We’ve started a tradition of writing a group document with very short takes on the games that we play. Of course, you’ll not get as much info as in a full review, but as our reviews likely won’t start for awhile, you can at least get a glimpse into what we think about certain games. The OG writers can leave their initials at the end of a comment if they want attribution…
We’ll post this to the blog every few weeks to give some thoughts on each game. I’ll sort them alphabetically and likely start at a random letter each time so that games later in the alphabet can be “first” from time to time.
Galileo Galilee: this is an interesting engine building game with a nice theme of using your telescope to discover constellations.Probably the most original things about it are the fact that when you use an action it gets moved backwards in a queue on your play board;and the fact that there are tons of objective constellation cards and when you meet the objective and pay the resources, you get to put the card in your player board and use the icons on its side as a kind of track to move up. Very neat! What was a bit weird about the game is the theme of the Spanish Inquisition, whereby when you meet some objectives you pick up inquisitors which score you negative points unless you persuade them. Weirdly, when you persuade them you move them up a little scale so that they become less negative, or eventually positive, but at the same time every time you persuade one inquisitor you score all your inquisitors and lose a few victory points. As a concept this was weird to get your head around, and I thought the game was telling you to get loads of inquisitors and just keep persuading them-I did this and ended up losing 22 points and the game as a result! So lesson learned. I need to play again to see if this is a problem, but I don’t think so since the other three players didn’t go for that kind of strategy and did fine. Enjoyed it!
Galileo Galilei – A surprisingly lighter than expected rondel euro. Move 1-3 and take the pair of actions there. However, one row of actions is constantly cycling so the combinations are always changing. Really enjoy the main mechanism, and how clean the systems and actions are in this one. It may lack some variety needed for a long life, but nothing an expansion couldn’t address in the future. – RP
Fischen/Fishing – a somewhat chaotic trick-taking game where those who take fewer tricks get better cards, which enables them to win more tricks, which enables other players to get better cards. Lots of surprise cards for the first few plays. With 5p, it can end after 7 rounds rather than 8.
Gibberers – This is one of the highlights of the week because it created concrete memories of the people around the table and what happened. At the same time, some of the rules in the game feel unnecessary and a bit rigid. If you want to play Concept with make-believe words that gain meaning through play. As you try to convey concepts, you all end up on the same page.
Hens – Small box card game that’s more challenging that one might think at first. Create a 3×4 or 4×3 grid, getting hen colors in groups. Play like colors without worry about values, however different colors MUST be 1 more or 1 less than every hen adjacent. Score your biggest group, the group you place your rooster (wooden piece) on ½ way through the game, medals on all hens, and a common goal card. We enjoyed it quite a bit. -DG
JinxO – it’s nice to see that my lack of skills at the match game carry over somewhere else; I was dreadful at this too. Pleasant enough, but not a game I’d ask to play.
Kathmandu – one of the new Feld games in the city line. Feels very much like El Dorado with a point salad-ish scoring system. Use dice each turn to determine movement and gain a matching color resource. Then based on the type of space you land on, do an action there. Typical of feld, there are punishments for not being able to do things, and if you get enough, you lose a turn. It is kinda of a race to get to the end of the Six board map but you don’t have to as the most points wins not the first to finish the course. It has the most miniscule player aid I have ever seen. Seriously why couldn’t they have printed it on a card? More frustrating because they included the typical Queen ad cards. 95 min for 3p,first game for all of us. (20 for setup, 15 for rules). As one of my opponents said, why am I not playing El Dorado.
LotR Duel for Middle earth. This takes 7W duel and makes it better. The addition of the Middle Earth story really makes this better. Super quick to play and with three distinct ways to win, you have to be on your guard at all times. One of my favorite two player games ever. Also I’m undefeated lifetime against one of the designers (Bauza). As one of my opponents said, this is an improvement on 7W duel.
Magic Number Eleven – I’ll go out on a limb and suggest that it’s the best “fast” (30 minutes?) soccer match game since Streetsoccer. I was very impressed with how it used a tile-laying-like mechanic to simulate the build-up of soccer play. There’s enough randomness to feel like an actual soccer game but not so much that it overwhelms intelligent play.
