Archive for the 'Board Game Review' Category

El Paso is a push-your-luck game where players are cowboys who are trying to loot towns and get away before the sheriff arrives. The players loot 7 towns one after the other. Each town contains loot tiles which each display one of 6 loot types (cattle, gambling, horse, cash, saloon, gold) and a number from 1 to 5.  Each turn a player either commits to a turn of looting, or moves on to the next town.

LOOTING
All players that decide to loot lay one of their cards face down – each card shows a type of loot and a number from 1 to 8 – and these show what loot each player will try to take.  Then, the dice are rolled – each dice shows 2 cattle brands, 2 dice icons and 2 sheriff stars. If any sheriff stars are rolled, these dice are frozen for this town. If all 5 dice now show sheriff stars, the sheriff has arrived – any players who are looting are caught and must discard all loot tiles in their possession (victory points are unaffected). Read the rest of this entry »

Many people have compared Atlantis to Cartagena but I shall review Atlantis from fresh as not everyone has played Cartagena (and will add a few notes about Cartagena at the end).

In Atlantis, 52 stacks of tiles are laid out in a trail leading from Atlantis to the mainland with one water tile in the middle.  The tiles are either in stacks of two tiles or single tiles.  Each tile shows one of 6 different symbols and each has a number on them from 1 to 7.  Players have three meeple (which they will move from Atlantis to the mainland) and a hand of cards which each show one of the different symbols.  The goal: To collect as many points as possible.

Each turn, a player plays a card and moves one of their meeple to the next tile along that shows the matching symbol. Read the rest of this entry »

In Cheese, players flip a piece of cheese (made of foam) and score points depending upon how it lands.  One corner of the cheese block has a nibble taken out of it.  When the cheese lands, if the nibbled corner is facing downwards the player gets no points and the turn moves on to the next player.  However, if the nibbled corner is facing upwards the player scores points: 1 point if the cheese is resting on its largest side, 3 points if resting on its long edge, and 9 points if resting on its short edge.  A player that scores points on a flip can gamble those points and take another turn immediately; however, if they do not score any points on their next flip then they lose all the points for that turn.

The cheese block has large round holes in it of three sizes and these start the game filled with foam discs so it is a single, solid block.  When a player scores points they remove a foam disc (small for 1 point, medium for 3 points and large for 9 points) from the cheese to keep to record their score.  Removing a disc changes the balance of the cheese block slightly.  The first player to 12 points wins. Read the rest of this entry »

Infinite City is a tile laying game.  The first thing to strike you is that the rules are very, very short.  This definitely appealed to me but the short rules do not mean the game is shallow.

The goal of Infinite City is to score as many points as possible and points are scored depending upon which tiles your markers are on at the end of the game.  To set-up, five tiles are placed face-down on the table in a cross shape and each player is given 15 markers of their colour and dealt a hand of 5 tiles, which they keep hidden from the other players.

On a player’s turn, they select a tile from their hand and place it face-up orthogonally next to a tile already in play.  They place one of their markers on this new tile and then follow the written instructions on it.  The instructions have lots of different effects such as swapping the position of two tiles in play (along with any markers on them), removing all markers from a single tile, playing another tile immediately, adding more tiles to your hand, swapping hands, and so on. Read the rest of this entry »

The rules for 7 seemed relatively straight forwards when read, but when you see the game laid out it can be quite daunting as there are a lot of different decks of cards, different tokens, even several boards.  (Not that daunting is necessarily a bad thing.)

In 7, the players are heroes in a fantasy setting working together to stop the Unnamed returning to the world.  The players win if they can close all 6 portals, or if they can collect the 7 pieces of armour with at least one hero having a Might score of 30+.  If all 14 cataclysms take place, the players lose.  However, whilst the game is co-operative, there can be only one winner (so long as all the players don’t lose) and that will be the player with the most might. Read the rest of this entry »

Priests of Ra is based on the classic game Ra, also by Reiner Knizia.  I shall be reviewing Priests of Ra as if not having played the original game because not everyone has played the original game and it is important to see it for the game it is and not just the comparison.  I’ll add comparisons separately at the end.

Priests of Ra is a bidding and tile collection game played over three epochs (rounds).  Players are aiming to score the most victory points which are scored by collecting different sets of tiles.  Players bid for tiles using their three bidding stones and each stone has a unique number on it from 1 to 15. Read the rest of this entry »

Day & Night is a two-player only game which has already won awards.

Players take on the roles of Day or Night with the goal of building temples on the squared board.  At the start of the game, all tiles on the board are neutral but, during the game, these tiles will be changed into day or night tiles many times.  As soon as a player has an area of 9 contiguous tiles of their type, these become a temple and remain fixed from then on.  The first player to build two temples wins. Read the rest of this entry »

Games which are simple but have something different about them always intrigue me and the rules of Strada Romana sounded like it fit in that category.

In Strada Romana, players take turns moving carts which are crossing the board – some from left-to-right and some right-to-left.  The goal is to score as many points as possible, which are scored by completing contracts as well as correctly guessing which wagons will arrive first and some bonus victory points. Read the rest of this entry »

Playing role cards each round to perform actions isn’t a new idea but the fresh ideas in this game sounded like they would give it a new and interesting twist.

In Havana, players try to earn as many points as possible by using workers, cash and materials to build buildings.  Each turn, players will carry out two actions based on the role cards they have in front of them.  These actions include things like taking half the cash in the middle, gaining workers, stealing materials from other players, and more.  Each player starts the game with an identical set of role cards to pick from. 

Each role has a single digit on it and turn order each round is based on players comparing the two-digit number that these two digits create.  Read the rest of this entry »

When the Spiel Des Jahre nominees are announced, I always check out any games that I don’t already know.  Fits was one of these and, whilst it looked light, it sounded different and entertaining.

In essence, Fits is Tetris the board game.  Each player has their own board and will slide Tetris block shape tiles down their board until they can go no further – no horizontal movement is allowed.  The board is covered in a grid of dots and, when all the tiles have been placed, players score points based on what dots on the board are covered and not covered.  Each player has the same set of tiles (shapes) but each player has a slightly different situation as each player starts with a single random piece already on their board and each player’s starting tile will be different compared to each other.  Cards are then revealed one at a time showing a specific tile to be placed on the boards and all players place that tile.  Read the rest of this entry »