The rules of Strasbourg immediately caught my attention as the game has an unusual but simple bidding mechanic as well as some placement too.  During the game, players use their influence to affect the guilds and score victory points (VPs).  At the start of the game, each player can keep 1 to 5 secret objective cards which earn VPs at the end (or -3 VPs if not fulfilled).

Each player starts with a deck of 24 influence cards (4 x values 1-6) which they will use over the game’s 5 rounds.  Each round, players draw as many cards as they like (one at at a time) from their deck into their hand.  Then, each player arranges their cards into any number of face-down stacks of their choosing.

Next, players bid for various items.  During each auction, the first player chooses whether to bid by turning over 1 of their card stacks and the rest of the players have the same choice.  The player with the highest total bid wins the benefit of the auction plus the 2nd and 3rd placed bidders may also win benefits too. Read the rest of this entry »

Yggdrasil is a co-operative game where the players are Norse gods trying to stop the evil ones causing the end of the world.  The first thing that strikes you is the artwork which is colour-rich, polished and seems almost backlit – which will be familiar to you if you’ve played or seen Ghost Stories as it’s by the same artist.  The board shows the great cosmic tree that supports the nine worlds.

THE GAME
During the game, the 6 evil ones advance across the 8 spaces towards Asgard.  Each turn, the current player draws an evil one card and then takes 3 actions.  Each evil one card shows which evil one advances 1 space towards Asgard and each evil one has a power too which get stronger as they advance.  The players lose if 5 evil ones go past the 3rd space, 3 evil ones go past the 5th space, or 1 evil one reaches the final 8th space (Asgard).  The players win if they can exhaust the evil one deck without losing, so they need to force the evil ones back and this is done through combat and the Norse gods will need the support of Viking spirits to stand a chance of beating them. Read the rest of this entry »

The game’s full name is ‘Artus and the Knights of the Round Table’ and the reason this game has caught my attention is that it is by the same designers who created El Grande which is one of my favourite games (as wel as many others like Tikal I, Tikal II and Asara).

During the game, players play cards from their hand (they each have identical decks) to move their Knights (usually clockwise) around the table.  Each chair has a number next to it ranging from -15 to +10.  When a knight moves, the player scores points equal to the number of the chair they leave.  If a knight moves to a chair already occupied by a knight then that knight gets displaced to the first empty chair anti-clockwise.  Players also have cards that move the princes, make a prince into a new king, and trigger scoring situations (i.e. score all your knights on the carpet chairs, etc.)

The gameplay sounds clean, simple and tactical, but the extra twist is that when the King moves (or a prince becomes the new King) the whole table is rotated so the King is at the crown position which can shift the numbers (and, therefore, the potential for scoring) a lot. Read the rest of this entry »

‘Pirates (2^nd Edition): The Governor’s Daughter’ (which I’ll call Pirates from now on) was launched at Essen last year at the same time as ‘Merchants & Marauders’.  From reading the rules, Merchants & Marauders seemed like it would be the detailed game and Pirates would be a more simple Eurogame so they both interested me.

The Goal – In Pirates, players are racing to be the first to rescue the Governor’s Daughter who has been kidnapped by the Dread Pirate Roberts.  To save her, a player needs to obtain both parts of the map to Roberts’ island, then go there and either pay him 50 doubloons or intimidate him (with 30+ reputation).  Each player has their own character with a unique ability and, during the game, players can upgrade their ship’s battle strength and cargo capacity.  Also, players have a hand of up to 5 cards which can be battle cards (altering battle strength), missions cards (giving personal goals usually involving sailing to a space and fighting) and crew cards (such as +1 battle strength for the next round). Read the rest of this entry »

Khan was released at Essen in October 2010 and I finally got my chance last night and it was worth the wait.  The setting is 1244 and each player is chasing out the existing 8 Mongol leaders in order to conquer more territory than their opponents.  Each player their own coloured set of counters representing their yurts (which are like large tents) and starts with some special action cards and a hand of 4 random cards.

