“Do Your Job”, a unique card game that features two different ways to play, will be hitting Kickstarter soon. It’s designed to be a quick filler in between longer games, or simply for when you and your family only have ten minutes to spare on game night. Before we sneak a peak at what makes it tick, I’d like to thank Billy Mearns from Wicked Manatee Games for reaching out to me and providing me with a prototype copy. It’s important to note that the artwork on the prototype copy is not final.
Board Games
“Heartland” is a three-dimensional tile-laying game that tasks players with earning the most victory points. In this particular instance, each player represents a settler that is trying to develop the best plot of land in Middle America during the early 1800’s (America’s “Heartland”). It’s worth noting that the box art of my copy is in German, but the rules include an English translation. The components themselves have no text on them, meaning that those who are thinking about buying this version will find it to be fully functional (even if you don’t speak German).
“Say Anything” and “Say Anything Family” were among the first board games to enter my “new” collection, my old one having been lost in a series of floods several years earlier (que sad Panda face). Both games revolve around the same theme, much like “Wits & Wagers” and “Wits & Wagers Family” do. They aren’t that different from one another, so I’ll be covering both here to save on time. “Say Anything” and “Say Anything Family” can be described as light party games, designed for either adults (the former) or family game night (the latter). Let’s take a quick look at what comes in each game and how they are played before heading into the review.
Game Salute announced earlier this year that “The Princess Bride” board game was in the works. I know, I know…”Inconceivable!” Not much is presently known about this party-themed game, but I did receive a preview pack in the mail, courtesy of Game Salute.
I’m a big fan of games like “Civilization” and “Risk”, but they often require the user to invest over the long haul…time, effort, a kidney, that sort of thing. “Eight-Minute Empire” solves that problem by simplifying the overall theme to the point where games can be played in under a half-hour’s time. That’s pretty impressive, if I dare say. It’s an area control game at heart that tasks players with conquering lands and owning goods in an effort to score the most victory points. Before we get started taking a look at this game in further detail, I’d like to thank Ryan Laukat from Red Raven Games for providing me with a free review copy.
I give a lot of credit to those who have the patience to sit down with a large jigsaw puzzle and attempt to piece it together, is hard thinking piece a puzzle, choosing This or That is not easy . In my house, a jigsaw puzzle would have a shelf life of about two hours before something “accidentally” happened to it. “Puzzle Me!”, while having a jigsaw puzzle theme, isn’t about spending hours/days to assemble a picture. Rather, players will be trying to build their own crossword as large as they can while trying to stop their opponents from doing the same. Before we take a look at this game in further detail, I’d like to thank Richard Reyes from Brainstormers for sending me a free review copy.
As a retro gamer, I had the pleasure of growing up in an era where real-time strategy games began to take a foothold. “Warcraft” and “StarCraft” were particular favorites of mine, mainly because I enjoyed the resource management aspect and marching armies across the map to reign unholy terror on my opponents. “Hexica”, while not a video game, takes what I like about the aforementioned games and adds a capture the flag element. Players will not only be managing money and a fleet, but will be racing to capture flags as they appear. Before we take a look at this game in further detail, I’d like to thank Eli Ortiz for reaching out to me and providing me with a copy of the game.
North Star Games has always come through for us one way or another, especially when the kids feel the need to get silly (which happens often). “Say Anything” and “Crappy Birthday” are regular hits, with the occasional “Wits & Wagers” thrown in for good measure. Needless to say that I was surprised by “Clubs” as it wasn’t the kind of game I’d have expected from North Star Games considering the pattern. While hundreds upon thousands of card game variants exist (officially or unofficially), I hadn’t seen one yet that focused on the suit of clubs…until today. “Clubs” tasks players with getting rid of all of their cards quickly while trying to collect the only suit that will score them points…you guessed it, clubs. Before we take a look at this particular card game, I’d like to thank Matt Mariani from North Star Games for providing me with a free review copy.
