannon Rare Tech, 1 Rift Conductor Discovery, 10 Rift Cannon Ship Parts. Expansion for base game. The Rift Cannon expansion was included in the Worlds Afar Collection - a Kickstarter bundle of a number of expansions and some exclusive content.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameFightingScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Modular Board
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
470.jpgEclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy - Seekers00+0 mins
View Details
This upcoming expansion will introduce two new species to play your Eclipse - 2nd Dawn for the Galaxy with, The Magellan and The Enlightened of Lyra.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
69.pngEclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy - Supernova2 - 614+60 - 200 mins
View Details
This is the new version of the Supernova expansion for the new implementation of Eclipse (Second Dawn to the Galaxy). It was included in the Galactic Counselor level pledge for the Eclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy Kickstarter campaign, and came as a reward in the Dized Kickstarter campaign in December 2019.

Categorys
CivilizationExpansion for Base-gameFightingScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Modular Board
Variable Player Powers
70.jpgEclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy - Worlds Afar Collection2 - 614+60 - 200 mins
View Details
Stretch Goals associated with the Kickstarter for Eclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy. Includes: Optional Turn Order Variant Galactic Events (Including Nebula, Supernova, Black Hole, and Pulsar) Minor Species Rift Cannon Terran Ships Ship Stands 2 X Extra Dice (Translucent) 6 X Resource and Game Sheets 3 X Blueprint Tiles Scorepad New Rule Sheet for Worlds Afar Collection

Categorys
CivilizationExpansion for Base-gameFightingScience FictionSpace ExplorationWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Modular Board
Player Elimination
Tile Placement
Turn Order: Pass Order
Variable Phase Order
Variable Player Powers
294.jpgEketorp3 - 68+45 - 60 mins
View Details
This text refers to the Queen 2007 reprint. The older edition had players write down their viking orders and was two rounds longer. In Eketorp, players build Viking strongholds upon the Swedish island of Öland. The goal of the game is to collect the most valuable blocks to build your own fortress, either by winning battles on the resource spaces or by stealing blocks from other vikings. Each turn, new resources appear and the players secretly plan their viking movements. After all the placements are revealed, vikings battle each other for blocks (with the losers sent off to the field hospital to recover). The game ends after a set number of rounds, or when one of the players has succeeded in finishing their fortress.

Categorys
BluffingFightingMedieval

Mechanics
Action Queue
Hand Management
Secret Unit Deployment
Simultaneous Action Selection
Worker Placement
406.jpgEmerge2 - 414+75 mins
View Details
New islands have emerged from the ocean, and as scientists, you must research the new, developing ecosystems present there. Watch the islands on the board grow in three dimensions as you learn more about them, and add colorful plants and animals to each island as you explore their ecosystems. Each round in Emerge, earn points by rolling your dice and using them to collect research and make discoveries. All players start with the same research board, but throughout the game you can modify your own board and change what you're researching. After eight rounds, score points based on how flourished and biodiverse your islands are as well as varying research objectives. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsDiceEnvironmentalExploration

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
End Game Bonuses
Re-rolling and Locking
Turn Order: Progressive
71.jpgEntdecker: Exploring New Horizons2 - 410+90 mins
View Details
[Careful: there are two similar games with Entdecker in the title. Don't confuse Die Neuen Entdecker (also known as Entdecker: Exploring New Horizons) with Entdecker, a different game. In short - if your Entdecker's board does not have a scout trail leading to native huts, it's not this Entdecker.] A reworking of the game Entdecker, this game still starts with a blank game board that represents an unexplored sea. Tiles are drawn and placed on squares on the board. As the tiles are placed, islands develop on the board and players pay to place settlements, forts, or scouts on these islands in an effort to become the most powerful explorer. Completed islands yield victory points to all who have invested in exploration on an island, but of course the most points go to the player who has established the strongest presence. This updated version adds a larger board, fees to enter from all but one edge of the board, a different income system, new bonus waterfall tiles, the ability to draw (for a price) from open stacks of tiles, and most of all an entirely new area of the board that represents scouts exploring jungles on the islands in search of exotic plants (this is the bonus discovery chip system revamped), and other changes.

Categorys
ExplorationNautical

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Modular Board
Tile Placement
72.pngEscape from the Aliens in Outer Space2 - 812+20 - 45 mins
View Details
Escape from the Aliens in Outer Space is a card game of strategy and bluff set on a badly damaged deep space research ship. On-board systems have failed, plunging the ship into darkness. But even worse: A mysterious alien plague has crept aboard and is transforming the human crew into horrendous monsters! The remaining crewmen desperately try to save their lives by escaping from the derelict spaceship, but in the darkness the aliens are lurking...hungry for human flesh. The game is played on a hexagon-based map that represents the spaceship. Each player is given a map sheet and a pencil. Map sheets must be of the same zone, and every zone has its specific name. Starting from the first player and continuing clockwise, every turn, each player must make a movement. To do so, the player must write on their map sheet the coordinates of the sector to which they are moving. Every time the players move to the gray (dangerous) sectors they have to draw a card; these cards make the players tell the others their position or lie about it, depending on the card. Every card is kept secret from other players. The humans' objective is to save themselves using the escape hatches, while the aliens' objective is to hunt down the humans. Each player's identity and position is kept secret; you will need to interpret the movements and behaviors of the other players to learn who and where they really are.

Categorys
HorrorParty GamePrint & PlayScience Fiction

Mechanics
Grid Movement
Hexagon Grid
Hidden Movement
Hidden Roles
Paper-and-Pencil
Secret Unit Deployment
Team-Based Game
Variable Player Powers
362.jpgEuropa Universalis: The Price of Power1 - 414+90 - 300 mins
View Details
Govern one of Europe's great nations through the Ages of Discovery, Reformation, Absolutism, and Revolutions — spanning more than three hundred years of history. Lift your nation out of the slumber of the Dark Ages and create a glorious empire, through clever diplomacy, brave exploration, and ruthless conquest. Each of the playable nations have their own very unique opportunities and challenges. Europa Universalis is a strategy board game that gives players a full 4X game experience in a historical setting. Through the strategic use of cards and careful management of resources, you can expand your realm on the map board, while at the same time developing the internal machinery of the state on your player board. You must build diplomatic relations that support your ambition and you can explore far-away parts of the world. By recruiting skilled advisors and carefully investing monarch power in great ideas, province development, and long-term strategies, you may well be able to outshine your historical counterparts. This is a game for 1–4 players (depending on the various scenarios included and up to 6 with the expansion). The goal of the game is to build the most successful empire, and points are scored for (amongst other things) owned provinces, explored territories, diplomatic relations, victories in wars, and secret objectives that have been accomplished. The board game is based on the famous strategy game series by Paradox Interactive and captures the heart and soul of the grandness that makes the computer game so magnificent. Includes solo mode by Dávid Turczi —description from the publisher

Categorys
Age of ReasonCivilizationEconomicExplorationNapoleonicNegotiationPike and ShotPoliticalRenaissanceVideo Game ThemeWargame

Mechanics
Action Points
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
34.jpgEurope Engulfed: WWII European Theatre Block Game2 - 314+720 mins
View Details
from GMT website: More than thirteen years of design and development have gone into the making of Europe Engulfed (EE), which is GMT Games' first offering to the block-game enthusiast. It covers the entirety of World War II in Europe from September 1939 to the end of 1945. Europe Engulfed plays fast with its focus on playability and making players feel the pressures their historical counterparts were under. The game achieves this level of playability without sacrificing historical detail. The entire campaign is playable in a single 10-to-14 hour day once players become familiar with its elegant game systems including: Wood Block Units: Wood blocks for land units provide a realistic fog of war. Only the controlling player can see if their units are armor or infantry, weak or strong until combat is engaged. The inability to know the strength of your opponent ensures that even the most experienced players will make their fair share of tactical and strategic errors. Production and Strategic Warfare: Europe Engulfed Game Turns represent two months each and production and strategic warfare takes place within each of these turns. The inventive production system shows that the conquering power does not get the same value out of resource areas as the original power that lost them. Production levels are easy to calculate and production choices include special actions, fleets, U-boats, strategic fighter and bomber assets, ground-support units, flak, V-weapons, and, of course, lots and lots of armor and infantry and the odd paratrooper or cavalry unit from which to choose. Special Actions: Special actions are an innovative rule system to account for the large historical territorial gains that occurred over the course of a two-month game turn without bogging the game down with multiple player turns. Using Special Actions, players can purchase additional movement phases and combat rounds, amphibious and airborne assaults, and even take actions during an opponent's combat phase. Rulebook and Playbook: The 24-page rulebook is clearly written with many examples. Also included is a 24-page playbook. The playbook includes player notes, designer notes, optional rules, scenarios, index, and an extended example of play highlighting the May/June 1940 turn which reveals tactics for successfully attacking and defending. Europe Engulfed plays quickly with a very historical feel. Many players have indicated that they actually feel the pressures and stresses felt by the strategic level commanders in the real war. We know of no other European Theater of Operations game that plays this fast and with this much historical value. Play Times: 1939 Campaign: Up to 14 hours 1941 Campaign: Up to 10 hours Blockskrieg!: Up to 6 hours European War: Up to 5 hours '42 - '43 two-map scenario: 4 hours '42 - '43 one-map scenario: 3 hours Patton's Fantasy scenario: 2 hours Integrates with: Asia Engulfed

Categorys
WargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Action Points
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Ratio / Combat Results Table
Secret Unit Deployment
Simulation
Variable Set-up
407.jpgEvacuation1 - 412+60 - 150 mins
View Details
"Hurry to the ship! Twelve houses from our town have already burned down!" In Evacuation, life on our planet is being burned away thanks to increasingly intense sunlight, so everyone is trying to move all the people and factories in their territories from the "old" planet to a new one — and they have only four rounds in which to do so. You start the game with a full functioning economy, and over the course of play, you must dismantle that economy and move it. Income on the old planet shrinks over time, and production probably won't be much better until you establish yourself on the new planet and kick things into action. Resources can't be mixed across the planets, so you need to take special care with your planning. To do this, you choose actions from the player board, with the expert variant adding cards to your hand that allow you to choose additional actions and combine them. Each action has its own value, and the sum of these actions is important for an "end of the round" bonus. Additionally, players move their markers along the orbital track based on the value of their actions. If you can raise production of three resources to level 8 and have three stadiums on the new planet, you win. Otherwise, players compare scores after four rounds. Evacuation includes modules to add new play options. NOTE: A community FAQ is available here to provide some clarity on Frequently Misplayed Rules.

Categorys
Industry / ManufacturingRacingScience FictionTerritory Building

Mechanics
Hand Management
Highest-Lowest Scoring
Income
Pick-up and Deliver
Solo / Solitaire Game
408.pngEvacuation: SPIEL '23 Promo Card00+0 mins
View Details
A new public task card given out at SPIEL '23. It shows two public tasks, one of the back and one on the front, labelled PPT1 and PPT2. In order to fulfil PPT1, a player has to have one food production, one energy production, and one steel production on the New World. Playing it costs one food, increases steel production on the New World by one, and awards three points at the end of the game. In order to fulfil PPT2, a player has to have six population and/or factories on the New World. Playing it costs one steel, increases food production on the New World by one, and awards four points at the end of the game.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
214.jpgFalling Sky: The Gallic Revolt Against Caesar1 - 414+180 - 360 mins
View Details
Late Summer, 54 BC: In a series of brilliant and brutal campaigns, Caesar has seized Gaul for Rome. But not all tribes rest subdued. In the north, the Belgic leader Ambiorix springs a trap on unwary legions while Caesar is away. In the south, an ambitious son of the Arverni seeks to unite a Celtic confederation in revolt against the hated Romans. And what of the influential Aedui? Their republic appears content to shelter under Roman protection – but can they be trusted any further than any other Gauls? Meanwhile, along the Rhine, Germanic warbands multiply... Falling Sky: The Gallic Revolt Against Caesar, formerly Gallic War, takes 1 to 4 players into the military actions and complex politics of Roman-occupied but not-yet-conquered Gaul. Caesar and his hard-hitting legions cannot be everywhere and will not triumph without powerful allies among local tribes. But each Gallic confederation has its own agenda and must keep its eyes not only on the Romans but also on Celtic, Belgic, and Germanic rivals. Players recruit forces, rally allies, husband resources for war, and balance dispersed action with the effectiveness and risk of concentrated battle. Leveraging GMT's popular COIN Series system to integrate historical events with wide-ranging strategic options across the game board, Falling Sky provides accessible and deep historical gaming of war, politics, and diplomacy. A full solitaire system enables solo players to test their skill against an array of game-run factions, each unique. From Britannia to the Rhenus and down to Provincia, armies are on the move. Who shall finally subdue Gaul? Players: 1-4 (full solitaire system) Map: Area movement Time scale: 1 year per 15-card campaign Designers: Volko Ruhnke and Andrew Ruhnke Series Developer: Mike Bertucelli (source: GMT website, updated here by designer)

Categorys
AncientWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Dice Rolling
Events
Movement Points
Simulation
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Phase Order
Variable Player Powers
215.pngFire in the Lake1 - 40+180 mins
View Details
(from GMT website:) Volume IV in GMT’s COIN Series dives headlong into the momentous and complex battle for South Vietnam. A unique multi-faction treatment of the Vietnam War, Fire in the Lake will take 1 to 4 players on US heliborne sweeps of the jungle and Communist infiltration of the South, and into inter-allied conferences, Saigon politics, interdiction of the Ho Chi Minh Trail, air defense of Northern infrastructure, graduated escalation, and media war. Renowned designer and modern warfare expert Mark Herman joins COIN Series creator Volko Ruhnke for a collaborative production not to be missed. Fire in the Lake features the same card-assisted counterinsurgency game system as GMT's Andean Abyss, Cuba Libre, and A Distant Plain, with a pack of twists that take the Series to another level, including: Pivotal events that trump initiative (Tet Offensive, Vietnamization, Easter Offensive, and Linebacker II) Inter-coup campaign effects that vary by RVN leader Counterinsurgent guerrillas (US-led Irregulars and ARVN Rangers) Insurgent troops (NVA) for direct force-on-force engagements Tunneled VC and NVA bases Trail construction and degradation A larger-than-ever event deck for even greater play variety Short and medium-length scenarios with either random or period-event options DESIGNER: Mark Herman & Volko Ruhnke SERIES DEVELOPER: Mike Bertucelli MAP ART: Chechu Nieto COUNTER & CARDS ART & RULES LAYOUT: Mark Simonitch

Categorys
Civil WarModern WarfarePoliticalVietnam WarWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Simulation
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Phase Order
Variable Player Powers
35.pngFirefly Fluxx2 - 68+5 - 30 mins
View Details
Join Mal, Wash, Zoë, Inara, Kaylee, Jayne, Simon, River, Book, and more as Fluxx enters the 'Verse at full speed. With the rules constantly changing, Firefly Fluxx is just as unpredictable as misbehaving in space! Fluxx is a card game in which the cards themselves determine the current rules of the game. By playing cards, you change numerous aspects of the game: how to draw cards, how to play cards, and even how to win. At the start of the game, each player holds three cards and on a turn a player draws one card, then plays one card. By playing cards, you can put new rules into play that change numerous aspects of the game: how many cards to draw or play, how many cards you can hold in hand or keep on the table in front of you, and (most importantly) how to win the game. There are many editions, themed siblings, and promo cards available.

Categorys
Card Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Set Collection
73.jpgFirst Martians: Adventures on the Red Planet1 - 410+60 - 90 mins
View Details
Built on the core of the award-winning Robinson Crusoe: Adventures on the Cursed Island, First Martians: Adventures on the Red Planet pits players against the hostile Martian environment and a whole host of new adventures and challenges. The immersive experience is further enhanced with an integrated app that maintains the balance and challenge throughout. Players have the option of taking on the design as a series of separate games, in a custom campaign mode in which each successive game builds on the last.

Categorys
AdventureExplorationScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Modular Board
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Solo / Solitaire Game
Storytelling
Variable Player Powers
Worker Placement
81.jpgFleets: The Pleiad Conflict2 - 412+120 mins
View Details
In 3400 AD, mankind has colonized the Pleiad star cluster where mighty corporations vie for control and influence. Each player equips fleets with escort ships and upgrades and uses them to control star systems for VPs. Diplomatic leverage, cunning, and brute force will determine the victor. Each round in Fleets: The Pleiad Conflict consists of six phases: 1) Player order. Every round has a new randomized player order. Being first has its pros and cons, so does being last. 2) Build. The players take turn buying new fleets, escort ships, and upgrades, using their megacredits. The fleets each consist of a flagship and space for some combinations of escort ships and upgrade cards. Which fleet you choose and how you develop it will determine its strengths and weaknesses. 3) Deployment. The players place their fleets at the different systems they want to control. 4) Diplomacy. Players take turns using diplomatic actions. There are 2 basic actions: A) Use 2 diplomatic points to retreat your fleet from the board. B) Use 6 diplomatic points to retreat an opposing fleet from a system where you have a fleet. There are also diplomatic actions on some fleets, systems, and action cards. 5) Battle. At every system with more than one fleet there will be a battle where every ship gets to shoot once. Each fleet has different initiative numbers for its ships, describing when they get to act. Late ships risk being shot down before they have a chance to fire. During battle, players can also use battle actions on action cards, upgrade cards, fleets, and escort ships. Most battle actions cost energy from the fleet. If a flagship is destroyed, its owner must immediately retreat all surviving escort ships from that battle and discard the fleet. 6) Reward. Players get 1 VP for each system they have to themselves (The first player to reach 7 VP is the winner.). Then each fleet gets energy from its reactor and resources from the system where they are located. Then each player gets 2 diplomatic points, 6 megacredits, and an action card, and then the next round can begin.

Categorys
Science FictionWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
82.jpgFluxx2 - 68+5 - 30 mins
View Details
Fluxx is a card game in which the cards themselves determine the current rules of the game. By playing cards, you change numerous aspects of the game: how to draw cards, how to play cards, and even how to win. At the start of the game, each player holds three cards and on a turn a player draws one card, then plays one card. By playing cards, you can put new rules into play that change numerous aspects of the game: how many cards to draw or play, how many cards you can hold in hand or keep on the table in front of you, and (most importantly) how to win the game. There are many editions, themed siblings, and promo cards available.

Categorys
Card Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Set Collection
83.jpgFog of Love217+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Fog of Love is a game for two players. You will create and play two vivid characters who meet, fall in love and face the challenge of making an unusual relationship work. Playing Fog of Love is like being in a romantic comedy: roller-coaster rides, awkward situations, lots of laughs and plenty of difficult compromises to make. Much as in a real relationship, goals might be at odds. You can try to change, keep being relentless or even secretly decide to be a Heartbreaker. It’s your choice. The happily ever after won’t be certain, but whatever way your zigzag romance unfolds, you’ll always end up with a story full of surprises – guaranteed to raise a smile!

Categorys
BluffingCard GameDeduction

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Hand Management
Role Playing
Semi-Cooperative Game
Simulation
Simultaneous Action Selection
Storytelling
36.jpgForbidden Island2 - 410+30 mins
View Details
Forbidden Island is a visually stunning cooperative board game. Instead of winning by competing with other players like most games, everyone must work together to win the game. Players take turns moving their pawns around the 'island', which is built by arranging the many beautifully screen-printed tiles before play begins. As the game progresses, more and more island tiles sink, becoming unavailable, and the pace increases. Players use strategies to keep the island from sinking, while trying to collect treasures and items. As the water level rises, it gets more difficult- sacrifices must be made. What causes this game to truly stand out among co-op and competitive games alike is the extreme detail that has been paid to the physical components of the game. It comes in a sturdy and organized tin of good shelf storage size. The plastic treasure pieces and wooden pawns are well crafted and they fit just right into the box. The cards are durable, well printed, and easy to understand. The island tiles are the real gem: they are screen-printed with vibrant colors, each with a unique and pleasing image. With multiple levels of difficulty, different characters to choose from (each with a special ability of their own), many optional island formats and game variations available, Forbidden Island has huge replay value. The game can be played by as few as two players and up to four (though it can accommodate five). More players translates into a faster and more difficult game, though the extra help can make all the difference. This is a fun game, tricky for players of almost any age. Selling for under twenty dollars, oddly, Forbidden Island is a rare game of both quality and affordable price. For those who enjoy Forbidden Island, a follow-up project by Gamewright titled Forbidden Desert was released in 2013. From the publisher's website: Dare to discover Forbidden Island! Join a team of fearless adventurers on a do-or-die mission to capture four sacred treasures from the ruins of this perilous paradise. Your team will have to work together and make some pulse-pounding maneuvers, as the island will sink beneath every step! Race to collect the treasures and make a triumphant escape before you are swallowed into the watery abyss!

Categorys
AdventureFantasy

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Grid Movement
Hand Management
Map Reduction
Modular Board
Pick-up and Deliver
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Player Powers
37.jpgForbidden Sky2 - 510+60 mins
View Details
Soar to dizzying heights in the electrifying cooperative adventure. Work as a team to explore a mysterious platform that floats at the center of a savage storm. Connect a circuit of cables to launch a secret rocket — all before you are struck by lightning or blown off to the depths below. It's a high-wire act that will test your team's capacity for courage and cooperation. One false step and you all could be grounded…permanently! This latest installment in the Forbidden... game series takes you to new heights with several novel challenges, including collectively planning a terrain using only limited information and constructing a real electrical circuit.

Categorys
ElectronicScience Fiction

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Modular Board
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
216.jpgForbidden Stars2 - 414+120 - 180 mins
View Details
The shifting Warp Storms that surround the long lost Herakon Cluster have finally abated, leaving the ancient treasures and planets within this sector open to the rest of the galaxy. Now, the great factions of the galaxy mobilize their fleets and race to establish a foothold. The reward for successful domination surpasses all other concerns, and the price for conquering this sector will be paid in lives. Forbidden Stars challenges you and up to three other players to take command of a mighty fighting force: the Ultramarines chapter of Space Marines, the Eldar of Craftworld Iyanden, the Evil Sunz Ork clan, or the World Eaters Warband of the Chaos Space Marines. Each faction offers unique armies and play styles, but your goal remains the same — to claim the key objectives selected for your faction. These objective tokens are scattered throughout the Herakon Cluster, but your opponents are sure to defend your objectives against you. You need to build massive armies and command them in unending war to best your enemies and claim your objectives. The fight for the Herakon Cluster is brutal and bloody, and either you will stride triumphant over the bodies of your fallen foes — or they will do the same to you. Each round in Forbidden Stars is divided into three phases. In the planning phase, players take turns placing order tokens face down on the separate tiles (systems) that make up the game board; the four types of order tokens that players can place correspond to four types of actions that players can resolve in the second phase of play. In the operations phase, players reveal their tokens to: Dominate, draining friendly planets of their important resources Strategize, purchasing cards that can upgrade their orders and combat abilities Deploy, building cities, factories, bastions, and new mobile units Advance, moving units and attacking their enemies. The last phase of each round is the refresh phase, during which players profit from the planets they control, reveal event cards to move the impassable Warp Storms, and heal any units wounded in battle. Because of the game's three-phase structure, strategy in Forbidden Stars is balanced between short-term bluffing and long-term tactical military action. The game's set-up also poses strategic opportunities. Players start the game by taking turns assembling sections of the Herakon Cluster, placing individual system tiles along with their own starting forces and the enemy objectives that they must defend. This intentional construction, along with the unique domination abilities of the game's four factions, means that players must work to best utilize their own force's strengths while exploiting the weaknesses of their opponents.

Categorys
BluffingFightingMiniaturesScience FictionWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Card Play Conflict Resolution
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Modular Board
Order Counters
Variable Player Powers
381.jpgFormula D2 - 108+60 mins
View Details
Formula D is a high stakes Formula One type racing game where the players race simulated cars with the hope of crossing the finish line first. This is a re-release of Formula Dé with several changes from the original format. Whilst old tracks can be used with the updated Formula D rules, the new game features boards that have an F1 track and a Street Track on the other side. These street tracks each have a novel inclusion or two to add greater theme - The game mechanisms are a simple race, get to the finish line first! However, players have to use a significant amount of planning, and rely on quite a bit of luck. Each player manages when to shift gears, with each gear providing a different speed. (For example, 4th gear is a die that rolls random numbers from 7 to 12 for spaces moved.) Each turn, players may move up one gear, stay in that gear, or move down gears. This forces players to match possible rolls with the optimum distance for that turn, and hopefully plan ahead. However, speed is not the only issue! Corners have a "stop" rule that requires players to stop once, twice, or three times on that corner in consecutive turns or face a penalty. This creates an effective speed limit to the corners. Of course, things do not always go as planned! Players take penalties if they miss their roll, bump into another car, are blocked by other cars, have to brake heavily, or have to downshift several gears. These are taken off of a car’s attributes (Tire health, Brake wear, Transmission Gears, Body, engine, and Suspension). Losing the maximum in any of these categories will result in elimination, or a severe setback for that car. This requires that players manage their car’s health, plan for their best path, and have good luck on their rolls. This high amount of luck gives the game its family appeal, and lets weaker players have a chance at winning once in a while. However, the fun does not end with a single race! The rules include the ability to customize your cars, use a pre-generated character, add Slipstreaming (Drafting) rules and road debris, and change tire types to modify your distance rolls. There are also variations for a single lap race, or multiple laps with pit stops to repair some of your damage points. In addition, numerous expansion tracks can be purchased to vary the demands on each driver and car. Each track may also have weather effects (rain) that change car handling and die rolls due to skidding on wet track. This opens up the game for rally rules giving championship points over a number of races. Formula D adds a few items that are not in the original Formula De: There is the added excitement of illegal racing in the streets of big cities - anything goes! This adds custom cars, nitro acceleration, drifting in the curves, dirty tricks, gun battles, and trash on the road to add more variation. A basic change is the use of a "Dashboard" with movable pegs to manage your car’s attributes instead of the paper forms from Formula De. There are also two sets of pre-painted cars; a Formula 1 set and the Street Race set of stock cars. The street cars come with "Character" profiles to give a bit of role-playing to the game. Finally, the old category of "Fuel" for the car has been renamed Transmission Wear to give a better thematic fit to the effect of multiple downshifting. The popularity of this game has given it a lot of expansions, some simplifications to the rules (See Formula Dé Mini), and a lot of "after market" parts. There are also fan expansions and tracks for the very dedicated player. In many ways, this has become a multiple game system.

Categorys
RacingSports

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Different Dice Movement
Grid Movement
Movement Points
Player Elimination
Push Your Luck
Race
Roll / Spin and Move
Simulation
Turn Order: Stat-Based
431.jpgFractal: Beyond the Void2 - 40+0 mins
View Details
Fractal: Beyond the Void* is redefining the 4X genre with an expansive and dynamic strategy game in an ever-changing, story-driven legacy setting. Millenia after the collapse of the Federation, the greatest empire to ever rule the galaxy, a few species are taking up to the stars again to escape their dying worlds. They all have the same goal: to rebuild their civilizations and reclaim their former glory. But there can only be one ruler. This Collector Edition of Fractal includes the core game and the first campaign, “Beyond the Void”, along with Kickstarter-exclusive acrylic colony tokens, metal first-player token, and cooperative Alliance expansion.

Categorys

Mechanics
91.jpgFuji2 - 410+30 - 45 mins
View Details
In Fuji, you play as a group of adventurers on their way to Japan‘s most famous volcano, Mount Fuji. But just before you arrive at your destination, the earth begins to shake and the volcano erupts! Now your group must escape the deadly lava flows as quickly as possible to reach the safe village. In this cooperative dice game, players simultaneously and secretely roll their dice behind their screens in each round. During the game, you must find the best way across a certain number of terrain cards to the safe village for each player. Each terrain card has a given dice requirement. You can move to a card only if you match this requirement better than both your neighbors — but since you know only your own dice and can communicate only vaguely, you will need both skill and luck to save yourselves. The game ends with a success if all players reach the village. It fails if one of you falls victim to the lava or becomes too exhausted to proceed. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Dice

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Variable Player Powers
92.pngGaia Project1 - 412+60 - 150 mins
View Details
Gaia Project is a new game in the line of Terra Mystica. As in the original Terra Mystica, fourteen different factions live on seven different kinds of planets, and each faction is bound to their own home planets, so to develop and grow, they must terraform neighboring planets into their home environments in competition with the other groups. In addition, Gaia planets can be used by all factions for colonization, and Transdimensional planets can be changed into Gaia planets. All factions can improve their skills in six different areas of development — Terraforming, Navigation, Artificial Intelligence, Gaiaforming, Economy, Research — leading to advanced technology and special bonuses. To do all of that, each group has special skills and abilities. The playing area is made of ten sectors, allowing a variable set-up and thus an even bigger replay value than its predecessor Terra Mystica. A two-player game is hosted on seven sectors. —description from the publisher

Categorys
CivilizationEconomicMiniaturesScience FictionSpace ExplorationTerritory Building

Mechanics
Contracts
End Game Bonuses
Hexagon Grid
Income
Modular Board
Network and Route Building
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
Turn Order: Pass Order
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
Victory Points as a Resource
58.jpgGalaxy Trucker2 - 410+60 mins
View Details
In a galaxy far, far away... they need sewer systems, too. Corporation Incorporated builds them. Everyone knows their drivers -- the brave men and women who fear no danger and would, if the pay was good enough, even fly through Hell. Now you can join them. You will gain access to prefabricated spaceship components cleverly made from sewer pipes. Can you build a space ship durable enough to weather storms of meteors? Armed enough to defend against pirates? Big enough to carry a large crew and valuable cargo? Fast enough to get there first? Of course you can. Become a Galaxy Trucker. It's loads of fun. Galaxy Trucker is a tile laying game that plays out over two phases: building and flying. The goal is to have the most credits at the end of the game. You can earn credits by delivering goods, defeating pirates, building an efficient ship, and being the furthest along the track at the end of the flying phase. Building happens in real time and has players build their personal space ships by grabbing tiles from the middle of the table before the timer runs out. Tiles start out facedown so they won't know what they have until they take it, but they may choose to return it faceup if they don't want it. They must place the tiles they keep in a legal manner in their space ship. Usually this just means lining up the connectors appropriately (single to single, double to double, universal to anything) but also includes proper positioning of guns and engines. Tiles represent a variety of things including guns, engines, storage containers, crew cabins, shields, and batteries. They may also peek at the cards they will encounter in phase 2, but they must sacrifice building time to do this. At any time players may call their ships finished and take an order marker from the center. Once building is completed, and ships have been checked for errors, the flight begins. The flight cards are shuffled and player markers are placed on the flight board according to the order markers taken. Cards are revealed one at a time and players interact with them in order. They may include things such as pirates, abandoned vessels, disease outbreaks, meteor showers, worlds with goods to pick up, player-on-player combat zones, and other various things. Most of the cards will cause players to move back on the flight track and they must decide if the delay is worth their efforts. When all the cards are encountered players sell any goods they have collected, collect their rewards for finishing in first, second, or third place or having the most intact ship, and then lose some credits for damaged components. Space can be a very dangerous place and it is not uncommon to see your ship break into smaller and smaller pieces or lose some very valuable cargo off the side. If your ship gets damaged too much you can get knocked out of the race, so be careful! 3 rounds of this are done, and in each round players get a bigger board to build a ship that can hold more components. After the 3rd round the player with the most credits wins!

Categorys
Real-timeScience FictionSpace ExplorationTransportation

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Events
Real-Time
Relative Movement
Team-Based Game
Tile Placement
Track Movement
314.jpgGalaxy Trucker2 - 48+20 - 30 mins
View Details
In the fast and goofy family game Galaxy Trucker, players begin by simultaneously rummaging through the common warehouse, frantically trying to grab the most useful component tiles to build their spaceship — all in real-time. Once the ships are launched, players encounter dangerous situations while vying for financial opportunities, each hoping to gain the most valuable cargo and finish with as much of their ship still intact as possible. Of course, that's easier said than done since many hazards will send pieces of your ship, your cargo, and your crew hurling into the depths of space. The goal is to survive the trek — hopefully with at least some of your crew and ship intact — and have at least one credit by the end of the game. (Profit, yay!) Players earn credits by delivering goods, defeating pirates, having the best-looking ship, and reaching their destination before the others. This version of Galaxy Trucker is a relaunch of the original 2007 release by Vlaada Chvátil that features new art, more ship tiles, tweaked card effects, and streamlined gameplay that consists of only a single flight through space. That said, should you want a longer, more challenging experience, you can play a three-flight game known as the "Transgalactic Trek".

Categorys
Action / DexterityAdventureAviation / FlightDiceHumorReal-timeScience FictionSpace ExplorationTransportation

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Events
Real-Time
Relative Movement
Tile Placement
Track Movement
93.jpgGalaxy Trucker: The Big Expansion2 - 512+60 mins
View Details
From BoardgameNews.com: Spiel '08 will see a new truckload of interstellar destruction with Galaxy Trucker: The Big Expansion. As is often the case with expansions, The Big Expansion includes a number of mix-and-match components: Pieces and rules for five-player games. An updated version of Rough Road Ahead, a set of cards previously released in a downloadable format on the Czech Games website that will be expanded and reformatted. Additional adventure cards, including two previously available only at Spiel 07. A special deck of adventure cards that players individually insert into the deck themselves to surprise their fellow drivers. A new alien species. New ship building components, including life support for the new ET. New ship classes. The expansion is not fully compatible with the first edition of Galaxy Trucker, due to component differences. A compatibility kit has been produced, containing replacement components for the base game, but as of March 2009 it is not yet widely available.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameReal-timeScience FictionSpace ExplorationTransportation

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Memory
Tile Placement
283.jpgGentleman's Deal5 - 912+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Description from the publisher: In this game, you turn into one of the influential citizens of a small but very wealthy town. Gathered together with others authoritative persons like yourself in some hidden place, you share money earned from another shady business. You need to use all your diplomatic tricks to make deals to determine how much money everyone collects. Can you be silver-tongued enough to please everyone, including yourself? You should because the player with the most money wins the game! Gentleman’s Deal is a diplomatic party game about sharing money. Each turn, one player becomes a dealer and receives a secret card with the amount of money they must share. They make offers personally to each player, then those players simultaneously vote "yes" or "no". If a deal was accepted by a majority of players, they gain all offered by dealer and the dealer takes the rest! The dealer must balance between being too generous and too greedy because if a majority of players vote to decline their offer, the dealer heads to jail and must skip their next turn. Acquiring money isn't the only goal of the deals. Players also share useful contacts represented by the cards of different accomplices that give powerful benefits, and everybody wants to obtain them. The game ends after several rounds depending on the number of players, and whoever has most money wins!

Categorys
BluffingNegotiationParty Game

Mechanics
Bribery
Team-Based Game
Voting
38.pngGermania Magna: Border in Flames2 - 414+30 - 60 mins
View Details
The Roman Empire exists for almost 400 years. It is, however, but a pale shadow of what it used to be in the times of Caesar or Trajan. The World is changing and new powers are rising; soon they will begin to harass and attack the Roman lands. Deep within the impenetrable and dark forests, which stretch beyond the rivers of Rhine and Danube, live brave Germans, who turn their greedy eyes on rich towns and villages spread across the Roman provinces. It would be, however, a lot easier to pillage and conquer if not for rivalry and constant wars between tribes and warbands. "Germania Magna: Border in Flames" is a card-wargame of shifting alliances. Each player assume the role of a Germanic warlord leading his warriors into Roman provinces, which lie across the Rhine and Danube rivers. The Roman Empire is still too strong to be conquered, but its fields and cities provide loot for your warriors, and its armies give you an excellent opportunity to prove yourself as a worthy leader and, by doing so, to achieve eternal glory for yourself. The enemy is very powerful, so to win you need to forge alliances (however fragile) with other warlords, who will switch sides each time the tide of war changes.

