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Lewis Ralston:
September has been a remarkable month for me in regards to my board collection. I’m an actor and terrible with money. I had a gig this month and I know I have one coming up this Winter, so I was itching to spend. Furthermore, it’s just been the North East Tabletop Expo in Gateshead...so spend I did. I’ll highlight some of my favourites here and even throw in some honourable mentions at the end.
Wyrmspan is the recently released sister to Wingspan, but with dragons. I’ve never played the original Wingspan, but I heard both versions of this game are great. I can happily vouch that Wyrmspan is brilliant.
In this game you excavate caves and entice dragons to earn rewards and score victory points. It’s a competitive and strategic game, but the experience is a cosy one in a world where you and the dragons have a harmonious bond.
I’m in awe of the art, the components feel great to hold, there’s an insane number of dragons (each COMPLETELY UNIQUE) and they’re all hand-illustrated beautifully, the mechanics flowed well with each other, have I mentioned the art? Wyrmspan was a bit of a stab in the dark for me – it's realistically the first game of its kind that I own (I was concerned it would play like Anachrony, but thankfully they’re not remotely the same) and it’s not the high tension, high drama and fast-paced action I tend to be drawn towards – but it paid off. I think it’s absolutely incredible.
Speaking of “high tension, high drama”, let’s talk The Mind. The Mind has been a great time filler this month: it’s a deck of cards that fits in a small box and it’s quick and easy to play. The goal of The Mind is to play cards one by one in numerical order from smallest to largest. The twist? You can’t talk or signal in any way to the other players. You have to meld your minds, and play tactically. The deck of cards is numbered from 1-100, and there are 12 levels (in a 2-player game). The size of your hand is equal to the level number that you are on (level 3 means each player holds 3 cards), and you pass a level when every player has played all their cards. If you play the wrong card at the wrong time, you lose a life (which can be gained back on some levels), and you continue from where you’re at. You are offered a lifeline (in the form of a throwing star? I don’t really get the theme) where you can all agree to use it in order to discard the lowest card in your hand. That’s information, but you only get so many, so use them wisely.
For such a simple game, it does everything you want in a high-tension fast-paced game and it’s super cheap! Best £10 game I’ve ever bought.
My partner is an absolute gremlin for all things Greek mythology. Her favourite musical: Hadestown. Her favourite TV show of recent years: Kaos. Our male cat is named Grover for goodness sake (after the Percy Jackson character). When we saw Horrified were releasing a Greek Monsters version, it was at the top of our wishlist.
Horrified: Greek Monsters has you working together against infamous villains of Greek mythology, each bearing unique win conditions. You are avatars of Greek Gods traversing the intricately detailed Isle of Elysium, picking up items, aiding Greek Legends and (hopefully) destroying the vile Greek Monsters.
You know the devs have done their research for this game. Every single component ties in with the theme, and you could spend hours just looking at the game board and picking out how brilliantly it has been designed. The cards could be pulled straight from a Greek vase, and it’s so fun to move the minis around the board. Most of all, it’s super fun. It reminds me a lot of Pandemic, and I can see this being the new variant I pull out for new players or if we’re “Pandemic’d out”. The game is around £40 and I can see where every penny of that went. Highly recommend.
Honourable Mentions
As I said, I’ve played a lot, so here’s a brief mention of a few games.
Kavango – Only played it once so far. Sushi Go meets Wyrmspan in this incredibly fun game with positive messaging... but it may have the worst rulebook I have ever read. I’ll be making a full post on this soon (@play_the_b_roll on Instagram), so keep your eyes peeled.
Circuitry – A game made by Blood Moon Games, a company local to me that I met at the North East Tabletop Expo. The hidden gem of the expo and perfect for puzzle lovers.
Lost Cities – 2-player versus. In this punishing game of skill and luck, you try to earn as many points as possible as you set off on expeditions on the search for gems...but be careful - every expedition has a cost, and you could find yourself risking it all.
Suzanne Bradley:
If you are looking for a game to relive the nostalgia of video stores, this game is not for you. Blockbuster is a movie trivia-based game that involves time limits and knowing more movies than your friends to win. However, if you and your friends don’t know movies, you may find this game difficult to play.
WHAT COMES WITH BLOCKBUSTER The game comes with a:
· Parking Lot Board
· A Timer
· A mini–Blockbuster Sign
· A set of Rules
· A Deck of Movie Cards
· A Deck of Head-to-Head cards
The whole kit comes in a very fun VHS tape shaped box.
HOW TO PLAY
The aim of Blockbuster is to collect a movie from all eight genres. After the board and little sign is set up you break up into to two teams and start with the Head-to-Head. A player from each team sits opposite with the buzzer in between and one face down Head-to-Head Card. Flip the card click the timer and the players must name as many films as they can that fit into this category. An example of a category is “Movies with Superheroes.” The player who names the most will have first choice of the movie cards.