Men-Nefer – The new release from German Millan, and it feels like a rework of some of the mechanisms he used in Bitoku. It has action programming, where you play, then you slide across the river, and then replace your tile with a new action tile for the next round. But, you can do these things in some variable order, creating a lot of decisions on timing. Everything around that mechanism is classic Euro point salad stuff, but they were all clean and enjoyable for me as a point salad fan – no zone left me wanting. Enjoyed this play a lot, looking forward to more of them – RP
Mesos – ten rounds of drafting cards in a set collection game. In each of three eras there is some interim scoring / punishment based on events that come up in the deck. Surprisingly simple. Pretty tight at 5p. Our first game has a bunch of degenerate strategies as different people chose simple strategies and were sometimes left alone. I can’t wait to play it again now that people can see how much certain things can score (Artisans)
Mini Dinosaur – I strongly dislike betting games, and betting games where you have very limited control _and_ choices of bets that don’t align with the limited control you have approximate torture for me. Not just not for me, but a 1 on a 10 point scale.
Minos – an excellent Stan Kordonsky game that overstayed its welcome for me at 4.5 hours for 4p.Dice drafting requires that you plan because dice have to be activated from high numbers to low numbers. If that does not scare you away, you will love it.
Moving day – draft boxes and friends and then stack things up in your three vehicles. Gotta keep the heavier boxes on bottom and make sure your friends are strong enough to carry your sh*t. A solid family title.
Ninjan. RPS card game. First play a card to determine turn order and then use your card to play RPS against one of the three scoring piles in the middle. Perfectly fine family fare from Helvetiq, but nothing my game group will ever touch again.
Panda Spin – a somewhat chaotic climbing/shedding game where those who don’t win the trick might get to upgrade their cards by spinning them from the weak (white) side to the strong (blue) side. Shedding out gives you points based on how many cards other players have. Special symbols and variability in suits used add to the entertainment.
Quando – the best Kendi game of the year. And of course the one I didn’t get. Play a set of cards from your hand, then the next player plays a set. Draw a card, taking either the side you can see or mystery meat on the other side (cards are double sided). If someone plays trips, all other players either have to play a 0 or draw a card.
Rajas of the Ganges: Cards and Karma – An AP-inducing little game where you have to choose to take one die or one action from a common tableau of up to 16 cards. It could zip by if you grab cards, but I am not sure you can do well playing that way.
Rebirth: got another play of this in, enjoying the experience basically you are turning over. I’m playing one tile every turn, and then you have to choose where on a map of Scotland you place it. To score either when being placed (by making chains of similar tiles) or if placed inside a citadel, they score when the citadel has been completed, there is a lot of interaction. You are also trying to surround castles with your tiles in order to claim them, as they are worth a decent amount of points at the end of the game. At the same time you are trying to build next to cathedrals so is to pick up scoring cards. The one problem I have with the game is that the winner so far has always been the one who chained together a very large or even two very large large sets of tiles; the points that you gain from castles and the cards that you pick up tend to even out between the players. This turns the game into one in which you are looking to sacrifice your tiles in order to stop other players from making long chains. I’m not sure yet whether this is a problem or not, since both times I played it was with players that hadn’t played before and I guess that’s a bit of a learning curve there. Even if this is a problem I still like the game a lot because it’s just such fun and the components are so lovely. There is a second version of the game on the backside which I’m looking forward to trying.
Resafa – Possibly the most interesting main mechanism of Essen 2024 yet – Play a 2 sided card one way, with a color + main action. The color allows you to move up a special card track or take a free bonus card that refills every round and has a ton of neat ideas. The tension of picking between really wanting a certain color this turn, and caring about the main action, while also deciding between bonus card/special track bump, creates a really rewarding decision tree from one card play. There are a TON of small, forgettable rules, some of which feel like odd patches to prevent things breaking? Don’t expect to get them all right early, which is my main criticism – RP
River valley glassworks – another non traditional board. Play a glass piece to the board, draw all the pieces from an adjacent space. Place those on an array scoring points for variety of colors as well as two most prevalent colors. Stupid quick, only one round. There is a deck of cards with alternate scoring rules but I didn’t use them. The base game was enjoyable and quick.