Categorys
AncientCard GameWargame

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Open Drafting
Take That
217.jpgGlass Road1 - 413+20 - 80 mins
View Details
The game Glass Road commemorates the 700-year-old tradition of glass-making in the Bavarian Forest. (Today, the "Glass Road" is a route through the Bavarian forest that takes visitors to many of the old glass houses and museums of that region.) You must skillfully manage your glass and brick production in order to build the right structures that help you keep your business flowing. Cut the forest to keep the fires burning in the ovens, and spread and remove ponds, pits, and groves to supply yourself with the items you need. Fifteen specialists are there at your side to carry out your orders... In more detail, the game consists of four building periods. Each player has an identical set of fifteen specialist cards, and each specialist comes with two abilities. At the beginning of each building period, you choose a hand of five specialists. If during this building period, you play a specialist that no other player has in hand, you may use both abilities on that card; if two or more players play the same specialist, each of them may use only one of the two abilities. Exploiting the abilities of these specialists lets you collect resources, lay out new landscape tiles (e.g., ponds and pits), and build a variety of buildings, which come in three types: Processing buildings "Immediate" buildings with a one-time effect Buildings that provide bonus points at the end of the game for various accomplishments Mastering the balance of knowing the best specialist card to play and being flexible about when you play it — together with assembling a clever combination of buildings — is the key to this game. The 2021 edition of Glass Road includes previously released promotional material: the Oktoberfest and Adventskalender tiles and the Harlekin card for use in the solitaire version of the game.

Categorys
City BuildingEconomicMedieval

Mechanics
Enclosure
End Game Bonuses
Once-Per-Game Abilities
Open Drafting
Set Collection
Simultaneous Action Selection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tile Placement
Turn Order: Progressive
Variable Phase Order
Variable Set-up
95.jpgGloomhaven1 - 414+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Gloomhaven is a game of Euro-inspired tactical combat in a persistent world of shifting motives. Players will take on the role of a wandering adventurer with their own special set of skills and their own reasons for traveling to this dark corner of the world. Players must work together out of necessity to clear out menacing dungeons and forgotten ruins. In the process, they will enhance their abilities with experience and loot, discover new locations to explore and plunder, and expand an ever-branching story fueled by the decisions they make. This is a game with a persistent and changing world that is ideally played over many game sessions. After a scenario, players will make decisions on what to do, which will determine how the story continues, kind of like a “Choose Your Own Adventure” book. Playing through a scenario is a cooperative affair where players will fight against automated monsters using an innovative card system to determine the order of play and what a player does on their turn. Each turn, a player chooses two cards to play out of their hand. The number on the top card determines their initiative for the round. Each card also has a top and bottom power, and when it is a player’s turn in the initiative order, they determine whether to use the top power of one card and the bottom power of the other, or vice-versa. Players must be careful, though, because over time they will permanently lose cards from their hands. If they take too long to clear a dungeon, they may end up exhausted and be forced to retreat.

Categorys
AdventureExplorationFantasyFightingMiniatures

Mechanics
Action Queue
Action Retrieval
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Card Play Conflict Resolution
Communication Limits
Cooperative Game
Critical Hits and Failures
Deck Construction
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Grid Movement
Hand Management
Hexagon Grid
Legacy Game
Modular Board
Once-Per-Game Abilities
Role Playing
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Simultaneous Action Selection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Storytelling
Variable Player Powers
96.jpgGloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion1 - 414+30 - 120 mins
View Details
Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion is a standalone game that takes place before the events of Gloomhaven. The game includes four new characters — Valrath Red Guard (tank, crowd control), Inox Hatchet (ranged damage), Human Voidwarden (support, mind-control), and Quatryl Demolitionist (melee damage, obstacle manipulation) — that can also be used in the original Gloomhaven game. The game also includes 16 monster types (including seven new standard monsters and three new bosses) and a new campaign with 25 scenarios that invites the heroes to investigate a case of mysterious disappearances within the city. Is it the work of Vermlings, or is something far more sinister going on? Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion is aimed at a more casual audience to get people into the gameplay more quickly. All of the hard-to-organize cardboard map tiles have been removed, and instead players will play on the scenario book itself, which features new artwork unique to each scenario. The last barrier to entry — i.e., learning the game — has also been lowered through a simplified rule set and a five-scenario tutorial that will ease new players into the experience.

Categorys
AdventureExplorationFantasyFightingMiniatures

Mechanics
Action Queue
Action Retrieval
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Communication Limits
Cooperative Game
Critical Hits and Failures
Deck Construction
Grid Movement
Hand Management
Hexagon Grid
Legacy Game
Line of Sight
Once-Per-Game Abilities
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Simultaneous Action Selection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Player Powers
103.jpgGobblin' Goblins2 - 128+20 - 30 mins
View Details
Description from the deisgner: Gobblin' Goblins is a card game where you must defeat your opponents by being the greediest goblin in a sneaky battle for gross gourmet food. Using a simple play a card and pick up a card mechanic, players collect sets of coloured food cards in order to gobble them off their plate. Action cards can be used to steal and swap food cards as well as causing rounds of vomiting and even explosive diarrhoea. Distraction cards can be played out of turn to hijack your opponents dining experience. Goblins gobble everything from mud pie to flip flops to rusty old pylons. Their stomachs are bottomless, however, each goblin has it's own likes and dislikes as well as allergies. They also have their own special ability depending on their category. Gobbled unwanted food results in minus points and favourable food awards extra points. When all the cards are played, the goblin with the most points is the winner.

Categorys
Card GameFantasyHumor

Mechanics
Set Collection
Variable Player Powers
386.jpgGonza Index1 - 514+20 - 60 mins
View Details
The Gonza Index is the most valuable stock market in the Solar 175 universe. This vast market trades shares in all the largest space based corporations and is unique in having its home in the most exclusive postal code in Yurushi City. Trillions of credits move through the machinations of this system every second making the gatekeepers of this institution some of the richest and most powerful in human history. The volatility of the Gonza Index is legendary and this flux has led to the fortunes of some and the destitution of many. Which will you be? Gonza Index is a fast-paced, stand-alone, dice chucking game for 2 to 5 players set in the universe of Solar 175. Players take the role of stock traders in a futuristic dystopia and compete to gain the most credits. Each round you will roll 5 custom dice, take up to 2 re-rolls then the outcome of these dice will determine your actions this turn. Players can earn credit, purchase stocks, manipulate the market and gain the favour of the powerful broker cards. As you play, unique event cards will be flipped shifting market positions and changing the game. When this event deck is empty the game is over and the player with the most credits is crowned victorious! Push your luck as you invest your valuable credits in this unpredictable financial battle-ground.

Categorys
EconomicScience Fiction

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Dice Rolling
Move Through Deck
Open Drafting
Push Your Luck
Trading
233.jpgGROWL4 - 1010+10 - 15 mins
View Details
Work together to distribute the bites and wounds amongst the village. Some of you are wolves trying to "turn" the others. When Night falls, everyone secretly passes cards to their neighbors! 4-10 players (up to 15 with more cards) all claim to be innocent humans, but one (or more) of them is Wolf Zero, the original werewolf that wants to infect the village! The deck of cards sits face-up in the middle of the table. One by one you take turns picking up the top card and giving it to any (other) player you want. The cards can be a Bite (which brings you closer to becoming a wolf) or a Wound (which brings you closer to dead), or cards that cancel other cards. When a Night card is revealed, the full moon comes out and werewolves and humans get to pass cards anonymously, which is how the infection spreads and turns humans into wolves. Charms negate Bites and Salves negate Wounds. 3 Wounds (net) kill either a human or a werewolf. 3 Bites (net) turn a human into a werewolf, and only wolves can pass Bites at night. When the deck is exhausted at the end of the third night, Wolf Zero(es) begins to GROWL and slowly other wolves (even dead wolves) join the growl! If any humans are left alive, all humans (even dead ones) win. If all the players who are still alive are growling, all wolves (including dead ones) win!

Categorys
BluffingCard GameDeductionParty Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Move Through Deck
Player Elimination
Role Playing
Take That
Team-Based Game
Traitor Game
306.pngHadrian's Wall1 - 612+30 - 60 mins
View Details
When visiting the North of Britannia in 122 AD, the Roman Emperor Hadrian Augustus witnessed the aftermath of war between his armies and the savage Picts. In a show of Roman might, he ordered a wall to be built that would separate the Pict tribes from the rest of England. Grand in its design, the wall stretched 80 Roman miles, from coast to coast. Hadrian's Wall stood in service to the Roman Empire for nearly 300 years before its eventual decline. Today, Hadrian's Wall is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the remains of the forts, towers, and turrets can still be explored. In Hadrian's Wall, players take on the role of a Roman General placed in charge of the construction of a milecastle and bordering wall. Over six years (rounds), players will construct their fort and wall, man the defenses, and attract civilians by building services and providing entertainment — all while defending the honor of the Roman Empire from the warring Picts. The player who can accumulate the most renown, piety, valor and discipline, whilst avoiding disdain, will prove to the Emperor they are the model Roman citizen and be crowned Legatus Legionis! —description from the publisher

Categorys
AncientCity Building

Mechanics
Hand Management
Paper-and-Pencil
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
219.jpgHanabi2 - 58+25 mins
View Details
Hanabi—named for the Japanese word for "fireworks"—is a cooperative game in which players try to create the perfect fireworks show by placing the cards on the table in the right order. (In Japanese, hanabi is written as 花火; these are the ideograms flower and fire, respectively.) The card deck consists of five different colors of cards, numbered 1–5 in each color. For each color, the players try to place a row in the correct order from 1–5. Sounds easy, right? Well, not quite, as in this game you hold your cards so that they're visible only to other players. To assist other players in playing a card, you must give them hints regarding the numbers or the colors of their cards. Players must act as a team to avoid errors and to finish the fireworks display before they run out of cards. An extra suit of cards, rainbow colored, is also provided for advanced or variant play. Hanabi was originally published as part of Hanabi & Ikebana.

Categorys
Card GameDeductionMemory

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Memory
Set Collection
456.pngHappy Little Dinosaurs2 - 48+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Lately, it feels like we’re all just dinosaurs trying to avoid the falling meteors. In this game, you’ll try to dodge all of life’s little disasters. You might fall into a pit of hot lava or get ghosted by your dino date, but the dino who survives it all wins the game! In Happy Little Dinosaurs, the first person to reach 50 points, or be the last Dinosaur standing, wins the game! During each round, you’ll flip a Disaster card featuring a Natural, Predatory, or Emotional disaster. Each player will play a Point card in hopes of collecting points and avoiding the disaster. You will work to avoid all of life’s little disasters and laugh as they happen to your friends. If you collect 3 Disaster cards of the same type OR 3 different types of Disaster cards, you will be out of the game. Point cards feature weapons, trinkets, and good luck charms that you use to collect points and avoid disasters. Each card has a point value between 0 and 9 that you will use when scoring a round. You can use Instant cards at different points during the game to tip the odds in your favor or save your Dinosaur from certain death. Player boards include your Dinosaur's traits, an Escape Route you use to track your score, and a Disaster Area where you will collect Disaster cards. You'll move your Dinosaur meeple along the Escape Route on your player board to track your score. Will you successfully dodge the disasters or get eaten by a prehistoric whale? Only the cards can decide. - description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsCard GameHumorNumberParty GamePrehistoric

Mechanics
Card Play Conflict Resolution
Hand Management
Player Elimination
Push Your Luck
Set Collection
Take That
Variable Player Powers
422.jpgHard to Get2 - 1210+15 mins
View Details
The Witness knows the right word. The Detectives are on the case. In Hard to Get, players must work together to find the right word, which only the Witness knows. The Detectives have few clues to go on – 5 dilemmas the Witness has to go through. Is Pancake more Tom Hanks or Tom Cruise? Is a Cactus Sweet or Sour? Hard to Get is an entertaining party game that will definitely spark lively discussions around the table.

Categorys
DeductionParty GameWord Game

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Cooperative Game
363.jpgHegemony: Lead Your Class to Victory2 - 414+90 - 180 mins
View Details
Extended edition includes Crisis & Control expansion. The Nation is in disarray and a war is waging between the classes. The working class faces a dismantled welfare system, the capitalists are losing their hard-earned profits, the middle class is gradually fading and the state is sinking into a deep deficit. Amidst all this chaos, the only person who can provide guidance is... you. Will you take the side of the working class and fight for social reforms? Or will you stand with the corporations and the free market? Will you help the government try to keep it all together, or will you try to enforce your agenda no matter the cost to the country? Hegemony is an asymmetric politico-economic card-driven board game for 2-4 players that puts you in the role of one of the socio-economic groups in a fictional state: The Working Class, the Middle Class, the Capitalist Class and the State itself. The Working class controls the workers. The Capitalist class controls the companies. The Middle class combines elements from both the Working class and the Capitalist. It has workers who can work in the Capitalist's companies but it can also build companies of its own, yet smaller. Finally the State is trying to keep everyone happy, providing benefits and subsidies when needed but trying also to maintain a steady income through taxes to avoid going into debt. While players have their own separate goals, they are all limited by a series of policies that affect most of their actions, like Taxation, Labor Market, Foreign Trade etc. Voting on those policies and using their influence to change them is also very important. Through careful planning, strategic actions and political maneuvering, you will do your best to increase the power of your class and carry out your agenda. Will you be the one to lead your class to victory? Hegemony is heavily based on actual academic principles such as Social-Democracy, Neoliberalism, Nationalism and Globalism, and allows players to see their real world applications through engaging gameplay. There are many ways to achieve hegemony- which one will you take? —description from the publisher

Categorys
EconomicEducationalPolitical

Mechanics
Action/Event
Hand Management
Variable Player Powers
Voting
339.jpgHellenica: Story of Greece1 - 711+120 - 180 mins
View Details
An explosion of creativity and violence erupted in the Aegean Basin in 800 B.C. that defined ancient Greece. This combination of science, mythology, development, and war was led by powerful city-states like Athens, Sparta, Corinth, Troy, Byzantium, Corcyra, and Thebes. These states vied for control over their rivals and dominated the lesser states around them. In time, some of them became so well known that they are remembered even today. Hellenica: Story of Greece is a 3.5X civilization game in which you harness the powers of one of seven beginning city-states to dominate the world around you. Your goal is to become the preeminent symbol of Greece for all posterity by completing a combination of secret and public goals. Will you be remembered as a warmonger or a peaceful philosopher? Great priest or apostate? Will you develop a devotion to the gods or focus on the advancement of your people? Can you guide your civilization during these turbulent times? Will your vision of Hellenic civilization be remembered for all time, or will you merely be a stepping stone for another…?

Categorys
AncientCity BuildingMythologyTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Betting and Bluffing
Dice Rolling
Die Icon Resolution
Events
Hidden Victory Points
Interrupts
Modular Board
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
Worker Placement
340.pngHellenica: Story of Greece - Leaders and Legends1 - 711+120 - 180 mins
View Details
An expansion for Hellenica: Story of Greece that adds unique leaders to the game allowing players to modify the characteristics of their city-state. Each leader confers a special bonus on the city-state that recruits them. For example, Heracles aids in fighting Mythological Creatures while Socrates makes your research more productive. Each leader is represented by a deck of cards that appear in a market that players review to recruit the leaders that they want. But, watch out, other players may be desiring the same leaders as you and leaders will not serve two city-states! —description from the publisher

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameAncientCity BuildingMythologyTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Die Icon Resolution
Events
Hidden Victory Points
Interrupts
Modular Board
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
Worker Placement
341.pngHellenica: Story of Greece - Themed AI Deck expansion1 - 711+120 - 180 mins
View Details
The Themed AI Deck expansion for Hellenica: Story of Greece expands the solo and AI playability of Hellenica by adding AI decks unique to each city-state. In the basic game, all city-states use the same AI deck. Using the Themed AI DEck expansion, each city-state will be more likely to follow its historical path. Thus, Sparta will tend to focus on land power, Athens will tend to want to control the seas, etc. Expand your Hellenica: Story of Greece experience using the Themed AI Deck expansion.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameAncientCivilizationMythology

Mechanics
Alliances
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Auction/Bidding
Betting and Bluffing
Dice Rolling
Die Icon Resolution
Events
Hidden Victory Points
Modular Board
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tile Placement
Variable Player Powers
432.pngHideous Abomination2 - 58+10 - 30 mins
View Details
A competition for creative miscreants Sharpen your bone saws and practice your whipstitching, the competition has begun! Take turns laying body part tiles to build your own unique abomination, trying to get the most desirable features and win the most trophies. With randomized win conditions and over 200 unique hand-inked body parts, no two games are ever the same. Who can breathe life into the most repugnant and bizarre monstrosity? —description from the designer

Categorys
HorrorHumorMedical

Mechanics
Die Icon Resolution
End Game Bonuses
Tile Placement
Variable Set-up
105.pngHigh Frontier 4 All1 - 514+30 - 240 mins
View Details
This is the 4th ed of Phil Eklund's signature game High Frontier. It started with Rocket Flight (1979), a game with the vision to let "Each player start as a spacefaring company in the year 2020 trying to make a profit in trade and technology development." Now that we are at that year, High Frontier has evolved into a modular system open to enthusiasts to keep it updated ever farther into the future. The Core Game is equivalent to the previous edition's basic and advanced rules, and includes Module 0 (Politics). It also comes with the beginner's game Space Diamonds (accessible to bright children), Race for Glory (introductory, including a playthrough), and a variety of solitaire and cooperative variants. The iconic map of High Frontier is the most comprehensive map of the solar system ever published! Since it is a delta-v map, it offers a completely different view of the accessibility of the worlds that orbit Sol. The cards and map have been expanded and produced in consultation with experts in the field, and the author himself is a former rocket scientist, and we can safely say this is the most accurate yet accessible game of space exploration/exploitation ever published. Transition rules allow High Frontier to work as an independent 4th stage in the Bios:Earth trilogy (Bios:Genesis, Bios: Megafauna, and BIOS: Origins) about the evolution of life on our planet. —description from the publisher

Categorys
CivilizationEconomicExplorationIndustry / ManufacturingScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Hand Management
Network and Route Building
Pick-up and Deliver
Point to Point Movement
Simulation
Variable Player Powers
106.jpgHigh Frontier 4 All: 6th Player Component Kit1 - 614+0 mins
View Details
All the components needed to play the High Frontier 4 All core game, module 1, and module 2 as a 6-player game. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
74.pngHigh Frontier 4 All: Module 1 - Terawatt & Futures1 - 514+30 - 240 mins
View Details
Module 1 - Terawatt introduces two new patent decks: Freighters and GW Thrusters. Freighters are a new type of patent card allowing the transport of valuable factory goods back to Low Earth Orbit. GW Thrusters are more powerful and efficient versions of the MW Thrusters of the core game, allowing your Spacecraft to reach the outer planets more easily. This module also optionally introduces Futures which are special game goals to earn victory points.

Categorys
CivilizationEconomicExpansion for Base-gameExplorationIndustry / ManufacturingScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Hand Management
Network and Route Building
Point to Point Movement
Simulation
Variable Player Powers
107.pngHigh Frontier 4 All: Module 2 - Colonization1 - 514+30 - 240 mins
View Details
Module 2 - Colonization introduces orbital space colonies called Bernals and space pioneers called Colonists. These two types of cards extend the core game to go beyond industrializing and exploiting the resources of the solar system to colonizing and settling the solar system. Bernals upgrade your Colonies to give you extra Victory Points, according to the Hydration of nearby Factories. They also award Colonists, which you can take to Sites to perform extra Operations there.

Categorys
CivilizationEconomicExpansion for Base-gameExplorationIndustry / ManufacturingScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Hand Management
Network and Route Building
Pick-up and Deliver
Point to Point Movement
Simulation
Variable Player Powers
113.jpgHigh Frontier 4 All: Module 3 - Conflict2 - 614+30 - 240 mins
View Details
As factions inevitably expand into the solar system and become less dependent on Earth and its resources, Loyalty changes and conflict can erupt.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCivilizationEconomicExplorationFightingIndustry / ManufacturingPoliticalScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
471.pngHigh Frontier 4 All: Module 4 - Exodus1 - 614+30 - 240 mins
View Details
This expansion is used to bridge High Frontier with the next game in the series, Interstellar. Module 4: Exodus introduces contracts that form new decks (not patents) tied to pairs of ideologies. Contracts are auctioned in a special auction (as part of the Fundraise Operation); players bid in years to complete (lowest bid wins). A timepiece chit is placed on the Sunspot Cycle to mark the bid. Winning a contract grants a cash advance, and further rewards upon fulfillment (bringing the contract to the specified destination), including ongoing abilities. If late for delivery, players owe late fees and/or may default (inability to bid on contracts until the advance is repaid). Discarding a contract gives a player the default chit - this gives them a VP penalty and the inability to bid on manned contracts. The contract deck flips to gold-side when any player produces an Isotope, causing Isotope monetization. A second Colonist queue (spaceborn) is available once you have a Colony Beyond Earth Orbit (BEO). Within your Faction, they cannot co-exist with earthborn Colonists (the Humans from Module 2). All Robots (including those from Module 2), are placed in the spaceborn queue. Cybernetics icons on contracts are required to implant augmentations, which grant abilities to the Colonist they are implanted on. Augmentation chits are implanted onto Colonists and remain attached to that Colonist until Decommissioned or removed. A Colonist with one or more augmentations is an augmented Colonist. An Colocated augmented Colonist is required for the promotion Operation. Anchoring a Bernal with a Dirtside matching your isostandard founds the isobank: Exodus contracts are activated. Isotope may be transfered to the isobank (adding to the isototal) to assist with a starshot, either during the game (desperation) or at game end. VP are given for contributions. A desperation starshot ends the game at the end of the current cycle; the starship must exit before game end or the commander suffers VP penalties. —description from the designer

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCivilizationEconomicExplorationIndustry / ManufacturingPoliticalScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
472.pngHigh Frontier 4 All: Tools 11 - 50+0 mins
View Details
Tools 1 is a player aid pack. It includes; 72 Cards for Tracking Futures and other things (for M1-4) Jump Start Rulebook with 48 technology cards Extensive Card and Map Quick Guides Extra Aqua & Isotope counter tokens

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
483.jpgHighland Clans3 - 58+45 - 60 mins
View Details
Take charge of your clan from the Scottish high country. In each round, a player first builds up his clan and landholdings, and then optionally conducts a raid on an opponent. You start by pulling six cubes from a bag. With green cubes you increase your ministers and potential to gain VPs at the end of a round. Yellow cubes attract warriors and permit you to hold more battle cards. The blue cubes are "pipers" used for combat support or possible VP generation. A blue cube can also be played as a "bard" to lure away opponents' followers. Finally, there are the red cubes, which represent cattle and generate VPs. You also use cubes to create new estates, where you can deposit cattle and groups of cubes (which are safer than those not on an estate). Raids are resolved simply. In three battle-rounds a card of value one to four is played by the two opponents; this value can be increased by a single blue cube. The one who wins the most battle-rounds wins the fight. The loser will then lose cubes while the victor gains a VP or two. After each round there is a valuation, in which the VPs are determined based on number of cubes. For example, the player with the most green cubes gets 3 VPs, while second most gets 2 VPs; if two players are tied for most, each gets only 1 VP. Another example: each red cattle tile is worth a VP, but if one player has the most he gets a 2 VP bonus. The estate tiles contain a number on the back. After each round a panel is turned. If the leading player has at least as many points as the number of the tile, the game ends. Bottom line: a fast game offering something for everyone: luck, tactics, and lots of interaction with your fellow players.

Categorys
MedievalTerritory Building

Mechanics
Tile Placement
234.jpgHistoria1 - 612+120 mins
View Details
In Historia, the players guide their civilization through 12,000 years of human history, from the first sparks up to the development of Singularity. Civilizations discover new technology and expand over the planet; they trade with more developed neighbors to import new technologies or exploit the land to have more power for future actions. Civilizations develop their military and wage wars with each other. They build wonders to make their civilization stand above others and to eventually attract tourists and newcomers to their land to follow their leaders and use their national advisors. Historia is a civilization game for 1-6 players that takes 25 minutes per player. A set of action cards is available to the players to guide their civilization, and used actions form a discard queue from which they are taken back into a player's hand during the game. Wars and raids are carried out in a non-disruptive way. When modern times have been reached the game ends and the player with the most VPs wins. A solo Historia variant with A.I. bots is also available. Flavor text: History is made by strong leaders and wise advisors, by conquests and discoveries, by wars and trade and amazing wonders. Historia is made by you.

Categorys
Civilization

Mechanics
Action Retrieval
Area Majority / Influence
Hand Management
Simultaneous Action Selection
235.jpgHistory of the Roman Empire2 - 412+180 mins
View Details
(From the Publishers Website: P500 production) "The History of the Roman Empire" covers the time-period from the Rise to the Fall of the Roman Empire in seven game turns starting in 60 BC (the first Triumvirate composed of Caesar, Crassus and Pompeus) until the last [Western] Emperor (Romulus Augustus) in 476 AD. The map contains the entire Mediterranean area as well as a part of Asia Minor. Each of the up to four Players takes the role of one Roman Faction and one group of "Barbarian" Peoples (non-Romans), and by playing certain event cards you can gain control over minor Kingdoms. The game is best suited for 4 Players but can be played by 3 or 2 Players as well. Since every Player controls a Roman Faction and a "Barbarian" People it is not possible to completely remove a Player from the Game (The Roman Faction that Player controls can be eliminated but the Barbarians can not). The Game "History of the Roman Empire" is not strictly historic but offers "a great lot of Flavor" with its 42 Roman Emperors (and Pretenders) and the 34 different "Barbarian" Peoples and minor Kingdoms. Since every Player controls Romans as well as Barbarians you will get all kinds of situations like Romans vs. Barbarians, Romans fighting among themselves, or Barbarians fighting other Barbarians. The Emperor for each Roman Faction changes every Game Turn as well as the Barbarian Peoples that the Players control. With its easy to learn rules - players who are familiar with "Hispania", "Britannia" or "History of the World" will find some similarities and some new features - and the constantly changing Barbarians, "The History of the Roman Empire" can be great fun. The Players will have to decide how to use their Roman Legions as well as how to use the armies of their Barbarians and of course where to plan new Cities and Forts (for the Roman Factions). Since it is worth many more Victory Points to control all areas of one color, soon everyone will try to establish his own small empire (and of course to disturb the others), until the more powerful Barbarians like the Goths or the Huns arrive and threaten to take control of the map. Each turn the Roman Factions spend some of their Victory Points on new Legions and/or Forts or Fortresses. The Barbarians do not use their Victory Points for recruiting Units but rather "mobilize" up to a certain number of Armies (how many units depends on the Barbarian People). Every game will present you with new situations since the Players will work on and change their strategies and the 45 random cards will influence every game in a unique way. At the end of the seventh turn, the players total their victory points and determine the winner. Will the Roman Empire rise to Glory or will it be crushed by the overwhelming Barbarians? It's up to YOU…

Categorys
AncientCivil WarWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Simulation
Variable Phase Order
236.jpgHitler's Reich: WW2 in Europe1 - 214+120 mins
View Details
No stacks of armies, no hexes, no overly-lengthy rules to learn - Hitler’s Reich takes five minutes to set up and two hours (or less!) to play. Players fight over Europe, across the North Atlantic and Mediterranean and into Russia using a combat mechanism similar to the traditional card game “War” with dice added in. High-quality wooden pieces mark their progress, which is aided economically, politically and on the battlefield through the competition for and play of Event Cards drawn from three unique decks: one for the Axis, one for the Allies, and one from which either side can attempt to draw. Hitler’s Reich is the first of the Card Conquest System game series in which players recreate epic military contests of history in short, comparatively simple and easy to learn, but hard to master games. Designed to be set up in minutes and played to conclusion in one sitting, these are not simulations but games, albeit ones packed with enough historical flavor, excitement, and decision making to give you the feeling of being there at the highest levels of command.

Categorys
WargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Area Movement
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Dice Rolling
Events
Simulation
Solo / Solitaire Game
387.jpgHorus Heresy213+135 mins
View Details
From publisher website: In the Horus Heresy board game, the most legendary battle in the history of the Warhammer 40,000 universe unfolds across the razed plains of Terra and in the frozen orbit above. Deadly fighting ranges from the Emperor’s golden Inner Palace to Horus’s flagship, the Vengeful Spirit. Taking the side of traitor or loyalist, two players control either fearless Space Marine legions or deviant Chaos Space Marines, mighty Titans, Imperial Armies both loyal and traitorous, and a fearsome array of other units, including the Emperor and Horus themselves. An innovative order and initiative system forces each side to carefully consider the commands they issue to their troops. A dramatic, card-driven combat system incorporates escalating damage, gives players the opportunity to allocate resources between attack and defense, and brings to bear the unique special powers of each unit type, from fortification-destroying Titans to the perverse daemons of Chaos. This legendary tale of treachery and heroism is brought to vibrant life with over one hundred magnificent sculpted plastic playing pieces. The stunning three-dimensional map of Terra brilliantly portrays the landscape immediately surrounding the Imperial Palace, from the magma-filled crevasses to the fortifications that offer the Imperial player protection against both enemy assault and orbital bombardments. Each one of these structures, as well as the Imperial Palace itself, have been expertly sculpted, and rise above the landscape to create a truly immersive experience. The fortifications of Terra have never looked more formidable! Once the board is set up with playing pieces and terrain for your first game, it will be a wonder to behold. Horus Heresy includes six scenarios that differ in both difficulty and style. The first scenario, titled Brother Against Brother, is recommended for all new players as it provides predetermined starting locations for both player's forces. It is a well balanced version of the Battle for Terra, and also presents a roughly historical recreation of the conflict's events. Horus Heresy is a board game that pits two players against each other to recreate the most famous battle of Warhammer 40,000’s rich history, in which the Warmaster Horus’s betrayal of the Emperor comes to its climax. Taking the side of either traitor or loyalist, players control a fearsome array of units, including the Emperor and Horus themselves. Brother fights brother, and the universe hangs in the balance! Not to be confused with Horus Heresy (1993), the original 1993 Games Workshop game of the same name.

Categorys
MiniaturesScience Fiction

Mechanics
Area Movement
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Hand Management
Turn Order: Time Track
Variable Player Powers
409.pngHow Dare You?1 - 1014+15 mins
View Details
The party game you can play anywhere Guess the number - but don't go too high! Lighten up the mood at any game night, dinner party or couples therapy session. Play it during business meetings, datenight your uncle's funeral - or all three at once! —description from the box Gameplay: One player reads a question (all answers are numbers). The active player must guess a number that is close to - but not higher - than the correct answer. Players take turns either making a guess that is higher than the previous player, or calling out a DARE if they believe the previous player guessed too high. When a Dare is called the answer is checked and the player who was wrong must keep the card for "Silly goose points". Once a player has collected a certain number of cards, the game ends, and the player with the most silly goose points loses. Everyone else wins. Nearly no table space is required, and the game therefore works well as a party game in nearly any setting. "How Dare you?" comes with 2 optional advanced rules that spice up the gameplay: "Doubling": If you guess a number that is at least twice that of the previous player, you gain a doubling card. This card negates one "silly goose point". This variant tempts players to make higher guesses. "Double Dare": If you are dared, you can either accept the dare and check the answer like normal, or you can reply with a "Double Dare". The player who is wrong will now get double punishment (two cards instead of one). But the player who initiated the dare, now has the option to chicken out and withdraw their dare. If they do, they must instead guess a higher number before the round continues as normal.

Categorys
BluffingParty GameTrivia

Mechanics
Betting and Bluffing
410.pngIdus Martii5 - 812+15 mins
View Details
Idus Martii is a hidden role game for 5 to 8 players. According to Plutarch, a seer had warned that harm would come to Caesar no later than the Ides of March. On his way to the Theatre of Pompey, where he would be assassinated, Caesar passed the seer and joked, "The Ides of March are come", implying that the prophecy had not been fulfilled, to which the seer replied "Aye, Caesar; but not gone." Players are members of the Senate and must plot in favor or against the magnicide of Julius Caesar. But it is not that easy, as they need to identify who shares their convictions in order to partner against the other players...while keeping an eye open for those who only look for their wealth. There are four roles that are dealt every turn: The "Consul" take the decision of who will play in the active round and distribute the rest of the roles. There are two "Edils" that will vote, secretly, if the Caesar will live or die. At last, the "Praetor" will decide to sneak a peek one of the two votes and can force that "Edil" to change his vote. Once all the players voted twice, they reveal his votes and check if the Caesar will live or die. But the decisions are not that easy. At the beginning of the game, players will take two different cards of their "team" (in favor, against, or to be neutral in the "magnicide") and they must discard one of these cards before the second round of votes take place in order to choose their final team. —description from the designer

Categorys
AncientBluffingCard GameDeductionNegotiation

Mechanics
Memory
Team-Based Game
Traitor Game
Voting
237.jpgImperial Struggle214+120 - 240 mins
View Details
In 1697 the Sun King, Louis XIV, emerged from a decade of war with his Continental ambitions still unsatisfied. Meanwhile, King William III of England sat easier on his new throne than he ever had before. With the Spanish succession crisis unresolved and looming, there were no illusions that the new century would be a quiet one. But neither France nor England could have anticipated the tumult of the years to come: a Second Hundred Years' War, during which these two tenacious adversaries would compete fiercely and proudly along every axis of human achievement. On battlefields from India to Canada to the Caribbean Sea their armies and fleets would clash; in the salons of Paris and the coffee-houses of London the modern world’s politics and economics would be born; and finally a revolution would rock the foundations of society – a revolution that could have ended not in blood and terror but in a triumph of democracy and liberty that might have transformed the world beyond imagining. Imperial Struggle is a two-player game depicting the 18th-century rivalry between France and Britain. It begins in 1697, as the two realms wait warily for the King of Spain to name an heir, and ends in 1789, when a new order brought down the Bastille. The game is not merely about war: both France and Britain must build the foundations of colonial wealth, deal with the other nations of Europe, and compete for glory across the span of human endeavor. Imperial Struggle covers almost 100 years of history and four major wars. Yet it remains a low-complexity game, playable in a short evening. It aims to honor its spiritual ancestor, Twilight Struggle, by pushing further in the direction of simple rules and playable systems, while maintaining global scope and historical sweep in the scope of a single evening. In peace turns, players build their economic interests and alliances, and take advantage of historical events represented by Event cards. They must choose their investments wisely, but also with an eye to denying these opportunities to their opponent. In war turns, each theater can bring great rewards of conquest and prestige, but territorial gains can disappear at the treaty table. At the end of the century, will the British rule an empire on which the sun never sets? Or will France light the way for the world, as the superpower of the Sun King's dreams or the republic of Lafayette's? —description from the publisher

Categorys
Age of ReasonWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Events
Open Drafting
Point to Point Movement
Secret Unit Deployment
Simulation
499.pngImposter Pigeon3 - 68+15 - 30 mins
View Details
A sneaky wee pigeon is trying to bluff its way into the flock - but where is it hiding? And who put it there? For the rest of you flockers: spot the imposter and run them from the roost before things get hawkward! Gather your flock and get ready to ruffle some feathers in this game of birds and bluffing! Unleash avian antics, outwit your bird-brained buddies, and spread your wings to victory in this mischievous and addictive social deduction game. —description from the publisher

Categorys
BluffingCard GameDeductionParty Game

Mechanics
Deduction
Hidden Roles
Traitor Game
Voting
84.jpgInfinite City2 - 610+45 mins
View Details
A rich new world has opened up. Resources are plentiful, the economy is booming, and the capital city of this new world is expanding like never before! Even though many corporations scramble to stake a claim in the exploding prosperity, only one can claim ownership! Who will take over the Infinite City? Will you place the capital next to the port, claiming both as your own? Will you use the transit station to move another player’s military base out of the way, or place your embassy to steal his temple? Will you try for a greater area under your control, or move to capture key buildings? Infinite City is a standalone tile game in which players become the leaders of corporations building an ever-sprawling city, maneuvering to control the largest districts while holding on to the most valuable buildings. Infinite City uses tiles to represent buildings, and colored pegs to represent control by players. The tiles are mixed, five tiles are dealt to each player, and five tiles are placed face down in the shape of a cross at the center of the play area. On their turns, players play a tile face up adjacent to one of the five starting tiles or a previously played tile, play one of their colored pegs on the tile, and follow the instructions on the tile. These instructions may lead to playing additional tiles, drawing tiles, moving tiles previously played, turning face down tiles face up, taking tiles from opponents, preventing actions or even exchanging hands of tiles with other players. When players finish their turns, if they have less than five tiles in their hands, they draw additional tiles so that they end their turn with at least five tiles. The game ends when one player places the last of his colored pegs, or the fifth Power Station tile is played. Each player is awarded points for contiguous groups of at least three tiles controlled by him at a rate of one point per tile. Some tiles have a point value number in the corner; players receive the number of points indicated for such tiles that they control. Also, some tiles have silver rings; the player controlling the most of these receives one point per such tile. The player with the most points wins.

