Kombo Klash is a tile-laying, ‘match three’ game from Hub Games. Players battle by playing the cartoon animal tiles from their hands, using each creature’s special abilities, and trying to make adjacent groups of three or more of the same type to score points.
Big chunky pieces of wood and plastic clacking together, no complicated rules, and an innate human fascination with playing with things. Abstracts are great. Mandala Stones is the latest such game from Board&Dice, and it’s a beautiful boxful of pink, yellow, blue and purple discs.
Looks can be misleading. The first time you take a look at Root’s box and artwork, you could be forgiven for thinking this is a cutesy woodland game.
Santa Monica is a game where you’re trying to develop a neighbourhood in South California, and trying to choose the features which will score you the most points.
Cooper Island is an unusual Euro game that marries worker-placement and tile-placement, along with a bit of resource management.Each player is developing their own peninsula of the oddly-shaped island, and resources are in short supply.
So you’re a Viking. And you’re dead. You’re a dead Viking. That’s where Langskip starts off, in this light, small box game from Crab Studios. It holds the unusual honour of being the second Viking-themed race game I’ve played.
I’ve got to start this review with a bit of a bombshell. Quacks of Quedlinburg (which I’ll shorten to Quacks for the rest of the review) has NOTHING to do with ducks.
The Tu’x Rebellion is a competitive, yet co-operative game, set in a fantasy world. It combines Euro-like resource management, and outright war-gaming, in a grand scale campaign.
Ishtar: Gardens of Babylon, from Bruno Cathala and Evan Singh, is a combination of tile-placement and area control. The premise of the game pits you as rival gardeners, seeking to do the seemingly impossible – grow beautiful gardens in the middle of the desert.
Disney Villainous came out of nowhere in 2018 and captured the imagination of the board-game-curious everywhere. Marvel Villainous picks up the baton and runs with the format, aiming to grab the attention of Marvel’s enormous fanbase. Let’s get under the bonnet (hood, for my American friends) and see what makes the game tick.
