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On The Road WBG Score: 6.5/10 Player Count: 2-4 Published by: Helvetiq Designed by: Gabriele Bubola, Leo Colovini This is a review copy. See our review policy here On The Road was the big new Essen release from Helvetiq in 2023. The game steps away from the usual small box/after dinner style game they make. It is targeted at families with a weight of 1.5 but comes in a larger box than usual for Helvetiq, and a bigger production overall. The theme is intriguing. You play a touring band making its way to the Sunshine festival, trying to gather as many fans as you go. But does it hit the right notes? Let's get it to the table and find out. How To Set Up On The Road Kick things off by placing the barn tile on the table near the bottom of the play area. This tile marks the starting point for our game. Now, mix up the location tiles. You are going to use them to create a road. Starting from the barn tile, randomly placing seven location tiles in a row, and then end it with a city tile. Repeat this two more times. You will have six location tiles left, tuck them in behind that final city tile, and then at the very end of that road place the mainstage tile. Next up, set up the porta-potty tile and the ticket tiles near the play area. Make sure the ticket tiles are stacked up neatly in ascending order, with the top and bottom tile showing. Next, take the location tokens and organize them by colour. Place them next to the play area. Depending on how many people are playing, you might need to return a couple of the pink tokens to the box: two tokens for a three-player game or three tokens for a two-player game. Each player will now place their van pawn next to the starting space at the barn tile. They will also take their fans stars in their colour and place three of them into a cloth bag. Finally, shuffle the movement cards and deal three to each player. You are now ready to play. The player who has most recently been to a music concert gets to be the starting player. How To Play On The Road Players are looking to attract the most fans as they tour around the country. The game is played over a series of turns where players must play a movement card, and then draw a movement card, unless you are currently on the mainstage tile, and draw fans from the bag; but only if you're standing on the mainstage tile or a city tile. The movement cards are sadly a little plain, but this does make them very easy to read! Simply discard the card of your choice and move that many spaces. If you are moving from the van tile, you can go backwards, forwards, or advance at double the cards value. Your choice. You will then take a location tile for the space you landed on. When finishing your movement on a location tile featuring a mountain, lake, forest, or field, players will start a performance aimed at promoting your band. Players will place their fans (stars) into the bag equivalent to the number of location tokens of the corresponding type you currently possess, this includes the most recently acquired location token. So, you will want to build up some repeat performance in certain areas to build your fans. But there are benefits to having multiple different types of tickets. As such, you will want to try and land on as many of the tiles as you can to build up your fan base. Each locations grants you a token or power. When you end your movement on a city tile, draw fans from the bag. This action allows you to discover if your fans want to attend your final concert at the festival. As such, moving forwards and backwards in a strategic fashion, you will want to try and hit all the cities along the way to maximise your fan growth. When you draw fans, you will take as many fans from the bag as the number of music symbols you have. These symbols are found on the pink location tokens and on the ticket tiles. When drawing fans from the bag like this, you will either draw a fan of your colour, in which case you will place it on the first available space of the mainstage tile. Well done, end game points! However, if the fan is of a rival players colour, you will place it on the porta-potty tile. When a player arrives at the mainstage they will discard all your movement cards and immediately claim the lowest-value ticket tile from the stack to gain extra fans. They can no longer move, and their only action is to draw fans from the bag. At the beginning of each subsequent turn, any player at the mainstage will take one pink location token. If none are available, you can move one of your fans from the porta-potty tile and return it to the bag. Giving you a chance to move it to the mainstage on a later turn. Then, proceed with drawing fans as usual. Whenever a player draws fans from the bag, you can take various actions by returning a certain number of different-coloured location tokens previously attained to the box. If you've got two different location tokens after one of your rivals draws some fans, discard them to make them put ALL the fans of your colour back into the bag, rather than placing them on the porta-potty tile. Two different location