Saltfjord – An excellent Euro based on Santa Maria. It offers multiple paths where concentrating on a path seems to offer rewards diversifying might not. The dice activation system of drafting a die and gaining the items and actions in that row or column while blocking the final action or good works exceptionally well. I’m not sure I need to own it, but greatly appreciate it
SETI – the big (and heavy) game from CGE this year. Explore the solar system to get the most Victory points. Pretty convoluted so I won’t even try to explain mechanisms. But do lots of actions to build your engine, explore things and gain victory points. Though there are only 5 rounds, I’d definitely set aside a good two to three hours for this one. Surprisingly enjoyable for me despite the length.
Shackleton Base – Worker placement game, with 3 color types – each of which produce unique resources/bonuses upon being played. Interesting decisions on where to play and which color. Also a “dump zone” style action that I would say felt actually really solid and part of the game which is rare for those – maybe not a dump zone after all! Possibly one of the most replayable Essen games so far, as there are 7 modules and you use 3. I enjoyed 4/5 I’ve played, so if even 1 more is enjoyable, that’s enough to keep me coming back. Really looking forward to trying the other modules, this is a really solid Euro. – RP
Shackleton Base – Another big heavy Euro. I found the learning curve on this one to be steep but the game is really interesting. Players “share” 3 corporations (selected out of 7 corporations) in their quest to earn reputation and points by building up their bases. There are 3 rounds with 6 actions but you can also chain actions. I definitely need to play this one again.
Sideboards – a second play, play drawer cards next to each other. Three scoring criteria cards are drawn at the beginning of the game, everyone uses the same ones. For a 5 to 10 minute game, there is weirdly maybe too much thinking about the three scoring rules? But when you need / want a filler of this miniscule length, it does its job.
Space bureau – space exploration where you choose your actions from a spaceship board that you have to cover with agents. Of course your agents have to also be connected so there is a hit of a puzzle there. Use your actions to explore and buy / sell goods for vp. It all works fine. The thirteen turns in the game felt more than enough to explore what it has to offer.
Spectacular – A 30-minute simultaneous action game that permits 16 actions each for six players. Each draft is a single die or tile and then placing it. I appreciate the design and would always play it, but did not find it exceptionally exciting. Much of the scoring is pretty mathematical.
Spectacular – Shelley and I enjoyed this one quite a bit as a 2-player. It’s very fast (less than 30 minutes at that player count) and the puzzly nature of the choices you have was satisfying. -DG
Stamp swap. The new one from Stonemaier. About stamp collecting… Draft stamps and things then I cut, you choose drafting on groups of things made from that draft. Place your stuff in your album and then score each round. It’s a bit fiddly to draft and then cut and then draft again. Also the stamps are a bit difficult to categorize which is somewhat of a problem since you need to know the theme of a stamp to score sometimes. If you love I cut, you choose – this is the game for you. I maybe could have maybe wanted getting some/all of the things randomly and splitting those – but I can see the argument for the current game design.
Stella Quest – An interesting trick-taking game where you don’t want to win two tricks in a row. This is likely better at 4p than at 3p because the more cards in a trick the more interesting it will be. You are trying to collect a set of 1-2-3-4-5-6, taking one card out of each trick you win. You have five lives and lose one if a variety of things happen, creating a loss condition and a win condition.
Torii – a 2p only game where you fight for dominance on a 4×4 grid. Place a torii every time you make a orthogonal line of 4. Win if you place four Torii or you get all 9 of your guys on the board. Each player gets one of six special abilities. End game is a bit of a dance just trying to prevent the opponent from getting a winning position if you’re unable to win yourself.
Treos – a route planning / programming game. Each round you get a hand of five cards, use one for initiative, three for the actions and then either discard the last or put it on top of the deck to draw again next time. You can move highwaymen around to block people. Expect the usual frustration when you get off track by programming wrong (or more likely, you’ve screwed things up because the pieces on the board obstruct the routes). Not much of an arc, you just complete quests (all of same difficulty) and continue until someone has 20 points. Fwiw despite specialization, our scores we’re pretty clumped the whole game, the win decided by turn order in the last round (sudden death victory condition). As one opponent said, why am I not playing Elfenland.
Up or Down? – having misunderstood the rules, I’m intrigued to try this again with a correct understanding. I don’t think it’s going to be enough of a hit for me, but it still might be.
Vampire Nights – I would not recommend it for 2p, as it limits the lateral motion options that are part of the game’s decision space. It is a game of moving one of your two meeples, often to a face-down tile, and seeing what you find. Lots of scoring variables, but the core is that we all start as people but some players might secretly become vampires, which changes how items score. The special action cards give you some powers that let you take people or items before the end-of-day phase.
