I’m not a big fan of Mahjong, but “Dragon Castle” opened my eyes a bit when I took the plunge via the digital adaptation released not too long ago. “Dragon Castle” does, for the most part, stay true to the “Mahjong” style gameplay, but here each player is creating their own castle from the tiles they match from the central board. There are a number of different ways to score too.
Board Games
While I loved the idea of the original Codenames, at most you had to have a three player minimum where one was simply the mediator between the other two players. No longer. “Codenames Duet XXL” can be challenging in the sense that there’s a risk/reward system at play…the more words you assign to a single clue, the more your partner may misconstrue what you mean. I believe that almost half of this game is knowing the way your partner thinks.
In case you missed it, “Castle Dice” recently released for iPhones and IPad devices for roughly $7. It’s an interesting mix of dice drafting and resource management. Seeing as how I can’t find the tabletop game anywhere (when I do the price is beyond inflated) this is a great alternative. Watch the video below to learn how to play!
I can’t recall how many hours I’ve spent fiddling with my digital cities throughout the many versions of “SimCity” and variants thereof, only to tear them down on purpose when I was through with them by calling upon every natural (or man-made) disaster available. “Cities Skylines” is a fantastic video game adaptation of “SimCity” and I was pleased to be able to give this physical copy a go.
I frequently ate at restaurants as a kid and one of the things I most looked forward to was the menu and the puzzles/games listed thereon. Of course, the waiter/waitress only had two crayon colors and my younger brother always had to have the cooler looking of the two…I was often left with some off-putting, unhealthy puke orange color. Mazes were often the star attraction on these kid menus and most were solvable in seconds.
What an incredibly potent game for such a small package! I was pleasantly surprised by “Songbirds” and would have definitely placed it on my honorable mentions for this year’s DGA Awards had I gotten the game sooner. In “Songbirds” you’re trying to figure out which songbird color will be the loudest…that is, which color will gain the most victory points before the end of the game. Players play cards to a grid to effect victory point awards and the one card they are left with determines the color that they’ll score.
I’m not a big fan of dice, but “Roll For Adventure” scratched all the right itches enough for me to thoroughly enjoy it. It’s a cooperative game where players are tasked with collecting so many gems/stones of power before one of the four lands they are trying to protect are overrun. A typical turn involves rolling dice unique to your character, activating your character’s special ability if possible, and assigning dice to one of the many boards to complete tasks. Enemies still remaining have the possibility of being activated, thus doing damage to your lands.
Well, hello! December snuck up on us pretty quickly and you know what that means…another DGA Awards list that is oh-so-helpful in helping people choose what games to look at next and/or possibly buy them for a loved one this holiday season. That’s what I keep telling myself anyway.
Jabuka: an uninhabited volcanic island in the Adriatic Sea known for messing with compasses and other devices due to magnetism. It also happens to be a word game that features coffee bean letters, because it just so happened that the developer thought of the idea while sipping a cup of “joe” at Starbucks. These coffee bean letters can be rotated to form other letters, with the ultimate goal being to form words that are difficult for your opponent to steal while coming up with alternative words using letters in words that your opponents have formed. Special thanks to the folks at Jabuka Games for reaching out and providing a copy.
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My business/economics college class was dry on occasion, but there were times that I enjoyed the projects that the professor handed out. One such project was to create a business and being relatively good at “Chess”, I decided to invent a 3D/4D computerized chess set. We didn’t have to actually make the product, just the PowerPoint. The gaming community and our level of technology isn’t exactly ready for 4D Chess, though I have seen 3D renditions throughout the years.
I’ve always had an interest in the sciences, though anyone who knows me wouldn’t be surprised. There isn’t enough Star Trek, Star Wars, Stargate, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, and other big names related to the science community floating around for my liking. “Lab Partners”, a tabletop game that will be seeking funding through the Kickstarter process in July 2019, takes a look at the chemistry side of things but in a fun/humorous way. Essentially, you are an unpaid intern working at your new position at ChemCo’s Research and Development Department. I know, right? Like, what could go wrong?
The zombies are hungry. You and a band of small survivors should probably work together, but it’s every man and woman for themselves in this harsh apocalypse. Your job: be the first player to play seven checkpoints and escape. “OMZ! (Oh My, Zombies!), as you may have guessed, is a casual zombie-themed card game that’s currently on Kickstarter looking for your support. I’ve already posted a written preview and video outlining the game and its features, so be sure to check them out after you’re done here. It supports 3-6 players and plays fairly quickly.
I’ve seen folks occasionally voice that the zombie genre has been pecked to death (pardon the pun)…I am not one of those people. Bring them on, I say. There’s something both frightening and appealing in fantasy no-win scenarios because in 90% of the movies I’ve seen, there’s never a cure. “OMZ!”, a 3-6 player card game that’ll be seeking funding through the Kickstarter process in late May 2019, advertises no such cure either. Rather, players will be attempting to accumulate seven checkpoints in order to escape. It’s important to stress that what I received was a prototype, so everything that you see and read about here is subject to change. I am also required by FCC regulations to disclose that I was paid to cover this game, however my thoughts and opinions are my own.
I honestly never thought I’d see the day. “Defense Grid: The Awakening” (the original video game by Hidden Path Entertainment released in 2008) was one of the first tower defense games I had ever played. It, and another game called “Sol Survivor”, frequented my time in between longer sessions of whatever Star Wars Flight Sim or 4X game I was playing at the time. “Defense Grid 2”, released in 2014, only improved on the formula by adding multiple AIs that gave you different abilities. Enter, “Defense Grid: The Board Game” and as mentioned previously, learning about it came to be an unexpected (but pleasant) surprise. Special thanks to Anthony Hanses from Forged by Geeks LLC for providing me with a free press copy for review purposes.
“Fluxx” is back with another rendition of Star Trek, this time “Deep Space Nine”. To date we’ve seen The Original Series and The Next Generation…from what I’m told Voyager is due out next year. The DS9 version plays similarly to the others so if you’ve played one of the others you’ll be able to jump into this without a problem. One of the key differences is a new meta card that lets you discard so many goal cards to draw more cards, an interesting way to get rid of a hand of goals you really don’t want especially if there’s a hand limit rule. It’s expensive to buy each one ($20 a pop), so if you’re strapped for cash buy the version that suits you best.
Vinnie Jr. graced us with his presence last night as we checked out “Sushi Roll”, Gamewright’s latest rendition of “Sushi Go”. I don’t blame him…he’s 18 now and way too cool for his dad. 18? Wait what? Ugh…I feel old. Anywho, “Sushi Roll”, as you may have guessed, uses dice instead of cards. The amount of content mirrors that of the original smaller tin, though it’s worth noting that it doesn’t hold a candle to the amount of content in the larger deluxe tin (“Sushi Go Party”). That said, the re-rolling and swapping mechanics are new, welcome, and fresh. Come check out our 45-50 minute play session and first impressions. Purchase links available in the description of the video for all three aforementioned versions, so pick the one(s) you like and help support me in the process!