The board shows various terrain areas with a river passing through some and the 8 Mongol leaders start on the board.  Next to the board are various Tetris-ish shaped tiles.  The goal is to place and own these to score points. Read the rest of this entry »

Prrrt is a game by Bruno Cathala and Ludovic Maublanc – the same team that brought us the superb Mow (also by the same publisher and artist).  Prrrt definitely has a unique theme as players are aiming to take the least shame for farting in an enclosed space.  Yes, you read that right.

The game consists of 3 types of cards – shame, smell and location.  Each incident, a location is drawn which determines the direction of play and the starting number of shame cards.  The game ends when there has been at least 1 incident in each location (so from 5 to 9 incidents) and the player with the highest total value on their shame cards loses.

The game mechanics are quite unique so I need to explain them.  In each incident someone has farted and players take turns asking each other who did it.  To start, players are dealt 5 smell cards which make up their hand.  On a player’s turn (let’s say Player A), they turn to their neighbour (Player B) and ask if they farted.  If B says yes, then B takes the shame for the fart right away and receives all the current shame cards and that incident ends. Read the rest of this entry »

For some time, I’ve wanted Fantasy Flight to do more Arkham Horror but not just expanding the already huge game.  So, the announcement of Mansions of Madness was great news.  If you’ve played ‘Betrayal at House on the Hill’ then think of ‘Mansions of Madness’ as ‘Betrayal at Arkham Horror on the Hill’ – which isn’t a bad thing at all.

Mansions of Madness pits one player (the Keeper) against up to 4 other players who are investigating strange goings on at the mansion (crypt, chapel, etc.)  The board is made up of room pieces whose layout is determined by the story (defined in the rules) that is being played.  The players don’t know the reason behind the weird happenings and it’s their job to uncover enough clues so that they understand how to defeat the evil that is at work.  The Keeper plays the role of the evil side – causing weird happenings, controlling the monsters, etc. – and their goal is to defeat the investigators. Read the rest of this entry »

Below are links to reviews of games that will be released in shops next week (in the UK):

Principato is a forthcoming game that is another game that looks to offer interesting game play but focused on a central core mechanic so isn’t too complex.  During the game, players generate resources (food and money) for their city and use them to increase their military strength (recruiting militia and condotierre forces as well as building catapults).  Players score victory points based on their comparative military strengths during the game (after each of the 3 game years plus 2 at random) plus bonus VPs for secret objectives and building cultural items.  However, militia and condotierre forces only add to your total strength if they are allocated resources too (food and gold respectively) – and count against your strength without these resources.  So, you need to balance how you use your resources.

The main game mechanic is the action card system which looks nice and simple but with some tough choices.  When activated, the action cards let you gather resources, convert resources into items like more banks, catapults, militia, etc. Players get 2 actions each turn which can be used to activate a card in their hand, swap a card in their hand with one of the cards on display, or take a favour cube (which counts as gold or food).  When played, some action cards let the player swap the card with one on display too.  Also, the oldest card on display is discarded each turn and a new one added.  So, there’s an interesting element of drafting.

Principato looks like it will be simple, fast and force players to make tough choices.  Players can not attack or trade with each other so the player interaction seems to come from denying them cards.  I’m looking forwards to trying this one.

View Eggertspiele’s Principato page and rules.

Neuroshima Hex on iPhone is a quick-playing well-executed game on iPhone  So, it’s great to see that the same developer (Big Daddy’s Creations) is releasing a puzzle version of the game in March 2011.

Neuroshima Hex Puzzle will contain 100 different puzzles to solve.  I think it sounds like a great idea as it’ll add a new way to play and I do like a good puzzle game especially if it uses a board game.  The iPhone Carcassonne solitaire mode was like a puzzle-mode and worked really well.  So, I’m looking forwards to this.  See the official site for more details.