tokens also allows you to discard the recently drawn fans back to the bag and have another try if you don't get what you want the first time. If you discard three different location tokens you can send all the fans of your colour from the porta-potty tile back into the bag. And if you ever discard four different location tokens you can put one of the selected fans of your colour straight to the mainstage tile instead of the porta-potty tile. The mainstage tile is where you will score points. The game ends when the mainstage is full. A different total required based on player count. The player with the most fans here is the winner. Is It Fun? On The Road Board Game Review Reading an interview with one of the designers, they said, “I was trying to create a game that can be played by families in 20 minutes where children can easily play... without any help. I would like to design a light game with increasing tension... The best physical element is the bag. It is nice and emotional to draw from a bag hoping to reveal one of your fans! In the first phase of the game you try to put as many of your fans in the bag whereas in the second phase you hope to extract them.” This sums up game brilliantly for me. With families who do not play more complex games, I can see this being a real winner. For my family, where we are used to more complex decisions this fell a little flat for us, which was a shame as the theme and style of the game is delightful. And I did enjoy the process of playing the game. I just wish it has just a smidge more strategy. But I can see this being a real winner in households that play maybe a few less games. The game flows very smoothly though and can be taught to most ages. The only complex part is the four ways you can use your tokens when drawing fans from the bag. It takes a few turns to remember this by heart, and we found we were referring to the rules a fair few times in our early games for this rule. The game provides a player guide but the symbology on this for the powers is a little off for me. I would recommend this game to any family with budding musicians in the ranks looking for a nice family game to play as a group. It looks great and offers an interesting theme and after a few games you will realise there are some fun ways to play with different strategies that work in different ways.

The Mystery Agency: The Vanishing Gambler WBG Score: 9 Player Count: 1-6 You’ll like this if you like: Exit, Unlock. Published by: The Mystery Agency Ltd. Designed by: Henry Lewis This is a review copy. See our review policy here SPOILER FREE REVIEW There is very little I can say in this review without spoiling things. Don't worry though, we won't spoil a thing. But I also don't think spoilers are necessary. If you like escape room style games, you will love this. It's phenomenal. If that's not enough and you want more, well sure, red on, and I will tell you a little more about how it plays. But let's face it. You are just delaying the inevitable. How To Set Up The Vanishing Gambler Unlock the main box and retrieve the padlocked envelope and loose newspaper page contained within. Inside the box, you'll find basic instructions prompting you to scan a QR code. After scanning, you'll be presented with a selection of games to log into. Opt for "The Vanishing Gambler" and input the password displayed on the box. From there, you can decide whether to play with a timer or without. The choice is yours. Once selected, your first clue will become accessible, marking the beginning of your adventure. How To Play The Vanishing Gambler In this game, you'll confront a series of puzzles, navigating a path that may not immediately reveal itself. Your initial task is to decipher the sparse clues provided to unlock the padlocked envelope. Once opened, the contents of the folder will equip you to tackle the challenges ahead, but where to begin? The array of possibilities may seem overwhelming initially, but maintain your vigilance, and you'll discern your next target. Each accomplishment will unveil your next step, propelling you forward until you reach the mission's conclusion. Should you encounter an impasse, rest assured that each puzzle offers two hints and a final solution accessible through the associated website. Utilising these resources may prolong your game time if you're playing with a timer, but otherwise, they won't hinder your progress. Even if you're not the most adept at these games, like myself, the hints are there as a safety net. I personally found I only needed to resort to them twice, and with a bit more patience and confidence, I believe I could've solved the puzzles independently. Nonetheless, remember that the primary goal is to enjoy the experience. Use them if you need to. Progress through each puzzle until you reach the ultimate objective. This game is about success or failure, but I am certain you'll eventually get there. Best of luck on your journey! And remember to have fun, and look for everything... everywhere! Is It Fun? The Vanishing Gambler Escape Room Board Game Review This is hands down the best experience I have ever had with a game in this