Categorys
City BuildingScience FictionTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Hand Management
Tile Placement
115.jpgIsle of Skye: Druids2 - 510+60 - 75 mins
View Details
One cannot win the struggle for dominance over the island without powerful allies. As every wise king knows, power is not measured in strength and gold alone. Having the support of the spiritual leaders of the country can be the decisive factor. Win the druids over to your cause, and harness the power of their mystical sacred sites for your benefit! Isle of Skye: Druids, the second expansion for Isle of Skye, can be played with the base game on its own or with the base game and the Journeyman expansion. This expansion splits the buying phase (phase 4) into two buying sessions. With your first purchase, you can buy a tile from your fellow players in the usual manner. For your second purchase, you can buy a tile from the dolmen board. These "druid" tiles are normal landscape tiles, except that they will often bear a stone tablet or a scroll. Stone tablets grant special powers that you can use until the end of the game, while scrolls are subject to the usual rules of the base game. New scoring tiles offer further variability.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameTerritory Building

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Set Collection
Tile Placement
116.jpgIsle of Skye: From Chieftain to King2 - 58+30 - 50 mins
View Details
Isle of Skye is one of the most beautiful places in the world, with soft sand beaches, gently sloping hills, and impressive mountains. The landscape of Isle of Skye is breathtaking and fascinates everyone. In the tile-laying game Isle of Skye: From Chieftain to King, 2–5 players are chieftains of famous clans and want to build their kingdoms to score as many points as possible—but in each game only four of the sixteen scoring tiles will be scored. Thanks to the scoring tiles, each game is different and leads to different tactics and strategies, but having enough money is useful no matter what else is going on. Managing that money can be tricky, though. Each turn, each player places two area tiles in front of them and sets the selling price for the tiles. Setting a high price is great, but only so long as someone actually pays the price because if no one opts to buy, then the seller must buy the tiles at the price they previously requested. In the end, the player with the best kingdom—and not the richest player—becomes the sovereign of the island.

Categorys
EconomicTerritory Building

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Catch the Leader
Set Collection
Tile Placement
Turn Order: Progressive
117.jpgIsle of Skye: Journeyman2 - 510+75 mins
View Details
Becoming a king is hard, but being a king is even harder. You need warriors to protect your kingdom, merchants to keep your treasury liquid and heralds which proclaim your popularity across the kingdom. Luckily, your best mate has agreed to take over the hard graft so that you concentrate becoming a glory chieftain. Isle of Skye: Journeyman, the first big expansion to Isle of Skye, contains new personal player boards indicating your progress in terms of strength, prosperity and popularity. As each progress step has requirements to be met, the personal player boards affect tile selling and placement. However, in order to claim the next level of development and gain potential rewards, it’s not sufficient to place the corresponding tiles only. A new pawn (the journeyman) needs to travel the kingdom and "activate" the tiles. In addition, four new scoring tiles are contained respecting the new challenges of Isle of Skye: Journeyman.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameTerritory Building

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Set Collection
Tile Placement
411.pngIslet1 - 48+20 - 40 mins
View Details
In Islet, you embody tropical birds seeking to nest on a small islet in the middle of the ocean. During the game you will collectively explore the islet to collect materials, while competing to create the best nests to spawn, thus guaranteeing the continuity of your species. On each of your turns you choose to either explore the islet to receive resources, or position yourself to create the perfect nests in which to spawn your precious eggs. This way, together - as much as against one another - you’ll build a tropical islet with its different biomes, and whoever spawns all their eggs on the islet first will be the winner. How to play: Whoever has touched an egg most recently starts the game. Starting with that player, take turns clockwise. On your turn, you must take either an EXPLORE or a MOVE action. When you EXPLORE, EXPLORE you lay 1 to 4 tiles from your reserve, expanding the islet, and receive resources in return. When you MOVE, you can ADVANCE your pawn and SPAWN (lay eggs), as many times as you want and in any order and combination, as long as you can pay the required resource cost. The end of the game can be triggered in 2 different ways: ● When a player SPAWNS their last egg, their turn ends as normal and then the current round ends (so that everyone plays the same number of turns). ● When a player takes the last islet tile from the bag, the current round ends and a new round is played (so that everyone plays the same number of turns). In any case, the player who spawned the most eggs wins the game. ISLET in the 2nd game in the series that started with Coral. -description from publisher

Categorys
Abstract StrategyAnimalsEnvironmentalExplorationTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Hand Management
Map Addition
Pieces as Map
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Three Dimensional Movement
Worker Placement
238.jpgIt's a Wonderful World1 - 514+30 - 60 mins
View Details
In It’s a Wonderful World, you are an expanding Empire and must choose your path to your future. You must develop faster and better than your competitors. You’ll carefully plan your expansion to develop your production power and rule over this new world. It’s a Wonderful World is a cards drafting and engine building game from 1 to 5 players. Each round, players will draft 7 cards and then choose which ones will be recycled to immediately acquire Resources, and which ones will be kept for construction to produce Resources each round and/or gain victory points. When a card is fully built, it’s added to the player’s Empire to increase the player’s production capacity for each round. The mechanical twist being that the production phase works in a specific order. You'll have to plan your constructions carefully! For a deeper insight of the gameplay, please follow this link : It's a Wonderful World - First steps In addition to the base game, players can also enjoy expansions boxes introducing an innovative Campaign mode. Each Campaign offers a storyline to follow and many gameplay twists. At the end of each campaign, players will open a reward booster to unlock new cards, enhance their base game and keep a memory of what happened during the campaign. All the campaigns can be replayed and don’t imply game components destruction. More info on the Campaign mode : It's a Wonderful World - Campaign Mode —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card GameCivilizationEconomicScience Fiction

Mechanics
Closed Drafting
End Game Bonuses
Hand Management
Set Collection
Simultaneous Action Selection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Player Powers
494.jpgJenga1 - 86+20 mins
View Details
A tower building game. Jenga is played with 54 wooden blocks; each block is 3 times as long as it is wide, and slightly smaller in height than in width. The blocks are stacked in a tower formation; each story is three blocks placed adjacent to each other along their long side, and each story is placed perpendicular to the previous (so, for example, if the blocks in the first story are pointing north-south, the second story blocks will point east-west). There are therefore 18 stories to the Jenga tower. Since stacking the blocks neatly can be tedious, a plastic loading tray is included. Once the tower is built, the person who built the tower moves first. Moving in Jenga consists of taking one and only one block from any story except the completed top story of the tower at the time of the turn, and placing it on the topmost story in order to complete it. Only one hand at a time may be used to remove a block; both hands can be used, but only one hand may be on the tower at a time. Blocks may be bumped to find a loose block that will not disturb the rest of the tower. Any block that is moved out of place may be left out of place if it is determined that it will knock the tower over if it is removed. The turn ends when the next person to move touches the tower, although he or she can wait 10 seconds before moving for the previous turn to end if they believe the tower will fall in that time. The game ends when the tower falls in any significant way -- in other words, any piece falls from the tower, other than the piece being knocked out to move to the top. The loser is the person who made the tower fall (i.e. whose turn it was when the tower fell); the winner is the person who moved before the loser. The same game concept was published in 1984 by Fagus under the name "Hoppla - eins zuviel!" According to the designer, the game was developed from Takoradi blocks/bricks. "Jenga" is Swahili for "build".

Categorys
Action / DexterityParty Game

Mechanics
Physical Removal
Single Loser Game
Stacking and Balancing
364.jpgJohn Company: Second Edition1 - 613+90 - 240 mins
View Details
In John Company, players assume the roles of ambitious families attempting to use the British East India Company for personal gain. The game begins in the early eighteenth-century, when the Company has a weak foothold on the subcontinent. Over the course of the game, the Company might grow into the most powerful and insidious corporation in the world or collapse under the weight of its own ambition. John Company is a game about state-sponsored trade monopoly. Unlike most economic games players often do not control their own firms. Instead, they will collectively guide the Company by securing positions of power, attempting to steer the Company’s fate in ways that benefit their own interests. However, the Company is an unwieldy thing. It is difficult to do anything alone, and players will often need to negotiate with one another. In John Company, most everything is up for negotiation. Ultimately, this game isn’t about wealth; it’s about reputation. Each turn some of your family members may retire from their Company positions, giving them the opportunity to establish estates. Critically, players do not have full control over when these retirements happen. You will often need to borrow money from other players to make the best use for a chance of retirement. Players also gain victory points by competing in the London Season for prestige and securing fashionable properties. John Company engages very seriously with its theme. It is meant as a frank portrait of an institution that was as dysfunctional as it was influential. Accordingly, the game wrestles many of the key themes of imperialism and globalization in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and how those developments were felt domestically. As such, this game might not be suitable for all players. Please make sure everyone in your group consents to this exploration before playing. The second edition is extensively revised and is not a reprint. —description from designer

Categorys
EconomicEducationalNegotiationPolitical

Mechanics
Bribery
Dice Rolling
Negotiation
Push Your Luck
Simulation
Voting
239.jpgJunta2 - 716+240 mins
View Details
Players represent various families in Republica de los Bananas. Each game turn has between 7 and 9 rounds, drawing cards, President assigns roles, foreign aid money is drawn, the president proposes a budget which is voted on, locations are chosen, there are assassination attempts, then the bank may be open or not, there may be a coup and aftermath, then the next round starts. The game is for 4 to 7 players (although there are 2 and 3 player variants). A president for life (El Presidente) is elected and then she or he allocates roles for all other players. Depending upon his or her office and the various cards they hold, each player has a certain number of votes. These are important for the first vote to elect El Presidente and then there are votes each turn on the budget proposed by the President. The budget starts when the President draws 8 money cards face down from the money deck (which varies in denomination from $1 to $3) and proposes allocations. Not everyone will be included in the budget and the amounts are at the President's discretion. The President can keep undisclosed foreign aid money. Players may attempt to assassinate the other players including the President by guessing where they will be from among five locations. Players who successfully assassinate another player take that player's unbanked money, the only safe money is the money that has been deposited in a players' Swiss bank account, and the only way to get to the bank is to survive the assassination round. If players are unhappy, see an advantage, or just want to, and there is a 'coup excuse', they can start a coup. A coup sees players compete using armed forces to control a majority of the 5 power centers. Rebel players control the forces of the role which they were assigned prior to the coup (e.g. army, navy, air force), and players loyal to the President do the same, seeking to control the strongholds until the coup is over. At the conclusion of each coup players who have control of the 5 power centres vote to be pro-President or pro-Junta determining if the President stays, or the Junta wins and elects a new President. And someone is sent to the firing squad. Players assassinated or killed simply become another member of their family and begin again with new cards, but keeping any of their family's funds deposited in their Swiss bank account. The game is won by whoever has the most pesos in their Swiss bank account when the money runs out.

Categorys
BluffingHumorMafiaNegotiationPoliticalWargame

Mechanics
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Simultaneous Action Selection
Trading
Variable Player Powers
Voting
118.pngKepler-30421 - 414+60 - 120 mins
View Details
The year is 3042: Humanity is ready to explore the galaxy. The most interesting celestial bodies to explore, and eventually colonize, have been known for centuries, and the nations of Earth finally have the technological level to reach them, thus beginning an unarmed competition that in the end the whole of humanity will win. Kepler-3042 is a resource management game in which you have to explore, colonize, exploit, and terraform the planets of the Milky Way using the available technologies. In each round, you must choose which action to perform and which bonus to activate, managing your supplies of matter, energy and antimatter. The peculiar strength of the game is the innovative resource management: Each player has a finite amount of matter, energy and antimatter that they can produce or spend during the game. In each round, they can decide to burn forever one or more resources to perform powerful actions, thereby allowing them to follow different strategies.

Categorys
EconomicScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Grid Movement
Hexagon Grid
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
Turn Order: Progressive
240.jpgKings' Struggle3 - 614+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Welcome to Kings' Struggle, a negotiation-focused card game with elements of trick-taking and set collection. The game is mechanically simple, with each player playing just one card per round, and each game lasting only seven rounds. Over the course of these seven rounds, players vie to win cards and earn gold through various means, which will score the victory points required to win. While this sounds simple, what makes Kings' Struggle special are the unique card abilities that have been crafted to drive negotiation. The ability of a card you've played can be activated on your turn — or not. It's up to you. Just remember, your action or inaction is for sale! Analyzing who has the most to win or the most to lose from your current ability and leveraging it to your maximum benefit is the name of the game. You must learn to play the players, more than you learn to play the game. While anyone can learn to play Kings' Struggle in a matter of minutes, players who find success will not be those who craft the best linear card play strategy, or those who enjoy the most luck, but those who have mastered the art of negotiation. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card GameMedievalNegotiation

Mechanics
Hand Management
Set Collection
Simultaneous Action Selection
Take That
Trading
Trick-taking
323.jpgKittin2 - 86+3 - 15 mins
View Details
In Kittin, you'll flip a card then all players will compete in a simultaneous fast-paced race to grab the cat meeples and match the arrangement. The player who is quickest at grabbing and best at stacking will win the cat-stacking race! —description from the publisher

Categorys
Action / DexterityAnimals

Mechanics
Pattern Building
Real-Time
Stacking and Balancing
119.jpgKyoto3 - 610+30 - 45 mins
View Details
Kyoto takes players straight into one of the burning issues of our time: climate change — and not with a wagging finger, but by putting them into the shoes of the decision makers. As delegates from different countries, players face a few quick rounds of negotiation at a climate conference. Together, they try to hit reduction targets and provide the needed funding, knowing that each round they fail to do so they inflict severe damage on the planet. But bent on preserving their own country's wealth and following their secret agendas, none of them may be eager to give more than absolutely necessary. After all, the winner will be whoever best preserves their wealth...unless the impending damage to earth becomes too severe, in which case the conference fails immediately and the greediest player can't win.

Categorys
EnvironmentalNegotiation

Mechanics
Bribery
Hand Management
Negotiation
473.jpgL.L.A.M.A.2 - 68+20 mins
View Details
In LLAMA, you want to dump cards from your hand as quickly as you can, but you might not be able to play what you want, so do you quit and freeze your hand or draw and hope to keep playing? Each player starts a round with six cards in hand; the deck consists of llama cards and cards numbered 1-6, with eight copies of each. On a turn, the active player can play a card, draw a card, or quit. To play a card, you must play the same number as the top card of the discard pile or one number higher. If a 6 is on the discard pile, you can play a 6 or a llama, and if a llama is on top, you can play another llama or a 1. If you quit, you place your remaining cards face down and take no further actions in the round. If all players have quit but one, that player can continue to play, but cannot draw more cards. The round ends when one player empties their hand or all players have quit. In either case, players collect tokens based on the cards in their hand. Each different number card in hand gets you white tokens (each worth 1 point) equal to the value of the card while one or more llamas gets you a black token (worth 10 points). (You can exchange ten white tokens for one black token at any time.) If you played all your cards, you can return one token (white or black) that you previously collected to the supply. You then shuffle all the cards and begin a new round, in which the first player to play will be the one who emptied their hand or was the last one to quit in the previous round. The game ends at the end of the round where at least one player has forty or more total points. Whoever has the fewest points wins! The original title of this game is a German acronym and stands for Lege alle Minuspunkte ab, that is, "discard all minus points", with "Lama" also being the German spelling of "llama". The Polish game Lato z Komarami features gameplay nearly identical to LLAMA except that the game has one less "llama" card, and the penalty for llama cards in hand is 10 points per card, instead of being 10 points for one or more llama cards.

Categorys
Card GameNumber

Mechanics
Hand Management
Ladder Climbing
Matching
Push Your Luck
120.jpgLabyrinth2 - 48+20 mins
View Details
Labyrinth (formerly The aMAZEing Labyrinth) has spawned a whole line of Labyrinth games. The game board has a set of tiles fixed solidly onto it; the remaining tiles that make up the labyrinth slide in and out of the rows created by the tiles that are locked in place. One tile always remains outside the labyrinth, and players take turns taking this extra tile and sliding it into a row of the labyrinth, moving all those tiles and pushing one out the other side of the board; this newly removed tile becomes the piece for the next player to add to the maze. Players move around the shifting paths of the labyrinth in a race to collect various treasures. Whoever collects all of his treasures first and returns to his home space wins! Labyrinth is simple at first glance and an excellent puzzle-solving game for children; it can also be played by adults using more strategy and more of a cutthroat approach.

Categorys
Children's GameMazePuzzle

Mechanics
Map Deformation
Modular Board
Network and Route Building
Point to Point Movement
Tile Placement
474.pngLacuna28+10 - 15 mins
View Details
Lacuna is a game for 2 players about collecting flowers on a pond at night. It takes seconds to set up and plays entirely on a cloth mat. The rules are simple: draw an imaginary line between 2 flowers, place a pawn, and collect both flowers. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Abstract Strategy

Mechanics
Zone of Control
241.jpgLancaster2 - 510+60 mins
View Details
From the designer of Glen More comes a new title published by Queen Games: Lancaster. In 1413, the new king of England, Henry V of Lancaster, has ambitious plans: The unification of England and the conquest of the French crown! Each player takes the role of an ambitious aristocratic family. Who will be the best supporter of this young king, and the most powerful Lord of his time? In Lancaster, the players want to proceed from simply being a Lord to being the most powerful ally of the king. They may achieve this by developing their own knighthood, as well as by clever deployment of individual knights in the counties of England, at their own castle, and to conflicts with France. In parliament, they try to push laws from which they will benefit themselves most. The player with the most power points at the end of the game is the winner. Every turn, players send their knights to the different locations: • Counties, where they compete with knights from other players for rewards and the favor of the nobles. • The castle, to receive income or new knights. • Into conflict with France, where all players combine their power and try to gain power points. In the counties, the strength of the knights is important, as you can remove the knight of another player by placing a knight of your own with higher strength in the same location.

Categorys
Medieval

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Auction/Bidding
Voting
Worker Placement
Worker Placement, Different Worker Types
97.jpgLand Without End: The Barbarossa Campaign, 1941212+0 mins
View Details
From Decision Games website: Land Without End: The Barbarossa Campaign, 1941 is a two-player, low-to-intermediate complexity, strategic-level simulation of the German attempt to conquer the Soviet Union in 1941. The German player is on the offensive, attempting to win the game by rapidly seizing key cities. The Soviet player is primarily on the defensive, but the situation also requires he prosecute counterattacks throughout much of the game. Game play encompasses the period that began with the Germans launching their attack on 22 June 1941, and ends on 7 December of the same year. By that time it had become clear the invaders had shot their bolt without achieving their objectives. The game may end sooner than the historic termination time if the German player is able to advance so quickly he causes the overall political, socio-economic and military collapse of the Soviet Union. Each hexagon on the map represents approximately 20 miles (32 km) from side to opposite side. The units of maneuver for both sides are primarily divisions, along with Axis-satellite and Soviet corps (and one army) of various types. The effects of the general air superiority enjoyed by the Germans throughout the campaign are built into the movement and combat rules. Each game turn represents one week. Players familiar with other strategic-level east front designs will note the unique aspects of LWE lie in its rules governing the treatment of supply, the capture of Moscow, and the Stalin line. Contents: Rules booklet Player Aid cards 700 Die cut counters 1 34" x 22" Map 1 Die Storage bags

Categorys
WargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hexagon Grid
Ratio / Combat Results Table
388.pngLeaders of Euphoria: Choose a Better Oppressor4 - 812+15 - 35 mins
View Details
As the city of Euphoria was being established, the struggle for political dominance raged on between the Euphorians and Subterrans. The Icarites had not yet descended upon the city and the Wastelanders were still deciding whether they wanted any part of it. Since it has become clear that the two factions cannot share control, it is time for you to pick a side. Choose your faction, find your allies, banish those who oppose you, and ensure your place at the top of the dystopian society to follow. Now it's your chance to Choose a Better Oppressor! Leaders of Euphoria: Choose a Better Oppressor is a social deduction game in the style of Good Cop Bad Cop, but set in the world of Euphoria. It takes place earlier in the timeline than Euphoria, when the city was young and foolish. Players will have 3 cards in front of them that determine whether they are on the Euphorian or Subterran team that will be investigated throughout the game to figure out who's on their team and who's not. Instead of the equipment cards from Good Cop Bad Cop, players now use and give artifacts from the Old World in a new Artifact Phase or as a standard action. In Leaders of Euphoria, you can use your turn to Hide one of your Recruit cards, which is important because, unlike Good Cop Bad Cop, you may not use important actions without having a hidden recruit to expose. Also, there is no player elimination like there was in GCBC, as players who are banished from the city become Wastelanders and have a new victory condition.

Categorys
BluffingCard GameDeductionParty GamePolitical

Mechanics
Memory
Take That
Team-Based Game
75.jpgLEADERS: The Combined Strategy Game2 - 613+120 - 180 mins
View Details
LEADERS: A Combined Game, the first title from rudy games GmbH, combines classic game elements with the opportunities offered by the modern technologies found in smart devices. This strategy game takes up to six players back to the Cold War era, with each player striving to attain world domination. In the game, you'll use skillful diplomacy to forge powerful alliances, research ground-breaking technologies to give yourself the decisive edge, dispatch secret agents to procure classified information about your opponents, participate in missions on behalf of the international community, and demonstrate your military power and conquer new areas. Thanks to the incorporation of a smart device in this design, LEADERS: A Combined Game enables a complex economy, involved research threads, and clandestine interactions with other players such as espionage or sabotage. ATTENTION: The "LEADERS" video game/app is required for playing!

Categorys
ElectronicExplorationSpies/Secret AgentsWargame

Mechanics
Action Queue
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Events
Player Elimination
Secret Unit Deployment
Take That
Team-Based Game
Variable Player Powers
280.pngLincoln214+90 - 120 mins
View Details
Lincoln is a fast-paced, light, two-player, card-driven strategy wargame set in the American Civil War that allows you to re-fight the entire American Civil War at a strategic level in under two hours. Game play uses point-to-point movement and area control, hidden army strengths, and decks of cards providing the command choices and luck; there are no dice. The Union and Confederate players each have their own card decks, reflecting the relative strengths and weaknesses of both sides. The Union player must do all the running to win the game by the time they have cycled through the Union card deck for the third time, having accumulated the required amount of victory points by capturing Confederate controlled areas, as well as squeezing the Confederate player with a naval blockade. The Confederate player must hold on and thwart the North's victory ambitions to win! Each time the decks are cycled, the Union player adds some better quality cards, becoming stronger as the game progresses, where as the Confederate player adds lower quality cards, becoming weaker. The underlying game mechanism is one of "deck destruction" rather than the more normal deck-building. Cards have multiple uses and can be recycled if used one way but during the course of the game you have to decide which cards are going to be permanently sacrificed from your deck cycle to allow you to build units.

Categorys
American Civil WarWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
125.jpgLine: The Skateboard Game2 - 46+15 - 30 mins
View Details
In Line you are a professional skateboarder competing against your opponents to take the grand prize. Lay down the best tricks and sickest combos to increase your score, but make sure your tricks link together or you may bail and break your flow. Line is a card-laying game for 2-4 players based around combining cards for the highest score. Players draft for cards and place them in their Line, ensuring that the trick connects to both the current obstacle and their previous trick. Points are scored based on length of combos so clever trick choice is vital to make the winning Line. —description from the designer

Categorys
Card GameSports

Mechanics
Hand Management
Network and Route Building
Open Drafting
Pattern Building
Tile Placement
242.jpgLondon2 - 413+90 mins
View Details
London lies devastated after the Great Fire of 1666. This is your opportunity to build a new city on the ashes of the old. It is up to you how you employ the talents of the people of London to this end. Will you favor the business classes, who will earn you money? Or would you prefer to spend more money than you can rightly afford on grand monuments and sumptuous palaces? You must also deal with the problem of rising poverty and how to employ the many paupers of the city. Throughout the game you will be forced to make tough decisions. To achieve one aim you must sacrifice another, which may open an opportunity for a competitor. London is a 2-4 player game with a playing time of approximately 90 minutes. Players select cards with varying powers of cashflow, victory points, and poverty penalties, and compete to manage them most efficiently. Nearly 250 years of progress is glimpsed in this game. Famous buildings and monuments of the era as well as engineering developments such as streetlights are illustrated on the cards. As with a lot of games, London is about scoring the most VPs. Players manage their hand, selecting cards to play into their building display by laying them out in a line. At some point a player will choose to run his city. They can activate their buildings in whatever order they prefer. The resulting actions can generate money and VPs, reduce poverty or have some other effect specified on the card. Some cards have an entry cost which must be paid before the action can be performed.

Categorys
City BuildingEconomic

Mechanics
Hand Management
Open Drafting
126.jpgLost Cities210+30 mins
View Details
Lost Cities is a card game in the Kosmos two-player series. The game originally consisted of a single deck of cards of rank 2–10 in five different colors with three special "handshakes" ("HS" in scoring examples below) in each suit, but as of 2019 the game now includes six colored suits, with the sixth color being optional for gameplay. A game board is included to organize discarded cards and help players organize their card collections. The object of the game is to gain points by mounting profitable archaeological expeditions to the different sites represented by the colored suits of cards. On a player's turn, they must first play one card, either to an expedition or by discarding it to the color-appropriate discard pile, then draw one card, either from the deck or from the top of a discard pile. Cards played to expeditions must be in ascending order, but they need not be consecutive. Handshakes are considered lower than a 2 and represent investments in an expedition. Thus, if you play a red 4, you may play any other red card higher than a 4 on a future turn but may no longer play a handshake, the 2, or the 3. The game continues in this fashion with players alternating turns until the final card is taken from the deck. The rest of the cards in hand are then discarded and players score their expeditions. Each expedition that has at least one card played into it must be scored. Cards played into an expedition are worth their rank in points, and handshakes count as a multiplier against your final total; one handshake doubles an expedition's value, while two handshakes triples that value and three handshakes quadruple it. Expeditions start at a value of -20, so you must play at least 20 points of cards into an expedition in order to make a profit. If you are left with a negative value and have a handshake, the multiplier still applies. A 20-point bonus is awarded to every expedition with at least eight cards played into it. A complete game of Lost Cities lasts three matches, with scores for each match being added together. Scoring example 1: An expedition has a 2,3,7,8,10 for a total of 30. This expedition is worth 10 total points: 30 plus the initial -20. Scoring example 2: An expedition has 2 HS, and 4,5,6,7,8,10 for a total of 40. This expedition is worth 80 total points: 40 points for cards, plus the initial -20, ×3 for the two multipliers, plus the 20-pt bonus for playing 8+ cards. Scoring example 3: An expedition has 1 HS, and 4,6,7 for a total of 17. This expedition is worth -6 total points: 17 plus the initial -20, ×2 for the multiplier.

Categorys
Card GameExploration

Mechanics
Hand Management
Push Your Luck
Score-and-Reset Game
Set Collection
127.jpgLost Cities: To Go28+20 mins
View Details
Lost Cities has been around for ages, and now you can travel these expeditions in a handy portable format, with you once again needing to forge paths across the Himalayas, along volcanoes, under water, and through the rainforest or the desert — but beware of bandits who make for surprising turns! Each step you take in Lost Cities: To Go requires a tile in the color of the chosen expedition, but you can place tiles only if they're higher than what's been placed previously. Only by finding the right mix of tiles will you stay in front and win. This portable-format push your luck tile game is the Lost Cities equivalent to Keltis Mitbringspiel with the usual Lost Cities scoring rules and some additional ideas, including a storage where players may keep two tiles for a later use, some raid tiles that help discarding a few tiles and some extra actions provided by the lowest-numbered (2, 3, 4) tiles.

Categorys

Mechanics
Push Your Luck
Set Collection
243.jpgLost Galaxy: The Intergalactic Card Game2 - 48+10 - 15 mins
View Details
Expand, protect, survive —In a galaxy far, far away, a cosmic catastrophe is looming. Soon, the sun will turn into an all-devouring supernova. Who will be able to evacuate the largest number of planets and ensure the survival of their fraction? Before you play Lost Galaxy: The Intergalactic Card Game, download and install the free Lost Galaxy app from your app store. Start the app and place your smartphone or tablet at the center of the table. Each player chooses one of the four factions: sirians, broods, cyborgs, or mechs. Shuffle the card stack and each player gets now five cards on his hand. Gameplay: The player in turn can play up to his 6 hand cards: He can place a planet card with #1 at a free spot (there are 8 free spots around the smartphone) He can place a planet card with one level higher or lower on an existing planet card stack He can evacuate a planet (card stack) by playing a space ship card He can destroy a part or the whole planet by playing a special card At the end of his turn the player fills up his cards on the hand up to 6 cards again. How to win: If the sun becomes a super nova (the app shows you that) you have to count the level of evacuated planet cards. The player with the most own evacuated planet levels win the game. Benefits of the app: Unpack and play - no need to read a rule book More action thank to special random events More diversity with fractions with special skills chosen via the app More fun due app updates with additional game content —description from the publisher

Categorys
FantasyScience Fiction

Mechanics
Hand Management
Take That
Variable Player Powers
220.jpgLost Ruins of Arnak1 - 412+30 - 120 mins
View Details
On an uninhabited island in uncharted seas, explorers have found traces of a great civilization. Now you will lead an expedition to explore the island, find lost artifacts, and face fearsome guardians, all in a quest to learn the island's secrets. Lost Ruins of Arnak combines deck-building and worker placement in a game of exploration, resource management, and discovery. In addition to traditional deck-builder effects, cards can also be used to place workers, and new worker actions become available as players explore the island. Some of these actions require resources instead of workers, so building a solid resource base will be essential. You are limited to only one action per turn, so make your choice carefully... what action will benefit you most now? And what can you afford to do later... assuming someone else doesn't take the action first!? Decks are small, and randomness in the game is heavily mitigated by the wealth of tactical decisions offered on the game board. With a variety of worker actions, artifacts, and equipment cards, the set-up for each game will be unique, encouraging players to explore new strategies to meet the challenge. Discover the Lost Ruins of Arnak! —description from the publisher

Categorys
AdventureExplorationTravel

Mechanics
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Move Through Deck
Once-Per-Game Abilities
Open Drafting
Resource to Move
Solo / Solitaire Game
Turn Order: Progressive
Worker Placement
308.jpgLove Letter2 - 410+20 mins
View Details
All of the eligible young men (and many of the not-so-young) seek to woo the princess of Tempest. Unfortunately, she has locked herself in the palace, and you must rely on others to take your romantic letters to her. Will yours reach her first? Love Letter is a game of risk, deduction, and luck for 2–4 players. Your goal is to get your love letter into Princess Annette's hands while deflecting the letters from competing suitors. From a deck with only sixteen cards, each player starts with only one card in hand; one card is removed from play. On a turn, you draw one card, and play one card, trying to expose others and knock them from the game. Powerful cards lead to early gains, but make you a target. Rely on weaker cards for too long, however, and your letter may be tossed in the fire! Number 4 in the Tempest: Shared World Game Series

Categorys
Card GameDeductionRenaissance

Mechanics
Deduction
Hand Management
Player Elimination
Score-and-Reset Game
Take That
85.jpgLunch Money2 - 413+20 mins
View Details
This card game simulates children (a little girl is featured on all cards) running around the playground beating up each other and stealing their lunch money. Once you get past the strange theme, there's a fun little game where players beat each other senseless with cards like 'Poke in the Eye', 'Uppercut', and 'Humiliation.' Not for the weak willed, this game is mean. The last player still standing wins. Re-implemented by: Beer Money Integrates with: Beer Money

Categorys
Card GameFighting

Mechanics
Hand Management
Take That
128.jpgLunch Money: Sticks and Stones2 - 812+10 mins
View Details
This 55-card expansion set is designed to be mixed in with the original Lunch Money card game. New weapons like Chunk, basic attacks like Spank and Evil Eye, defenses like Backlash and Hide, and specialty cards like Tantrum, Cooties, and Wedgy make Lunch Money: Sticks & Stones a necessity for every Lunch Money fan. Expands Lunch Money

Categorys
Card GameExpansion for Base-gameFighting

Mechanics
Take That
423.pngLying Pirates: The Race for the Pirate Throne2 - 613+30 - 90 mins
View Details
Lying Pirates is a first to finish fast-paced dice game for 2-6 players You are the captain of your ship and the dice you have is your crew. The game plays in a number of rounds where every round consists of three phases. Betting, sailing and action phase. The betting phase: Inspired by the classic game Liars Dice , this poker-like mechanic will test your bluffing and probability skills. The sailing phase: All except the loser sail forward on the map and battle for their event/tile. Some events you really want to explore and some you want to avoid at all cost. The action phase: To aid you on your journey you'll have action cards on hand. Play these strategically to attack opponents and defend or upgrade your crew. —description from the designer

Categorys
BluffingDiceMathNauticalRacing

Mechanics
Betting and Bluffing
Dice Rolling
Events
Modular Board
Race
245.jpgMaharaja3 - 58+240 mins
View Details
Based on the highly successful Britannia, which dealt with the migrations of peoples into the British Isles from the Romans to the Normans, Maharaja employs much the same system, transferred to a different geography and time period. The map depicts the Indian sub-continent from the foothills of the Himalayas to the island of Sri Lanka (aka Ceylon, Serendib). The time period covered runs from the Aryan invasions of 1500 BC to the establishment of the British Raj in the mid-1800s. Re-published in French as Maharadjah by Descartes (with new box cover). Re-implements: Britannia

Categorys
AncientMedievalPike and ShotWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Paper-and-Pencil
Variable Player Powers
40.jpgMapmaker: The Gerrymandering Game1 - 48+30 - 45 mins
View Details
You are a mapmaker, which means you make maps… and determine who wins elections. You belong to a political party: Red Elephants, Blue Donkeys, Yellow Porcupines, or Green Leaves. Your only job? Make sure your party wins the next election. You get to redraw the districts. But so do the other mapmakers. Everyone starts with the same number of voters, spread across counties. Players each place four district borders per turn. When a district gets closed off, whoever has the most voters inside claims it. At the end of the game, the entire board will be sectioned into districts. The party with the most districts wins. If there’s a tie, the party with the most swing counties wins. You must scramble to draw the best lines first. Can you crack and pack voters? Can you scheme and strategize? Can you create unfair, lopsided, strangely shaped districts that will guarantee your party’s victory? Mapmaker: The Gerrymandering Game is fast to learn and fast to play. It’s full of surprises, maneuvers, and outmaneuvers. It’s a hands-on way to try out gerrymandering yourself. -description from designer

Categorys
Abstract StrategyPolitical

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Enclosure
60.pngMars Horizon: Blast Off!1 - 49+60 - 90 mins
View Details
An authentic, tactical yet fun card game about leading a space agency from its first rocket launch through to the first mission to Mars. In Mars Horizon: Blast Off! each player is aiming to complete the first crewed mission to Mars. To achieve this galactic task you run your own space agency and must make all the key decisions of what rockets to build, what missions to run, where to spend resources and what risks to take to make space-history. Will you be the first to successfully launch a satellite, to put the first person in space, to land on the moon or finally complete a crewed mission to Mars? Or will your family or friends get there first? The sky's the limit provided you’ve got the vision and the nerves that space exploration demands! Mars Horizon: Blast Off! Is easy to learn yet full of strategic challenges with plenty of risks and rewards. There is a whole new red planet to play for! Based on our many months of intense research for both this and our digital sister project (called ‘Mars Horizon’ too) and drawing from the support we’ve had from both the UK Space Agency and other space organisations, the game is as authentic as it can be while ensuring all the players will be having fun. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card GameDiceEducationalSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Income
Open Drafting
Race
Simulation
Stat Check Resolution
246.jpgMascarade2 - 1310+30 mins
View Details
Who are you in Mascarade? Whoever you want to be...at least until someone else calls you out on it! Each character receives a face-down role card at the start of the game, and in a game with 4-5 players some role cards are placed in the center of the table. On a turn, you take one of three actions: 1) Announce your character: Claim the power of a certain character and take the associated action. You don't have to have that character card in front of you to take this action, but if someone else says that they're that character and reveals the card to prove it, that player takes the action instead while you lose one coin to the tribunal. 2) Swap cards or not: Take another player's character card along with yours, place them under the table, shuffle them around a bit, then give one card back to the other player while keeping one for yourself. You (presumably) know whether you changed characters and can have some idea of who you are now, but that other player might be in the dark. 3) Secretly look at your character: Look at your character card to make sure of who you are. Play continues until one player obtains 13 coins and wins — or until a player has lost all of their coins, in which case the player with the most coins wins. Mascarade includes more character cards than the number of players, so not all characters will be used in each game. The rules suggest that you use certain characters in your first games, but once you know the game, you can try many other distributions.

