Archive for the 'Board Games' Category

Formula De (now Formula D) is a superb racing game that really brings formula one car racing to life with lots of tricky decisions about whether to risk speed or not, blocking, and speed.  So, Powerboats had a tough challenge to live up to.

The game board consists of 6 double-sided board sections which show hex grids with hexes either full of water or land.  The board sections interlock and fit within a frame that holds them in place.  The board sections can be rotated and flipped to create a massive variety – one side of the boards is easier than the other as the ratio of water to land is different.

The course of the race is laid out using a start/finish line and 3 marker buoys which are placed on various letters printed on the boards; however, you can place them anywhere you want too to make what you feel is the best course.  As you’d expect, the first player to get their boat round each of the buoys (in order and in the correct direction) and cross the finish line wins. Read the rest of this entry »

Il Principe is a difficult game to categorise as it involves card management, bidding, area control and role taking.  However, rather than delivering a confusing mix of genres, it delivers a tight game which I really enjoyed.

Players are building cities and institutions in Italy to earn victory points (VPs).  At the start of each round, players receive 5 cash and 4 cards – the cards come in 5 colours each representing a different city institution (town hall, university, etc.).  The players keep 2 cards and the rejected cards are combined and auctioned off colour-by-colour.  After the auctions, a player can either (a) use cards and cash to build a city, or (b) place as many cards face-up in front of them of one colour showing control over the 5 different institutions.

There are 10 role cards (5 major & 5 minor in each colour).  The player with the most face-up cards of each colour gets the matching-coloured major role uses the role’s benefit, e.g. the player with the most face-up green cards gets the Banker role card which earns them 2 extra cash.  Read the rest of this entry »

Zombie Dice is a dice-rolling, push-your-luck game where players are zombies trying to be the first to eat 13 brains.  The game consists purely of 13 special dice whose faces show either footprints, shotgun blasts or brains.  The dice are one of 3 different dice types: The 6 green dice have more brains and few shotgun blasts, the 4 red dice have more shotgun blasts and fewer brains, and the 4 yellow dice are in between the two.

On their turn, a player takes 3 dice at random from the card tube and rolls them.  Any shotgun blast and brain results are set aside.  If the player has any footstep dice remaining they can take more dice at random from the tube to make a total of 3 dice and roll again.  The player can stop at any time and the amount of brains they have accumulated is added to their score.  If a player has no footstep results (i.e. they just roll brains and blasts), then their turn automatically ends.  However, if the player ever has 3 shotgun blasts then their turn is over and they lose any brains they rolled during that turn.  First player to eat 13 brains wins. Read the rest of this entry »

Norenberc is one of the three games coming from White Goblin at Essen. It caught my attention because it is designed by Andreas Steding who created Hansa Teutonica – a game that didn’t catch my attention enough at Spiel last year but I discovered afterwards that is was very good indeed.

Norenberc is a worker placement game with some new ideas. Players commit to where they will be taking actions each game turn before simultaneously revealing their intentions. This sounds fun (Fresco did something similar) but there’s an extra twist: Each action requires a worker and if any players have workers left to place at the end of a game turn, then another game turn occurs until all players have used their workers. So, if you take lots of actions in one turn, you may have to wait a few more turns before everyone gets your workers back and you can perform actions again. Read the rest of this entry »

After almost a year of the Metagames blog, I would really love to get your feedback on the site.  Please take a few seconds to complete the survey.  If you have any other thoughts, please DM my Twitter account.

Thanks,

James.

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Wow, it’s been almost a year since I started this blog.  Those of you who followed my Twitter from the start may remember I ran a competition back then and gave away a copy of one of my favourite Essen games to a random person who was following my Tweets from Spiel at Essen.  This year, I’m pleased to announce I shall be doing the same.

So, one follower of this blog will win a copy of one of my favourite games that gets released at Spiel this year.

To qualify for one entry into this random draw, you need to be following my Twitter account (@Metagames) during Spiel (October 21-24).

You can qualify for a further entry into the prize draw by completing the Metagames survey too (and remember to fill in your Twitter name).

You can qualify for yet a further entry by re-tweeting about the giveaway too.

Good luck.

Planet steam is an economic/resource game that was released at Essen in 2008. It was a sought after item in an epic-sized box (like a FantasyFlight Games big box size).  With a steampunk setting, players collect resources (water, ore, energy and quartz) from the available mine shafts in order to earn as much money as possible.  This is a ‘Thoughts On’ piece rather than a review as Planet Steam is a very interwoven economic system and I don’t feel one play is enough for a full review.

Players have a few starting resources and the basic carriers (which are the stores for each resource with limited capacity).  Also, the board shows a grid of mine shafts.  Each shaft can produce any resource depending upon what type of tank is placed on it.  Each player has a few platforms already on the mine shaft grid which means they are the only ones that can add tanks in order to mine from that space.  At the start of a round, players bid for characters which dictate turn order and give them a special power. Read the rest of this entry »

I posted about the forthcoming Troyes a week or so ago.  I’ve now read the rules and it looks excellent.  Players each roll dice (based on how many meeple they have in the council buildings) and these create a dice pool.  Players then take turns using the dice to activate different parts of the city to gain resources and money.  Players can use their own dice for free but have to pay other players to use their dice.  This sounds like a fresh addition to worker placement and I’m very keen to play it.  So much so, I’ve pre-ordered it.

Unfortunately for me, Troyes combines together two game design ideas that I’ve been playing with in my own prototypes.  But, hey ho, that’s the way it often goes and I’m really looking forwards to playing Troyes.

Link to pre-order page and rules: http://users.skynet.be/fb514094/News_eng.html

James.

Louis XIV is mostly a worker placement game but it’s quite unusual.  First of all, there’s no board; instead, there are 12 mini-boards laid out corner-to-corner in a square grid – this makes it easy to flip over any of the mini-boards but it also leaves spaces where various tokens get placed too.  Over 4 rounds, players try to earn as many victory points as possible.  Players can earn many VPs by fulfilling their mission cards which are completed by collecting the power chips shown on each card.  There are 4 types of power chip as well as one type that counts as any type.

Each round, players receive 5 cards – each card corresponds to one of the 12 mini-boards.  Each turn, players can play one of their cards and place up to 3 of their cubes (workers) from their supply onto the mini-board that matches their card.  Also, they can move any of the newly placed cubes onto an adjoining mini-board so long as they leave at least one cube behind and do not spread in two different directions at once from the same mini-board.  As players only have a limited amount of cubes, they can use their turn to add some cubes to their supply instead of placing.  Players discard the last card left in their hand so usually get 4 turns. Read the rest of this entry »

The Downfall of Pompeii is a light and fast game where players place their people in the buildings of Pompeii and then score points for each one that escapes the city after the volcano erupts.  In the first phase of the game, players take turns playing building cards to place their people in the building that matches their card.  Each building has a fixed number of spaces for people and, if a building is full, then the player can place their people in any building with spaces.  When the AD79 card is drawn, the placement gets faster because if a person is placed in a building that already has occupants, the player adds that many extra people elsewhere on the board too.  During this time, a player may draw an Omen card which means they get to throw one of their opponent’s people into the card volcano. Read the rest of this entry »