genre. It was so smooth, satisfying, and rewarding to play through, while navigating the tricky balance of being challenging but achievable. As you would expect with all products from this publisher, the components are seriously impressive and add a real premium sense of quality and class as you play, elevating the experience to one you may otherwise expect from visiting a physical escape room. The story and puzzles are genuinely engaging, and there were some real "WOW!" moments for us as we played. Actual gasps of exclamation as we saw things for the first time, discovered hidden clues, and accessed new parts of the story. It all felt a little more believable than some of the other storylines in this series. It felt more plausible, which, if it suits you, may add to your experience too. Although, if you prefer more sci-fi storylines, I would encourage you to check out The Man From Sector Six, which is also fantastic. The game can only be played once; after that, you will know everything, and the challenge and excitement are gone. However, like all products in this series, when you complete this, you will be offered simple and clear guidelines to reset the game to look 100% good-as-new, for you to pass on to a friend or family member for them to enjoy. There is a difficult balance for publishers of these games in this regard. Do you build something disposable, cheap, and small that people don't mind throwing away when done, or something more luxurious like this that offers an objectively better experience, but that comes at a real cost? I like that we as consumers have the choice. But personally, I prefer these experiences. Sure, they cost more. But they are unquestionably better. And as mentioned, easily resettable. Nothing is damaged or destroyed. And I am excited to give this to someone else and discuss their experiences with it when they are done. If this sounds like fun to you, I would encourage you to get into a little group with some local friends, buy all the games this publisher has, and share them amongst yourselves. They are all truly amazing experiences.

Star Trek: Away Missions WBG Score: 8 Player Count: 2-4 You’ll like this if you like: Warhammer Underworlds Published by: Gale Force Nine, LLC Designed by: Andrew Haught, Mike Haught, Phil Yates This is a free review copy. See our review policy here By Steve Godfrey At this point you’ll probably expect me to make some sort of stupid joke where I pretend to mix up two of the most popular space franchises because they’ve both got the word star in their title just for the cheap laughs. Well do you know what? I’m not gonna do it. Over the last couple of years of reviewing I think I’ve grown up and I believe I’m past such childish antics. Now, if you’ll excuse me I’ve just received a message from the USS Orville that a Vogon constructor fleet is making its way towards a Stargate bound for earth with a view to destroying it to make way for a bypass. So I’d ideally like to get this review out before then. Turns out planetary destruction isn’t good for the views. May the Schwartz be With You! How to engage warp For your first game set the board up as per the quick start guide. If not, see the rules to find how to customise the board set up. Pick the faction you’ll be playing with and set up the characters by filling in any of the holes on their boards with skill pegs. This base game comes with two factions. The Federation and the Borg but expansions will introduce others. Players will then pick their main objective on their double sided objective card. This will get you points at the end of the game if you complete it. Some will let you accumulate points throughout the game when you do certain things. Each player will then draw five support and five mission cards from their deck. Roll a die for initiative and the first player chooses one of their characters to activate. On a turn a player can take two actions. Move up to your activated characters max speed through normal spaces or turbo lifts but not through opposing characters or a space with two friendly characters. Take cover puts a take cover token on a character which allows them to roll an additional defence dice if attacked. This gets removed when that character moves out of that space. Special actions are any actions on cards or character boards. Mostly you’ll be using cards to complete missions that will get you those all important victory points to win the game. These generally need you to complete skill checks at particular terminals in the game. To do this check the skill score on the character and take that many dice. You can then take an extra die if you share a speciality with the mission. For example, if the mission wants a security skill check and you use Worf, who has a security speciality, then you get the extra dice. Roll those dice, and any rolls of four or above count as a success. The card then gets placed in a score pile for the end of the game. Attack. To attack, choose your target and check line of sight (three words that send shivers up many gamers spines) here it’s pretty simple. As long as you can draw an uninterrupted line between the