When I was young, I used to play a memory game (like we all probably did) where playing cards were laid out face-down and you turned over 2 of them to try to find a matching pair.  I was surprised that Gameworks’ game Bonbons was based on this premise as it seems such a simple game; however, Gameworks have a great track record and I was pleased to find out there was more to it than I expected.

In the centre of the table are 36 face-down sweet/confectionery/candy tiles: there are 32 different sweets (8 types each in 4 colours) plus 3 tiles showing coins, and 1 tile showing an empty wrapper.  Each player takes 4 of the 32 round tiles (which show the same sweets as the square tiles) and places these unseen, face-down in front of them.  The winner is the first person who has all the round tiles in front of them face-up.

On your turn, you get to turn over 2 tiles (square or round).  If you turn over a matching pair (which would be 1 square tile and 1 round tile), they stay face-up.  Most importantly, you can turn over an opponent’s round tile and, if you turn over the matching square tile too, you get to place that round tile in front of you and they get one of your face-down round tiles in return.  This stealing of other player’s round tiles really adds some fun to the game and it means you’re not just trying to match your own tiles, but are trying to match anyone’s face-down tiles.  It’s funny when you steal someone else’s round tile which they’ve been trying to find, but even funnier to see the look on their face when you give them one of your round tiles that hasn’t been turned over at all yet so they’ve spent lots of time and are back to square one. Read the rest of this entry »

Tschak! is a small card game where players are trying to gain treasure and avoid monsters but the gameplay offers something rather clever.

The 40 cards consist of wizards, warriors and dwarves with different values on them.  Each player is dealt 3 of each, plus one artefact card making a hand of 10 cards.  Players will assault 4 towers (one per round) and the player with most victory points (VPs) at the end wins.

Each tower has 3 levels played in order and each level has a random treasure and monster placed on it.  For each level, players play a total of 3 cards and the player with the highest combined value of cards gets the treasure (VPs) and the player with the lowest gets the monster (negative VPs).   A couple of the cards have special abilities: one wizard’s value is only the same as the most powerful wizard played by another player, and the artefact card doubles your weakest card.

Each level is played slightly differently.  On level 1, players simultaneously play 1 card at a time from their hands three times to make their total.  On level 2, players simultaneously play 2 cards and then 1 card.  On level 3, players play all 3 cards simultaneously.  This leaves each player with 1 card and these earn their owners 3, 2 and 1 gold based on the highest card values (gold being worth 1 VP each too). Read the rest of this entry »

I have been very impressed by GameWorks’ games as they’re always so beautifully produced with real attention to detail.  The box inner for Tikal II not only had specially moulded sections for all game parts but each section was numbered and these matched the numbers in the rules.  Last year they released: Tikal II, Water Lily and Sobek.  This year GameWorks have two new games:

	Tschak   Tshcak is a trick taking game where players go through 3 levels in each of 4 dungeons. The images of the cards released show various adventurers, monsters, spells and so on.  One of the green adventurers looks to be inspired by a certain laser disc videogame adventurer which is cool. The info on the game revealed so far doesn’t give much away but the goal  is to get all the treasures and no monsters.  However, Tschak is designed by Dominique Ehrhard who designed the superb, and superbly simple, Water Lily and Lascaux, so I will definitely give this one a try. Plays 2-4 players in 30-40 minutes.
	Bonbons  This is a memory game to get candy but with a twist because it seems you can also steal back some of the candies other players have won.  I don’t know much more than that. Plays 2-6 players in 10-20 minutes.