Categorys
BluffingCard GameMedievalParty Game

Mechanics
Hidden Roles
Memory
Variable Player Powers
247.pngMaskmen2 - 69+20 mins
View Details
Welcome to the world of Pro Wrestling! You must win at any cost or face the wrath of your sponsors. This year there are six new wrestlers debuting, so go out and win some matches! Over the four seasons of maskmen, whoever has won the most points is the winner. In a round, players can play cards or pass on their turn. Players play 1-3 cards on their turn of the same type of wrestler (that hasn't already been played), to help resolve the strength of the wrestler. The faster you get rid of your cards, the better your chances of winning. As soon as you rid your cards you get to take the highest point token available, then the next player to go out gets the next token. Once there is only one player remaining, the round ends and that player gets the -1 token.

Categorys
Card GameSports

Mechanics
Ladder Climbing
Trick-taking
129.jpgMath Fluxx2 - 68+5 - 30 mins
View Details
Math Fluxx is all about the numbers. Players use positive integers (whole numbers) in their quest to achieve a very mathematical goal — but it's not just putting 4 and 2 together to achieve the 42 goal (for example) as Math Fluxx also features the Plan B Meta Rule. Plan B puts special victory rules into play which give you a second way to win and require even more arithmetical acumen (e.g., "Plus Victory" lets you win if your keepers add up to the current goal). With Math Fluxx, the fun is exponential!

Categorys
Card GameMath

Mechanics
Hand Management
Set Collection
108.jpgMedici: The Dice Game1 - 410+20 mins
View Details
Medici: The Dice Game is a new design by Reiner Knizia that shares the setting and feel of his classic Medici board game, but using dice! Fast to learn and simple to play, Medici: The Dice Game is a dice-selecting, roll-and-write game. Over the course of three rounds, 2-4 players will fill their ships with the goods presented at the wharf. They will earn money for having the most valued loads, as well as for collecting majorities of the different goods. —description from the publisher

Categorys
DiceRenaissance

Mechanics
Open Drafting
Paper-and-Pencil
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
248.jpgMelee2 - 410+20 mins
View Details
It is the dawn of a new year. The old king has just died childless, and the new succession must be decided before the end of this year. You are a local baron or countess with as good a claim as anyone else, so now is the time to grab the throne. Your peers understand only force, and your subjects understand only gold. Gather your men, pay your knights, and assert your claim. Everyone will recognize the strongest and richest as the rightful monarch. In Melee you want to be the first person to capture an opposing castle (at which point the game ends immediately) or to have the most land and gold at the end of the year. Money is tight, and gold is used in the game both to build new units and to attack. The more gold you have and spend on your troops, the more motivated they will be and the higher your probability of success. Each player starts the game with a Castle, one unit of foot soldiers, and 15 gold coins. The game begins with a drafting session in which you purchase units (soldiers, knights, camps and catapults) and bid on special abilities that will enhance your income, attack, or other options in the game. The game is then played over four turns (seasons), and in each turn players simultaneously choose one of three potential actions: (a) tax, (b) build new units, or (c) move and attack. Each turn ends with players collecting income. To attack, you move your unit into an occupied area, then secretly decide how much gold you will spend to motivate your troops. The defender then has to guess how much you have spent. If the defender guesses wrong, the attack succeeds; if the defender is correct, the attack fails and you lose your unit. Regardless of success you have spent your gold, so the tight trade-off that players have to assess is whether to be cheap with your men so that you can conserve gold for future builds and attacks, or be generous to increase your chances now but limit future options. The different abilities available in each game make for varied strategies and strong replayability as no two games are alike. After the initial strategic planning stage, Melee is fast and highly interactive. Beware as the game can end suddenly with a bold attack on an inadequately defended castle, making for a game that can be very nasty, brutish and short.

Categorys
BluffingMedievalTerritory BuildingWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Auction/Bidding
Simultaneous Action Selection
Take That
Variable Player Powers
130.pngMEOW2 - 68+20 mins
View Details
MEOW is a card game by Reiner Knizia in which smart cats fight for food. A player must be wise and try to collect the best bowls, avoiding fishbones while trying not to break vases! Each game is divided into three rounds, and each round is divided into nine turns. On a turn, each player plays one cat card, then the player who played the most valuable card wins one award token. Keep in mind that not all awards are positive! At the end of the game, the player who collected the most points wins. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsCard Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Trick-taking
221.jpgMicroMacro: Crime City1 - 412+15 - 45 mins
View Details
Crimes have taken place all over the city, and you want to figure out exactly what's happened, so you'll need to look closely at the giant city map (75 x 110 cm / 29.5 x 43 inches) to find all the hidden information and trace the trails of those who had it in for their foes. MicroMacro: Crime City includes 16 cases for you to solve. Each case includes a number of cards that ask you to find something on the map or uncover where someone has gone or otherwise reveal information relevant to a case. The city map serves as a map in time as well as space, so you'll typically find people in multiple locations throughout the streets and buildings, and you need to piece together what happened, whether by going through the case card by card or by reading only the starting card in the case and trying to figure out everything that happened for yourself. Will you be able to answer all questions about the case without fail?

Categorys
DeductionMurder/Mystery

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Deduction
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Solo / Solitaire Game
342.pngMonikers4 - 1617+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Monikers is a party game based on the public domain game Celebrity, where players take turns attempting to get their teammates to guess names by describing or imitating well-known people. In the first round, clue givers can say anything they want, except for the name itself. For the second round, clue givers can only say one word. And in the final round, clue givers can’t say anything at all: they can only use gestures and charades. Based on the public domain game known as Celebrities.

Categorys
Card GameHumorMature / AdultParty GamePrint & Play

Mechanics
Acting
Communication Limits
Open Drafting
Role Playing
Singing
Team-Based Game
343.pngMonikers: More Monikers4 - 2018+60 mins
View Details
Includes 440 new Monikers cards, which is the size of the original game (and four times the size of a regular expansion). The box can hold up to 2000 Monikers cards. The 2019 edition of Monikers: More Monikers has been condensed down to 330 cards and a normal sized box.

Categorys
Card GameHumorMature / AdultParty Game

Mechanics
Acting
Open Drafting
Role Playing
344.pngMonikers: Serious Nonsense4 - 2018+60 mins
View Details
Monikers: Serious Nonsense is a standalone expansion for Monikers. It features 330 cards, written by the folks at Shut Up & Sit Down. The brand new set from Shut Up & Sit Down also includes the MUCH REQUESTED return of the Monikers: Twelve Hopelessly Stupid Fourth Rounds! (minus "the two least interesting ones")

Categorys
HumorMature / AdultParty Game

Mechanics
Acting
Open Drafting
Role Playing
345.jpgMonikers: Shmonikers4 - 2018+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Monikers: Shmonikers is the first expansion for Monikers. It features 112 new names and rules for adding additional rounds to the game. It can also be played as a standalone game.

Categorys
Party Game

Mechanics
Acting
Open Drafting
Role Playing
346.jpgMonikers: Something Something4 - 2018+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Monikers: Something Something is the second expansion for Monikers. It features 112 new names to add more variety to the base game! It can also be played as a standalone game.

Categorys
Party Game

Mechanics
Acting
Open Drafting
Role Playing
348.jpgMonikers: The Shut Up & Sit Down Nonsense Box4 - 2018+30 - 60 mins
View Details
The Shut Up & Sit Down Nonsense Box is a standalone expansion for Monikers. It features 112 cards, written by the folks at Shut Up & Sit Down.

Categorys
Party Game

Mechanics
Acting
Open Drafting
Role Playing
349.jpgMonikers: Twelve Hopelessly Stupid Fourth Rounds00+0 mins
View Details
It is a pack of cards that all have different fourth round rules. Like getting behind a couch and doing hand puppets. Or doing charades in pairs, but one person has to pose the other person. They're hilarious and weird and perfect for when you're having such a good time that you want a game to go on for just a little bit longer. It was a Kickstarter exclusive (at least initially) for the "Monikers: The Shut Up & Sit Down Nonsense Box" campaign.

Categorys
Card GameExpansion for Base-gameHumorMature / AdultParty Game

Mechanics
Acting
Open Drafting
Role Playing
433.pngMoon1 - 510+45 - 90 mins
View Details
Moon depicts an almost plausible rush to construct lunar bases that are attractive places to live and work for the people of Earth. The most prestigious base will become the new lunar capital! The game employs the familiar "pick & pass" or "hand drafting" mechanism for players to select a new structure cards to add to their base. Each hand of cards represents a convoy of experts and equipment travelling between the players' outposts, giving the player the choice of one new construction each turn. In a new twist on the genre, each hand always contains one of a number of "Expedition" cards that grant a special free action every turn before passing on to the next player. Wooden lunar rover tokens are a neutral resource that add a worker placement element to the game. They are also used to break ties and so must be used with care. Over the three distinct eras of the game, players compete for majority in 5 aspects of their bases: housing, transportation, science, industry, and food production. At the end of each era, the leader in each of these areas as determined by flag icons on their constructed buildings, collects bonus victory points. Each game also features a number of randomly selected "Reputation" cards which provide one-time or ongoing bonuses for the player who meets the requirement and claims the card. Moon is the third game of a loose trilogy, preceeded by Villagers and Streets. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Science FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Closed Drafting
End Game Bonuses
Hand Management
Worker Placement
434.pngMoon: Valkyrie Expansion1 - 512+0 mins
View Details
Blast off for Earth in a lunar-made Valkyrie spacecraft and bring back amazing new technology from the home planet! This expansion for Moon includes a Valkyrie token for each player. Once per era, you can place your Valkyrie on the launch board, taking a bonus as you do - the earlier you launch, the more choices you have. Then, pay the resource cost to obtain a new structure card from the special market. New cards will be available in each era, including such wonders as Beef Trees, Rover Factory, and Wormhole. These are added to your base, giving you even more opportunities for maximising your engine and constructing the most popular city on the Moon! Also includes three new Expedition and Reputation cards for the base game. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
End Game Bonuses
Open Drafting
Worker Placement
365.jpgMosaic: A Story of Civilization1 - 612+90 - 120 mins
View Details
Mosaic: A Story of Civilization is a Civilization-Building game from Glenn Drover, designer of, among others, Age of Empires III: The Age of Discovery, Railways of the World, Sid Meier's Civilization: The Boardgame, and Raccoon Tycoon. Mosaic is an action selection game. On your turn, you will perform one of seven actions and acquire components. Acquiring Components is important in creating the unique mosaic of your civilization. They are used as prerequisites for many new technologies, as well as for scoring. Also, by pursuing specialization in one or more Civilization Components, you may be able to claim a ‘Golden Age’ of that type. As the game goes on and your Civilization grows, scoring cards are eventually revealed from the four decks. Each time a scoring card is revealed, your Civilization will score for each region that you dominate with your cities and military units. After the third scoring card is revealed, there is one final turn and the game ends. You will then score for your cities and towns, your wonders, projects, and golden ages, and for all of your cards that score for your unique Civilization Components. -description from publisher Please note that the solo rules are only included in the Kickstarter edition, not in the retail version.

Categorys
Civilization

Mechanics
Action Queue
Area Majority / Influence
Hand Management
Open Drafting
Tags
350.jpgMuffin Time: Deluxe Edition2 - 813+30 - 0 mins
View Details
Muffin Time is a chaotic card game with more twists and turns than you can shake a spork at! Battle your friends, family, and hyper-intelligent pets by drawing and playing from a deck of unique cards that'll either help you, thwart others, or mix things up for the sheer hell of it! To win the game, you just need to start your turn with exactly 10 cards in your hand but if you think that'll be easy, you're wrong (wronger than a duck wearing shoes - and that's pretty damn wrong). This follows the same rules as the regular Muffin Time game. Players draw a card on their turn and can choose to "place" up to three trap cards out of their hand. As a second part of their turn they either pick up one card or play one action card, which are all unique and can have wide-ranging consequences on the other players or game as a whole The game ends an a player wins when someone starts their turn holding exactly 10 cards. This deluxe version includes cards from the Pie Flavour and Rainbow booster packs so contains 200 cards (the standard 120 plus 40 from each booster).

Categorys
Card GameHumorParty Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Take That
351.jpgMuffin Time: Kickstarter Pack2 - 612+20 - 40 mins
View Details
40 card expansion for Muffin Time. Includes 11 holo cards.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCard GameParty Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Take That
352.jpgMuffin Time: Pie Flavour Pack2 - 613+0 mins
View Details
40 card expansion for Muffin Time. Includes 1 holo card - "Pie Flavour", and 3 additional blank cards.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCard GameParty Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Take That
353.jpgMuffin Time: Rainbow Pack2 - 613+0 mins
View Details
40 card expansion for Muffin Time. Includes 1 holo card - "Rainbows", and 3 additional blank cards.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameCard GameParty Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Take That
132.jpgMunchkin Warhammer: Age of Sigmar3 - 612+60 - 90 mins
View Details
The Eight Realms of Age of Sigmar form a new battleground for Munchkin players to explore in Munchkin: Warhammer – Age of Sigmar — and by "explore", we mean kill monsters and take their stuff, obviously. Munchkin: Warhammer – Age of Sigmar is compatible with Munchkin Warhammer 40,000 and its expansions.

Categorys
Card GameFantasyFighting

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Take That
Variable Player Powers
249.jpgMythotopia2 - 413+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Mythotopia is a deck-building game set in a medieval fantasy world that draws on the mechanisms found in A Few Acres of Snow with players customizing their personal card decks by drafting cards and expanding into provinces. The game board is composed of forty provinces, each with its own card. At the start of play, you receive a number of Province cards at random, then mark your initial positions with town pieces. Shuffle these Province cards with a set of five Initial cards to form your starting deck, then draw a hand of five cards. The game includes 27 Improvement cards, 16 of which are drawn and placed on display; these cards will be drafted during the game. Mythotopia has nine variable victory point (VP) cards, four of which are drawn at random for a game; place these cards on display with three fixed VP cards, then place a number of VP counters on each card. The fixed VP cards give points for building cities, roads and castles, while the variable ones may change the board situation by adding dragons, runestones and citadels. Alternatively they may grant VPs for controlling a certain number of sea areas, for successfully attacking other players, and for building cities/roads. As these VP cards vary from game to game, they alter the balance between developmental and aggressive play. On your turn, perform two actions, then refill your hand to five cards. Nine actions are possible, such as buying armies or ships (after starting with six armies and two ships), placing these armies or ships, drafting Improvement cards (for a cost of one gold), placing cards in reserve (to use them on a future turn), permanently removing cards from your deck, using a card for its specific action, and invading a neighboring province. To invade, you must play the Province card from which you attack as well as military cards and food; invading must be the first of your two actions, so if you're placing armies to prepare for an attack, opponents have the chance to prepare defenses. Three resources are used in Mythotopia: food to feed invading armies, stone to build cities, roads and castles, and gold to buy armies, ships and Improvement cards. Most provinces contain one resource type, and gaining that province gives you that resource. You can turn towns into cities, which increases the number of cards you can keep in your reserve. You can connect provinces with roads, which allows you to substitute one card for another on the same network in addition to moving armies freely between those provinces. Castles increase the defensive value of a province. All of these constructions (cities, roads, castles) give you victory points, as does taking control of a province. Additional points are available via the VP cards, with you taking VP counters when you meet the condition on a card. For example, building a road gives you two VPs, but if the "Roadside Inns" VP card is in play, then you can expend an extra gold to gain an additional VP. You can lose VPs if you lose control of a province, but you never lose VP counters. The game ends after four of the seven VP cards have been emptied, and the player with the most VPs wins.

Categorys
Card GameFantasyMedievalMythologyTerritory BuildingWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Hand Management
Variable Set-up
250.jpgNapoleon Saga: Waterloo214+45 - 90 mins
View Details
Napoleon Saga is a strategic card game for two players that lets them play the 1815 Belgium campaign battles opposing the French army to the coalition force. In this game, each player has two decks of cards that represent his army and his strategic plans. They deploy their starting troops on the board and alternate turns to defeat their opponent in one of two ways: Disbanding the opposing army by emptying their ranks. Reaching at least ten Victory points by defeating enemy units and completing secret objectives. You can recreate famous historical battles such as Quatre-Bras, Ligny, Waterloo or Wavre with the scenarios included in the two expansions, (the base game contains no scenarios), or you can change history by building your own armies with the deck-building aspect of the game.

Categorys
Card GameNapoleonicWargame

Mechanics
Action Points
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Secret Unit Deployment
Simulation
389.jpgNemesis1 - 512+90 - 180 mins
View Details
Playing Nemesis will take you into the heart of sci-fi survival horror in all its terror. A soldier fires blindly down a corridor, trying to stop the alien advance. A scientist races to find a solution in his makeshift lab. A traitor steals the last escape pod in the very last moment. Intruders you meet on the ship are not only reacting to the noise you make but also evolve as the time goes by. The longer the game takes, the stronger they become. During the game, you control one of the crew members with a unique set of skills, personal deck of cards, and individual starting equipment. These heroes cover all your basic SF horror needs. For example, the scientist is great with computers and research, but will have a hard time in combat. The soldier, on the other hand... Nemesis is a semi-cooperative game in which you and your crewmates must survive on a ship infested with hostile organisms. To win the game, you have to complete one of the two objectives dealt to you at the start of the game and get back to Earth in one piece. You will find many obstacles on your way: swarms of Intruders (the name given to the alien organisms by the ship AI), the poor physical condition of the ship, agendas held by your fellow players, and sometimes just cruel fate. The gameplay of Nemesis is designed to be full of climactic moments which, hopefully, you will find rewarding even when your best plans are ruined and your character meets a terrible fate.

Categorys
AdventureHorrorMiniaturesScience Fiction

Mechanics
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Hidden Roles
Interrupts
Modular Board
Player Elimination
Semi-Cooperative Game
Solo / Solitaire Game
Team-Based Game
Traitor Game
Variable Player Powers
424.jpgNew Angeles4 - 614+120 - 240 mins
View Details
Description from the publisher: The largest, richest, and most diverse city on Earth, New Angeles is home to the Space Elevator that rises along its buckyweave tether and connects us to Luna and its invaluable Helium-3 deposits. It is here, in New Angeles, that you'll find the global headquarters for the worlds' most powerful megacorps: Haas-Bioroid, Globalsec, Jinteki, Melange Mining, NBN, and the Weyland Consortium. And it is here, in this shining beacon of human achievement and advancement, that these powerful megacorps enjoy a uniquely fertile breeding ground for their projects and their rivalries. In New Angeles, you gain control of one of these megacorporations, then you use your wealth and influence to create more wealth and more influence. To do this, you cut deals and forge temporary alliances. You leverage your credits and assets to gain financial superiority over your corporate rivals. All the while, you also need to keep an eye toward the masses, striking deals with the other corps as necessary in order to keep a lid on crime, disease, and unrest. If you want to maximize your profit, you need to keep New Angeles open for business!

Categorys
BluffingMiniaturesNegotiationPoliticalScience Fiction

Mechanics
Hidden Roles
Negotiation
Semi-Cooperative Game
Traitor Game
Variable Player Powers
Voting
390.pngNew Eden1 - 410+45 - 60 mins
View Details
It's the year 2442, and Earth is facing complete destruction. The sea level is irrevocably rising, and the vast depths of the ocean now lie above the former land areas. Inspired by Jules Verne's visions and equipped with the latest technology, a deep sea city — "New Eden" — is being built, with the main dome standing on a "White Smoker", a spring at the bottom of the sea from which hot water flows at up to 300 °C. This current forms a basic supply for the inhabitants (represented in game by coins), and from there, the station is constantly being expanded and enlarged with useful modules from the last mega-factories on the coast of Mount Everest or from the black market in order to receive further resources, points, and lucrative advantages. Many of these well-intentioned actions can damage "New Eden", however. Will the station withstand this damage, or will it collapse in on itself? Only those who keep an eye on the balance between progress and destruction can collect points in the final scoring. Whoever has built the most points and thus the safest and most livable station wins "New Eden". In more detail, New Eden lasts three rounds. Each round, first reveal the module cards and place them in four rows. Players take turns buying a card from the display, using oxygen to take an action with a diver on a module, or passing. When you buy a card, the cost can vary from 10 coins + 3 repaired damage to 1 coin + 1 damage. When a row is empty, all cards drop down one level, making them cheaper, but potentially damaging. Discard all cards on display once everyone has passed. Once all players have passed, enter the black market phase. Each player takes three cards from the black market deck, with remaining cards placed in rows on the display. Pay for any cards with coins and damage, then place the remaining cards in a row of the display. Players then bid on a row in the display, with each row having a combination of discard black market cards and empty spaces, which allow you to move a diver and activate a module. Once all four rows have been auctioned, players have a brief scoring and clean-up before the next round. After three rounds, if your level of damage exceeds the meter on your board, you score no endgame points, keeping only those points scored during play. Whoever has the highest score wins.

Categorys
Science Fiction

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
136.jpgNo Thanks!3 - 78+20 mins
View Details
No Thanks! is a card game designed to be as simple as it is engaging. The rules are simple. Each turn, players have two options: play one of their chips to avoid picking up the current face-up card pick up the face-up card (along with any chips that have already been played on that card) and turn over the next card However, the choices aren't so easy as players compete to have the lowest score at the end of the game. The deck of cards is numbered from 3 to 35, with each card counting for a number of points equal to its face value. Runs of two or more cards only count as the lowest value in the run - but nine cards are removed from the deck before starting, so be careful looking for connectors. Each chip is worth -1 point, but they can be even more valuable by allowing you to avoid drawing that unwanted card. The first versions of the game supported up to five players, but a 2011 edition supports up to seven. This game was originally published in Germany by Amigo as Geschenkt ...ist noch zu teuer!, meaning Even given as a gift, it is still too expensive!. Amigo's international edition, titled No Merci! (a delightful multi-lingual pun), had rules in several languages, including English. The game has subsequently been released in other countries under an assortment of names.

Categorys
Card Game

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Closed Economy Auction
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Push Your Luck
Set Collection
412.jpgNucleum1 - 414+60 - 150 mins
View Details
When Elsa von Frühlingfeld presented her invention to King Frederik Augustus II of Saxony, people thought it was trickery. She used the recently isolated element Uranium to heat up a jar of water and used the resulting steam to power an engine that kept the Uranium active via a process she called “atomization.” Her device, the Nucleum, ushered in a new era of energy and prosperity over the next decades. Saxony went from a minor regional power to the hub of European science and engineering. Now, a generation later, factories are still hungry for more power, demanding bigger and more Nucleums to be built, more Uranium imported from the nearby country of Bohemia, and railways and power lines built across the country to carry the tamed power of the atoms to Saxony’s great cities. Inventors, engineers, and industrialists flock to the Saxon court, vying to be the leader in this new industrial revolution. Nucleum is a heavy euro board game in which players take role of industrialists trying to succeed during the economic and technological boom of 19th-century Saxony, fueled by the invention and spread of the Nucleum (a nuclear reactor). Players earn victory points by developing their networks, building and powering urban buildings, securing contracts, and meeting milestones (randomized endgame goals). Each player also gets unique asymmetric technologies, giving them special powers when unlocked. Gameplay is continuous; players take turns one after another with no rounds or phases. —description from the publisher

Categorys
EconomicIndustry / ManufacturingScience Fiction

Mechanics
Action Retrieval
Contracts
End Game Bonuses
Hand Management
Income
Market
Network and Route Building
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
Variable Player Powers
475.jpgNunatak: Temple of Ice2 - 410+30 - 45 mins
View Details
In the three-dimensional construction game Nunatak: Temple of Ice, you build a step pyramid together in a mountain of ice — but this game isn't co-operative, so watch your step! (A "nunatak", by the way, is a hill or mountain completely surrounded by glacial ice.) For each pillar stone placed, you receive cards with different values that will affect your score in the end. For every four pillars built in a square, a new level of the monument opens up, with the temple of ice growing step by step. Who can place their stones most wisely and rise to the icy challenge?

Categorys
AncientPrehistoric

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Modular Board
Multi-Use Cards
Open Drafting
Set Collection
366.jpgOn Mars1 - 414+90 - 150 mins
View Details
Following the success of unmanned rover missions, the United Nations established the Department of Operations and Mars Exploration (D.O.M.E.). The first settlers arrived on Mars in the year 2037 and in the decades after establishment Mars Base Camp, private exploration companies began work on the creation of a self-sustaining colony. As chief astronaut for one of these enterprises, you want to be a pioneer in the development of the biggest, most advanced colony on Mars by achieving both D.O.M.E. mission goals as well as your company’s private agenda. In the beginning, you will be dependent on supplies from Earth and will have to travel often between the Mars Space Station and the planet's surface. As the colony expands over time, you will shift your activities to construct mines, power generators, water extractors, greenhouses, oxygen factories, and shelters. Your goal is to develop a self-sustaining colony independent of any terrestrial organization. This will require understanding the importance of water, air, power, and food — the necessities for survival. Do you dare take part in humankind’s biggest challenge? On Mars is played over several rounds, each consisting of two phases - the Colonization Phase ​and the Shuttle Phase​. During the Colonization Phase, each player takes a turn during which they take actions. The available actions depend on the side of the board they are on. If you are in orbit, you can take blueprints, buy and develop technologies, and take supplies from the Warehouse. If you are on the surface of the planet, you can construct buildings with your bots, upgrade these buildings using blueprints, take scientists and new contracts, welcome new ships, and explore the planet’s surface with your rover. In the Shuttle Phase, players may travel between the colony and the Space Station in orbit. All buildings on Mars have a dependency on each other and some are required for the colony to grow. Building shelters for Colonists to live in requires oxygen; generating oxygen requires plants; growing plants requires water; extracting water from ice requires power; generating power requires mining minerals; and mining minerals requires Colonists. Upgrading the colony’s ability to provide each of these resources is vital. As the colony grows, more shelters are needed so that the Colonists can survive the inhospitable conditions on Mars. During the game, players are also trying to complete missions. Once a total of three missions have been completed, the game ends. To win the game, players must contribute to the development of the first colony on Mars. This is represented during the game by players gaining Opportunity Points (OP). The player with the most OP at the end of the game is declared the winner.

Categorys
City BuildingEconomicExplorationScience FictionSpace ExplorationTerritory Building

Mechanics
Closed Drafting
Contracts
Delayed Purchase
End Game Bonuses
Hand Management
Hexagon Grid
Income
Movement Points
Moving Multiple Units
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
Tile Placement
Variable Phase Order
Worker Placement
367.pngOn Mars: Alien Invasion1 - 514+80 - 150 mins
View Details
On Mars: Alien Invasion is the much-anticipated Somewhat Cooperative Expansion to Vital Lacerda’s best-selling and highly-rated On Mars base game. Though this expansion was originally going to be named Surviving Mars, Eagle-Gryphon Games made the decision to change the name to On Mars: Alien Invasion to better reflect the theme and content of this expansion. The game narrative is contained in four chapters of a story written by Nathan Morse. Gameplay contains four new and different ways to expand upon and play the base game. You will play one versus many; completely cooperatively; and even solo if you wish, depending on the chapter. Included are four fresh and completely replayable ways to establish colonies On Mars! For instance, here is the narrative that opens the first chapter and sets the stage for all of the following action: Alert! Sensors indicate that aliens are invading the famous red planet! Long have the conspiracy theorists predicted this. The threat to your mission is too great; you must take action. Will you be able to prevent the infectious spread of these beings bent on expanding to every habitable planet in the galaxy? Or will you play for the other side, a species trying to establish a colony on Mars, blithely oblivious to the danger their expansion represents, unaware that there are others out there eager to keep humans “where they belong” on Earth. —description from the publisher On Mars: Alien Invasion is a short story expansion to On Mars made in 4 chapters with 4 different modes of play. The short story is called Alien Invasion and contemplates the following Chapters and modes of play: Chapter 1 - Invasion - 1 vs All - 3 to 5 players Chapter 2 - Outbreak - Co-Op - 2 to 4 players Chapter 3 - Blackout - Co-Op - 2 to 4 players Chapter 4 - Monolith - Solo - 1 player —description from the designer

Categorys
City BuildingEconomicExpansion for Base-gameExplorationScience FictionTerritory BuildingVideo Game Theme

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Worker Placement
435.jpgOne Deck Galaxy1 - 214+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Your civilization has reached the stars, and your population is hungry for discovery. Explore, colonize, research — but be sure to build up your strength to be ready for the dangers that await! One Deck Galaxy is a co-op space civilization-building game using only cards, dice, and tokens. Each card in the deck represents both a location in space your civilization has scouted, but also the benefits it could reap by colonizing or studying it. These benefits increase your ability to roll dice and manipulate them, and help your civilization grow stronger. When the deck runs out, the era advances and your foes become more dangerous. If you're not ready, they may overwhelm you and send your empire into decline before it can become truly great!

Categorys
Card GameDiceSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Melding and Splaying
Move Through Deck
413.jpgOrion Duel212+25 mins
View Details
Will you be able to cross the universe and join one of the Orion nebulas? On the way, you will find black holes that will weaken you to death or galaxies that will make you stronger. Plan your maneuvers well because each of your moves can give your opponent an opportunity to get closer to victory. Your tiles possess two colors, yours in majority, and your opponent's color as well. Try to connect your tiles smartly while not giving too much opportunities. You can win in 3 different ways: by connecting 2 opposite sides of the board with an unbroken chain of hexagons of your color; by collecting 4 GALAXY PIECES on connected hexagons of your color; or by making your opponent get 3 BLACK HOLE PIECES on connected hexagons of his/her color. Pay attention to all 3 possibilities! Do not let any of them escape your mind. -description from publisher

Categorys
Abstract Strategy

Mechanics
Hexagon Grid
121.jpgP'achakuna28+30 - 60 mins
View Details
P'achakuna takes you on a journey in the heart of the Andes together with your most loyal friend — your llama. The game includes both black and white llamas, with you controlling one color and your opponent the other. White llamas move only through the green valleys, while black llamas scale the barren mountains. Whatever the color, however, you want to visit mountain villages to deliver the dye that they desire, ideally collecting dye for yourself along the way. In P'achakuna, each player starts with one llama of their color in the center of the board in the white village, with a white dye loaded on its back. The board is composed of hexagonal tiles that are either half valley/half mountain, two-thirds valley/one-third mountain, or vice versa. The tiles are extremely thick so that you can grab the mountain section of the tile and pluck it from the board. Six villages sit on the perimeter of the game board, each corresponding to one of the primary or secondary colors. Each village has a random demand tile in it that shows two colors, one in high demand and one in low demand; neither of these colors can match the color of the village. On a turn, you may first rotate one unoccupied tile; by paying two dye resources from your personal supply, you can rotate a second tile. You then must move each of your llamas at least one space, but you can move them further if you desire and if the terrain allows them to do this. You rotate tiles to create long paths of valley or mountain so that ideally your llamas can travel far with each move. If you move a llama into a village, you trade the dye on that llama. If the dye you carry isn't in demand in that village, you simply trade that dye for the dye from the village, say, green for yellow. If the dye is in demand, then you add 1-2 dye of that delivered color to your personal supply (depending on whether the demand is low or high), then you place a dye matching the color of that village on your llama. If you collect a color in your personal supply and don't have it in your scoring track, you can place it in your scoring track. No matter what, you replace the demand tile in that village, making sure the color of that village isn't on the demand tile. During a turn in a village, you can hand in four dye from your personal supply to acquire a new llama that is then placed in that village with a dye from that village on its back. Each llama moves on your turn, and you can have at most three llamas. As soon as you have one dye of each of the seven colors on your scoring track, you win. To hold the demand tiles, the game includes a handmade fabric bag from Bolivia and Peru, which supports the local community.

Categorys
AnimalsMazePuzzle

Mechanics
Hexagon Grid
Map Deformation
Modular Board
Network and Route Building
Pick-up and Deliver
Point to Point Movement
Tile Placement
335.jpgPaleo1 - 410+45 - 60 mins
View Details
Paleo is a co-operative adventure game set in the stone age, a game in which players try to keep the human beings in their care alive while completing missions. Sometimes you need a fur, sometimes a tent, but these are all minor quests compared to your long-term goal: Painting a woolly mammoth on the wall so that humans thousands of years later will know that you once existed. (Okay, you just think the mammoth painting looks cool. Preserving a record of your past existence is gravy.) What might keep you from painting that mammoth? Death, in all its many forms. Each player starts the game with a couple of humans, who each have a skill and a number of life points. On a turn, each player chooses to go to one location — possibly of the same type as other players, although not the same location — and while you have some idea of what you might find there, you won't know for sure until you arrive, at which point you might acquire food or resources, or find what you need to craft a useful object, or discover that you can aide someone else in their project, or suffer a snakebite that brings you close to death. Life is full of both wonders and terrors... At the day's end, you need food for all the people in your party as well as various crafts or skills that allow you to complete quests. Failure to do so adds another skull on the tote board, and once you collect enough of those, you decide that living is for fools and give up the ghost, declaring that future humans can just admire someone else, for all you care. Paleo includes multiple modules that allow for a variety of people, locations, quests, and much more during your time in 10,000 BCE.