space you're in to an opponent's space (that doesn’t go through a friendly character) you can hit them. Pick your weapon and gather the dice it gives you and add them to your attack skill dice and roll them and line them up from highest to lowest on the dice track. The defender does the same with their defence dice and lines those up highest to lowest next to the attack dice. Then compare the dice. Attacks that are higher than the opposite defence dice score a hit regardless of what was rolled. So a 2 against a 1 will hit. However any unopposed dice needs a 4 to hit. Damage is taken by removing pegs from that defender's character board and weakening their skills. When a character has no pegs on their board then one more hit will neutralise them and they are out of the game. If you happen to neutralise someone as the Borg then congratulations, they’ve been assimilated and you now have a shiny new recruit to the cause. With both skill checks and attacks/defence you can discard a card from your hand to re roll dice. You can do this as many times as you want. Once everyone has activated all of their characters the round ends. Remove all activated tokens, discard any unwanted cards from your hand and draw back up to five mission and five support cards. Roll a die for initiative and go again. At the end of the third round the game ends. Score all mission cards and your main objective and the player with the most points wins. Star Trekkin’ across the universe. I’ve got a certain amount of respect for publishers who try to make an original thematic game out of any big IP (intellectual property), especially one that’s as big and sprawling as Star Trek. It’s difficult trying to capture the essence of what fans love about it whilst still being a fun and engaging (pun not intended) game. When it comes to themes I think Gale Force Nine do a great job with any IPs they touch, well certainly the ones I've played anyway. Now I've got a decent knowledge of Star Trek and I reckon I know enough to do pretty well in a pub quiz, but not enough to get caught up in a deep dive conversation at a Trek convention. For example I had to look up who Shelby was (one of the characters in this box. I’ve only seen those episodes once). I’ll also commend them for going with this character because it’s thematic to the initial setting rather than one of the other more popular characters. If their previous Doctor Who game is anything to go by then they definitely put a lot of effort and research into their themes. In that game alone there are some pretty deep cut references. They seem to have some real fans working on these games and if nothing else the fans will get a kick out of seeing some of these cool thematic elements and little nods to some of the more obscure references, all whilst appealing to more casual fans of these shows/movies. I’m talking about the theme a lot but getting that essence right in games like this is key, even if the game is solid, if you’re using a well known brand like this you need to make it feel like it and if you don’t get that right, even on a surface level, then you’ll be sure to alienate a lot of your core fan base. It’s a tough balancing act to get right that unfortunately a lot of IP based games don’t manage to pull off. Star Trek: Away Missions, thankfully does get it right. At this point I’ve only used the base game but the two factions involved in that box really feel like their on screen counterparts. Resistance is useless The Borg slowly stomp round the decks like some horror movie villain posing the ever looming threat of assimilation. I don’t know if having seen the Borg on screen helps, but seeing one of those figures getting closer to you felt genuinely tense and imposing. Mostly because if a Borg neutralises an opponent they take control of them for their collective. They’re not all about assimilating others though. Even though they have a couple of missions based on assimilating opponents units, they’re more about taking over areas of the ship. That doesn’t mean that the player in control won’t go for your characters though because their hive mind ability (the active Borg can give one of their actions to another one) is a great way of helping complete their more difficult skill cards, so the more Borg they have in the collective the better. These particular mission cards ask you for multiple accumulative successes to complete and aren’t always possible in one round with one Borg so to get through more missions you’ll certainly need to sacrifice part or all of another Borg's activation to complete those cards. Unlike the Federation who have lots of specialities, the Borg start off as blank slates but they’ve got lots of opportunity to upgrade themselves with those all important skill boosts. I love how customisable this makes them. You can put any one of them in a space and throw an appropriate upgrade on them for a boost, where the Federation have to spend time manoeuvring certain characters into position if they want those boosts. Adapting is the other important game in town. If you compare the Borg to the Federation you’ll quickly see how squishy they