Yellow house – 2p card game called trick taking but really is more shedding. Theme is van gogh and Gauguin arguing about art in a Yellow House in Arles. Some interesting card management ideas in play here. There is a nice back and forth action here once you get the hang of the rules around how you play cards.
AI Space Puzzle – A clever game where one player places tiles without saying anything to communicate with the other players who interpret those tiles and place people and dice on a grid. The missions are so diverse that when one gets bored, just turn the page. You may have to think laterally and the rules explicitly prohibit conventions, so good luck saving the astronauts.
Ancient Knowledge: Heritage – The expansion to last year’s game about the decline of civilizations adds some needed new technology cards (the decks get thin when playing with 4 players), some additional project cards (including some that have two different game effects) and additional artifact cards. But the primary focus of the expansion is two different modes of solo play – and actually work quite well. (Not included: the rumored “replacement” cards for the “mean/take that” cards in the original game… which, frankly, were not all that mean.)
Babylon: very impressed by the design of this one, this is a gorgeous looking game with tons of plastic bridges, statues waterfalls… A bit like era, in which you are trying to place tiles in a 3-D fashion on your play board as defined by tiles that you take from a common three level open “quarry close”. What I really like her at the game was not the novelty of the pieces, et cetera et cetera, but the clever way that the rules force you in certain directions.
Bomb Busters – Bomb Busters is not The Crew or Hanabi, but it is good fun.It is a co-op game without the need for conventions or even much experience with cards. Consider it an exciting version of Go Fish with logic and push-your-luck. As there are 66 missions with cards in sealed boxes, I don’t know what is coming, but want to find out.
Boxtop pinball haunted house – well thematic at least to play on Halloween night. Flick dice, score points based on what you hit and where you land. Probably a once a year game each Halloween for theme night.
Burger slam – rapid play, memory. Flip a card on a stack, it has one to three ingredients on it. Slap the bun on the burger when the order is complete – either 2 each of the four different ingredients or seven of a single ingredient. If slap jack is your favorite game, this will suit you fine. The advanced version adds modifiers to make it even more difficult to remember things as it might nullify cards or change the orders.
Candy spiders leopards – a JP trick taking game. The only game I’ve ever played with a fafrotskies theme. Lifetime I’ve now played one hand total of card games with this theme
Capybara cookie club – a Knizia game about being in a snooty animal club where you want to hoard all the cookies. There are two discard piles and you have to play a card exactly one more than the number on the pile (like LLAMA, when you get to 5 you play a 1 on top to restart it). Each species of animal also has a special effect that sis resolved when you play it. At the end of the round you lose cookies equal to the highest rank for each animal. It feels like a marginally more interesting LLAMA variant. The components (identical sized 1/5/25 pt chips) aren’t great.
Castle Combo – perfectly cromulent, but not fun.
Cat and the tower – a cooperative game where you build a rickety tower and try to balance things. For a balancing game it works.
Choconnect – abstract tile pushing game. Put one of three types of chocolates into the shared board from the outside. Win when you get a scoring line made (3 of dark, 4 of milk, 5 of white). It’s an abstract and well it plays as you would expect.
Fifty fifty. Remember what I was saying about playing a game again in case the rules were read to you wrong. With the right rule, there is at least a game here. Still not one I want to repeat but it does restore my belief in all things Benndorf. But man this game is still not for me but I can at least understand why other people felt it was OK.
Fischen / Fishing – I really enjoyed this new take on trick-taking games. Can see this getting plenty of play. -MJR
Flower fields. Funny how the game gets better on repeated plays when you use the correct rules. Having figured out the bee economy, the game doesn’t break down on us. With the right economic tension, the game really is a nice tight affair. Definitely worth playing again.
Galaxy Postman – a longer midweight game about delivering mail, packages, and aliens on a board that is constantly being explored. Wormholes aid travel while asteroids inhibit it. A very tactical game that is all about opportunistic play and a few gambles when exploring new sectors. The time on the box (60-90) is a lie. I suggest playing the shorter 5-round game, as then you won’t complete almost everything.