The winner takes 6 off the top of the movie card deck, after a good shuffle, and chooses three to use. This is why the head-to-head is so important to win. The player with the movie cards must place their three movie cards on the board in the order that they Act out, Quote or use one word to describe the movie in that space. If their team guesses correctly, they get to keep that movie card. The team who is the first to get all eight genres wins.
THINGS I LIKE
I love movies, so this game is a blast for me and other movie fanatics. It’s a box of nostalgia for anyone over the age of 30 who absolutely loves movies and movie trivia.
Watching your friends act out scenes from movies they’ve never seen is always hilarious.
Also I enjoy getting to explain what certain movies are to people who have never heard of them.
I love the Blockbuster design. Bright yellow and blue, and VHS theme is an absolute delight.
THINGS I DON’T LIKE
Most of the movies are from before the year 2000 with a smattering of others from the last 20 years, so if you are under the age of 30 a lot of these movies, (unless you’re mad for cinema) will be unknown.
The timer is a bit annoying, as you must press and hold to get it started, but if you don’t hold it long enough the timer ends faster.
OVERALL
I love Blockbuster, and initially getting people to play is easy. It’s a fun box with a hint of nostalgia and a cool retro sign, which serves no purpose. Sadly, getting people to play a second time is far more difficult. The memories of picking up a film you have never even heard of and trying to act it out can turn people away from ever playing it again. And while there is a lot of laughs to be had, most people see me bringing Blockbuster to a games night as a threat rather than something to be excited about.
Emma Hunt:
This month, I have been playing Art Society. I played it a few weeks ago with a friend for a second time and had to add it to my board game collection. Just for the stunning artwork more than anything else!
Art Society is a 2-4 player game where players become Art Connoisseurs. Players will take it in turns to choose the different size paintings (amount of players + 1) that players will then bid on and place on their own gallery wall. The painting that is left behind makes its way into the museum and the paintings left will determine how the paintings in your gallery score at the end of the game.
What I love about this game is the artwork. I love a tile placement game with pretty tiles and this fits that mark. The tiles have amazing artwork and the box the game comes in is also beautiful. It’s a board game box that you definitely want to put at the front of your board game display. It has good player intractability and is also strategic.
This is the game for you if you enjoy tile placement games with a pretty theme!
Steven Gibney:
This month I’ve struggled to squeeze in much gaming time, the continuing fun of having an 11 month old baby. But I have made time to explore some relatively recent additions to my collection. By coincidence both deck builders, but with very different gameplay.
Firstly is Mycelia, where players are tasked with honoring the forest goddess and collecting heroes to clear the forest of dew drops. Each player starts with a board covered in dew drops and a set of cards. Then each player builds out their deck by hiring forest dwellers to unlock new abilities that will help them more efficiently clear their board. Since each player focuses on their own board there isn’t much aggression, the most competitive aspect is buying cards before other players. Overall, I found the act of steadily clearing your board of small blue gems to be oddly relaxing and therapeutic.
My second game, Behext, involves three or more players acting as spellcasters casting and avoiding hexes. Players must build their deck out so they can continually pass a hex token to another player. Failure to pass the token results in negative consequences, causing a loss of willpower, which translates to victory points. During their turn players can purchase cards and add them to their deck to defend themselves or attack other players. After several rounds of aggressive gameplay, players tally points based on willpower and the cards they purchased, with the highest score winning. The game boils down to an aggressive and magical game of hot potato, whereby the most ruthless and cunning player is usually the one who will win.
Both Mycelia and Behext rely on deck building mechanics but the beauty of these games is that they show that whether you’re protecting a forest or battling deadly mages, similar mechanics don’t always result in the same style of gameplay.
Seb Hawden:
I recently had a quirky little game called Moonrollers delivered that I backed on Kickstarter. I love Moonrakers so backing its little brother was a no-brainer. Moonrollers is a dice-chucking, push-your-luck game set in the same universe as Moonrakers. While it has a few similarities, it is a completely different beast.
Moonrakers has you rolling dice and trying to secure crewmates by fulfilling the requirements on their cards. These requirements are all faces of the dice, thrusters, shields, reactors and damage must be used to fulfil said crewmate requirements. There are ways to get more dice and the whole game revolves around pushing your luck to get the most out of your turn. Push too far though and you may lose it all.
There are juicy decisions to be had, especially with the dice having faces that add more dice to your pool and faces to be used as wild symbols. The ability to steal cards your opponents have been working on for vital special abilities also adds a bit of spice and let’s be honest, pushing your mates to bust and laughing at them is always hilarious.
Each card you are working on, when secured gives you access to game-breaking abilities and powers. You know, extra rolls, re-rolls, face substitutions, that sort of thing. There is also a hidden hazard mechanic which adds spice to the scoring, with a hidden amount of hazard symbols, rewarding players for being brave and calculating what other payers have. It's quite spicy. Getting the right combinations of powers, pushing your luck and playing the odds will decide who wins.
Moonrollers is a quick game with laughs, decent decisions and a small bit of engine building. You can combo certain powers together in nice ways to make future rolls more likely to hit. If you’re looking for a quick dice roller, you can do a lot worse than Moonrollers.