are compared to their human counterparts. Maybe having robot parts isn’t all it’s cracked up to be? However, completing some missions will get you adapt tokens and these will be used in conjunction with some support cards that will let you add additional dice in combat, defence, skill checks etc. So before you know it those squishy Borg will be a force to be reckoned with. Especially when you consider that more of the metal mickeys will be populating the board every round. The more difficult the task, the more sweeter the victory. The Federation on the other hand are more than happy to wander round completing missions and keeping themselves to themselves, after all why would you purposely start a fight with the Borg? When it comes to combat, the Federations main phasers are set to stun but don’t be fooled into thinking that they won’t bring out the big guns when need be as they have a good array of firepower to equip if you want something with a little more kick. They’ve got a few missions that rely on neutralising a target but for the most part they’re all skill checks and some of them require two separate checks to complete. I.e. Complete one at one terminal and then complete another at a different terminal with another character. Their whole thing is very much cooperation. It creates a lovely chess-like puzzle as you try to manoeuvre your characters into position to score as much as you can. Even more so when you’re trying to do it with the characters who can get you those skill bonuses. In fact a lot of their support deck is all about cooperation. It’s composed of healing cards and a good assortment of cards that grant either extra movement or ones that give movement to other friendly characters. It’s certainly thematic and really helps get into position to score those higher point cards. Set phasers to fun I’ve seen people mention that the game isn’t interactive enough and that potentially combat doesn’t happen often enough and in some respects that can be very true. In regards to that though this game very much reminds me of Scythe wherein the focus is very much on manoeuvring and objectives and combat is there as an objective and tactical move but certainly isn't intended to be used as a long term goal. Again, this for me all feels very thematic, after all I never really saw Star Trek as an all out action show. Of course how much combat there is in the game completely depends on how, as a player, you want to approach each game or even how you go about building your deck of cards should you choose to do that. But the fact that this game isn’t just about combat is one of the reasons I enjoy it as much as I do. Outside of being thematic, Star Trek: Away Missions is just a lot of fun. I love the puzzle of trying to get your people in position to try and complete missions. Succeeding is great but failing them brings its own agonising decision of whether you’re going to discard a card to try and re roll some dice. Granted that may be an easy decision at first, but the more you fail the more you find yourself hesitating, can you afford to discard another card to try again? should you just accept your fate and walk away? Or should you try again?, because you can’t possibly fail a third time right? I really like that the game ramps up as the rounds progress and makes each one an ever desperate clamber for points. You generally never know how well each other is doing, well, unless one player's score pile is looking a little light, but you’ll all be trying to eke out one last card just in case that’s the one that takes the game for you. There's Klingons on the starboard bow. As I mentioned earlier this set only comes with the two factions. At the time of writing there are 7 additional sets that have been released. Another Federation box, two Klingon and two Romulans. These are all The Next Generation based sets and there are 2 more Federation sets but these cover the original series (I’ll be reviewing those two boxes soon so watch this final frontier…err space) so at the moment I’m giving this game an 8. There's enough replayability in this core box to keep you going for a decent amount of games. The variation of the tile setup, the missions, playing both factions and even doing a little bit of deck building with the extra cards. But that’s only going to get you so far before you’ll be gagging for something extra. Of course this isn’t designed to be just these two factions so eventually you’ll want to think about getting some expansion sets. At the time of writing this I’ve only really used the two Original series expansion sets so I've not really managed to dive into everything this game can offer in terms of variability with different factions. I do think that this is where the game will really start to shine though. Even if you only get one box of Klingons and Romulans I think that will give you that bit of extra choice you need to make the game pop. With more choice comes the need to store all of this stuff and that’s something that the core box isn't designed for. Which I’m still a bit torn on if I’m honest. In one respect I would have loved it if they'd designed