Until your next appointment
The Gaming Doctor
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Opinionated Gamers 2024 Essen SPIEL Quick Takes – Part 2 (14 Nov 2024)
We’ve started a tradition of writing a group document with very short takes on the games that we play. Of course, you’ll not get as much info as in a full review, but as our reviews likely won’t start for awhile, you can at least get a glimpse into what we think about certain games. The OG writers can leave their initials at the end of a comment if they want attribution…
We’ll post this to the blog every few weeks to give some thoughts on each game. I’ll sort them alphabetically and likely start at a random letter each time so that games later in the alphabet can be “first” from time to time.
Galileo Galilee: this is an interesting engine building game with a nice theme of using your telescope to discover constellations.Probably the most original things about it are the fact that when you use an action it gets moved backwards in a queue on your play board;and the fact that there are tons of objective constellation cards and when you meet the objective and pay the resources, you get to put the card in your player board and use the icons on its side as a kind of track to move up. Very neat! What was a bit weird about the game is the theme of the Spanish Inquisition, whereby when you meet some objectives you pick up inquisitors which score you negative points unless you persuade them. Weirdly, when you persuade them you move them up a little scale so that they become less negative, or eventually positive, but at the same time every time you persuade one inquisitor you score all your inquisitors and lose a few victory points. As a concept this was weird to get your head around, and I thought the game was telling you to get loads of inquisitors and just keep persuading them-I did this and ended up losing 22 points and the game as a result! So lesson learned. I need to play again to see if this is a problem, but I don’t think so since the other three players didn’t go for that kind of strategy and did fine. Enjoyed it!
Galileo Galilei – A surprisingly lighter than expected rondel euro. Move 1-3 and take the pair of actions there. However, one row of actions is constantly cycling so the combinations are always changing. Really enjoy the main mechanism, and how clean the systems and actions are in this one. It may lack some variety needed for a long life, but nothing an expansion couldn’t address in the future. – RP
Fischen/Fishing – a somewhat chaotic trick-taking game where those who take fewer tricks get better cards, which enables them to win more tricks, which enables other players to get better cards. Lots of surprise cards for the first few plays. With 5p, it can end after 7 rounds rather than 8.
Gibberers – This is one of the highlights of the week because it created concrete memories of the people around the table and what happened. At the same time, some of the rules in the game feel unnecessary and a bit rigid. If you want to play Concept with make-believe words that gain meaning through play. As you try to convey concepts, you all end up on the same page.
Hens – Small box card game that’s more challenging that one might think at first. Create a 3×4 or 4×3 grid, getting hen colors in groups. Play like colors without worry about values, however different colors MUST be 1 more or 1 less than every hen adjacent. Score your biggest group, the group you place your rooster (wooden piece) on ½ way through the game, medals on all hens, and a common goal card. We enjoyed it quite a bit. -DG
JinxO – it’s nice to see that my lack of skills at the match game carry over somewhere else; I was dreadful at this too. Pleasant enough, but not a game I’d ask to play.
Kathmandu – one of the new Feld games in the city line. Feels very much like El Dorado with a point salad-ish scoring system. Use dice each turn to determine movement and gain a matching color resource. Then based on the type of space you land on, do an action there. Typical of feld, there are punishments for not being able to do things, and if you get enough, you lose a turn. It is kinda of a race to get to the end of the Six board map but you don’t have to as the most points wins not the first to finish the course. It has the most miniscule player aid I have ever seen. Seriously why couldn’t they have printed it on a card? More frustrating because they included the typical Queen ad cards. 95 min for 3p,first game for all of us. (20 for setup, 15 for rules). As one of my opponents said, why am I not playing El Dorado.
LotR Duel for Middle earth. This takes 7W duel and makes it better. The addition of the Middle Earth story really makes this better. Super quick to play and with three distinct ways to win, you have to be on your guard at all times. One of my favorite two player games ever. Also I’m undefeated lifetime against one of the designers (Bauza). As one of my opponents said, this is an improvement on 7W duel.
Magic Number Eleven – I’ll go out on a limb and suggest that it’s the best “fast” (30 minutes?) soccer match game since Streetsoccer. I was very impressed with how it used a tile-laying-like mechanic to simulate the build-up of soccer play. There’s enough randomness to feel like an actual soccer game but not so much that it overwhelms intelligent play.