My play session of “The Great Heartland Hauling Company” was an overall positive one. The folks at Game Salute were kind enough to throw in the “Badlands Expansion” pack, so I figured I’d cover it separately just to give you an idea of what it all entails.
If “Euro Truck Simulator 2” has taught me anything, it’s that you shouldn’t take bends at fifty-five miles per hours while hauling a vat of toxic substances. Luckily, “The Great Heartland Hauling Company” doesn’t test my competence as a truck driver…rather, players will be picking up and selling cargo as they move around the board. It’s a buy low, sell high kind of deal (sort of) while managing an inventory of cards and cargo. Before we take a look at this game in closer detail, I’d like to thank Dan Yarrington from Game Salute for providing me with a free review copy.
There’s been a lot of games focused around farming as of late, but I’m not going to complain. I’ve spent hours days months trying to build the perfect farm on games in the “Harvest Moon” series. Perhaps these type of games appeal to my resource management addiction, who’s to say? In “Fill the Barn”, players will be playing cards and trying to harvest crops to earn money. Before we take a look at this game in closer detail, I’d like to thank Dan Yarrington from Game Salute for providing me with a free review copy.
For those of you not familiar with the fairy tale, “Emperor’s New Clothes” is about two swindlers who create clothes for the emperor so grand that they are invisible to anyone unfit for his position, among other things. The emperor dons the invisible clothes and suspects something is amiss, but doesn’t want to appear unfit or “stupid” himself by saying so. While his ministers and the townsfolk also go along with the pretense, one little boy (who is innocent of such things) decides to speak up and point out that there really is no special clothing on the emperor. It’s this classic tale by Hans Christian Andersen that inspired the development of “Emperor’s New Clothes”, a board game by Jonathan Liu (from “GeekDad”).
“Tahiti” is a resource gathering game that tasks players with collecting the most goods for their respective tribe. The game starts players out on a small group of islands, but through tile placement, players will be expanding the archipelago (an island group or chain) in an attempt to control what type of resources spawn where. Will you have what it takes to ensure that your tribe has the most resources by the end of it all? Before we take a look at this game in further detail, I’d like to thank James Mathe from Minion Games for providing me with a free review copy.
I first learned how to play UNO as a kid, back in the day when the dinosaurs roamed the earth. Not only was it refreshing to find a Star Trek variant of the game, but it gave me great pleasure to watch the kids play a game that I once played in my youth. It’s worth noting that there are a few different versions or editions of this particular game, so some of the rules and/or pictures that you’ll see below may not match up with your copy, if you happen to have one. The special edition, for example, has a few special cards that mine doesn’t. Mine came in a tin case and has “collector’s edition” written on the top, but the art on the front of the tin case is different from other collector’s editions I’ve seen. The ones I found on Amazon seem to come in your standard card package and look a bit different, but the rules are generally the same across all versions.
Games like “Castle Panic” and “Pandemic” are well received in my household, mainly because the kids get to team up with dad instead of being forced to match wits with him. It’s also rare that I come across real-time based board games (“Damage Report” being the last one), but when I do, we generally have a good time. “Rise of the Zombies!” combines these two mechanics and thrust the kids and me back into the world of the undead, a place we frequent often. This time around however, we were working together to stay alive as opposed to trying to eat each other’s brains. Before we get started, I’d like to thank Dan Verssen from Dan Verssen Games for providing me with a free review copy.
As an avid chess player and a former member of the United States Chess Federation, it goes without saying that I know my way around the chessboard. “For the Crown: 2nd Edition” showed up unexpectedly on my doorstep just the other day and I was surprised to learn that the game not only had a chess theme to it, but also deck-building mechanics. This is probably the only time I’ll ever be able to use “chess” and “deck-building” in the same sentence, so forgive me if I spontaneously combust with excitement periodically throughout the review. Before we take a look at this game in further detail, I’d like to thank Stephanie Marroquin from Victory Point Games for sending me a free review copy. It’s worth noting that there is a polybag version and a boxed version…the components I mention and the pictures you’ll see represent that of the boxed version.