Top 3 Gamelyn Games
Gamelyn Games Feature
How many Tiny Epic games have you played? Have you played any at all? Are you intrigued by the ‘tiny’ idea behind these games? Do you think it is genius idea or a marketing gimmick? Well, let’s settle down to look at some of the best titles in the collection to see which Tiny Epic game rules them all!
Set in the time after the game depicted in Tiny Epic Kingdoms, Tiny Epic Defenders is a cooperative game where players must work together to defend the land from constant attacks, and ultimately defeat the final end game boss, the ‘Epic Foe.’ This is done by moving around the seven different game areas, and protecting each area of land, securing each regions threat, and using their own and the lands unique abilities.
This has the feel of a computer game to me. There is a ‘grind style’ to the way you need to work your way around the various locations and cycle through the deck’s enemy cards enough times to reach the final round where you must face the ‘Epic Foe.’ You are playing the same game over and over, seeing if you can outlast the game. Trying to stay alive long enough to defeat the ‘Epic Foe’ and become victorious. It becomes a war of attrition.
So, is this fun? Well yes! If you like a grind, then this could well be your favourite game of the collection. I love the feeling of slowly working my way through the enemy cards knowing each round I am moving one step closer to winning the game. So long as I can stay alive! There is a real sense of achievement from this. Working cooperatively, I enjoy discussing what are the right tactics and trying to outlast the game. There is some luck in terms of being in the right place at the right time, but ultimately, the game rewards players who are willing to take on the hoards of enemies and brave out the storm.
Different parts of the land will certainly fall, and new enemies will come to test you. Utilising the many different artifacts and working as a team is crucial in this game. This is certainly my favourite cooperative game in the Tiny Epic series.
There is something simply joyous about tiny dinosaurs meeples! It’s a worn out cliché to say, especially with this range of games, but there is so much ‘game’ in this box! For what is a simple worker placement and set collection game, Tiny Epic Dinosaurs is incredibly enjoyable to play. It feels very involved and absorbing throughout.
You are playing as Dinosaur ranchers, trying to maximise the space and efficiency in your Dinosaur breading farm. You need to collect resources, assign roles to your ranchers, arrange your ranch in the most efficient way, ensure all your dinosaurs remain well fed and happy, and breed the right dino’s to satisfy the demands of the contracts on the market.
There are four main dinosaurs to breed, and then 15 other unique dinosaurs available via genic testing using the research cards, offering greater rewards. Getting one and fulfilling a private contract requiring a specific unique dinosaur is a highly satisfying experience. The game is played over six rounds and the rancher with the most points scored from successfully completing contracts, research cards and for any remaining dinosaurs in their ranch is the winner.
Each choice you make in the game feels tight and important. You will feel fully immersed throughout the game as everything do will feel essential to your potential success. As you assign your ranchers, there are limited spots and getting to the right place early before it is gone is a tense and exciting affair. The entire game is so brilliantly made and so tightly made. It feels like the most well-oiled game from the series and is my favourite game to play solo or competitively in a two-player.
There are multiple ways to experience this game. Either from the zombies or humans’ perspective and in both competitive and co-op mode. The game is set in a mall where Zombies are terrorising the locals, and it is your job to try and stop them. Unless of course, you are playing as the zombies, in which case, it is your job to claim ground against the previous inhabitants, who insist of impaling your friends heads with a variety of weapons!
This is the most impressive game when set up. It has a commanding table presence for such a small box game. There is a lot of variety with the double-sided mall cards and different modes of play. The multiple different objectives you can work on also expand the game a great deal. In one game you could be trying to fix the Helicopter, attempting to call the C.D.C. and trying to investigate the source of the outbreak. The next, your goals could be to trying to assemble an arsenal of weapons, help escort the army, and ultimately escape the mall. And in another game, the goals may be to discover a cure, quarantine the infected, and try and save the stranded.
Each mission feels very different, making each combination in a game feel like a unique experience. And of course, you could be on either side of these roles, playing one time as the humans, and the next as the zombies.
This can be done either competitively against the zombies using an AI as the Zombies, cooperatively against the zombie AI, playing as the zombies yourself either against a group of humans either working together or against each other, or in a solo mode. All offer their own unique gameplay, and make this game feel fresh each time it hits the table.
There are a wider variety of weapons and items to collect as the humans, and a great selection of characters to chose from. One of my favourite mechanisms in this game is when playing as the human, if you lose all your life, you are not out the game.
Rather, your character card is flipped over and handed to the zombie player for them to now use.