Men-Nefer – The new release from German Millan, and it feels like a rework of some of the mechanisms he used in Bitoku. It has action programming, where you play, then you slide across the river, and then replace your tile with a new action tile for the next round. But, you can do these things in some variable order, creating a lot of decisions on timing. Everything around that mechanism is classic Euro point salad stuff, but they were all clean and enjoyable for me as a point salad fan – no zone left me wanting. Enjoyed this play a lot, looking forward to more of them – RP
Mesos – ten rounds of drafting cards in a set collection game. In each of three eras there is some interim scoring / punishment based on events that come up in the deck. Surprisingly simple. Pretty tight at 5p. Our first game has a bunch of degenerate strategies as different people chose simple strategies and were sometimes left alone. I can’t wait to play it again now that people can see how much certain things can score (Artisans)
Mini Dinosaur – I strongly dislike betting games, and betting games where you have very limited control _and_ choices of bets that don’t align with the limited control you have approximate torture for me. Not just not for me, but a 1 on a 10 point scale.
Minos – an excellent Stan Kordonsky game that overstayed its welcome for me at 4.5 hours for 4p.Dice drafting requires that you plan because dice have to be activated from high numbers to low numbers. If that does not scare you away, you will love it.
Moving day – draft boxes and friends and then stack things up in your three vehicles. Gotta keep the heavier boxes on bottom and make sure your friends are strong enough to carry your sh*t. A solid family title.
Ninjan. RPS card game. First play a card to determine turn order and then use your card to play RPS against one of the three scoring piles in the middle. Perfectly fine family fare from Helvetiq, but nothing my game group will ever touch again.
Panda Spin – a somewhat chaotic climbing/shedding game where those who don’t win the trick might get to upgrade their cards by spinning them from the weak (white) side to the strong (blue) side. Shedding out gives you points based on how many cards other players have. Special symbols and variability in suits used add to the entertainment.
Quando – the best Kendi game of the year. And of course the one I didn’t get. Play a set of cards from your hand, then the next player plays a set. Draw a card, taking either the side you can see or mystery meat on the other side (cards are double sided). If someone plays trips, all other players either have to play a 0 or draw a card.
Rajas of the Ganges: Cards and Karma – An AP-inducing little game where you have to choose to take one die or one action from a common tableau of up to 16 cards. It could zip by if you grab cards, but I am not sure you can do well playing that way.
Rebirth: got another play of this in, enjoying the experience basically you are turning over. I’m playing one tile every turn, and then you have to choose where on a map of Scotland you place it. To score either when being placed (by making chains of similar tiles) or if placed inside a citadel, they score when the citadel has been completed, there is a lot of interaction. You are also trying to surround castles with your tiles in order to claim them, as they are worth a decent amount of points at the end of the game. At the same time you are trying to build next to cathedrals so is to pick up scoring cards. The one problem I have with the game is that the winner so far has always been the one who chained together a very large or even two very large large sets of tiles; the points that you gain from castles and the cards that you pick up tend to even out between the players. This turns the game into one in which you are looking to sacrifice your tiles in order to stop other players from making long chains. I’m not sure yet whether this is a problem or not, since both times I played it was with players that hadn’t played before and I guess that’s a bit of a learning curve there. Even if this is a problem I still like the game a lot because it’s just such fun and the components are so lovely. There is a second version of the game on the backside which I’m looking forward to trying.
Resafa – Possibly the most interesting main mechanism of Essen 2024 yet – Play a 2 sided card one way, with a color + main action. The color allows you to move up a special card track or take a free bonus card that refills every round and has a ton of neat ideas. The tension of picking between really wanting a certain color this turn, and caring about the main action, while also deciding between bonus card/special track bump, creates a really rewarding decision tree from one card play. There are a TON of small, forgettable rules, some of which feel like odd patches to prevent things breaking? Don’t expect to get them all right early, which is my main criticism – RP
River valley glassworks – another non traditional board. Play a glass piece to the board, draw all the pieces from an adjacent space. Place those on an array scoring points for variety of colors as well as two most prevalent colors. Stupid quick, only one round. There is a deck of cards with alternate scoring rules but I didn’t use them. The base game was enjoyable and quick.
Saltfjord – An excellent Euro based on Santa Maria. It offers multiple paths where concentrating on a path seems to offer rewards diversifying might not. The dice activation system of drafting a die and gaining the items and actions in that row or column while blocking the final action or good works exceptionally well. I’m not sure I need to own it, but greatly appreciate it
SETI – the big (and heavy) game from CGE this year. Explore the solar system to get the most Victory points. Pretty convoluted so I won’t even try to explain mechanisms. But do lots of actions to build your engine, explore things and gain victory points. Though there are only 5 rounds, I’d definitely set aside a good two to three hours for this one. Surprisingly enjoyable for me despite the length.