Categorys
Card GameExplorationPrehistoric

Mechanics
Action/Event
Cooperative Game
Memory
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Simultaneous Action Selection
Variable Set-up
76.jpgPandemic2 - 48+45 mins
View Details
In Pandemic, several virulent diseases have broken out simultaneously all over the world! The players are disease-fighting specialists whose mission is to treat disease hotspots while researching cures for each of four plagues before they get out of hand. The game board depicts several major population centers on Earth. On each turn, a player can use up to four actions to travel between cities, treat infected populaces, discover a cure, or build a research station. A deck of cards provides the players with these abilities, but sprinkled throughout this deck are Epidemic! cards that accelerate and intensify the diseases' activity. A second, separate deck of cards controls the "normal" spread of the infections. Taking a unique role within the team, players must plan their strategy to mesh with their specialists' strengths in order to conquer the diseases. For example, the Operations Expert can build research stations which are needed to find cures for the diseases and which allow for greater mobility between cities; the Scientist needs only four cards of a particular disease to cure it instead of the normal five—but the diseases are spreading quickly and time is running out. If one or more diseases spreads beyond recovery or if too much time elapses, the players all lose. If they cure the four diseases, they all win! The 2013 edition of Pandemic includes two new characters—the Contingency Planner and the Quarantine Specialist—not available in earlier editions of the game. Pandemic is the first game in the Pandemic series.

Categorys
Medical

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
Set Collection
Trading
Variable Player Powers
137.jpgPandemic: Fall of Rome1 - 58+45 - 60 mins
View Details
At the height of its power, the Roman Empire held more than two million square miles of territory containing over a hundred million people. Throughout the centuries of its existence, the Empire brought major advancements in engineering, architecture, science, art, and literature. By the beginning of the 5th Century, decades of political corruption, economic crisis, and an overburdened military had exacted a severe toll on the stability of the Empire. This paved the way for severe incursions from aggressive barbarian tribes, leading to a decline from which Rome would not recover. Now citizens, soldiers, and allies of Rome must unite to protect the Empire. Combining the cooperative gameplay of Pandemic with innovative new mechanisms, Pandemic: Fall of Rome takes players back in history to the time of the world's greatest empire: Rome. A weakened military has left the borders open to invasion from countless tribes such as the Anglo-Saxons, Goths, Vandals, and Huns. As you march through the Roman Empire, you must recruit armies, fortify cities, forge alliances, and face off against the invading hordes in battle. Simply defending Rome is not enough; players must find a way to stop the incursions and find peace with their neighboring peoples. Players collect sets of matching-colored cards to forge an alliance with the different tribes. In doing so, they gain the ability to use cards matching the tribe to convert other members of that tribe into Roman soldiers, furthering their ability to hold the line against other invaders. Take on unique roles with special abilities to improve your team's chances to protect against the invaders. Work together, use your skills wisely, and stop the fall of Rome! Pandemic: Fall of Rome includes a solitaire mode in which the player takes on the burden of being the Emperor and commands three different roles to try to protect the city from the invading hordes. Players who want a more difficult game can try the "Roma Caput Mundi" challenge by adding more Revolt cards to the deck; they must also respect the law in Rome that Roman legions are not allowed in the city. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Ancient

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Events
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Player Powers
251.pngPandemic: Hot Zone - Europe2 - 48+30 mins
View Details
Pandemic: Hot Zone – Europe features the same nail-biting co-operative experience of Pandemic in which players win or lose together, but in a smaller form that you can take anywhere and play in a shorter amount of time. As members of an elite team, you use your character's unique abilities to treat cases, stop outbreaks, and research the cures. Discover all three cures in time to win! Add extra challenges with new mutation cards! —description from the publisher

Categorys
Medical

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
98.pngPandemic: Hot Zone - North America2 - 48+30 mins
View Details
Disease threatens North America and only you can stop it! In Pandemic: Hot Zone – North America, players work together against the game to discover cures for three deadly diseases that threaten the continent. Travel to different North American cities to treat local populations, prevent outbreaks, and share research with your team. Can you discover the cures before it's too late? Hot Zone – North America is a shorter, more portable version of the best-selling cooperative game Pandemic.

Categorys
MedicalPrint & Play

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
Set Collection
41.pngPandemic: Iberia2 - 58+45 mins
View Details
Welcome to the Iberian Peninsula! Set in 1848, Pandemic Iberia asks you to take on the roles of nurse, railwayman, rural doctor, sailor, and more to find the cures to malaria, typhus, the yellow fever, and cholera. From Barcelona to Lisboa, you will need to travel by carriage, by boat, or by train to help the Iberian populace. While doing so, distributing purified water and developing railways will help you slow the spread of diseases in this new version of Pandemic. Discover a unique part of the world during a historically significant time period: the construction of the first railroad in the Iberian Peninsula during the Spring of Nations. The game comes with two variants that can be added : Influx of Patients : the cubes, representing patients, will tend to flock to hospitals to try to get cured. Hospitals also are a bit more powerful. Historical Diseases : instead of being generic, each disease has a specific power to better represent what it is (Malaria, Cholera, Yellow Fever etc.) Part of the Pandemic series.

Categorys
MedicalPost-NapoleonicTrains

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Network and Route Building
Point to Point Movement
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Trading
Variable Player Powers
61.jpgPandemic: In the Lab1 - 68+45 - 60 mins
View Details
In Pandemic: In the Lab, the second expansion for Pandemic, you will use a new game board that allows you to move the pawns in a laboratory. The goal of this activity is the same as in the base game – finding cures for diseases – but this time in a new way. Behind sealed bio-hazard doors, scientists race against time to sequence diseases, take samples, and test cures. Pandemic: In the Lab includes four new roles, new Virulent Strain events, and a Worldwide Panic Mutation scenario. Players can compete individually or on rival teams (when playing with four or six players). Can your team work together in the lab to save humanity? Pandemic: In the Lab requires the base game. Two of the 3 scenarios also require Pandemic: On the Brink to play. Part of the Pandemic series.

Categorys
EnvironmentalExpansion for Base-gameMedicalScience Fiction

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Team-Based Game
Trading
Variable Player Powers
138.jpgPandemic: On the Brink2 - 58+45 mins
View Details
Pandemic: On the Brink includes new event cards, new role cards, rules for five players, and optional game challenges to increase the difficulty of the Pandemic base game. These new challenges, which can be used individually or combined for even more difficult play, are as follows: The Virulent Strain challenge makes one disease become particularly deadly in unpredictable ways. The Mutation challenge adds a fifth (purple) disease that behaves differently than the original four. The Bio-Terrorist challenge pits one player against the others! Part of the Pandemic series.

Categorys
EnvironmentalExpansion for Base-gameMedicalScience Fiction

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
Secret Unit Deployment
Set Collection
Team-Based Game
Trading
Variable Player Powers
139.jpgPandemic: Rising Tide2 - 58+45 mins
View Details
It is the dawn of the Industrial Age in the Netherlands. For centuries, the country has relied upon a series of dikes and wind-powered pumps to keep it safe from the constant threat of flooding from the North Sea, but this system is no longer enough. In Pandemic: Rising Tide, it is your goal to avert tragedy by constructing four modern hydraulic structures in strategic locations that will help you defend the country from being reclaimed by the ocean. Storms are brewing and the seas are restless. It will take all your guile to control the flow of water long enough to usher in the future of the Netherlands. It's time to get to work. Containing the water that threatens to consume the countryside is your greatest challenge. Water levels in a region are represented by cubes, and as the water containment systems currently in place begin to fail, more water cubes are added to the board. With water levels constantly on the rise, failure to maintain the containment system could quickly lead to water spilling across the board. To successfully build the four hydraulic structures needed to win a game of Pandemic: Rising Tide, you must first learn to predict and manipulate the flow of water. Failing to maintain safe water levels throughout the country can bring you perilously close to failing your mission. Fortunately, water can be corralled by a strategically placed dike or slowed by pumping water out of a region. Correctly identifying and intervening in at-risk areas can get you one step closer to victory.

Categorys
Environmental

Mechanics
Action Points
Area Movement
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Set Collection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Trading
Variable Player Powers
86.pngPandemic: State of Emergency2 - 413+45 mins
View Details
Saving the world just got a little bit harder in Pandemic: State of Emergency, an expansion for Pandemic that offers three new challenges: The Hinterlands Challenge, in which the diseases spread from animals to humans. The Emergency Events Challenge, in which unpredictable events have nasty effects on the game. The Superbug Challenge, in which a fifth disease that cannot be treated threatens the world! To fight off this threat, you must first find its cure, using quarantines to stop the spread of disease in the meantime, then produce vaccine doses. You must eradicate the superbug disease to win. This is NOT for the faint of heart... Part of the Pandemic series.

Categorys
EnvironmentalExpansion for Base-gameMedical

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
Set Collection
Trading
Variable Player Powers
324.jpgParis: Eiffel28+20 - 30 mins
View Details
The tower built by architect Gustave Eiffel rises high above Paris, announcing the inauguration of the Universal Exposition. There are those who define it as a monstrous iron cyclops and others as the first step into modern architecture. There is no doubt it will leave very few indifferent. Paris Eiffel is an expansion of Paris: La cité de la lumière. There are eight new action postcards that provide far more variability in the game. The postcards are accompanied by a series of die-cut figures that will add a spectacular third dimension to your Paris. In this expansion you will visit Parisian marvels such as the Arc de Triomphe, the obelisk of Luxor, Louvre Museum, and naturally, the Eiffel Tower. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
Action Drafting
Area Majority / Influence
Open Drafting
Tile Placement
325.jpgParis: La Cité de la Lumière28+30 mins
View Details
Paris is a two-player board game by José Antonio Abascal infused with Parisian aesthetics by the boardgame’s artist Oriol Hernández. The game is set in late 19th century Paris during the 1889 “Exposition Universelle,” or world’s fair, when public electricity was a hot topic. Electricity spread throughout the city, creating today’s beautiful nocturnal Parisian streets and coining Paris’s nickname “La Cité de la Lumiére”, the city of lights. The most well-lit buildings are admired more highly by passers-by. In the first phase, players can either place tiles or grow their reserve of buildings. The cobblestone tiles are divided into 4 random spaces (their color, their opponents’ color, a streetlight or a mixed-color space where either player can build). Then, in the second phase, players build on top of their color or the mixed spaces, in effort to position their buildings as close to as many streetlights as possible. More streetlights solicit more adoration and points. The player with the best lit buildings steals the hearts of Parisian pedestrians and wins the game. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Abstract StrategyPuzzleTerritory Building

Mechanics
Action Drafting
Area Majority / Influence
Grid Coverage
Layering
Open Drafting
Square Grid
Tile Placement
284.jpgParthenon: Rise of the Aegean3 - 612+120 mins
View Details
Parthenon: Rise of the Aegean immerses you in an exciting, competitive world filled with aggressive trading, perilous voyages, and the construction of grand monuments. "Parthenon" is a game of commerce for 3 - 6 players set in the islands of the Aegean Sea. The time is 600 B.C., and mainland Greece stands on the threshold of glory. The Aegean Islands now attempt to share in that glory and to thrive in an increasingly profitable (and dangerous!) world. Each player strives to develop his island by building additional villages, workshops, and advanced structures such as fortresses, shrines, and academies. The first player to complete all of the structures on his or her island, including two Great Wonders, wins the game!

Categorys
AncientCity BuildingCivilizationEconomicMythologyNauticalNegotiationTransportation

Mechanics
Pick-up and Deliver
Set Collection
Trading
Voting
368.jpgPatchwork28+15 - 30 mins
View Details
In Patchwork, two players compete to build the most aesthetic (and high-scoring) patchwork quilt on a personal 9x9 game board. To start play, lay out all of the patches at random in a circle and place a marker directly clockwise of the 2-1 patch. Each player takes five buttons — the currency/points in the game — and someone is chosen as the start player. On a turn, a player either purchases one of the three patches standing clockwise of the spool or passes. To purchase a patch, you pay the cost in buttons shown on the patch, move the spool to that patch's location in the circle, add the patch to your game board, then advance your time token on the time track a number of spaces equal to the time shown on the patch. You're free to place the patch anywhere on your board that doesn't overlap other patches, but you probably want to fit things together as tightly as possible. If your time token is behind or on top of the other player's time token, then you take another turn; otherwise the opponent now goes. Instead of purchasing a patch, you can choose to pass; to do this, you move your time token to the space immediately in front of the opponent's time token, then take one button from the bank for each space you moved. In addition to a button cost and time cost, each patch also features 0-3 buttons, and when you move your time token past a button on the time track, you earn "button income": sum the number of buttons depicted on your personal game board, then take this many buttons from the bank. What's more, the time track depicts five 1x1 patches on it, and during set-up you place five actual 1x1 patches on these spaces. Whoever first passes a patch on the time track claims this patch and immediately places it on his game board. Additionally, the first player to completely fill in a 7x7 square on his game board earns a bonus tile worth 7 extra points at the end of the game. (Of course, this doesn't happen in every game.) When a player takes an action that moves his time token to the central square of the time track, he takes one final button income from the bank. Once both players are in the center, the game ends and scoring takes place. Each player scores one point per button in his possession, then loses two points for each empty square on his game board. Scores can be negative. The player with the most points wins.

Categorys
Abstract StrategyEconomicPuzzle

Mechanics
Grid Coverage
Income
Open Drafting
Rondel
Square Grid
Tile Placement
Turn Order: Stat-Based
Turn Order: Time Track
Victory Points as a Resource
252.jpgPaths of Glory214+480 mins
View Details
(from GMT Games' website:) They called it the Great War. In over four years of titanic struggle, the ancient Europe of Kings and Emperors tore itself to pieces, giving birth to our own violent modern age. The bloody battles fought in the trenches of the Western Front, the icy plains of Poland, the mountains of the Balkans, and the deserts of Arabia, shaped the world we know today. We are all orphans of the Great War. Paths of Glory: The First World War, designed by six-time Charles S. Roberts awards winner, Ted Raicer, allows players to step into the shoes of the monarchs and marshals who triumphed and bungled from 1914 to 1918. As the Central Powers you must use the advantage of interior lines and the fighting skill of the Imperial German Army to win your rightful 'place in the sun.' As the Entente Powers (Allies) you must bring your greater numbers to bear to put an end to German militarism and ensure this is the war 'to end all wars.' Both players will find their generalship and strategic abilities put to the test as Paths of Glory's innovative game systems let you recreate all the dramatic events of World War I. Components: 316 full-color die-cut counters: 176 5/8” die cut counters 140 1/2” die cut counters One 22x34" full-color mapsheet showing most of Europe and the Near East 110 Strategy Cards 32-page Rule Book including sample game replay (21 pages of actual rules) Two Player Reference Cards DESIGNER: Ted Raicer DEVELOPER: Andy Lewis ART DIRECTOR: Rodger B. MacGowan MAP ART: Mark Simonitch CARDS & COUNTER ART: Mark Simonitch (BGG description:) Following in the footsteps of We the People, Hannibal: Rome vs. Carthage, Successors (First/Second Edition), and For the People, Paths of Glory utilizes a similar card-driven system. The game covers WWI from its outbreak to American intervention and spans all of Europe and the Middle East. Not only is the game innovative, but it also plays fast, usually within just an evening. While the game itself has all of the normal expectations of a wargame, with various units, CRT charts and period chrome, at heart the game rests within the card play. Players are given a hand of cards to play out six sub-phases of a turn. Each sub-phase allows for the use of a card or a pass with a minimal movement of units. Each card has four possible uses: operational movement, strategic movement, special events, and replacement points. The cardplay forces players to constantly make tough decsions as they feel that they need to do a little bit of everything but they can only do one thing at a time. How you play your cards will decide to a large degree the outcome of the war.

Categorys
WargameWorld War I

Mechanics
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Dice Rolling
Point to Point Movement
253.jpgPendragon: The Fall of Roman Britain1 - 416+60 - 360 mins
View Details
From GMT's website: Volume VIII in GMT’s COIN Series transports us into the 4th and 5th Centuries A.D. and to the embattled Isle of Britannia. Pendragon – The Fall of Roman Britain covers a century of history from the first large-scale raids of Irish, Pict, and Saxon raiders, to the establishment of successor kingdoms, both Celtic and Germanic. This sumptuous volume adapts the celebrated asymmetrical COIN engine to depict the political, military, religious, and economic struggles of Dark Ages Britain. Pendragon leverages the tremendous flexibility of the COIN system, from dual events to dissimilar approaches and victory conditions, to capture the complexity of the period and let the players explore alternative narratives. Unlike earlier volumes, Pendragon is not about counterinsurgency per se, but focuses on the asymmetrical clashes between and among Romano-British authorities and Barbarian powers gnashing over the carcass of the Roman Empire, including: Barbarian Raiders plundering the land and trying to surprise unwary towns and hillforts, then melting into hills or fens. Expansion or decline of the Saxon Shore naval defense system to counter sea-borne raiders. Authentic Late-Roman military doctrine—mighty but hard-to-replace cavalry tracking down raiding parties before they can return their booty home. Accessible, powerful but fickle Foederati: barbarian warbands in Briton employ. Nuanced battle system representing troop qualities and tactics. Fortified strongholds that must be assaulted, besieged, or rebuilt to gain regional political control. Civil wars, coups, religious shifts, and cultural assimilation. Population movements over the generations, due to good administration, barbarian ravages, or climatic changes. Epochal Events ranging from Roman usurpations on the continent to massive reprisals against barbarian homelands. Evolution of rules and victory conditions throughout the game, as the still vivacious Roman Empire may or may not end with Britain fragmented among competing semi-barbarian proto-kingdoms. A deck of 83 cards with gorgeous commissioned original art. Short, medium, and full-length scenarios Support for solitaire, 2-player, 3-player and 4-player experiences. Each faction in Pendragon brings specific capabilities and challenges: The Dux represent the original Roman Army in Britannia: with the most powerful units in the game and a network of strong fortresses ringing the island and tied by efficient roads, you must strive to preserve the stability and prosperity of the provinces and punish any interloper daring to challenge the peace. If you can build up your prestige and maintain order, you may be able to keep the island in the Empire, or at least united in a new post-Roman power. You can rely on the civilian militia to assist you, but—as your peerless cavalry dwindles—you must resort to the traditional Roman offer to barbarians of land for service in your forces as Foederati. As the decay of institutions conspires with the scheming of feckless civilians and the marauding of restless barbarians, you may find that the dream of Empire is dead. If so, with your once proud Army little more than another group of warlords, you still can strive to carve for yourself the most powerful kingdom alongside your new rivals. The Civitates represent the Romanized aristocracy ruling the ancient Celtic tribes from lavish villas and prosperous Roman towns, chafing under the distant authority (and taxes) of Rome, mistrusting the uncultured and semi-Barbarian army, and yearning to settle century-old accounts with their neighbors. When the Barbarian storm comes down upon your island, you may find yourself woefully unprepared to cope—materially or culturally—and presented with a fundamental choice: strive to protect your lands, wealth, and way of life via the despised Army and untrustworthy Foederati, or sacrifice Roman comforts to face down the Barbarian challenge militarily and culturally through a return to Celtic traditions. The Saxons represent various Germanic groups including Angles, Jutes, Frisians, and Franks who harried, settled, and eventually took over swaths of Britain. As outsiders, you face a steep challenge just to come ashore against the might of the Roman army and navy. You will chip away at the Saxon Shore system, ravage the provincial economy to weaken the Britons’ capability to wage war, and see some of your best warriors serve as Foederati (often against yourself), but recognize that the more Saxons living on the island—whoever their paymaster—the more opportunities for advancing your nation. Eventually, you must secure footholds, perhaps in the marshy fens of the eastern seaboard that so resemble your homelands, in order to wield your considerable military potential and challenge the old masters of these rich lands to create England. The Scotti, named for the marauding groups of Irish raiders, also represent those Celts native to the island of Britain who differed from the romanized Civitates by remaining true (or reverting back) to the old ways. Often, the boundary between the two groups was porous... The biggest such group eventually formed the northern nation of the Picts, forebears of modern Scotland. As the Scotti, you see the disintegration of Roman Britain as an opportunity not so much to expand as to seize riches and renown to assert yourself at home. Raid ceaselessly, surprise and plunder poorly protected communities, kidnap for ransom, and show your military prowess against your unfortunate neighbors across the Irish Sea and Forth-Clyde isthmus… Then establish bases strategically along the enemy shores and entreat local hill tribes to reject post-Roman authority. But beware that your very advances will help give rise and limit your ability to grapple new powerhouses on the island! Components: See Wiki below. Players: 1-4 (includes full solitaire system) Map: Area Movement Timescale: about 15 years per campaign between Epoch cards Designer: Marc Gouyon-Rety Developer and Series Creator: Volko Ruhnke

Categorys
AncientMedievalPoliticalWargame

Mechanics
Action/Event
Alliances
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Events
Income
Simulation
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
414.jpgPenguin Airlines2 - 89+15 - 30 mins
View Details
Penguin Airlines, the airline with the fewest requirements for its pilots, begins its commercial journey. A crew controlled by nerves and pressure will try to land their planes. Players are divided into pairs, one member of the team will be the control tower and the other member will play the cabin crew. The control tower will reveal cards from the instruction deck that your partner must complete - press the red button! the fat lever in the ON! in the OOON! Activate the SLAPS! With each completed instruction you gain a time counter, each time you spend a counter you will have 30 more seconds to continue your flight. When completing five instructions the time stops and the remaining time counters will also be scored. If time runs out, the team will only score for completed instructions. The first team to reach 12 points will be the winner! Penguin Airlines, a real-time game where every turn can be epic. Penguin Airlines, la compañía aérea con menos requisitos para sus pilotos, comienza su andadura comercial. Una tripulación controlada por los nervios y la presión tratará de aterrizar sus aviones.Los jugadores se dividen en parejas, un miembro del equipo será la torre de control y el otro miembro interpretará a los tripulantes de cabina. La torre de control irá revelando cartas del mazo de instrucciones que deberá ir cumpliendo su compañero - pulsa el botón rojo! la palanca gorda en el ON! en el OOON! ¡Activa los SLAPS! Con cada instrucción cumplida se gana un contador de tiempo, cada vez que gastes un contador tendréis 30 segundos más para continuar vuestro vuelo. Al cumplir cinco instrucciones el tiempo se detiene y se puntuarán también los contadores de tiempo sobrantes. Si el tiempo se agota, el equipo sólo puntuará por las instrucciones cumplidas. ¡El primer equipo en llegar a 12 puntos será el ganador! Penguin Airlines, un juego a tiempo real donde cada turno puede ser épico.

Categorys
Action / DexterityAnimalsAviation / FlightParty Game

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Elapsed Real Time Ending
Real-Time
Team-Based Game
254.jpgPericles: The Peloponnesian Wars1 - 412+45 - 360 mins
View Details
Pericles is a four player 'sandbox' design that covers the period from 460 BC to 400 BC. The players each represent one of two Athenian or Spartan factions. The game has a political and a war phase. During the war phase the players are US versus THEM. During the Political Phase it is ME versus YOU (Athenian faction versus Athenian faction and Spartan king versus Spartan king). The City State (Athens or Sparta) that gains the most Honor wins the war and the faction on the winning side with the most Honor wins the game. There are over twenty scenarios that cover portions of the war with playing times from 30 minutes (mini Theater scenario), 45 minutes (6 years of the war), 90 minutes (a decade of war), and then there are the three long scenarios that cover the 1st Peloponnesian War, 2nd Peloponnesian War plus the Campaign game. There are rules for 3 player, 2 player, and solitaire play.

Categorys
AncientPoliticalWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
Simulation
Simultaneous Action Selection
Solo / Solitaire Game
309.jpgPerseverance: Castaway Chronicles - Episodes 1 & 21 - 414+80 - 180 mins
View Details
Caught in an enigmatic storm, a modern-day luxury ocean liner crashes ashore on an otherworldly island. As one of the ambitious survivors, you soon learn that the island is home to a multitude of majestic and fiercely territorial dinosaurs. With the cruiser beyond repair, you have no choice but to establish a foothold on the island, withstand the onslaught of the dinosaurs, and sow the seeds of what will one day become a strong and tenacious community capable of discovering the mystery of the island. Perseverance: Castaway Chronicles introduces the first two episodes in a series of euro-style dice-drafting / dice-placement strategy games. The saga will ultimately consist of four episodes, telling the story of a group of survivors becoming a mighty civilization on a hostile island. As each episode features unique characteristics and a different game feel, they are playable as standalone medium/heavy games but also as a continuous campaign. The theme and story unfolds through evolving game mechanisms across the episodes, also making the rules easier to learn. In the campaign mode, the outcome of each episode influences the next, but the game has no legacy elements and no hidden rules; the whole storyline is infinitely replayable. In Episode 1, players are striving to develop and protect the foothold town of Perseverance, besieged by the dinosaurs of the island. By building walls, traps and settlements, mounting defenses and partaking in the early political power struggles of a forming community, players gain followers to establish themselves as leaders. Episode 1 introduces the signature dice placement / area majority mechanism that evolves and spans through the series, and also features a defense mechanism against waves of attacking dinosaurs, unique to this episode. In Episode 2, the survivors have successfully defended the city of Perseverance, completing a massive wall to stop the dinosaur onslaught. Under the guidance of the ship’s senior officers, the players now set out to explore the surrounding wilderness, expand the settlement beyond the walls, and chart a path to the mysterious structure on the horizon. This Episode adds new actions to expand the core mechanism and allows for a deep customization of your Leader and faction through dozens of unique skills. The previous episode’s defense mechanism evolves into hex-based adventuring and expansion, allowing you to build outposts beyond the city walls, but beware - the dinosaurs are still not your friends...yet.

Categorys
City BuildingDiceExplorationScience Fiction

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Tile Placement
Worker Placement
Worker Placement with Dice Workers
142.jpgPhotosynthesis2 - 410+30 - 60 mins
View Details
The sun shines brightly on the canopy of the forest, and the trees use this wonderful energy to grow and develop their beautiful foliage. Sow your crops wisely and the shadows of your growing trees could slow your opponents down, but don't forget that the sun revolves around the forest. Welcome to the world of Photosynthesis, the green strategy board game!

Categorys
Abstract StrategyEconomic

Mechanics
Action Points
Area Majority / Influence
Bias
End Game Bonuses
Hexagon Grid
Income
Turn Order: Progressive
143.jpgPickomino2 - 78+20 mins
View Details
In Pickomino, two to seven players, ages 8 and up try to obtain fried worms for their chickens, so that they don't go hungry. Of course, anyone who doesn't manage to grab a worm off of the grill can help himself to those of his opponents. This fast-paced game by Reiner Knizia is, like Hick Hack im Gackelwack, a gambling game in the finest chicken tradition." Each turn players roll their dice and set aside all those matching any single value. The remaining dice are rolled and any value is set aside again until the player stops and takes a tile or busts and puts their last tile back. When a player busts and fails to take a tile they must also turn the highest tile face-down. Interestingly, the German edition from Zoch has English rules in the box. The Dutch edition is part of the Jakkie & Bak Collection The German edition is part of The Chicken Family of Zoch.

Categorys
AnimalsDice

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Push Your Luck
Re-rolling and Locking
310.jpgPlains Indian Wars1 - 410+60 - 120 mins
View Details
The Great Plains in the latter half of the 19th century was a cultural battleground. The Native way of life was under siege by an avalanche of invaders seeking land and progress. Plains Indian Wars reduces this monumental and catastrophic series of conflicts to its basic elements: A settler surge via long snaking wagon trains, the building of the Transcontinental Railroad, east and west, and the cavalry sent to protect them all. At the same time, Plains Indian Wars seeks to offer the Native-American player the opportunity to unite earlier, hold their own and perhaps even prevent European-American success. Plains Indian Wars can be played by 1-4 players. It is a card-driven, cube game that uses area movement and control. Game play averages 60-90 minutes. The Plains Indian Wars Map board centers on the Great American Plains between the Mississippi River in the east and the Rockies in the west, the Canadian border in the north and Mexican border in the south. The Northern Plains Tribes (NPT) and the Southern Plains Tribes(SPT)each defend 12 regions while the Northern (Crow)and Southern (Mexican) "Enemies" each defend 5 regions of their own. Separating the NPT and SPT is the planned route for the Transcontinental Railroad. US Completion (linking the two lines) ends the game and earns the US player a bonus. The Indian player earns a bonus if this is prevented. Through the course of the game Wagon trains attempt to travel historical trails to the Rockies. If they make it they earn victory points for the US player if they don't the Indian player gets the VPs. —description from the publisher

Categorys
American Indian WarsAmerican WestWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Dice Rolling
42.pngPlanet2 - 48+30 - 45 mins
View Details
The spark of life is about to jump from your hands to spread out in the world. Deploy your mountain ranges and your deserts, spread out your oceans and your glaciers. Handle wisely your continents to form environments suitable for the apparition of animal life and maybe you'll manage to create the most densely populated planet! In Planet, each player receives a planet core without anything on it. Each turn, players choose a tile with mountain/ice/forest/desert on it and place it on the planet. Then the player who fulfills the most conditions for the appearance of certain animals gains its card. —description from the publisher

Categorys
EnvironmentalPuzzleScience Fiction

Mechanics
Open Drafting
Tile Placement
Turn Order: Progressive
144.pngPocket Mars1 - 410+15 - 30 mins
View Details
For a long time now, Earth hasn't been a perfect place to live. You are one of the architects sent to Mars. Your objective is to set up an infrastructure for the first colonists who would arrive on the red planet and start a new chapter for mankind. Pocket Mars is a fast paced and wildly dynamic card game but don't let the short playthrough time fool you. It's a heavy weight filler! A compressed and easy to understand set of rules, combined with cards that you can play in more than one way is what makes this game great! Fifteen minutes is all it takes for you and your friends to set out on an exciting adventure in space! In the world of big games about Mars everybody should have one that fits in their pocket. Your goal is to place as many colonists as you can in the buildings of your Mars settlement. To do so, you will need to choose carefully how and when to play your cards. The way you trigger actions on your cards is the heart of the game. Everything depends on where you play them from, which is the game's main strategic element. You could play a project card straight from your hand and trigger its effect instantly or turn it into a module and play it from your preparation zone. This will let you add it to one of the five buildings in your settlement, trigger an action sequence and transport your colonists to Mars – a sure way to put a spanner in the works of your competition. Each card's set of various actions combined with the buildings' unique properties leaves you with a number of small but substantial decisions: − Where to put your card. − Where to play your card from. − What action sequence will give you the most possibilities within a given turn. What's more, anyone can activate an action from a module placed in one of the buildings by another player and share its effects. Pocket Mars may be a small game but MichaÅ‚ JagodziÅ„ski sure stuffed it with a lot of options that will have an impact on the survival of our civilization! :)

Categorys
Card GameScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Hand Management
Solo / Solitaire Game
145.jpgPotato Pirates3 - 67+20 - 45 mins
View Details
Potato Pirates is a lethal combination of potatoes, programming, and piracy rolled into an epic card game. Roast, mash, or fry your opponents and send them down to Davy Jones' locker — but before you can reign terror on the high seas, you have to first master the art of potato war. Use programming concepts such as functions, loops, and conditionals to fortify your attacks. If that's not enough, you could just loot and hijack your way to victory by saving Potato King from the deadlock of doom. When in need, summon the Kraken to your aid and deny everything...

Categorys
AdventureChildren's GameNauticalParty GamePirates

Mechanics
Action Queue
Player Elimination
326.pngPotato Pirates 3: Battlechips1 - 610+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Potato Pirates 3: Battlechips is a spud-tech-ular strategic card game power packed with Computer Science and Cybersecurity concepts. Play as your favourite captain to be the undisputed ruler of the Carbobbean Seas! Eliminate all enemies with carefully planned attacks or recover the Art of Potato War, which holds the secrets to vanquishing your opponents in the blink of an eye! Recovering it from the Spudnet and decrypting its contents won't be a problem... but can you fend off the competition long enough? Raise your powers, harness energy, dig for more resources, get help from companions, and mine for relics from the Spudnet to destroy whoever stands in your way!

Categorys
Card GameChildren's GameEducationalPirates

Mechanics
Hand Management
Market
Move Through Deck
Open Drafting
Player Elimination
Roles with Asymmetric Information
Solo / Solitaire Game
Take That
Turn Order: Stat-Based
Variable Player Powers
148.pngPotato Pirates: Enter the Spudnet2 - 610+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Potato King had been saved from the deadlock of doom and the Potato Pirates crew were on the lookout for a new adventure. At the same time, the spudnet spread throughout the entire Carbobbean Sea, connecting all the ports, making it the preferred mode of delivering goods. Keen to explore the uncharterd territories of the Carbobbean Seas, the crew grew their shipping network and their fleets, winning the potato folk over with their spudtastic delivery service. Competition soon went from stiff to ugly when other Potato Pirate fleets started their own spudnet delivery service, forming six fiercely competitive factions. Now it is your task to monopolize the spudnet (and please Potato King). Set up your warehouses, dispatch ships and fulfill orders. Watch out for your competitors using their special abilities to get the upper hand or sabotage your fleet. After all, piracy never dies and crime always pays. —description from the designer

Categorys
Children's GameDiceEducationalNauticalParty GamePiratesTransportationTravel

Mechanics
Action/Event
Card Play Conflict Resolution
Different Dice Movement
Multiple Maps
Open Drafting
Player Elimination
296.jpgPower Grid2 - 612+120 mins
View Details
Power Grid is the updated release of the Friedemann Friese crayon game Funkenschlag. It removes the crayon aspect from network building in the original edition, while retaining the fluctuating commodities market like Crude: The Oil Game and an auction round intensity reminiscent of The Princes of Florence. The objective of Power Grid is to supply the most cities with power when someone's network gains a predetermined size. In this new edition, players mark pre-existing routes between cities for connection, and then bid against each other to purchase the power plants that they use to power their cities. However, as plants are purchased, newer, more efficient plants become available, so by merely purchasing, you're potentially allowing others access to superior equipment. Additionally, players must acquire the raw materials (coal, oil, garbage, and uranium) needed to power said plants (except for the 'renewable' windfarm/ solar plants, which require no fuel), making it a constant struggle to upgrade your plants for maximum efficiency while still retaining enough wealth to quickly expand your network to get the cheapest routes. Power Grid FAQ - Please read this before posting a rules question! Many questions are asked over and over in the forums... If you have a question about a specific expansion, please check the rules forum or FAQ for that particular expansion.

