Real-time worker-placement?? What on Earth were they thinking? As Dr. Malcom said in Jurassic Park: “your scientists were so precoccupied with whether they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should”. I’m not sure there were many scientists involved with designing Pendulum, but you get the idea.
If you think of Board&Dice, you probably think of heavy Euro games with ancient historical themes. Traditionally, these have always started with ‘T’, so I wondered what I’d find when I received Zapotec in the mail.
Designer and self-publisher, Ben Downton (aka Prometheus Game Labs) has created a teeny-tiny little game which promises to give the same experience as a proper big-boy game.
Ahau: Rulers of Yucatan takes the Maya civilisation as its inspiration, delivering a Euro game mixture of area influence and engine-building. During the game you’ll be expanding your city state, building pyramids, and if push comes to shove, asking the gods for a helping hand
Tackling On Mars was a daunting prospect. Both in terms of reviewing it, and in just learning how to play it properly. Both have been extremely rewarding exercises though. On Mars is one of the best games I’ve ever played, it’s as simple as that.
Arkosa, the new title from Toon Hammer, plonks you on the titular planet of Arkosa, and makes you try to get back off of it. You see, there’s an opportunity to get off this desert world, but only the most prestigious of colonies gets the ticket.
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.
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.
Vladimír Suchý is back with a lavish new Euro, moving back to terra firma after his most-recent outings to space (Pulsar 2849) and the bottom of the ocean (Underwater Cities). Do you have what it takes to develop medieval Prague?
Update – Video review added.
Nemo’s War 2nd Edition pays homage to Jules Verne’s classic novel, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea. It’s a game designed from the ground-up to be a solo experience, and uses the content of the original book to create a narrative game that’s unlike any I’ve played before.