Shackleton Base – Worker placement game, with 3 color types – each of which produce unique resources/bonuses upon being played. Interesting decisions on where to play and which color. Also a “dump zone” style action that I would say felt actually really solid and part of the game which is rare for those – maybe not a dump zone after all! Possibly one of the most replayable Essen games so far, as there are 7 modules and you use 3. I enjoyed 4/5 I’ve played, so if even 1 more is enjoyable, that’s enough to keep me coming back. Really looking forward to trying the other modules, this is a really solid Euro. – RP
Shackleton Base – Another big heavy Euro. I found the learning curve on this one to be steep but the game is really interesting. Players “share” 3 corporations (selected out of 7 corporations) in their quest to earn reputation and points by building up their bases. There are 3 rounds with 6 actions but you can also chain actions. I definitely need to play this one again.
Sideboards – a second play, play drawer cards next to each other. Three scoring criteria cards are drawn at the beginning of the game, everyone uses the same ones. For a 5 to 10 minute game, there is weirdly maybe too much thinking about the three scoring rules? But when you need / want a filler of this miniscule length, it does its job.
Space bureau – space exploration where you choose your actions from a spaceship board that you have to cover with agents. Of course your agents have to also be connected so there is a hit of a puzzle there. Use your actions to explore and buy / sell goods for vp. It all works fine. The thirteen turns in the game felt more than enough to explore what it has to offer.
Spectacular – A 30-minute simultaneous action game that permits 16 actions each for six players. Each draft is a single die or tile and then placing it. I appreciate the design and would always play it, but did not find it exceptionally exciting. Much of the scoring is pretty mathematical.
Spectacular – Shelley and I enjoyed this one quite a bit as a 2-player. It’s very fast (less than 30 minutes at that player count) and the puzzly nature of the choices you have was satisfying. -DG
Stamp swap. The new one from Stonemaier. About stamp collecting… Draft stamps and things then I cut, you choose drafting on groups of things made from that draft. Place your stuff in your album and then score each round. It’s a bit fiddly to draft and then cut and then draft again. Also the stamps are a bit difficult to categorize which is somewhat of a problem since you need to know the theme of a stamp to score sometimes. If you love I cut, you choose – this is the game for you. I maybe could have maybe wanted getting some/all of the things randomly and splitting those – but I can see the argument for the current game design.
Stella Quest – An interesting trick-taking game where you don’t want to win two tricks in a row. This is likely better at 4p than at 3p because the more cards in a trick the more interesting it will be. You are trying to collect a set of 1-2-3-4-5-6, taking one card out of each trick you win. You have five lives and lose one if a variety of things happen, creating a loss condition and a win condition.
Torii – a 2p only game where you fight for dominance on a 4×4 grid. Place a torii every time you make a orthogonal line of 4. Win if you place four Torii or you get all 9 of your guys on the board. Each player gets one of six special abilities. End game is a bit of a dance just trying to prevent the opponent from getting a winning position if you’re unable to win yourself.
Treos – a route planning / programming game. Each round you get a hand of five cards, use one for initiative, three for the actions and then either discard the last or put it on top of the deck to draw again next time. You can move highwaymen around to block people. Expect the usual frustration when you get off track by programming wrong (or more likely, you’ve screwed things up because the pieces on the board obstruct the routes). Not much of an arc, you just complete quests (all of same difficulty) and continue until someone has 20 points. Fwiw despite specialization, our scores we’re pretty clumped the whole game, the win decided by turn order in the last round (sudden death victory condition). As one opponent said, why am I not playing Elfenland.
Up or Down? – having misunderstood the rules, I’m intrigued to try this again with a correct understanding. I don’t think it’s going to be enough of a hit for me, but it still might be.
Vampire Nights – I would not recommend it for 2p, as it limits the lateral motion options that are part of the game’s decision space. It is a game of moving one of your two meeples, often to a face-down tile, and seeing what you find. Lots of scoring variables, but the core is that we all start as people but some players might secretly become vampires, which changes how items score. The special action cards give you some powers that let you take people or items before the end-of-day phase.