Categorys
EconomicIndustry / Manufacturing

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Auction: Turn Order Until Pass
Catch the Leader
Income
Market
Network and Route Building
Turn Order: Stat-Based
255.jpgPrinces of the Renaissance3 - 612+180 mins
View Details
Princes of the Renaissance is set in Renaissance Italy. Each player takes on the role of one of the minor Condottiere princes, such as the Gonzagas or d'Estes. Then there are the big five major cities: Venice, Milan, Florence, Rome, and Naples. These are not controlled by individual players, but players will gain 'interests' in them as the game progresses. Each city has six tiles, most of which represent a famous character such as Lucrezia Borgia or Lorenzo Medici. Each tile has its own special properties that are linked to the character on the tile. Thus Cesare Borgia will help you to become more treacherous, while a Venetian merchant will increase your income. These tiles are also worth victory points, depending on the status of the city at the end of the game. A city's status will change as a result of war. When two cities fight, they will each need a Condottiere to fight for them. Players bid, using influence points, to decide who will represent each city. The outcome of the war will depend on a little luck and the size of each player's army. Each player also gets paid for fighting, no matter what the outcome of the war is. Thus players can turn influence into gold, which in turn can be used to buy more City tiles. No game on the Italian Renaissance would be complete without an element of treachery. Players can be openly treacherous by buying Treachery tiles, which will allow them to do nasty things like steal influence, bribe troops, or knock players out of an auction. However, the game allows players to be devious in other ways, that still remain legal. Making sure that a war goes the way you want it to is an important part of the game, and it is not always the player with the best army who ends up fighting. Want a city to lose, well become Condottiere for them and make sure you have a really bad army, or use Treachery tiles to bribe your own troops not to fight. At some point some player will become the Pope, which means he can form a Holy League (i.e. join one side in a battle). Want to make sure the Pope is on the 'right' side, well why not bribe him? What players negotiate over is up to them. The game does not force negotiation and works perfectly well without it, but it remains an avenue for players to explore.

Categorys
EconomicNegotiationRenaissance

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Auction/Bidding
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
222.jpgPuerto Rico3 - 512+90 - 150 mins
View Details
In Puerto Rico, players assume the roles of colonial governors on the island of Puerto Rico. The aim of the game is to amass victory points by shipping goods to Europe or by constructing buildings. Each player uses a separate small board with spaces for city buildings, plantations, and resources. Shared between the players are three ships, a trading house, and a supply of resources and doubloons. The resource cycle of the game is that players grow crops which they exchange for points or doubloons. Doubloons can then be used to buy buildings, which allow players to produce more crops or give them other abilities. Buildings and plantations do not work unless they are manned by colonists. During each round, players take turns selecting a role card from those on the table (such as "Trader" or "Builder"). When a role is chosen, every player gets to take the action appropriate to that role. The player that selected the role also receives a small privilege for doing so - for example, choosing the "Builder" role allows all players to construct a building, but the player who chose the role may do so at a discount on that turn. Unused roles gain a doubloon bonus at the end of each turn, so the next player who chooses that role gets to keep any doubloon bonus associated with it. This encourages players to make use of all the roles throughout a typical course of a game. Puerto Rico uses a variable phase order mechanism in which a "governor" token is passed clockwise to the next player at the conclusion of a turn. The player with the token begins the round by choosing a role and taking the first action. Players earn victory points for owning buildings, for shipping goods, and for manned "large buildings." Each player's accumulated shipping chips are kept face down and come in denominations of one or five. This prevents other players from being able to determine the exact score of another player. Goods and doubloons are placed in clear view of other players and the totals of each can always be requested by a player. As the game enters its later stages, the unknown quantity of shipping tokens and its denominations require players to consider their options before choosing a role that can end the game. In 2011 and mostly afterwards, Puerto Rico was published to include both Puerto Rico: Expansion I – New Buildings and Puerto Rico: Expansion II – The Nobles. These versions are included in the other game entry Puerto Rico (with two expansions), not this regular game entry for Puerto Rico. Some editions of Puerto Rico list the player count as 2-5 instead of 3-5, and they include variant rules for games with only two players.

Categorys
City BuildingEconomicFarming

Mechanics
Action Drafting
End Game Bonuses
Follow
Hidden Victory Points
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Turn Order: Progressive
Variable Phase Order
109.jpgPulsar 28492 - 414+60 - 90 mins
View Details
It is the year 2849, and humanity has harnessed the power of the pulsars. Now we must find a way to distribute this power throughout the stars. In this Euro-style game, players explore space, claim pulsars, and discover technologies that will help them build energy-distribution infrastructure on a cosmic scale. Dice are used to purchase actions, and players choose their dice from a communal pool. There are many paths to victory so you can blaze your own trail to a bright future. Draft dice to explore the universe in Pulsar 2849. Game is only 8 rounds long. Each round, roll dice based on the number of players, sort them based on their values, then draft dice to take actions. Possible actions â–¡ Fly your survey ship â–¡ take a Gyrodyne â–¡ Develop a Pulsar â–¡ Build one or more energy transmitter vectors â–¡ Patent a technology â–¡ Buy a dice modifier â–¡ Complete a special project in your HQ and unlock Gate Run Players score points each round based on what they've discovered and explored, and everyone has common goals that they want to achieve.

Categorys
DiceScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Open Drafting
Point to Point Movement
Variable Player Powers
Worker Placement with Dice Workers
311.jpgPursuit of Glory214+360 mins
View Details
Pursuit of Glory: The Great War in the Near East is a sequel to the award-winning Paths of Glory. This game puts you in the driver's seat of the British/Russian alliance or the Ottoman Empire during World War One. Gallipoli, holy war, mutiny, and the Russian Revolution await. Walk in the shoes of men such as Churchill, Lawrence of Arabia, Enver, and Falkenhayn. The action stretches from India to the Balkans, from the Black Sea to Suez. Can the Germans inspire a Persian uprising or forge an alliance with Afghanistan? Can the Russians capture a warm water port? Can the British guard the oil that fuels the Royal Navy? Can the Turks capture the Suez Canal and spark a revolt in Egypt? In Pursuit of Glory, your hand of 7 cards presents you with an array of strategic and operational opportunities. You must decide whether to use each card for its historic event, command points, or resources. You must then commit your forces to a variety of objectives: the Turkish-Russian frontier in Caucasia, the violation of neutral Persia, oil-rich Mesopotamia, the Suez Canal, the Balkans and its vital railroads. You must judge when it is right to invade Serbia or launch a new naval invasion (perhaps on the inset map representing Gallipoli). As the British, you must hold on while your Russian allies break through the Turkish lines in Caucasia and you bring your forces to bear through invasion and a gradual build-up of imperial might. As the Turks, your objective is to gain complete victory early, uniting your strength with Germany and crippling the British Empire in Egypt and India or to persevere. (from GMT website) Pursuit of Glory is a stand alone sequel to Paths of Glory, a card-driven strategy game covering the first World War. Unlike the original game, which focused on the European theater of World War I, Pursuit of Glory focuses entirely on the Great War in the Middle East. Pursuit of Glory uses the same card-driven mechanics and point-to-point of the first game, but with some rules changes and modifications to better simulate the conditions of the war in the Middle East. It was developed by Brad and Brian Stock with the permission of Ted Raicer, the designer of the original Paths of Glory. (BGG description) Game Features TIME SCALE Approx. 1 year per hand of cards MAP SCALE Point-to-Point NUMBER OF PLAYERS One or Two DESIGNER: Brad Stock & Brian Stock DEVELOPER: Tony Curtis & Neil Randall MAP, CARD, & COUNTER ART: Mark Simonitch

Categorys
WargameWorld War I

Mechanics
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Dice Rolling
Events
Movement Points
Point to Point Movement
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Simulation
Variable Set-up
285.jpgQuartermaster General2 - 612+90 mins
View Details
Quartermaster General is a fast-paced game that puts you in command of the major powers of the Second World War. In the game, supply is crucial to keep your armies and navies fighting; destroy your enemies' supply lines and their forces will surrender! During play, you control one or more countries on either the Axis or Allied team and try to score as many victory points (VPs) for your team as you can through the use of cards or by occupying the starred supply spaces. Each major power has a unique set of cards with which to marshal its forces, which are represented by wooden army and navy pieces. After twenty rounds of play, the team with the most VPs wins. Note: The French edition of Quartermaster General, known as Quartermaster, includes the Quartermaster General: Air Marshal expansion that is sold separately in the English edition.

Categorys
WargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Hand Management
Team-Based Game
286.jpgQuartermaster General: 19142 - 512+90 - 120 mins
View Details
Quartermaster General: 1914 is the next title in the critically acclaimed Quartermaster General series by Ian Brody and creates a narrative of the First World War in Europe, reflecting the military, technological, and social changes that occurred over the following four years. In Quartermaster General: 1914, each card has two different uses: one when played, and another when prepared. On your turn, you have the opportunity to both play and prepare a card. You can also spend cards to draft more troops, or use cards to attrition your opponents. However, your deck represents your overall resources, so moving too quickly through your deck early might result in your unsupported armies being swept away in the final rounds of the game. This is worth it if you can capture Berlin or Paris in 1915, but if your gambit fails, you may have a tough road ahead. The game ends after 17 rounds of play, or earlier if one side has a commanding lead. —description from the publisher

Categorys
WargameWorld War I

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Chaining
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Hand Management
Open Drafting
Team-Based Game
287.jpgQuartermaster General: Air Marshal2 - 612+0 - 90 mins
View Details
Quartermaster General: Air Marshal adds two entirely new mechanics to Quartermaster General. Bolster cards are played directly from your hand at a time specified on the card, adding a whole new element of surprise and challenge to the game. Your Air Forces provide an additional dimension to battle. Air Force pieces are deployed to the board through play of a Deploy Air Force card. Once in play, Air Forces may support Army or Navy units in the same space and apply additional pressure to adjacent enemy pieces.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameWargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Hand Management
Team-Based Game
288.jpgQuartermaster General: Alternate Histories2 - 612+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Description from the publisher: Quartermaster General: Alternate Histories is the second expansion for Quartermaster General, the critically acclaimed fast-playing World War II game. With Alternate Histories, the forces of France and China are added as supporting Allied powers, with pieces all their own, plus over one hundred new and updated cards to add even more variety to your game!

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameWargameWorld War II

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Hand Management
Team-Based Game
256.jpgQuartermaster General: The Cold War3 - 614+90 - 120 mins
View Details
The Quartermaster General series goes nuclear! Quartermaster General: The Cold War depicts the struggle between the aspirations of the Soviet Bloc, the West, and the Non-Aligned nationalist independence movements throughout the developing world. You will play a Bloc of nations: the Soviet Bloc, the Western Bloc, or the Non-Aligned Bloc. Each Bloc is considered an enemy to each other Bloc, even if players decide to cooperate temporarily to preserve the balance of power. Each of the three Blocs may be played by one or two people, depending on the number of players. On your turn, you’ll play cards to unfold a narrative of the Cold War, as it might have been. You may decide to use military force when espionage fails – but escalating tensions will reduce the penalty your enemies pay to use their WMDs in retaliation! —description from the publisher

Categorys
Modern WarfarePoliticalWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Hand Management
257.jpgQueen's Architect2 - 410+60 mins
View Details
In Queen's Architect, you're in demand all over the realm! Villages, monasteries, and towns need your help to construct important buildings and establishments. Assume the role of an architect and assemble a competent band of craftsmen. Raise buildings and assist the people with small repairs or farm work. The Queen will reward you with her appreciation and with coins. Gain the privilege of constructing the new royal palace, and you will win the game as the land's most successful architect!

Categorys
Medieval

Mechanics
Point to Point Movement
Rondel
Set Collection
Worker Placement
258.pngQueendomino2 - 48+25 mins
View Details
Description from the publisher: Build up the most prestigious kingdom by claiming wheat fields, forests, lakes, grazing grounds, marshes, and mountains. Your knights will bring you riches in the form of coins — and if you make sure to expand the towns on your lands, you will make new buildings appear, giving you opportunities for new strategies. You may win the Queen's favors ... but always be aware of the dragon! Queendomino is a game completely independent from Kingdomino, while offering a choice of more complex challenges. Two to four players can play Queendomino independently, but also in connection with Kingdomino, allowing for games with 7x7 grids for four players, or for up to six players if you stick to 5x5 grids.

Categorys
City BuildingFantasyMedievalTerritory Building

Mechanics
Enclosure
Open Drafting
Tile Placement
Variable Phase Order
43.pngRailroad Ink: Blazing Red Edition1 - 68+20 - 30 mins
View Details
In the multiplayer puzzle game Railroad Ink, your goal is to connect as many exits on your board as possible. Each round, a set of dice are rolled in the middle of the table, determining which kind of road and railway routes are available to all players. You have to draw these routes on your erasable boards to create transport lines and connect your exits, trying to optimize the available symbols better than your opponents. The more exits you connect, the more points you score at the end of the game, but you lose points for each incomplete route, so plan carefully! Will you press your luck and try to stretch your transportation network to the next exit, or will you play it safe and start a new, simpler to manage route? Railroad Ink comes in two versions, each one including two expansions with additional dice sets that add special rules to your games. The Blazing Red Edition includes the Lava and Meteor expansions. Try to confine the lava coming from the erupting volcano before it destroys your routes, or deal with the havoc brought by the meteor strikes and mine the craters for precious ore. These special rules can spice up things and make each game play and feel different. Each box allows you to play from 1 to 6 players, and if you combine more boxes, you can play with up to 12 players (or more). The only limit to the number of players is the number of boards you have!

Categorys
DiceTrains

Mechanics
Bingo
Connections
Dice Rolling
Line Drawing
Network and Route Building
Paper-and-Pencil
44.pngRailroad Ink: Deep Blue Edition1 - 68+20 - 30 mins
View Details
In the multiplayer puzzle game Railroad Ink, your goal is to connect as many exits on your board as possible. Each round, a set of dice are rolled in the middle of the table, determining which kind of road and railway routes are available to all players. You have to draw these routes on your erasable boards to create transport lines and connect your exits, trying to optimize the available symbols better than your opponents. The more exits you connect, the more points you score at the end of the game, but you lose points for each incomplete route, so plan carefully! Will you press your luck and try to stretch your transportation network to the next exit, or will you play it safe and start a new, simpler to manage route? Railroad Ink comes in two versions, each one including two expansions with additional dice sets that add new special rules to your games. The Deep Blue Edition includes the Rivers and Lakes expansions. Increase the difficulty by adding the River route into the mix, or use the Lakes to connect your networks by ferry. These special rules can spice up things and make each game play and feel different. Each box allows you to play from 1 to 6 players, and if you combine more boxes, you can play with up to 12 players (or more). The only limit to the number of players is the number of boards you have!

Categorys
DiceTrains

Mechanics
Bingo
Connections
Dice Rolling
Line Drawing
Network and Route Building
Paper-and-Pencil
Solo / Solitaire Game
259.jpgRaise Your Goblets2 - 128+20 - 45 mins
View Details
Have you felt the thrill of the struggle between life and death, sitting at the same table with your worst enemy and an unreasonable amount of poison? Don’t forget to bring some antidote when playing Raise Your Goblets! In Raise Your Goblets, players take the roles of nobles at a banquet, each one with their own agenda of personal vendetta. Each player has wine, poison and antidote tokens they can pour into the goblets, trying to poison their enemies while staying alive themselves! Each noble also has a special ability that allows them to bend or even break a rule. In more detail, each character has a plastic goblet, and each goblet is primed in secret at the start of the round with either wine, poison or antidote. On a turn, you take two actions, with actions being to peek inside your goblet, rotate all goblets left or right, swap your goblet with someone else's, or secretly add one of your wine, poison or antidote tokens to any goblet. Once someone has "served" all of their wine, they can call a toast on their turn instead of doing anything else. Each player, including the toaster, takes one more action, then everyone drinks. If you have more poison than antidote, you die. What's your goal in doing all of this? Well, at the start of a round you are given a target to kill, and everyone knows who is targeting whom. If at the end of a round, your target is dead, you score 1 point; if you're alive, you score 1 point; if both of these things are true, you score a bonus point (3 total). Also, whoever has the most wine in their cup scores 1 point. If someone has died, they receive a new noble card, and at the end of three rounds, whoever has scored the most points wins.

Categorys
DeductionHumorMemoryParty Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Memory
Team-Based Game
Variable Player Powers
477.pngRedwood1 - 410+45 - 60 mins
View Details
Redwood is a game of movement estimations and angle of view where players have to take pictures of wild animals to compose the most beautiful panorama. The game is for 1 to 4 players, ages 10+ and the games last about 45-60 min. During their turn, each player will have to choose between different movements and their angle of view (materialized by real plastic elements) to catch the animals in the picture (without disturbing them). Collecting animals and decorative elements earn victory points. During the game, new conditions for earning points will appear. The game ends after 5 turns and players will be rewarded if they meet certain conditions to earn more points. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsEnvironmentalExploration

Mechanics
Line of Sight
Movement Template
Set Collection
260.jpgRelic2 - 414+180 mins
View Details
Relic is a board game in which two to four players each assume the role of a powerful hero from the Warhammer 40,000 universe and bravely venture forth to shield the Antian Sector from certain doom. By completing missions and defeating enemies, characters compete to gain rewards and experience, furthering their chance of being the first to defeat whatever evil lies beyond the Warp rift. Building on the foundations of the Talisman system, Relic is an adventure game in which seemingly straightforward choices mask scores of possibilities. For those who haven't played the classic fantasy adventure game Talisman, this means that on each turn, a player rolls a single six-sided die before moving his playing piece that number of spaces clockwise or counter-clockwise around the region (outer, middle, or inner) of the board it currently occupies. That player then draws a card or cards to see what he's encountered, pitting his heroic persona against foul enemies, dangerous locations, and fantastic strangers. And all the while, these intrepid heroes rise in power, as they work their way toward the ultimate goal at the center of the board. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AdventureExplorationScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Roll / Spin and Move
Variable Player Powers
262.jpgRevolution!3 - 413+60 mins
View Details
Blackmail the printer. Threaten the innkeeper. Bribe the priest. Welcome to Revolution! Secretly bid against your opponents to gain victory points, control territories (worth victory points at the end of the game) and collect more Gold, Blackmail, and Force tokens for the next round of bidding! Will you try to control the tavern or the fortress? The harbor or the plantation? Knowing where to push for points – and where to back away and let your opponents fight – is the key to victory. Whoever has the most victory points at the end of the game wins. It's a game of bluff, counter-bluff, and surprise! Bidding tokens have different shapes and colors for easy identification. Colorful cardstock shields keep your bids private, and also provide a handy rules reference during the auction. Brightly-colored wooden blocks allow players to see, at a glance, who controls which colonial-themed territories. Revolution! is for three or four players. The rules can be taught in minutes, and a complete game takes less than an hour. Each new game lets players find new strategies and tactics. Get ready for Revolution!

Categorys
BluffingDeductionPolitical

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Auction/Bidding
Multiple-Lot Auction
Simultaneous Action Selection
264.jpgRise of the Necromancers2 - 513+45 - 120 mins
View Details
Are you evil? Maybe just a little? Then unleash your most wretched forces and seize power! To become the Necromancer King, you have to master dark magic, raise an army of undead minions, explore festering dungeons, and research ancient artifacts and spells. Rise of the Necromancers is an evil strategy game for 2-5 players, in which each player controls a Necromancer struggling for absolute dominance. Rise of the Necromancers is based on a classic fantasy narrative with character development as well as territorial strategy. The objective of the game is to develop your Necromancer and take control of the lands. Each player starts out as an aspiring Necromancer who can study spells, craft artifacts and eventually graduate from one of four academies. In time, your Necromancer can attract their own apprentice and assemble an undead army of minions to rule the lands. Your Necromancer can venture into dungeons where they will encounter wonders and dangerous creatures — and perhaps meet new companions. In the end, your Necromancer might be able to return to their academy and become Headmaster — or even seize the foulest of thrones as the Necromancer King. Each player moves their miniature Necromancer around the game board to gather resources, spells and artifacts, enter dungeons, battle cities and fight rival Necromancers. Throughout the game, Necromancers can increase their combat and movement abilities as they amass their armies. A Necromancer's minions can also be left behind to protect conquered cities and dungeons. In addition to the game's territorial component, the players compete in collecting spells, artifacts and minions affiliated with the four academies. Enough elements of the same color can make you Headmaster of an academy. The game has a varying starting set-up, so no two games are ever the same.

Categorys
FantasyHorrorZombies

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
297.jpgRise of the Necromancers: Dawn & Demons1 - 513+45 - 120 mins
View Details
Dawn & Demons, the first expansion for Rise of the Necromancers, gives you the power to summon and command four highly detailed Demon miniatures. Now you will have two pieces on the game board, enabling your Necromancer to research the dark arts while your demon, the general of your undead army, conquers the lands in the name of its master. Dawn & Demons also offers a CO-OP MODE where players work together to fight off the invading forces of light: the Arch Bishop and the impending dawn. In SOLO-MODE you will have to fight off the invasion all on your own. To win, all players must place their 13 Dominion Counters before the Arch Bishop calls forth the dawn and banishes all Necromancers and their minions. Cities will be reinforced by soldiers and mighty griffon knights will seek out libraries, workshops and dungeons to purge them of evil. Players will work together to share their evil plans and summon mighty demons that can crush the forces of light. —description from the publisher

Categorys
FantasyHorrorZombies

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
355.jpgRisk 2210 A.D.2 - 510+240 mins
View Details
Risk 2210 A.D. is yet another entry in the long series of Risk variants. Set in the not-so-distant future, battles are now fought by machines of destruction, known as MODs, for short. Human commanders still lead these mechanized troops, but these commanders each have special powers and abilities. These come into play via the use of Command cards, which add a new dimension to the game. Now the battle is not just for the continents, but the sea and moon are also battlegrounds. Although much has been added, the basic flavor of the game is still Risk. One welcome change is the institution of a five-turn game limit, which allows the game to play to completion in about three hours. Further, players must also factor in economics in the form of energy. This energy is used to purchase command cards, bid for turn order, and hire new commanders. There is much more strategy and planning involved in this new version, but it should still appeal to the classic Risk fans. Re-implements: Risk

Categorys
Science FictionTerritory BuildingWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Auction/Bidding
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
369.jpgRivals for Catan210+45 - 120 mins
View Details
The Rivals for Catan is a reimplementation of Catan Card Game. The Rivals for Catan was released in German in September of 2010, on the 15th anniversary of the original card game. An English edition was released in the fourth quarter of 2010. The designer of the game, Klaus Teuber, has stated that he completely reworked many of the original card game's mechanics to make it easier for newcomers to play the game. Each player portrays a prince for Catan, developing their individual provinces and competing to build a more successful province than the other. The basic mode of play is similar to the original Catan Card Game, where players expand their provinces by building settlements connected by roads. Players may also build expansions in their settlements that aid them in various ways, or upgrade their settlements to cities to allow more expansions to be built. They build these additions by using resources that they accumulate each turn, which are determined by the roll of a die. Cards are drawn on each turn to replenish the players' hands. The players may also use action cards that directly affect either their own province or their opponent's province. The Rivals for Catan features a reduced pool of cards, without the more aggressive style of action cards found in the original Catan Card Game. Therefore, all action cards will be able to be used from the beginning of the game unlike in the original card game. Ways to Play: The Introductory Game focuses on the basics of the card game, featuring gameplay that is more appropriate for newcomers. This game is played to 7 victory points and includes 36 Expansion Cards in four stacks. This play style should take beginner players 25 to 30 minutes to play. Three Theme Games add more rules, expansions, and aggressive cards. These Theme Games may be played individually or combined to play a variant called "The Duel of the Princes." Each Theme Game adds 24 Expansion and Event Cards to the cards from the Introductory Game, which are placed in two stacks separately from the cards from the Introductory Game. When playing a Theme Game, playtime should be around 45 to 60 minutes. As with the original Catan Card Game, players can also play the Tournament Game, in which each player chooses specific cards to build their deck ahead of time from which they draw from during the game. Theme: The theme of The Rivals for Catan is no longer restricted only to the feudal era of the Middle Ages like the original Catan Card Game. The Introductory Game portrays the very early years of the world of Catan, while each Theme Game takes place in progressively later eras. These eras are known as "The Era of Gold," "The Era of Turmoil," and "The Era of Progress." Belongs to the Catan Series.

Categorys
Card GameCity BuildingMedievalTerritory Building

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Open Drafting
328.jpgRivals for Catan: Deluxe210+45 - 60 mins
View Details
Rivals for Catan: Deluxe puts you in charge of one of the two factions developing newly-settled Catan. Use your unique card mix to create your own principality. Explore and settle new lands. Acquire resources through card play and the luck of the dice. Use gold, resource combinations, and trade to develop your domain. Expand your settlements and cities, recruit heroes, and defend your lands through politics, invention, and intrigue. Use your cunning! Become prince of Catan! Rivals for Catan: Deluxe includes card trays to keep the different card piles organized as well as nine hard-to-find promotional cards. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card GameTerritory Building

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Open Drafting
Random Production
Trading
45.jpgRoboRally2 - 812+45 - 120 mins
View Details
The robots of the Robo Rally automobile factory spend their weekdays toiling at the assembly line. They put in hard hours building high-speed supercars they never get to see in action. But on Saturday nights, the factory becomes a world of mad machines and dangerous schemes as these robots engage in their own epic race.It takes speed, wits, and dirty tricks to become a racing legend! Each player chooses a robot and directs its moves by playing cards. Chaos ensues as all players reveal the cards they've chosen. Players face obstacles like industrial lasers, gaping pits, and moving conveyor belts -- but those can also be used to their advantage! Each player aims to make it to each of the checkpoints in numerical order. The first player to reach all of the checkpoints wins. (source: http://avalonhill.wizards.com/games/robo-rally/comingsoon) In RoboRally players each control a different robot in a race through a dangerous factory floor. Several goals will be placed on the board and you must navigate your robot to them in a specific order. The boards can be combined in several different ways to accommodate different player counts and races can be as long or as short as player's desire. In general, players will first fill all of their robot's "registers" with facedown movement cards. This happens simultaneously and there is a time element involved. If you don't act fast enough you are forced to place cards randomly to fill the rest. Then, starting with the first register, everyone reveals their card. The card with the highest number moves first. After everyone resolves their movement they reveal the next card and so on. Examples of movement cards may be to turn 90 degrees left or right, move forward 2 spaces, or move backward 1 space though there are a bigger variety than that. You can plan a perfect route, but if another robot runs into you it can push you off course. This can be disastrous since you can't reprogram any cards to fix it! Robots fire lasers and factory elements resolve after each movement and robots may become damaged. If they take enough damage certain movement cards become fixed and can no longer be changed. If they take more they may be destroyed entirely. The first robot to claim all the goals in the correct order wins, though some may award points and play tournament style. The game was reprinted by Avalon Hill (Hasbro/WotC) in 2005.

Categorys
MazeMiniaturesRacingScience Fiction

Mechanics
Action Queue
Bias
Grid Movement
Lose a Turn
Modular Board
Programmed Movement
Race
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Simultaneous Action Selection
298.jpgRoll Player1 - 410+60 - 90 mins
View Details
Mighty heroes don’t just appear out of thin air -- you must create them! Race, class, alignment, skills, traits, and equipment are all elements of the perfect hero, who is ready to take on all opposition in the quest for glory and riches. In Roll Player, you will compete to create the greatest fantasy adventurer who has ever lived, preparing your character to embark on an epic quest. Roll and draft dice to build up your character’s attributes. Purchase weapons and armor to outfit your hero. Train to gain skills and discover your hero’s traits to prepare them for their journey. Earn Reputation Stars by constructing the perfect character. The player with the greatest Reputation wins the game and will surely triumph over whatever nefarious plot lies ahead!

Categorys
DiceFantasy

Mechanics
Closed Drafting
Dice Rolling
Open Drafting
Role Playing
Set Collection
Variable Player Powers
299.jpgRoll Player: Monsters & Minions1 - 510+60 - 120 mins
View Details
A call to arms! An abomination of a beast is terrorizing villages throughout the kingdom, leaving behind a path of death and destruction. The lord has summoned all able-bodied adventurers to return to the capitol and organize a plan to rid the kingdom of this menace. In Roll Player: Monsters & Minions, not only do players compete to construct the greatest fantasy characters, they must also gather information about the monstrous threat looming, and prepare for a final showdown against the beast. The more prepared the adventurers are for the battle, the better they'll do, but that information doesn't come for free. Listen for rumors to gather details for the fight ahead. Where is its lair? What obstacles will there be along the way? What will its next strike be? Players earn Reputation Stars by constructing the perfect character, as well as driving back the evil of the monster and its minions. The player with the greatest Reputation wins the game and becomes the heir to the kingdom!

Categorys
DiceExpansion for Base-gameFantasy

Mechanics
Closed Drafting
Dice Rolling
Role Playing
Set Collection
Variable Player Powers
46.jpgRoll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age1 - 48+30 - 45 mins
View Details
In Roll Through the Ages, players roll dice to obtain commodities and workers to build up their civilizations. Dice can be rerolled twice unless they come up as a hazard. Players use their workers to build infrastructure to support additional works or to build monuments that are worth points. At the same time, commodities are gathered that allow your civilization to develop. Once all monuments or five developments are achieved by a player, the game ends at the end of the round, points are counted, and a victor is declared. The game takes its name from Through the Ages: A Story of Civilization, although the two games have different styles and designers.

Categorys
AncientCity BuildingCivilizationDice

Mechanics
Contracts
Dice Rolling
Die Icon Resolution
Events
Paper-and-Pencil
Push Your Luck
Re-rolling and Locking
Solo / Solitaire Game
281.jpgRoll Through the Ages: The Iron Age1 - 410+40 - 60 mins
View Details
Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age, a sequel to the highly-awarded Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age, lets you build an Iron Age civilization in under an hour! Do you build provinces, raise armies, and conquer barbarians or build ports and ships to gain trade goods? Explore the strategies of Greece, Phoenicia, and Rome as you erect monuments, fend off disasters, and strive to feed your people. Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age gives players different ways to build their empires: the Trade and Naval strategies of the Phoenicians, the conquests of Alexander the Great, and the engineering prowess and gradual absorption of new provinces by the Roman Republic. Grab those dice — including the Fate die — and prepare to build the greatest empire as you continue to roll through the ages! Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age games that include the Mediterranean Expansion have their own game entry at Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age with Mediterranean Expansion.

Categorys
AncientCity BuildingCivilizationDice

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Paper-and-Pencil
Push Your Luck
Solo / Solitaire Game
391.pngRome in a Day2 - 58+15 - 20 mins
View Details
The once thriving Roman Empire fell apart. Who can resist the temptation to claim some of the lands for themselves? Do you prefer vineyards or quarries? Or maybe you want a little bit of everything with some olive groves and an oil mill on top? All you need is to make a good trade: offer a beautiful antique theater in exchange or add a few precious diamonds… Divide and swap lands, outguess and bribe your opponents! Create a prosperous domain from the lots of Rome! Lotta Rome is a simple strategy game based on the original "cut-and-choose" mechanic that will win the hearts of aspiring conquerors of all ages. Before the start, all players are dealt with their personal set of buildings with the card of buildings, a pile of lands tiles (there are 5 types - fields, city, olive gardens etc), gems/cristals, choice cards of smaller and bigger lands, reminder cards and screens. The game is played in 4 turns. During each turn, players take top 5 tiles of lands and place them in front of themselves. Then they take 2 top buildings from the building card and place them on the 2 lands from the left. Next, players take their screens and start divivding those 5 pieces of lands into 2 groups - a bigger and a smaller ones. In any ratio they want (32, 14 even 5). And add 1 crystal to the smaller land. When everyone is ready, the exchange begins. Players put the screens down allowing other players to see and choose a land that they have made. Note: at the first turn players choose the lands from a neighbour from the left, at 2nd - from the right, and then again left and finally right. For the max interaction When selection is made, players put a choice card reflecting their decidion of lands. Then, players take the chosen lands from the neighbour from the left and join them to the remaining piece of their own. Turn by turn, they build their domains, taking the most suitable lands to make their so-called new empire more profitable. How to gain points? For every kind of terrain with the corresponding building placed on it or next to it. Then the number of lands multiply with the number of buildings for EACH type of lands. The crystals gained for choosing smaller lands also bring points - 3 points for each crystal. The player with the most points wins the game.

Categorys
MedievalTerritory Building

Mechanics
Hexagon Grid
I Cut, You Choose
Income
Simultaneous Action Selection
149.jpgRoot2 - 410+60 - 90 mins
View Details
Root is a game of adventure and war in which 2 to 4 (1 to 6 with the 'Riverfolk' expansion) players battle for control of a vast wilderness. The nefarious Marquise de Cat has seized the great woodland, intent on harvesting its riches. Under her rule, the many creatures of the forest have banded together. This Alliance will seek to strengthen its resources and subvert the rule of Cats. In this effort, the Alliance may enlist the help of the wandering Vagabonds who are able to move through the more dangerous woodland paths. Though some may sympathize with the Alliance’s hopes and dreams, these wanderers are old enough to remember the great birds of prey who once controlled the woods. Meanwhile, at the edge of the region, the proud, squabbling Eyrie have found a new commander who they hope will lead their faction to resume their ancient birthright. The stage is set for a contest that will decide the fate of the great woodland. It is up to the players to decide which group will ultimately take root. Root represents the next step in our development of asymmetric design. Like Vast: The Crystal Caverns, each player in Root has unique capabilities and a different victory condition. Now, with the aid of gorgeous, multi-use cards, a truly asymmetric design has never been more accessible. The Cats play a game of engine building and logistics while attempting to police the vast wilderness. By collecting Wood they are able to produce workshops, lumber mills, and barracks. They win by building new buildings and crafts. The Eyrie musters their hawks to take back the Woods. They must capture as much territory as possible and build roosts before they collapse back into squabbling. The Alliance hides in the shadows, recruiting forces and hatching conspiracies. They begin slowly and build towards a dramatic late-game presence--but only if they can manage to keep the other players in check. Meanwhile, the Vagabond plays all sides of the conflict for their own gain, while hiding a mysterious quest. Explore the board, fight other factions, and work towards achieving your hidden goal. In Root, players drive the narrative, and the differences between each role create an unparalleled level of interaction and replayability. Leder Games invites you and your family to explore the fantastic world of Root! —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsFantasyWargame

Mechanics
Action Queue
Action Retrieval
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Point to Point Movement
Race
Sudden Death Ending
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
265.jpgRoot: The Underworld Expansion2 - 610+60 - 90 mins
View Details
New factions and battlefields join the world of Root! The Underworld Expansion includes: The Great Underground Duchy: an imperial faction that mixes the flexibility of the Marquise with the escalating Eyrie Dynasties. The Corvid Conspiracy: a secretive faction that hatches plots directly into the hands of their opponents. Two new maps: dig tunnels on the mountain map or fight to control the ferry on the lake map. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AnimalsExpansion for Base-gameFantasyWargame

Mechanics
Action Queue
Area Majority / Influence
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
King of the Hill
Point to Point Movement
453.jpgRunebound: Second Edition2 - 612+120 - 240 mins
View Details
Runebound is a classic adventure game from Fantasy Flight Games in which mighty heroes must take on the perils of Terrinoth. The game can be largely played without conflict between the players but victory can only be claimed by the first player to defeat the Dragonlord Margath, so the players are actually in a race to level up and acquire powerful weapons, armour and allies in order to take on the final adversary. Runebound features a series of 4 Adventure Decks that helps to pace the speed of the game and ensures that the players level up by acquiring experience before they are ready to take on a harder set of challenges (events and monsters). Several of the key features of Runebound are that combat is played out in 3 phases, Ranged, Melee and Magic and a player has the ability to specialise in a particular discipline, although this may make them vulnerable against certain creatures. The game also features a novel movement system using a series of terrain dice. Runebound is playable solo and is expandable by many adventure packs that alter the final challenge (replacing the Dragonlord for example). Runebound 2nd Edition also has a series of big box expansions that provide a new map or central map overlay to alter the game in some way. Runebound 2nd Edition is different from 1st Edition in that the original game featured a d20 and this was replaced by 2 10-sided dice, which helped to better balance the luck factor.