Yellow house – 2p card game called trick taking but really is more shedding. Theme is van gogh and Gauguin arguing about art in a Yellow House in Arles. Some interesting card management ideas in play here. There is a nice back and forth action here once you get the hang of the rules around how you play cards.
AI Space Puzzle – A clever game where one player places tiles without saying anything to communicate with the other players who interpret those tiles and place people and dice on a grid. The missions are so diverse that when one gets bored, just turn the page. You may have to think laterally and the rules explicitly prohibit conventions, so good luck saving the astronauts.
Ancient Knowledge: Heritage – The expansion to last year’s game about the decline of civilizations adds some needed new technology cards (the decks get thin when playing with 4 players), some additional project cards (including some that have two different game effects) and additional artifact cards. But the primary focus of the expansion is two different modes of solo play – and actually work quite well. (Not included: the rumored “replacement” cards for the “mean/take that” cards in the original game… which, frankly, were not all that mean.)
Babylon: very impressed by the design of this one, this is a gorgeous looking game with tons of plastic bridges, statues waterfalls… A bit like era, in which you are trying to place tiles in a 3-D fashion on your play board as defined by tiles that you take from a common three level open “quarry close”. What I really like her at the game was not the novelty of the pieces, et cetera et cetera, but the clever way that the rules force you in certain directions.
Bomb Busters – Bomb Busters is not The Crew or Hanabi, but it is good fun.It is a co-op game without the need for conventions or even much experience with cards. Consider it an exciting version of Go Fish with logic and push-your-luck. As there are 66 missions with cards in sealed boxes, I don’t know what is coming, but want to find out.
Boxtop pinball haunted house – well thematic at least to play on Halloween night. Flick dice, score points based on what you hit and where you land. Probably a once a year game each Halloween for theme night.
Burger slam – rapid play, memory. Flip a card on a stack, it has one to three ingredients on it. Slap the bun on the burger when the order is complete – either 2 each of the four different ingredients or seven of a single ingredient. If slap jack is your favorite game, this will suit you fine. The advanced version adds modifiers to make it even more difficult to remember things as it might nullify cards or change the orders.
Candy spiders leopards – a JP trick taking game. The only game I’ve ever played with a fafrotskies theme. Lifetime I’ve now played one hand total of card games with this theme
Capybara cookie club – a Knizia game about being in a snooty animal club where you want to hoard all the cookies. There are two discard piles and you have to play a card exactly one more than the number on the pile (like LLAMA, when you get to 5 you play a 1 on top to restart it). Each species of animal also has a special effect that sis resolved when you play it. At the end of the round you lose cookies equal to the highest rank for each animal. It feels like a marginally more interesting LLAMA variant. The components (identical sized 1/5/25 pt chips) aren’t great.
Castle Combo – perfectly cromulent, but not fun.
Cat and the tower – a cooperative game where you build a rickety tower and try to balance things. For a balancing game it works.
Choconnect – abstract tile pushing game. Put one of three types of chocolates into the shared board from the outside. Win when you get a scoring line made (3 of dark, 4 of milk, 5 of white). It’s an abstract and well it plays as you would expect.
Fifty fifty. Remember what I was saying about playing a game again in case the rules were read to you wrong. With the right rule, there is at least a game here. Still not one I want to repeat but it does restore my belief in all things Benndorf. But man this game is still not for me but I can at least understand why other people felt it was OK.
Fischen / Fishing – I really enjoyed this new take on trick-taking games. Can see this getting plenty of play. -MJR
Flower fields. Funny how the game gets better on repeated plays when you use the correct rules. Having figured out the bee economy, the game doesn’t break down on us. With the right economic tension, the game really is a nice tight affair. Definitely worth playing again.
Galaxy Postman – a longer midweight game about delivering mail, packages, and aliens on a board that is constantly being explored. Wormholes aid travel while asteroids inhibit it. A very tactical game that is all about opportunistic play and a few gambles when exploring new sectors. The time on the box (60-90) is a lie. I suggest playing the shorter 5-round game, as then you won’t complete almost everything.
Until your next appointment
The Gaming Doctor
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About Dale Yu
Dale Yu is the Editor of the Opinionated Gamers. He can occasionally be found working as a volunteer administrator for BoardGameGeek, and he previously wrote for BoardGame News.