Categorys
AdventureExplorationFantasyFighting

Mechanics
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Hexagon Grid
Open Drafting
Role Playing
Variable Player Powers
77.jpgSamurai2 - 410+30 - 60 mins
View Details
Samurai is set in medieval Japan. Players compete to gain the favor of three factions: samurai, peasants, and priests, which are represented by helmet, rice paddy, and Buddha figures scattered about the board, which features the islands of Japan. The competition is waged through the use of hexagonal tiles, each of which help curry favor of one of the three factions — or all three at once! Players can make lightning-quick strikes with horseback ronin and ships or approach their conquests more methodically. As each figure (helmets, rice paddies, and Buddhas) is surrounded, it is awarded to the player who has gained the most favor with the corresponding group. Gameplay continues until all the symbols of one type have been removed from the board or four figures have been removed from play due to a tie for influence. At the end of the game, players compare captured symbols of each type, competing for majorities in each of the three types. Ties are not uncommon and are broken based on the number of other, "non-majority" symbols each player has collected. The game is part of what is sometimes called the Knizia tile-laying trilogy.

Categorys
Abstract StrategyMedieval

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Hand Management
Hexagon Grid
Once-Per-Game Abilities
Set Collection
Tile Placement
392.pngSCOUT2 - 59+15 mins
View Details
SCOUT is a ladder-climbing game in which cards have two potential values, players may not rearrange their hand of cards, and players may pass their turn to take a card from the current high set of cards into their hand. More specifically, cards are dual-indexed, with different values on each half of the card, with the 45 cards having all possible combinations of the numbers 1-10. During set-up, whoever is shuffling the cards should randomize both the order of the cards in the deck and their orientation. Once each player has been dealt their entire hand of cards, they pick up that hand without rearranging any of the cards; if they wish, they can rotate their entire hand of cards in order to use the values on the other end of each card, but again they cannot rearrange the order of cards in their hand. On a turn, a player takes one of two actions: • Play: A player chooses one or more adjacent cards in their hand that have all the same value or that have values in consecutive order (whether ascending or descending), then they play this set of cards to the table. They can do this only if the table is empty (as on the first turn) or the set they're playing is ranked higher than the set currently on the table; a set is higher if it has more cards or has cards of the same value instead of consecutive cards or has a set of the same quantity and type but with higher values. In this latter case when a player overplays another set, the player captures the cards in this previous set and places them face down in front of themselves. • Scout: A player takes a card from either end of the set currently on the table and places it anywhere they wish in their hand in either orientation. Whoever played this previous set receives a 1 VP token as a reward for playing a set that wasn't beaten. Once per round, a player can scout, then immediately play. When a player has emptied their hand of cards or all but one player have scouted instead of playing, the round ends. Players receive 1 VP for each face-down card, then subtract one point for each card in their hand (except if they were the player scouted repeatedly to end the game). Play as many rounds as the number of players, then whoever has the most points wins.

Categorys
Card Game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Ladder Climbing
Score-and-Reset Game
223.jpgScythe1 - 514+90 - 115 mins
View Details
It is a time of unrest in 1920s Europa. The ashes from the first great war still darken the snow. The capitalistic city-state known simply as “The Factory”, which fueled the war with heavily armored mechs, has closed its doors, drawing the attention of several nearby countries. Scythe is an engine-building game set in an alternate-history 1920s period. It is a time of farming and war, broken hearts and rusted gears, innovation and valor. In Scythe, each player represents a character from one of five factions of Eastern Europe who are attempting to earn their fortune and claim their faction's stake in the land around the mysterious Factory. Players conquer territory, enlist new recruits, reap resources, gain villagers, build structures, and activate monstrous mechs. Each player begins the game with different resources (power, coins, combat acumen, and popularity), a different starting location, and a hidden goal. Starting positions are specially calibrated to contribute to each faction’s uniqueness and the asymmetrical nature of the game (each faction always starts in the same place). Scythe gives players almost complete control over their fate. Other than each player’s individual hidden objective card, the only elements of luck or variability are “encounter” cards that players will draw as they interact with the citizens of newly explored lands. Each encounter card provides the player with several options, allowing them to mitigate the luck of the draw through their selection. Combat is also driven by choices, not luck or randomness. Scythe uses a streamlined action-selection mechanism (no rounds or phases) to keep gameplay moving at a brisk pace and reduce downtime between turns. While there is plenty of direct conflict for players who seek it, there is no player elimination. Every part of Scythe has an aspect of engine-building to it. Players can upgrade actions to become more efficient, build structures that improve their position on the map, enlist new recruits to enhance character abilities, activate mechs to deter opponents from invading, and expand their borders to reap greater types and quantities of resources. These engine-building aspects create a sense of momentum and progress throughout the game. The order in which players improve their engine adds to the unique feel of each game, even when playing one faction multiple times.

Categorys
EconomicFightingMiniaturesScience FictionTerritory Building

Mechanics
Action Drafting
Card Play Conflict Resolution
Contracts
End Game Bonuses
Force Commitment
Grid Movement
Hexagon Grid
King of the Hill
Movement Points
Narrative Choice / Paragraph
Solo / Solitaire Game
Take That
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
Victory Points as a Resource
Zone of Control
415.jpgSea Salt & Paper2 - 48+30 - 45 mins
View Details
During your turn, you assemble your hand, maybe place cards for their effect, and decide if you want to end the round. But do you think you are the one with the most points in hand? You will have to choose: stop the round immediately or give the others an extra turn to try to extend the gap? Is it worth taking the risk? The game ends when you reach 30/35/40 points (4/3/2 players). The excitement of ending the round to catch your opponents off guard The pleasure of playing your effect cards and making combos It's a set collection card game like Rummy. The origami created especially for the game is just the illustrations on the cards.

Categorys
Card Game

Mechanics
Closed Drafting
Hand Management
Melding and Splaying
Open Drafting
Push Your Luck
Set Collection
416.jpgSea Salt & Paper: Extra Salt2 - 48+30 - 45 mins
View Details
A mini-expansion for Sea Salt & Paper, presented as a booster pack: 8 new cards with 5 new effects.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-game

Mechanics
Hand Management
Melding and Splaying
Push Your Luck
Set Collection
152.jpgSecret Hitler5 - 1013+45 mins
View Details
Secret Hitler is a dramatic game of political intrigue and betrayal set in 1930s Germany. Each player is randomly and secretly assigned to be a liberal or a fascist, and one player is Secret Hitler. The fascists coordinate to sow distrust and install their cold-blooded leader; the liberals must find and stop the Secret Hitler before it's too late. The liberal team always has a majority. At the beginning of the game, players close their eyes, and the fascists reveal themselves to one another. Secret Hitler keeps his eyes closed, but puts his thumb up so the fascists can see who he is. The fascists learn who Hitler is, but Hitler doesn't know who his fellow fascists are, and the liberals don't know who anyone is. Each round, players elect a President and a Chancellor who will work together to enact a law from a random deck. If the government passes a fascist law, players must try to figure out if they were betrayed or simply unlucky. Secret Hitler also features government powers that come into play as fascism advances. The fascists will use those powers to create chaos unless liberals can pull the nation back from the brink of war. The objective of the liberal team is to pass five liberal policies or assassinate Secret Hitler. The objective of the fascist team is to pass six fascist policies or elect Secret Hitler chancellor after three fascist policies have passed.

Categorys
BluffingCard GameDeductionHumorParty GamePoliticalPrint & PlaySpies/Secret Agents

Mechanics
Hidden Roles
Player Elimination
Team-Based Game
Traitor Game
Voting
492.jpgSecrets4 - 810+15 - 35 mins
View Details
In Secrets, the second co-design between Eric Lang and Bruno Faidutti, players are assigned a hidden team — the CIA or KGB — and are trying to collect the most points for their side. In addition, one or two players are secretly anti-establishment Hippies who are working for nobody. Their goal is to fight the Man and have the fewest points. On your turn, offer one of two randomly drawn agent cards to another player. These cards are worth points and have varying good or bad abilities. That player either accepts the agent, in which case they score it, or they refuse, in which case the card returns to you, and you score it. The game ends when a player has five cards, after which the teams are revealed; the team with the highest combined score wins, unless a Hippie has the single lowest score, in which case they win. The interactions between the character cards are the spice of the game, but since the abilities are discoverable during play, the game can be taught in three minutes.

Categorys
BluffingCard GameDeductionParty GameSpies/Secret Agents

Mechanics
Advantage Token
Open Drafting
Push Your Luck
Tags
Take That
Team-Based Game
478.jpgShadow Ninjas2 - 58+10 - 20 mins
View Details
Shadow Ninjas is a hidden movement game of one versus many for 2 to 5 players. All the Ninja players are allowed to move any of the shadow tokens, some of which hide the Ninjas of individual players. This means players can accidentally - or not so accidentally - move other players’ tokens into danger or away from victory. To be a Ninja player you will need a good poker face and an ability to bluff so that no one can guess which shadow hides your Ninja. To be a Guard player you must be prepared to be outnumbered, but not overwhelmed, by all of the shadows that need to be investigated to protect the Shogun’s prized koi carp. —description from the designer

Categorys
Maze

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hidden Movement
Line of Sight
225.jpgShadows over Camelot3 - 710+60 - 80 mins
View Details
Shadows over Camelot is a cooperative/semi-cooperative hand-management and deduction-based board game for 3–7 players. Each player represents a knight of the Round Table and they must collaborate to overcome a number of quests, ranging from defeating the Black Knight to the search for the Holy Grail. Completed quests place white swords on the Round Table; failed quests add black swords and/or siege engines around Camelot. The knights are trying to build a majority of white swords on the Table before Camelot falls. On each knight's turn, the knight takes a "heroic action", such as moving to a new quest, building his hand, or playing cards to advance the forces of good. However, he must also choose one of three evil actions, each of which will bring Camelot closer to defeat. Moreover, one of the knights may be a traitor, pretending to be a loyal member of the party but secretly hindering his fellow knights in subtle ways, biding his time, waiting to strike at the worst possible moment... But enough words... don your cloak, climb astride your warhorse, and gallop into the Shadows to join us in Camelot!

Categorys
AdventureBluffingDeductionFantasyMedievalMythology

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Player Elimination
Semi-Cooperative Game
Set Collection
Team-Based Game
Traitor Game
Variable Player Powers
62.jpgShakespeare: The Bard Game2 - 512+60 mins
View Details
This is a game where each player is a play manager who must put on plays at various theaters. The game lasts the span of time agreed upon before the game starts by the other players. The object of the game is to collect acclaim points by putting on a play. To put on a play, you must buy a script from Shakespeare and collect the correct number of props, actors, and patrons for that script. Everything has a price... You begin with 40 shillings. You must pay for each prop at five shillings each, an actor is five shillings, and a patron is requested without cost at a great house. You may gain a second patron or ten shillings at a great house by answering an easy question correctly. Each script must be bought from Shakespeare if he is not busy. So, how do you make money in this game? This is the heart of the game. 1. You may recite a speech where your audience decides how much you gain (1-10 shillings) based on your performance. 2. You may show your knowledge by answering an easy, medium, and difficult question about Shakespeare and gain 10, 15, or 20 shillings. These questions can be multiple choice or true/false. 3. You can Busk. Busking is an impromptu performance where you gain five shillings and a fate card. If you like Shakespeare, and you like boardgames, then this is the game for you! Microbadge Buy It

Categorys
RenaissanceTrivia

Mechanics
Acting
Dice Rolling
Roll / Spin and Move
Voting
122.jpgSherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: The Thames Murders & Other Cases1 - 813+60 - 120 mins
View Details
Have you ever had the desire to walk the streets of Victorian London with Sherlock Holmes in search of Professor Moriarty? To search the docks for the giant rat of Sumatra? To walk up Baker Street as the fog is rolling in and hear Holmes cry out, "Come, Watson, come! The game is afoot!"? Now you can! You can enter the opium den beneath the Bar of Gold, but beware, that may be Colonel Sebastian Moran lurking around the corner. You can capture the mystery and excitement of Holmes' London in this challenging and informative game. You, the player, will match your deductive abilities against your opponents and the master sleuth himself, Sherlock Holmes. In Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective, you are presented with a mystery to solve, and it is then up to you to trace the threads of evidence through the byways and mansions of nineteenth century London. You will interview suspects, search the newspapers for clues, and put together the facts to reach a solution. Why were two lions murdered in Hyde Park? Who is responsible for the missing paintings from the National Gallery? Who murdered Oswald Mason and why? These are just a few of the cases that will challenge your ingenuity and deductive abilities. This is not a board game: No dice, no luck, but a challenge to your mental ability. The game has been thoroughly researched for Holmesian and Victorian accuracy so as to capture a feeling of that bygone era.

Categorys
DeductionMurder/MysteryNovel-basedPost-NapoleonicSpies/Secret Agents

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Narrative Choice / Paragraph
Solo / Solitaire Game
Storytelling
417.jpgShipyard (2nd Edition)1 - 412+40 - 120 mins
View Details
We’re in 19th century, sea transport is more and more important. Both corporations and naval forces require newer and newer ships. Try to put yourself in the role of their manufacturers. Hire employees, buy accessories, get favour of evaluating committees. Don’t forget to rent a canal and you can heave anchor. Players take turns, beginning with a randomly selected player and continuing around the table clockwise. On their turn, they will choose one of the available actions from the Action Track. The action will get the player something they need to help build their ships. On the player's next turn, they will move that Action Card ahead of all the others and choose a different action. If a player completes a ship on their turn (ships consists of little cards depicting bows, sterns, and (preferably several) middle pieces with several options to add equipment or crew), it is taken out for a shakedown cruise in a canal, during which they may score points for speed, crew, equipment, or safety. As players take their turns, the line of Action Cards will advance around the Action Track. When the lead Action Card reaches the Starting Space again, the countdown marker moves down one space, and play continues. The game ends when the countdown marker reaches the finish space. (It can also end early if the players run out of Ship Cards.) Bonus points are scored for Government Contracts, and the player with the most points wins. The game lasts about 30 minutes per player. —description from the publisher

Categorys
EconomicIndustry / ManufacturingNautical

Mechanics
Contracts
End Game Bonuses
Modular Board
Open Drafting
Rondel
Set Collection
Tile Placement
266.jpgSid Meier's Civilization: The Board Game2 - 413+120 - 240 mins
View Details
Please note: this entry covers the 2010 release of Sid Meier’s Civilization: The Board Game from FFG. This game is unrelated to the similarly named 2002 Eagle Games Sid Meier's Civilization: The Boardgame. From Press Release: Before you lies a vast bounty of land, ripe for the plucking. Your meager beginnings will influence the paths you must take. Lead your people well and they will take you to infinite heights of greatness. If civilization manages to endure the ages, your name will hang in every whisper of its legacy... Fantasy Flight Games is excited to announce the upcoming release of Sid Meier’s Civilization: The Board Game! Forge an empire to stand the test of time using innovative game mechanics with multiple paths to victory. Will you lead the greatest army in the world to conquer your foes? Or will you be the first to journey to the stars, becoming the most technologically advanced civilization known to man? The choice is yours. Designed by Kevin Wilson, Civilization: The Board Game is inspired by the legendary video game series created by Sid Meier. Players are tasked with guiding an entire civilization throughout the ages, taking ownership of your people’s technology, economy, culture, and military, as well as all the choices that go along with them. There are four different paths to victory, and each is riddled with opposition. In Civilization: The Board Game, 2-4 players take on the roles of famous leaders in charge of historical civilizations, each with their own abilities. Players will be able to explore a module game board, build cities and buildings, fight battles, research powerful technology, and attract great people by advancing their culture. No matter what your play style is, there is a civilization for you! Fans of Sid Meier’s classic video game franchise will find familiar footing in Civilization: The Board Game. Staying true to the foundations of its video game predecessor while creating a new and unique way to play, Civilization: The Board Game captures the spirit and grandeur of carving out a magnificent empire from modest beginnings. Players start off with a single city, one army figure, and one scout, and from these meager origins you must forge through the ages and become the greatest civilization in the world. Those unfamiliar with the video game series will find Civilization: The Board Game a great way to enter into the world of Civilization. The strategy and tactical decisions involved in Civilization: The Board Game will appeal to strategy gamers and war gamers alike, and the ability to win through culture and technological advancement will give those who only wish to focus on their own empire a chance at victory as well.

Categorys
City BuildingCivilizationExplorationNegotiationVideo Game Theme

Mechanics
Deck, Bag, and Pool Building
Grid Movement
Hand Management
Modular Board
Open Drafting
Rock-Paper-Scissors
Square Grid
Tech Trees / Tech Tracks
Trading
Variable Player Powers
357.jpgSkull3 - 610+15 - 45 mins
View Details
Edited description from Bruno Faidutti's write-up of the game in his Ideal Game Library: Skull & Roses is the quintessence of bluffing, a game in which everything is played in the players' heads. Each player plays a face-down card, then each player in turn adds one more card – until someone feels safe enough to state that he can turn a number of cards face up and get only roses. Other players can then overbid him, saying they can turn even more cards face up. The highest bidder must then turn that number of cards face up, starting with his own. If he shows only roses, he wins; if he reveals a skull, he loses, placing one of his cards out of play. Two successful challenges wins the game. Skull & Roses is not a game of luck; it's a game of poker face and meeting eyes. Skull & Roses Red features the same gameplay as Skull & Roses, with the only change being alternate rules that allow each player to control two biker gangs. Both Skull & Roses Red and Skull are playable on their own, with each game containing six different biker gangs. Each Skull or Skull & Roses set can be combined with another to allow for games with more than six players.

Categorys
BluffingCard GameParty Game

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Hand Management
Player Elimination
479.jpgSky Team212+15 mins
View Details
Sky Team is a co-operative game, exclusively for two players, in which you play a pilot and co-pilot at the controls of an airliner. Your goal is to work together as a team to land your airplane in different airports around the world. To land your plane, you need to silently assign your dice to the correct spaces in your cockpit to balance the axis of your plane, control its speed, deploy the flaps, extend the landing gear, contact the control tower to clear your path, and even have a little coffee to improve your concentration enough to change the value of your dice. If the aircraft tilts too much and stalls, overshoots the airport, or collides with another aircraft, you lose the game...and your pilot's license...and probably your life. From Montreal to Tokyo, each airport offers its own set of challenges. Watch out for the turbulence as this could end up being bumpy ride! AWARDS & HONORS 2024 - Spiel des Jahres Winner 2024 - Best Light Game - BBQ Awards 2024 - Best Cooperative Board Game - Origins Awards 2024 - Best 2023 Insider Game - Les Lys (Québec) 2024 - Game of the Year - Spiel des Jahres 2024 2024 - Best 2-Player & Innovation Gameplay - Big Awards 2024 2024 - Best 2-Player & Cooperative Game - Golden Geek Awards 2023 Runner up for Best Innovative & Thematic Game - Golden Geek Awards 2023 2023 - Best Cooperative Game - Board Game Quest 2023 - Best 2-Player Game - Board Game Arena Awards 2023 - Best 2-Player Game - Squirrelly Awards 2023 - Best Board Game - Dicebreaker Tabletop Awards 2023 - Two Player Board Game Winner - Game Boy Geek 2023 - Best Co-Op Game - Gaming Trend 2023 - Seal of Excellence - Dice Tower —description from the publisher

Categorys
Aviation / Flight

Mechanics
Communication Limits
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Worker Placement with Dice Workers
454.pngSleeping Gods1 - 413+60 - 1200 mins
View Details
"Are the stars unfamiliar here?" she asked, and the sky grew suddenly dark, the star's patterns alien and exotic. "This is the Wandering Sea. The gods have brought you here, and you must wake them if you wish to return home." In Sleeping Gods, you and up to 3 friends become Captain Sofi Odessa and her crew, lost in a strange world in 1929 on your steamship, the Manticore. You must work together to survive, exploring exotic islands, meeting new characters, and seeking out the totems of the gods so that you can return home. Sleeping Gods is a campaign game. Each session can last as long as you want. When you are ready to take a break, you mark your progress on a journey log sheet, making it easy to return to the same place in the game the next time you play. You can play solo or with friends throughout your campaign. It's easy to swap players in and out at will. Your goal is to find at least fourteen totems hidden throughout the world. Like reading a book, you'll complete this journey one or two hours at a time, discovering new lands, stories, and challenges along the way. Sleeping Gods is an atlas game. Each page of the atlas represents only a small portion of the world you can explore. When you reach the edge of a page and you want to continue in the same direction, you simply turn to a new page and sail onward. Sleeping Gods is a storybook game. Each new location holds wild adventure, hidden treasures, and vivid characters. Your choices affect the characters and the plot of the game, and may help or hinder your chances of getting home! Welcome to a vast world. Your journey starts now. —description from the publisher

Categorys
AdventureExplorationFantasyFightingNautical

Mechanics
Action Points
Cooperative Game
Events
Hand Management
Narrative Choice / Paragraph
Push Your Luck
Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
Solo / Solitaire Game
Storytelling
99.jpgSmall Star Empires2 - 413+10 - 30 mins
View Details
Small Star Empires is a quick area control game for 2-4 players. In this game, players colonize the galaxy using their ships, which they move on a modular board containing hexagonal spaces (systems). The modular board is made up of seven different double-sided sector tiles, which allows for a different map and different experience each time you play the game. During a turn, a player must move one of their ships on the board. They can move the ship only in a straight line, as far away as they want, but they cannot go over systems controlled by other players. After moving the ship, the player has to choose whether to place a colony or a trade station in that system. Both of these mark control over the system until the end of the game, but the trade station gives the player bonus points for each adjacent system controlled by their opponents. The game ends when either all of the players have placed their colonies and trade stations on the board or until none of the players' ships can move (because they have become blocked by other players' systems). After the game ends, points are calculated. Each player gets one point for each planet that they have in their systems. (Systems have 1 to 3 planets on the board.) Players also earn points for Nebulae; the more they have from one color, the more points they earn, with bonus points from other special systems such as the Unexplored System Tiles, which are part of a variant in the game. After calculating the points, the player with the most points wins!

Categorys
Science FictionSpace ExplorationTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Enclosure
Grid Movement
Hexagon Grid
Modular Board
154.jpgSmall Star Empires: Dawn of Discoveries2 - 413+15 - 45 mins
View Details
After decades of geological tests done on a remote research station deep in Tollaran space, scientists stumbled upon amazing discovery. They found that the rare crystals they were studying have enormous amount of energy, unlike anything they've seen before. The discovery of these crystals led the galaxy to a new era of technological breakthroughs, as it was already going through exciting and turbulent times since the start of the first major intergalactic conflicts. When using Small Star Empires: Dawn of Discoveries, at the start of the game you randomly draw crystals of three colors from the bag and place one at each 1 planet system on the board. Additionally, you shuffle the technology deck and reveal several technology cards that will be available for the players to research (purchase). Once you colonize a system containing a crystal, you collect that crystal. During the game you may spend collected crystals in order to research the available technologies. Additionally, you may also build research stations on the board. When an opponent colonizes a system adjacent to your research station, you both get "research bonus" and gain one extra crystal for use. The technologies that you will research range from new engine drives that enable special movement across the board, utility modules that can be used to colonize asteroids and weapons, and shields that can be used to defend or damage ships. Eventually the technologies could score points at the end of the game, so you need to think about which technologies fit your strategy best! How will you use the possibilities that the powerful crystals have to offer? Will you use the them to engage in researching peaceful technologies to further prosper your civilization or engage in military research in order to subdue the other civilizations?

Categorys
Science FictionSpace ExplorationTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Enclosure
Grid Movement
Modular Board
Open Drafting
155.jpgSmall Star Empires: The Galactic Divide2 - 413+15 - 45 mins
View Details
After decades of colonization, the spacefaring races have finally come to the moment where even their own colonized space is not enough. Tensions are rising as each civilization tries to force its agenda upon the crowded galaxy and fortify its position. When using Small Star Empires: The Galactic Divide, at the beginning of the game you choose which civilization to play with and take its corresponding civilization board. Each civilization board has unique abilities that cost certain amounts of power to play, and a track on which you mark the amount of power you have available. To increase your power, you must build massive battle stations on strategic locations adjacent to other players. Battle stations also protect your adjacent systems, disabling the other players from using special abilities on your territories. Will you accept planets into your Tollaran Republic to build a mighty galactic federation, conquer the galaxy under your Hantal'ar Empire, unite the planets under Ora'Nor, or buy the most powerful galactic corporations as the Pern Conglomerate?

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameScience FictionTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Enclosure
Grid Movement
Modular Board
Variable Player Powers
87.jpgSmall World2 - 58+40 - 80 mins
View Details
In Small World, players vie for conquest and control of a world that is simply too small to accommodate them all. Designed by Philippe Keyaerts as a fantasy follow-up to his award-winning Vinci, Small World is inhabited by a zany cast of characters such as dwarves, wizards, amazons, giants, orcs, and even humans, who use their troops to occupy territory and conquer adjacent lands in order to push the other races off the face of the earth. Picking the right combination from the 14 different fantasy races and 20 unique special powers, players rush to expand their empires - often at the expense of weaker neighbors. Yet they must also know when to push their own over-extended civilization into decline and ride a new one to victory! On each turn, you either use the multiple tiles of your chosen race (type of creatures) to occupy adjacent (normally) territories - possibly defeating weaker enemy races along the way, or you give up on your race letting it go "into decline". A race in decline is designated by flipping the tiles over to their black-and-white side. At the end of your turn, you score one point (coin) for each territory your races occupy. You may have one active race and one race in decline on the board at the same time. Your occupation total can vary depending on the special abilities of your race and the territories they occupy. After the final round, the player with the most coins wins. Clarifications: available in a pinned forum post.

Categorys
FantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Auction: Dutch Priority
Dice Rolling
Hidden Victory Points
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
Victory Points as a Resource
301.pngSmall World of Warcraft2 - 58+40 - 80 mins
View Details
In Small World of Warcraft, players vie for conquest and control of a world that is simply too small to accommodate everybody. Small World of Warcraft is set on the fantasy world of Azeroth, where the races of the Alliance and the Horde — including Orcs, Dwarves, Trolls, and Worgen — clash in a world-consuming conflict. In the game, players choose combinations of special powers and races from the Warcraft universe, such as Portal Mage Pandarens or Herbalist Goblins, and vie for control of Azeroth. To help them achieve dominance, players will occupy legendary terrains and seek control of powerful artifacts. However, all empires must eventually fall, so players need to be ready to put an overextended race into a state of "decline" and lead a new one to rule Azeroth. In more detail, on each turn either you use the multiple tiles of your chosen fantasy race to (normally) occupy adjacent territories, possibly defeating weaker enemy races along the way, or you give up on your race and let it go into decline. A race in decline is designated by flipping the tiles over to their black-and-white side. At the start of the game or after you go into decline, you choose a new race/power combination at the start of your turn, with the 16 races and 20 powers being paired randomly each game. At the end of your turn, you score one coin for each territory your races occupy. You may have one active race and one race in decline on the board at the same time. Your occupation total can vary depending on the special abilities of your race and the territories they occupy. After the final round, the player with the most coins wins.

Categorys
FantasyFightingTerritory BuildingVideo Game Theme

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Increase Value of Unchosen Resources
Team-Based Game
Variable Player Powers
Victory Points as a Resource
157.jpgSmall World Underground2 - 58+30 - 90 mins
View Details
"This world's not big enough for all of us, so it's time you step aside to make room for me." That's the spirit of Philippe Keyaerts' award-winning Small World, and the 2011 release Small World Underground is a standalone game that keeps that spirit intact, while putting a new spin on the game play. Small World Underground includes 15 fantasy-themed races of creatures along with 21 special powers. Each player will control several creature/power combinations over the course of the game – spending points to draft these combinations – and will use those creatures to claim control of various subterranean locations. Some locations hold relics or are designated as "places of power", and monsters must first be conquered before a player can claim these special benefits. At the end of each turn, a player scores points for the regions he holds, and the player with the most points at game end wins. Small World Underground is playable on its own, but can be combined with other Small World releases. The publisher recommends that players be familiar with Small World before playing Small World Underground.

Categorys
FantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
King of the Hill
Variable Player Powers
159.jpgSmall World: A Spider's Web2 - 58+80 mins
View Details
Small World: A Spider's Web is a mini-expansion for Small World that contains three Races (Ice Witches, Skags and Slingmen) and three Special Powers (Copycat, Lava and Soul-Touch). This expansion comes complete with a plastic storage tray designed to store all the badges and tokens from A Spider’s Web, plus it includes room for all the additional recent Small World expansions. It also includes leader tokens for the 3 new Races. A Spider’s Web features entries from Andrew Capel, Alex and Bill Gurski, and Randy Pitchford, “Spiderine” backers from the Small World 2 Kickstarter campaign.

Categorys
CivilizationExpansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
160.jpgSmall World: Be Not Afraid...2 - 58+40 - 80 mins
View Details
In Small World, players vie for conquest and control of a world that is simply too small to accommodate them all. Small World: Be Not Afraid... adds five new races to this game – Barbarians, Homunculi, Pixies, Pygmies, and Leprechauns – along with five new special powers; the races and powers can be mixed with those of the base game as well as any other Small World expansions. Small World: Be Not Afraid... comes packaged with a token tray for storage of the expansion components and the components of other SW expansions previously released.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
140.jpgSmall World: Cursed!2 - 58+40 - 80 mins
View Details
Cursed! is a Small World board game expansion. Cursed! includes 2 new Small World Races - Kobolds and Goblins; along with 5 new Special Power Badges - Cursed; Hordes of; Marauding; Ransacking; and Were-. The Cursed! expansion was created as part of the Small World Design Contest and features winning designs from the over 700 different entries submitted. This is an expansion and requires a copy of the Small World board game. Components: 2 Fantasy Race Banners 1 Blank Fantasy Race Banner 5 Special Power Badges 1 Blank Special Power Badge 30 Matching Race Tokens (16 x Kobolds, 11 x Goblins, 2 x Horde, 1 x Lost Tribe) 1 Rules Booklet Expands: Small World

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
47.jpgSmall World: Grand Dames of Small World2 - 58+40 - 80 mins
View Details
The Grand Dames of Small World is the first expansion for Days of Wonder's Small World board game released in 2009. The Grand Dames includes 3 new powerful female race banners - Gypsies, Priestesses and the ghostly White Ladies. It also includes 2 new Special Power Badges - Historian and Peace-Loving. The Grand Dames of Small World expansion was created as part of the Small World Design Contest and features winning designs from the over 700 different entries submitted. This is an expansion and requires a copy of the Small World board game. Components: 3 Fantasy Race Banners 27 Matching Race Tokens (11x Gypsies, 9 x Priestesses, 7 x White Ladies) 2 Special Power Badges 1 Blank Special Power Badge 1 Rules Booklet

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
161.jpgSmall World: Leaders of Small World2 - 58+40 - 80 mins
View Details
This expansion of Small World is a promotional expansion first given away at Spiel 2009 in Essen. The expansion is based on an idea of Michael Ormesher in a Days of Wonder "Race design contest". The expansion consists of 24 leader tokens (the second edition has 48) that are neither a race nor a power. When you pick a new race, you can opt to take its leader. The leader acts as an additional race token. The leader, however, disappears as soon as the race goes into decline. Also, the leader is brave, which means that he can only be staying at regions that are not immune. Leaders can be held hostage for ransom. If the ransom is not paid, the leader counts as two victory points at the end of the game for the player that captured the leader.

Categorys
CivilizationExpansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
110.jpgSmall World: Necromancer Island3 - 68+40 - 80 mins
View Details
Publisher blurb: A Small World Scenario for 3 to 6 players At first no one noticed the small island on the lake - nor paid any attention to the gnarly pretense of a man who drifted onto it, sitting astride a wooden log with a huge grimoire on his lap employing a shovel as his unlikely paddle. A ghastly green mist soon shrouded the island, wrapping it in a ghostly silence pierced only by a maniacal laughter and some intermittent curses. Then, one moonlit night, an impossibly crooked tower emerged high above the mist, casting a long and dark shadow on the surrounding land... The Necromancer had arrived! In Necromancer Island, one of the players assumes the role of a dreaded Necromancer who inhabits an island in the center of Small World's central Lake region. He captures the souls of all Race tokens lost to conquests, using them to progressively spawn Ghosts who invade the surrounding Regions. To make matters worse, his Powers grow as his reach across the land increases. If the Necromancer succeeds in bringing all of his Ghosts into play, anytime before the game's end, he wins!

Categorys
CivilizationExpansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
162.jpgSmall World: Realms2 - 68+40 - 80 mins
View Details
Game description from the publisher: Small World Realms includes scores of puzzle-like geomorphic Terrain regions that are assembled into variously sized and shaped board maps. Map designs are based on any of the 12 preset Scenarios created by the game's designer, Philippe Keyaerts. Players can also create their own maps and scenarios using the components included. Small World Realms can be used with either of the series' base games: Small World or Small World Underground. To accomplish this, the tiles are two-sided with one side for the base game and the other for the underground version.

Categorys
CivilizationExpansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Modular Board
Variable Player Powers
63.jpgSmall World: River World2 - 58+40 - 80 mins
View Details
Description from the publisher: In Small World: River World, players discover new maps full of water regions haunted by merciless pirates. Players need to defend their precious harbors against them, fight them on the river, and still keep an eye on their opponents! Some regions such as the shipyard or the temple of the seer may help them to have the upper hand, but in River World, there is still not enough room for everybody. And random events that trigger on each turn add to the chaos! Small World: River World includes two double-sided game boards, i.e., four maps in total, one for each of the four possible player configurations. Note: To play with this expansion, you need the following contents from Small World: race banners, special power badges, markers, victory coins, and the reinforcement die. The publisher recommends removing the "Flying" special power before using this expansion.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
78.jpgSmall World: Royal Bonus2 - 58+80 mins
View Details
Small World: Royal Bonus is a mini-expansion for Small World that contains three Races (Fauns, Igors and Shrubmen) and three Special Powers (Aquatic, Behemoth and Fireball). Royal Bonus was first released only to Kickstarter backers of the digital version of Small World. On September 8 Days of Wonder announced that the Royal Bonus would again be available at retail in November 2014.

Categorys
CivilizationExpansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Dice Rolling
Variable Player Powers
163.jpgSmall World: Tales and Legends2 - 58+40 - 80 mins
View Details
Will you end up drinking the Philter of Forgetfulness, be flung from the Great Catapult, or even have a chance to seduce the White Queen? Thanks to this new expansion for Small World, the wise veterans of the game now have a chance to re-write History... Tales & Legends introduces 54 new Event cards that change the storyline of each turn during the game. Some events may have small consequences, while others are nearly cataclysmic in their impact. At the start of each turn (except the first) a new event card is drawn and put into play. The next Upcoming Event is also visible, so players know what faces them on the next turn. This expansion was created by Laurent Verrier, Special Prize Winner of the Small World Design Contest. Philippe Keyaerts, the original game’s author, provided additional development assistance.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameFantasyFightingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Auction/Bidding
Dice Rolling
Events
Variable Player Powers
48.jpgSolenia1 - 410+30 - 45 mins
View Details
Several millennia ago, the tiny planet Solenia lost its day-and-night cycle: Its northern hemisphere is forever plunged into darkness, and its southern hemisphere is eternally bathed in sunlight. Your mission is to carry on your ancestors' honorable task of traveling the world to deliver essential goods to the inhabitants of both hemispheres. While the Day people want you to deliver the rarest gems and stones, the Night people sorely need wood and wheat to survive. Be efficient and outpace your opponents to collect the most gold stars by the end of the game! A game of Solenia plays out over 16 rounds, and in each round, each player plays one card from their hand onto an empty space of the 5x5 game board. You can play the card on either: A floating production island, to gain as many resources as the value of the card you played of the type corresponding to this space A floating city, to fulfill a delivery tile by delivering the resources depicted on it. You must play your card adjacent to the airship in the center of the playing area or adjacent to another card of yours already played. When someone plays a 0 card, the airship advances one space, then at the end of your turn, you remove the back edge of the board, give players resources based on the cards they have on this strip of the playing area, flip the strip over (turning night to day or dawn to dusk or vice versa), and place it on the other side of the game board. The game ends when each player has played all 16 of their cards. The player with the most gold stars wins! —description from designer

Categorys
Card GameExplorationFantasy

Mechanics
Bias
Hand Management
Modular Board
Pick-up and Deliver
Solo / Solitaire Game
484.jpgSpace Alert1 - 512+30 mins
View Details
Space Alert is a cooperative team survival game. Players become crew members of a small spaceship scanning dangerous sectors of the galaxy. The missions last just 10 real-time minutes (hyperspace jump, sector scan, hyperspace jump back) and the only task the players have is to protect their ship. During play, the central computer will announce the presence of various threats on one of the supplied 10 minute soundtracks that also acts as a game timer. The threats vary from space battleships and interceptors to different interstellar monsters and abominations, asteroids or even intruders and malfunctions on the spaceship. Players have to agree who will take care of which task and coordinate their actions (moving around the ship, firing weapons, distributing energy, using battlebots to deal with intruders, launching guided missiles, etc.) in real time to defend the ship. Only a well-working team can survive 10 minutes and make the jump back to safety. The game offers several difficulty levels, huge variability and a unique experience for one to five player teams. One mission lasts only about 30 minutes, including setup and evaluation. (Based on a description from Czech Games Edition)

Categorys
ElectronicReal-timeScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Action Queue
Area Movement
Cooperative Game
Elapsed Real Time Ending
Hand Management
Real-Time
Simultaneous Action Selection
Solo / Solitaire Game
480.jpgSpace Base2 - 514+60 mins
View Details
In Space Base, players assume the roles of Commodores of a small fleet of ships. Ships begin docked at their stations and are then deployed to sectors as new ships are commissioned under your command. Use cargo vessels to engage in trade and commerce; mining vessels to build reoccurring base income; and carriers to spread your influence. Establish new colonies for a new Commodore in a sector to gain even more influence. Gain enough influence and you can be promoted to Admiral! Space Base is a quick-to-learn, quick-to-play dice game using the core "I roll, everyone gets stuff" mechanism seen in other games. It's also a strategic engine builder using a player board (your space base) and tableaus of ship cards you can buy and add to your board. The cards you buy and the order you buy them in have interesting implications on your engine beyond just the ability on the card you buy, making for a different type of engine construction than seen in similar games. Players can take their engine in a number of directions: long odds and explosive gains, low luck and steady income, big end-game combos to launch from last to first, or a mix-and-match approach. Ultimately, Space Base is a game you can just start playing and teach everyone how to play in the first round or two and has a satisfying blend of dice-chucking luck and challenging strategic choices.

Categorys
DiceScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Open Drafting
Random Production
226.pngSpace Cadets: Dice Duel4 - 812+30 mins
View Details
Your plan is quickly coming together. Simplicity itself. Just continue to close the gap to the enemy, and launch when within range. Your crew is well-trained and work quickly at their stations, just the edge you need to come out on top. “Engineering, power to Helm. Move forward and close the distance to the enemy. Keep shields in the front. We're going straight in”. You can feel the bridge vibrate slightly as the engines come up to speed. “Captain, all sensors are on weapon lock”, says the Sensor Officer. “You can fire at will.” A slight smirk crosses your face. “On my mark! Launch both tor... Wait, where did they go?” You look at the viewscreen, puzzled, with a growing sense of unease. Sensors starts shouting. “Crystal Warp! Captain they've done a crystal warp and they're directly behind us!” From your right comes the panicked voice of the Shields officer. “Umm, Captain... All of our shields are to the front!” You start barking out orders. “Shields, use the crystal we captured to raise the aft shield. Weapons, start to move the torpedoes to the rear tubes! Helm, get us out of here!” The crew gets to work, but you look on in horror as two torpedoes lance out from your nemesis... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Space Cadets: Dice Duel – the "Team vs. Team, Real-time, Dice-Rolling Game of Starship Combat!" – pits two spaceships against one another in quick-paced combat. The players are divided into two teams, each team playing the crew of a ship and winning or losing together based on how well they perform. The game ends when one side destroys their opponent by causing four points of damage through torpedoes or mines. Each ship has six Bridge Stations: Engineering generates power for the other stations. Helm maneuvers the ship on the map. Weapons loads the torpedo tubes to attack the enemy. Sensors locks onto the enemy so torpedoes can hit, and uses jammers to stop the enemy from locking on. Shields helps protect the ship from enemy torpedoes. Tractor Beams can grab the powerful crystals, move the enemy ship on the map, and launch Mines. Each player is in charge of one or more of these stations, or has the overall role of Captain to coordinate everything. There are no game turns in Space Cadets: Dice Duel; instead the game continues with players acting as quickly as possible until one side wins.

Categorys
DiceFightingParty GameReal-timeScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Action Queue
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Team-Based Game
134.jpgSpace Station2 - 612+60 mins
View Details
Finally, the international space industry is beginning to grow! To encourage the development, global funds are awarding prizes to companies that are outstanding in different areas. You control one of those companies and want to compete for the biggest, best and most beautiful space station the world has ever seen. But the competition is hard... In Space Station you start your space station with a core module card on the table, then over six years (rounds) you expand it by paying and placing new module cards. Each year you start with a five card hand, crew tokens and new MegaCredits (money), with the amount of crew and money determined by the structure of your space station. You use money primarily to pay for new modules, and the crew gives you special effects on many of your modules. During the year, the players take turns doing actions such as building, using module actions, playing event cards, repairing or passing. When everyone passes, the year ends and victory points are awarded: There are six kinds (colors) of modules and for each kind, the player(s) with the most modules of that kind is awarded a victory point. Players' crew tokens are then reset, and player may discard a card before refilling their hand and getting money for the next year. At the end of the sixth year, the player with most victory point wins.

Categorys
Card GameScience Fiction

Mechanics
Hand Management
Pattern Building
Worker Placement
146.jpgSpartacus: A Game of Blood and Treachery3 - 417+120 - 180 mins
View Details
In Spartacus: A Game of Blood & Treachery, an exciting game of twisted schemes and bloody combats inspired by the hit STARZ Original series, each player takes on the role of Dominus, head of a rising house in the ancient Roman city of Capua. Each house is competing for Influence to gain the favor of Rome. Through a combination of political schemes and glorious battles on the arena sands your house will rise in fame and stature. As Dominus, you have a variety of resources at your disposal. Guards protect you from schemes launched by rivals. Slaves run your household and earn gold. Gladiators compete to bring glory to themselves and influence to their Dominus. Three main phases occur in each game round of Spartacus: A Game of Blood & Treachery. The Intrigue Phase is when players launch their Schemes, hoping to raise their fortunes while undermining their rivals. Schemes and Reactions are represented by cards in the Intrigue Deck. Players wield their Influence to put their Schemes into play, often asking for (or bribing) another player’s help in hatching the most complex plots. The Market Phase is when players buy, sell and trade Assets (Gladiators, Slaves, Equipment and Guards). Players also bid against each other to acquire new Assets at Auction. Wealth is not the only path to success as players bluff and bargain with each other to acquire the Assets they covet. The Arena Phase is when the bloody games are held. Gladiators from two rival Houses are pitted against each other in a brutal fight for glory. The spectacles of the games are represented by miniature combat on the arena board. Fighters pit their Attack, Defense and Speed dice against one another to determine the victor. All players seek to increase their fortunes by betting on the outcome of the gruesome conflict. Fighters who emerge from the arena victorious gain Favor and their Dominus gain Influence. The goal of the game is to become the most influential house in Capua, securing your family’s power for years to come. During the game, players will bribe, poison, betray, steal, blackmail, and undermine each other. Gold will change hands again and again to buy support, stay someone’s hand or influence their decisions. Will you be the honorable player whose word is their bond or the treacherous schemer whose alliances change with the wind? —description from the publisher

Categorys
AncientDiceFightingMiniaturesMovies / TV / Radio themeNegotiation

Mechanics
Auction/Bidding
Betting and Bluffing
Bribery
Dice Rolling
Grid Movement
Hand Management
Movement Points
Sudden Death Ending
Trading
Variable Player Powers
267.pngSpirit Island1 - 413+90 - 120 mins
View Details
In the most distant reaches of the world, magic still exists, embodied by spirits of the land, of the sky, and of every natural thing. As the great powers of Europe stretch their colonial empires further and further, they will inevitably lay claim to a place where spirits still hold power - and when they do, the land itself will fight back alongside the islanders who live there. Spirit Island is a complex and thematic cooperative game about defending your island home from colonizing Invaders. Players are different spirits of the land, each with its own unique elemental powers. Every turn, players simultaneously choose which of their power cards to play, paying energy to do so. Using combinations of power cards that match a spirit's elemental affinities can grant free bonus effects. Faster powers take effect immediately, before the Invaders spread and ravage, but other magics are slower, requiring forethought and planning to use effectively. In the Spirit phase, spirits gain energy, and choose how / whether to Grow: to reclaim used power cards, to seek for new power, or to spread presence into new areas of the island. The Invaders expand across the island map in a semi-predictable fashion. Each turn they explore into some lands (portions of the island); the next turn, they build in those lands, forming settlements and cities. The turn after that, they ravage there, bringing blight to the land and attacking any native islanders present. The islanders fight back against the Invaders when attacked, and lend the spirits some other aid, but may not always do so exactly as you'd hoped. Some Powers work through the islanders, helping them (eg) drive out the Invaders or clean the land of blight. The game escalates as it progresses: spirits spread their presence to new parts of the island and seek out new and more potent powers, while the Invaders step up their colonization efforts. Each turn represents 1-3 years of alternate-history. At game start, winning requires destroying every last settlement and city on the board - but as you frighten the Invaders more and more, victory becomes easier: they'll run away even if some number of settlements or cities remain. Defeat comes if any spirit is destroyed, if the island is overrun by blight, or if the Invader deck is depleted before achieving victory. The game includes different adversaries to fight against (eg: a Swedish Mining Colony, or a Remote British Colony). Each changes play in different ways, and offers a different path of difficulty boosts to keep the game challenging as you gain skill.

Categorys
Age of ReasonEnvironmentalFantasyFightingMythologyRenaissanceTerritory Building

Mechanics
Action Retrieval
Area Majority / Influence
Automatic Resource Growth
Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Cooperative Game
Events
Hand Management
Modular Board
Set Collection
Simultaneous Action Selection
Solo / Solitaire Game
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
268.pngStar Trek Chrono-Trek2 - 611+15 - 45 mins
View Details
In Star Trek Chrono-Trek, a time-travel game similar to Chrononauts but set in the Star Trek universe, each player becomes a Star Trek character with a unique identity and a secret mission. During the game, players travel backwards and forwards through history, doing all those things people have always dreamed of using time travel to do: Visiting the great moments of the past, peeking into the future, collecting up artifacts, coming to grips with the paradoxes of time travel, and of course, changing pivotal events and altering the course of history itself. Explore the history (and alternate history!) of the entire Star Trek universe in this version of Chrononauts. Try to alter history to restore your specific timeline! Maybe you need to ensure that the Federation gets founded, or just retrieve the Orb of Time and some tea. Earl Grey. Hot. —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card GameMovies / TV / Radio themeScience FictionSpace Exploration

Mechanics
Hand Management
Modular Board
Set Collection
269.jpgStar Trek: Ascendancy314+180 mins
View Details
Boldly go where no one has gone before. In Star Trek: Ascendancy — a board game of exploration, expansion and conflict between the United Federation of Planets, the Klingon Empire, and the Romulan Star Empire — you control the great civilizations of the Galaxy, striking out from your home worlds to expand your influence and grow your civilization. Will you journey for peace and exploration, or will you travel the path of conquest and exploitation? Command starships, establish space lanes, construct starbases, and bring other systems under your banner. With more than 200 plastic miniatures and 30 star systems representing some of the Star Trek galaxy's most notable planets and locations, Star Trek: Ascendancy puts the fate of the galaxy in your hands. The great unknown lies before you; with every turn is a new adventure as your ships explore new space systems, encounter new life forms and new civilizations, make wondrous discoveries, and face challenging obstacles, all drawn from the vast fifty year history of Star Trek. Will you brave the hazards of Rura Penthe to harvest vital resources, race to develop Sherman's Planet before your rivals stake their claim, or explore the mysteries of the Mutara Nebula on an ever-growing, adaptive map of the galaxy. With an infinite combination of planets and interstellar phenomena, no two games of Star Trek: Ascendancy will ever play the same!

Categorys
CivilizationExplorationMiniaturesMovies / TV / Radio themeNegotiationScience FictionSpace ExplorationTerritory BuildingWargame

Mechanics
Action Points
Dice Rolling
Events
Modular Board
Point to Point Movement
Simulation
Trading
Variable Player Powers
100.jpgStar Trek: Catan3 - 410+75 mins
View Details
Settling the Final Frontier Since 1966, millions of Star Trek fans all over the world have watched adventures of the Starship Enterprise, Captain Kirk, and Mr. Spock. And since 1995, millions of enthusiastic players all over the world have played Klaus Teuber's Catan - a board game classic. It's time to bring them all together on the Final Frontier! In Star Trek: Catan, players start the game with two small Outposts at the intersection of three planets, with each planet supplying resources based on the result of a dice roll. Players collect and trade these resources – dilithium, tritanium, food, oxygen and water – in order to build Starships that connect regions in the galaxy, establish more Outposts and Starbases (upgraded Outposts) at new intersection points in order to increase resource acquisition, and acquire Development Cards that provide Victory Points (VPs) or special abilities. On a dice roll of 7, a Klingon ship swoops in to prevent resource production on one planet while taxing spacegoers who hold too many resources. Star Trek: Catan differs from the basic Settlers in one aspect: a set of Support Cards formerly available only in German as Catan Scenarios: Helpers of Catan. Each Support Card features a special ability and one of Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Sulu, Scott, Uhura, Chekov, Chapel, Rand, or Sarek. Some special abilities make basic actions better, such as reducing the costs of Starbase upgrades or allowing the player to trade a resource of their choice at 2:1 for a turn, while others break rules, such as protecting the player from discarding on a 7 or producing a resource when the player rolls a number that wouldn't otherwise produce for them. Players get a specific Support Card during setup based on turn order, with later players getting generally more useful abilities to compensate for early player advantage. When a player uses a Support Card ability for the first time, they may trade it in for a Support Card of their choice or keep it for a second use, but they may only trade immediately after use.

Categorys
Movies / TV / Radio themeNegotiationScience Fiction

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Modular Board
Network and Route Building
Trading
164.pngStar Trek: Catan - Federation Space3 - 410+75 - 150 mins
View Details
Game description from the publisher: During its original mission, the Enterprise, Captain Kirk, and his intrepid crew visited many strange new worlds and discovered many new life-forms and civilizations. Now you and your friends can boldly go and explore this galaxy, too, with the Star Trek: Catan - Federation Space Map Set, which includes two maps depicting the Known Galaxy. Based on the "Explored Galaxy" map seen in Kirk's quarters itself, these maps allow you to settle the famous worlds of Federation Space using pieces from your Star Trek: Catan base game. Components 2 full color maps depicting the “Explored Galaxy” known as Federation Space. 4 individual scoring tracks—1 for each player 4 sets of scoring markers—2 for each player 18 Victory Point tokens—New ways to score 1 Almanac with 1 page of rules and 20 pages of planet and episode descriptions.

Categorys
Expansion for Base-gameMovies / TV / Radio themeNegotiationScience Fiction

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Hand Management
Network and Route Building
Trading
270.jpgStar Wars: Rebellion2 - 414+180 - 240 mins
View Details
Star Wars: Rebellion is a board game of epic conflict between the Galactic Empire and Rebel Alliance for two to four players. Experience the Galactic Civil War like never before. In Rebellion, you control the entire Galactic Empire or the fledgling Rebel Alliance. You must command starships, account for troop movements, and rally systems to your cause. Given the differences between the Empire and Rebel Alliance, each side has different win conditions, and you'll need to adjust your play style depending on who you represent: As the Imperial player, you can command legions of Stormtroopers, swarms of TIEs, Star Destroyers, and even the Death Star. You rule the galaxy by fear, relying on the power of your massive military to enforce your will. To win the game, you need to snuff out the budding Rebel Alliance by finding its base and obliterating it. Along the way, you can subjugate worlds or even destroy them. As the Rebel player, you can command dozens of troopers, T-47 airspeeders, Corellian corvettes, and fighter squadrons. However, these forces are no match for the Imperial military. In terms of raw strength, you'll find yourself clearly overmatched from the very outset, so you'll need to rally the planets to join your cause and execute targeted military strikes to sabotage Imperial build yards and steal valuable intelligence. To win the Galactic Civil War, you'll need to sway the galaxy's citizens to your cause. If you survive long enough and strengthen your reputation, you inspire the galaxy to a full-scale revolt, and you win. Featuring more than 150 plastic miniatures and two game boards that account for thirty-two of the Star Wars galaxy's most notable systems, Rebellion features a scope that is as large and sweeping as any Star Wars game before it. Yet for all its grandiosity, Rebellion remains intensely personal, cinematic, and heroic. As much as your success depends upon the strength of your starships, vehicles, and troops, it depends upon the individual efforts of such notable characters as Leia Organa, Mon Mothma, Grand Moff Tarkin, and Emperor Palpatine. As civil war spreads throughout the galaxy, these leaders are invaluable to your efforts, and the secret missions they attempt will evoke many of the most inspiring moments from the classic trilogy. You might send Luke Skywalker to receive Jedi training on Dagobah or have Darth Vader spring a trap that freezes Han Solo in carbonite!

Categorys
Civil WarFightingMiniaturesMovies / TV / Radio themeScience FictionSpace ExplorationWargame

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Area-Impulse
Card Play Conflict Resolution
Contracts
Delayed Purchase
Dice Rolling
Die Icon Resolution
Events
Hand Management
Hidden Movement
Income
Once-Per-Game Abilities
Simulation
Take That
Team-Based Game
Variable Player Powers
Variable Set-up
370.jpgStar Wars: The Clone Wars1 - 514+60 mins
View Details
Traverse a galaxy where iconic Jedi heroes utilize the familiar gameplay mechanisms of the Pandemic series in Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Planets under siege populate the game board as players take on the role of legendary Jedi traveling from battle to battle, teaming up and fighting off the Separatist threat. Battle droids attack on sight, and a planet invaded by too many will fall under a blockade, hindering Jedi from liberating it from the enemy or accomplishing missions. Players must work together to confront the onslaught of droids by moving into their spaces and engaging them in combat, utilizing dice and squad cards to deal damage and push back the threat. In between battles, players move from planet to planet, battling more droids, crushing blockades, completing missions to turn the tide of war, and facing off against iconic villains.

Categorys
Movies / TV / Radio theme

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Die Icon Resolution
Point to Point Movement
Variable Player Powers
371.jpgStar Wars: Unlock!1 - 610+60 mins
View Details
Unlock! is a co-operative card game inspired by escape rooms that uses a simple system which allows you to search scenes, combine objects, and solve riddles. Play Unlock! to embark on great adventures, while seated at a table using only cards and a companion app that can provide clues, check codes, monitor time remaining, etc. Star Wars: Unlock! uses the Unlock! game system to send you on three new adventures full of ships, droids, and action! (1) An unforeseen delay You are smugglers in the Outer Rim, facing danger and the unexpected every day. Today, while transporting expensive cargo belonging to Jabba the Hutt, you are intercepted by an Imperial Star Destroyer! Imperial operatives impound your ship and confiscate everything in your cargo bay. You know it is only a matter of time before they take a close look and discover Jabba‘s hidden illegal goods. There‘s no time to waste. You need to break out of your cell, rescue your astromech and get hold off the cargo. Then all you need to do is recover your ship and escape! Your objective: Escape with your astromech (co- pilot droid) and the cargo. (2) Escape from Hoth Echo Base, an important Rebel stronghold, has managed to remain hidden on the ice planet Hoth for some time. The hostile climate provides excellent cover and protection from the Empire- but you must always remain vigilant! You head out on a routine patrol with your trusty tauntaun mount, a hearty creature native to Hoth. After an uneventful morning, you take a brief break to rest your tauntaun while you contact Echo Base with an update. However, due to heavy atmospheric disturbance, you can‘t reach them. Your mission: Continue your patrol, explore the ice planet, and contact Echo Base! (3) Secret mission on Jedha You are an Imperial spy sent to infiltrate the Holy City of Jedha. An Imperial pilot transporting a crate of priceless kyber crystals crashed their Zeta- class cargo shuttle on the surface. You must retrieve the crate without alerting the Rebel scum Saw Gerrera or any of his lawless mercenaries on Jedha. There is an Imperial informant waiting for you on the surface with more details. Meanwhile, Imperial Command orbits Jedha in a Star Destroyer. They are within communications range and expect regular updates. Your mission: Gather intel, maintain your cover story, and recover the kyber crystals!

Categorys
Card GameMovies / TV / Radio themePuzzle

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Elapsed Real Time Ending
Storytelling
372.pngStationfall1 - 912+90 - 120 mins
View Details
What is Stationfall? Well, imagine a dozen or so random humans, robots, and none-of-the-aboves, each with their own abilities, goals, and secret relationships, have been turned loose on a space station that is going to be incinerated upon its inevitable reentry into Earth's atmosphere. You are one of these characters, and the others are collaborators you have on hand ready to assist you in achieving your goals. But choose them wisely, as any one of them could secretly be another player waiting to betray you! Stationfall is a box full of creative solutions, but that box is going to morph, twist, and grow teeth over the course of play. Your best turns will exploit the unique tactical freedom of being a secret conspiracy, as well as deductions about your opponents’ identities and motives. Stationfall is messy, intricate, and full of dangerous variables. —description from the publisher

Categorys
DeductionScience Fiction

Mechanics
Action Points
Deduction
Hidden Roles
Hidden Victory Points
Pick-up and Deliver
Roles with Asymmetric Information
Variable Player Powers
271.jpgSteampunk Rally Fusion2 - 814+45 - 60 mins
View Details
Steampunk Rally Fusion is a standalone game that can be combined with the original Steampunk Rally. It introduces new tracks with unique event cards, new part abilities (Gear Up and Overcharge), and a new card type: Secret Projects. It also debuts new custom dice representing powerful Fusion energy! Take on the role of ingenious inventors from history. Draft cards to invent your racing contraption. Power your creation's abilities with combinations of steam, heat, electricity, and Fusion dice. Use cogs to augment bad dice rolls and upgrade certain machine parts. Smashing through damaging terrain spaces may cause parts to fly off your machine, constantly forcing you to adapt your strategy and discover new card synergies. Fortune favors the brash, so get ready to Gear Up, Overcharge your machine, and remake history! —description from the publisher

Categorys
DiceRacingScience Fiction

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Modular Board
Open Drafting
Race
Resource to Move
Simultaneous Action Selection
Track Movement
Variable Player Powers
383.jpgStellar28+30 mins
View Details
Space! For millennia, humans have marveled at the cosmos. Modern astronomy gives us valuable insight about what’s happening in the universe, but there is still a sense of wonder to be had in looking up at the expanse above us. In Stellar, you are stargazers, calibrating your telescopes to bring into view celestial objects of various types — planets, moons, asteroids, interstellar clouds, black holes, even satellites — as you create a beautiful display of the night sky! You have eleven rounds to play cards to your telescope and notebook, building a night sky tableau. After that, you'll calculate your points, and the stargazer with the most point wins! —description from the publisher

Categorys
Card Game

Mechanics
Area Majority / Influence
Hand Management
Open Drafting
Set Collection
Tile Placement
272.pngStruggle of Empires2 - 713+180 - 240 mins
View Details
Struggle of Empires recreates the various wars fought between the European powers as they attempted to become the dominant force in Europe and the rest of the world during the eighteenth century. Build armies and fleets, make alliances, establish colonies, improve your economy, and ultimately wage war to expand your empire. Be careful, though, as a profligate country can end up being consumed by revolution. From the designer: Think of Civilization/Age of Renaissance set in the 18th century. Players take the role of one of the major powers of the period and fight in both Europe and the colonies. The twist to the game is that in each war, players must form into two alliances. Once allied with a player, you cannot fight each other. This means that you do not have the backstabbing of Diplomacy to worry about; if he's allied, he's with you until the end of the war. This means that a player has to think carefully about who he wants to fight against and who he wants to ally with. Very often he will want to ally with his natural enemy and go to war with the guy who doesn't really want to fight him. On top of this, you have lots of improvement tiles that you buy to shape your empire, plus alliances with minor powers, and the possibility of going into revolution. Even though it is a big empire building game, it will scale from 3 to 7 players and has pretty simple rules.

Categorys
Age of ReasonCivilizationFightingPoliticalTerritory Building

Mechanics
Alliances
Area Majority / Influence
Area Movement
Auction/Bidding
Dice Rolling
123.jpgSupremacy: The Game of the Superpowers2 - 612+340 mins
View Details
Supremacy pits conventional superpowers against one another for control of the earth. Along the lines of modern warfare Risk, only with an integrated supply/demand economic system. Warfare comes in all forms from conventional, biological, chemical and all the way to nuclear. Neat little plastic mushroom clouds are included to show where regions of the earth have been blasted, and if nuclear winter occurs, all players lose. The game also spawned a great many supplements to expand the game further.

Categorys
EconomicModern WarfarePoliticalWargame

Mechanics
Commodity Speculation
Dice Rolling
88.jpgSushizock im Gockelwok2 - 58+20 mins
View Details
This is another game in Zoch's "small square box" line and seems to be a follow-up to Reiner Knizia's Pickomino. There are five dice. Each dice has: 2 x Sushi (blue) 2 x Fishbone (red) 1 x Chopsticks (blue) 1 x Chopsticks (red) There are 24 tiles: 12 x Sushi (blue) ... Worth +1 to +6 points 12 x Fishbone (red) ... Worth -1 to -4 points Players roll dice to try and collect "Sushi" and "Fish Bone" tiles from the centre of the board (the tile they get depends how many they rolled). Players can also steal tiles from other players by rolling 3 or more appropriately coloured "Chopsticks" on their dice. 3 Chopsticks allows you to take the top tile from an appropriate pile from another player, 4 or 5 chopsticks allows you to nominate which tile from the pile you want, but you are not allowed to look first. At the end of the game (when the tiles are all gone), players score points based on the tiles they have collected, however if you have more blue tiles than red tiles, you lose the excess blue tiles first! This game is part of The Chicken Family of Zoch.

Categorys
Dice

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Memory
Push Your Luck
Set Collection
49.pngT.I.M.E Stories2 - 412+90 mins
View Details
Description from the publisher: The T.I.M.E Agency protects humanity by preventing temporal faults and paradoxes from threatening the fabric of our universe. As temporal agents, you and your team will be sent into the bodies of beings from different worlds or realities to successfully complete the missions given to you. Failure is impossible, as you will be able to go back in time as many times as required. T.I.M.E Stories is a narrative game, a game of "decksploration". Each player is free to give their character as deep a "role" as they want, in order to live through a story, as much in the game as around the table. But it's also a board game with rules which allow for reflection and optimization. At the beginning of the game, the players are at their home base and receive their mission briefing. The object is then to complete it in as few attempts as possible. The actions and movements of the players will use Temporal Units (TU), the quantity of which depend on the scenario and the number of players. Each attempt is called a "run"; one run equals the use of all of the Temporal Units at the players' disposal. When the TU reach zero, the agents are recalled to the agency, and restart the scenario from the beginning, armed with their experience. The object of the game is to make the perfect run, while solving all of the puzzles and overcoming all of a scenario’s obstacles. The base box contains the entirety of the T.I.M.E Stories system and allows players to play all of the scenarios, the first of which — Asylum — is included. During a scenario, which consists of a deck of 120+ cards, each player explores cards, presented most often in the form of a panorama. Access to some cards require the possession of the proper item or items, while others present surprises, enemies, riddles, clues, and other dangers. You usually take possession of local hosts to navigate in a given environment, but who knows what you'll have to do to succeed? Roam a med-fan city, looking for the dungeon where the Syaan king is hiding? Survive in the Antarctic while enormous creatures lurk beneath the surface of the ice? Solve a puzzle in an early 20th century asylum? That is all possible, and you might even have to jump from one host to another, or play against your fellow agents from time to time... In the box, an insert allows players to "save" the game at any point, to play over multiple sessions, just like in a video game. This way, it's possible to pause your ongoing game by preserving the state of the receptacles, the remaining TU, the discovered clues, etc. T.I.M.E Stories is a decksploring game in which each deck makes anything possible! Official FAQ Expansions were published in this order: Asylum (base game) (2015) T.I.M.E Stories: The Marcy Case (2015) T.I.M.E Stories: A Prophecy of Dragons (2016) T.I.M.E Stories: Under the Mask (2016) T.I.M.E Stories: Expedition – Endurance (2017) T.I.M.E Stories: Lumen Fidei (2017) T.I.M.E Stories: Estrella Drive (2017) T.I.M.E Stories: Brotherhood of the Coast (2018) T.I.M.E Stories: Madame (2019) The Expansions link below also includes many fan-made expansions.

Categorys
AdventureMature / AdultPuzzleScience Fiction

Mechanics
Cooperative Game
Dice Rolling
Move Through Deck
Narrative Choice / Paragraph
Storytelling
Variable Player Powers
273.jpgTable Battles20+20 mins
View Details
Description from the publisher: The Table Battles system is a light battle game that recreates battles throughout human history with broad strokes and an emphasis on playability. Players roll and allocate dice to Unit cards, with each card accepting specific die results or dice combinations. On a later turn, those dice are removed to activate the Unit and attack an enemy formation, removing wooden pieces assigned to the formation in question. But the enemy may be able to screen the attack (cancelling it), counterattacking (inflicting extra losses on the attacker), or absorb it via a strategic reserve. In fact, in most cases, the enemy MUST do so if they're able to. The result is a tense cat-and-mouse game in which both players make feints and counterfeints, looking for an advantage and acting decisively once it presents itself. In this base game, there are eight different scenarios and 84 different formations. The battles included are: Bosworth, 1485 Ivry, 1590 White Mountain, 1620 Marston Moor, 1644 Battle of the Dunes, 1658 Malplaquet, 1705 Plains of Abraham, 1759 Brooklyn Heights, 1776

Categorys
Age of ReasonAmerican Revolutionary WarPrint & PlayWargame

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Simulation
Worker Placement
165.jpgTakenoko2 - 48+45 mins
View Details
A long time ago at the Japanese Imperial court, the Chinese Emperor offered a giant panda bear as a symbol of peace to the Japanese Emperor. Since then, the Japanese Emperor has entrusted his court members (the players) with the difficult task of caring for the animal by tending to his bamboo garden. In Takenoko, the players will cultivate land plots, irrigate them, and grow one of the three species of bamboo (Green, Yellow, and Pink) with the help of the Imperial gardener to maintain this bamboo garden. They will have to bear with the immoderate hunger of this sacred animal for the juicy and tender bamboo. The player who manages his land plots best, growing the most bamboo while feeding the delicate appetite of the panda, will win the game.

Categorys
AnimalsEnvironmentalFarmingTerritory Building

Mechanics
Action Points
Contracts
Dice Rolling
End Game Bonuses
Grid Movement
Hexagon Grid
Modular Board
Network and Route Building
Pattern Building
Set Collection
Tile Placement
302.jpgTales of the Arabian Nights1 - 612+120 mins
View Details
From Z-Man Games Webpage: In Tales of the Arabian Nights, you are the hero or heroine in a story of adventure and wonder just like those told by Scheherazade to her spellbound sultan! You will travel the land seeking your own destiny and fortune. You will learn stories and gain wisdom to share with others. Will you be the first to fulfill your destiny? The next Tale is yours to tell! There is, of course, a winner in Tales of the Arabian Nights, but the point of the game is less to see who wins and more to enjoy the unfolding and telling of a great story! In this new edition of the groundbreaking storytelling game, you enter the lands of the Arabian Nights alongside Sindbad, Ali Baba, and the other legendary heroes of the tales. Travel the world encountering imprisoned princesses, powerful 'efreets, evil viziers, and such marvels as the Magnetic Mountain and the fabled Elephant's Graveyard. Choose your actions carefully and the skills you possess will reward you: become beloved, wealthy, mighty - even become sultan of a great land. Choose foolishly, however, and become a beggar, or be cursed with a beast's form or become insane from terror! YOU will bring to life the stories of the inestimable Book of Tales in this vastly replayable board game with over 2002 tales that will challenge, amuse, astound and spellbind you for years to come. Re-implements: Tales of the Arabian Nights

Categorys
AdventureArabianExplorationFantasyTravel

Mechanics
Dice Rolling
Narrative Choice / Paragraph
Point to Point Movement
Role Playing
Solo / Solitaire Game
Storytelling
Variable Player Powers
166.jpgTalisman: Revised 4th Edition2 - 613+90 mins
View Details
Theme: Talisman is an adventure board game set in a high fantasy medieval world. Players have 14 characters to choose from all based on role playing archetypes, such as heroes, wizards, villains, thieves, monsters, etc. The game makes players feel they are traveling the world to find equipment, weapons, ancient relics, and companions that will help them on their quest to acquire the Crown of Command. Along the way they visit various locales in the worlds, battle each other and fantastic creatures to make their way to the top. Goal: Each player is trying to move from the outer world and ultimately to the inner world. Players wander the outer, middle, and inner worlds trying to acquire equipment, weapons, and companions. They will also improve statistics with equipment, companions, and encounters and battles with fantasy creatures and each other. Once they complete a Talisman quest, players will enter the inner world and face its challenges to finally reach the Portal of Power to claim the Crown of Command. Then the other players must race to stop this player before he eventually kills them all with the Command spell. Gameplay: To begin, players select a character card from among the 14 provided. Characters have basic statistics to start. These are Life [hit points], Strength [physical prowess], and Craft [Magic and Intelligence]. Some characters are naturally more gifted in combat and others in magic, while others are mix of the two. Additionally characters are often differentiated with unique abilities, starting equipment, and starting spells. This all makes the players actually feel different during play. In addition items and companions players acquire during play also add to statistics, increasing Strength, Craft, Life or adding new abilities, etc. Actual game play is relatively simple, making the game easy to pick up with novices. On a player's turn they throw a die for movement. Player then chooses which direction, left or right, or if meeting qualifications may be able to move from outer to middle world, or middle to inner world. Once on space, player follows instructions on space, or encounters face up cards already in space, or other player if in space. Most spaces have a player draw a number of cards to encounter. These can be creatures, companions, weapons, equipment, treasure, or relics. Players must fight creatures and win before acquiring any other items or companions. If another player is in the space, players may attack with either Craft or Strength but are not required to do so. The defender defends with same statistic attacked with. If the defender loses, he loses a life and an item or companion of attackers choice. If the attacker loses, he loses a life. Players start in the outer world, and build up their character's statistics and items to try and move to the middle world. There are two ways to move up to the middle world, one requiring a test of strength and the other a boat man's ride for a price. Once in the middle world, play proceeds in the same manner, but the challenge generally is increased with more threats such as the desert and temple. However, there is more potential for encounters and items as most spaces now draw more than one card. In the middle world, players may also acquire a Talisman quest, that once completed, will grant them a Talisman. The Talisman is required to unlock the Crown of Command and pass through the Portal of Power in the Inner Worl