the insert with some future faction storage in mind (not everything of course.) On the other hand, having each one in their own separate boxes does make them easier to grab at a glance for a quick plug and play style game. Although this goes out of the window a bit if you’re changing up a team or wanting to create some decks. Let’s hope for some kind of storage solution in the future. Star Trek: Away Missions is billed as a 2-4 player game but the 3 & 4 players games need the addition of a few extra tiles to create a bigger map so you’ll essentially need access to another core box which I think is a big shame. Unlike games like Star Wars Rebellion or Memoir 44 that are 2 player games with rules in place for more players (which personally I think should only be played at 2) I would love to try this with more players. I think having more players running round the map could be a lot of fun and at this point I really hope Gale Force 9 see their way to releasing an additional map pack, a) to have a change or setting and b) to add in the tiles we need to play at the higher player counts. Don’t get a big head So certainly the most divisive thing you read about in the game is the miniatures. They’ve gone down a more cartoony bigger head approach and the be frank, your either gonna love them or hate them. They join a pantheon of marmite board game miniatures along with the Marvel United minis. Personally I really like them, it makes them easier to tell apart from a distance when they’re unpainted and it adds a bit of character to them. I’ll admit that it is a bit of a contrast when you consider that they’ve used screen shots on the cards and then used non realistic minis but I do think the scale is needed, especially if you’ve got no plans to paint them. The Borg are a little harder to tell apart being as though they’re very similar looking so you’ll have to reference the card with the model art work. It the names/numbers on each base go a way to helping. It’s life Jim but not as we know it. If you’re a fan that’s been on the lookout for a fun and thematic Star Trek game (that isn’t based on ship to ship combat) then Star Trek: Away Missions is well worth checking out. The core box does a great job of pulling you in and giving you a fun experience that, even though it’s enough on its own, it’ll leave you eager to pick up more factions and really open it up to the final frontier. Right, I’m going to board my own enterprise, open it up to warp 6 and gonna find me some Klingons!.......by which I mean I’m gonna drive to my FLGS to get some expansions.

Vaalbara WBG Score: 8 Player Count: 2-5 You’ll like this if you like: Libertalia, Citadel, Santo Domingo Published by: Studio H Designed by: Olivier Cipière This is a free review copy. See our review policy here By Steve Godfrey Vaalbara is, according to the rulebook, an as yet undiscovered continent and not the nickname of the local pub landlady who has a penchant for banning the locals (Val barrer?No...? Fine I’ll get on with the review) How to discover a continent. To set up separate out all the land cards relevant to your player count, shuffle them and place as many cards as you have players in a row. Then set out another row behind those. Place the rest of the deck behind those rows face down and orientate them so that the grey triangle points to the right. Then give everyone two victory points and their deck of 12 cards which they’ll then shuffle and draw 5. On a turn everyone will pick one card from their hand to play face down. Everyone reveals their cards and places them in ascending order. In the case of any ties look at the top card of the face down land cards. It’ll show each of the colours in a descending order and the leftmost player colour will have their card go before the other/s. This is why the orientation of the deck matters. In ascending order players will trigger their cards' effect and then take a land card from the front row of cards to be placed in front of them and then score it immediately. Each type of land card will score differently. Forrest’s are straight up points. Meadows get you 1 point for each one in your and your neighbours realms. Mountains gain 10 if you have two or 20 if you have four. Fields get you 2 points per field in your realm including the one you just played. Villages get you 2 per different land in your realm. Rivers get you points equal to the card number you played (max 6) multiplied by the number of rivers in your realm. At the end of a round slide the back row of land cards forward and then fill in the back row. Players draw back up to five cards and you go again. After 9 rounds total up your points. If at the end of the game you have 5 different lands you score 5 points, or if you have 6 different lands you score 10. Choose your role Do you remember the game where you realised that a particular mechanism clicked with you? Was there a particular tussle in an area control game or a particular combo you set off in a deck builder where you had that eureka moment that made you want to start buying as many of those games as you possibly can? Well in the case of simultaneous role/card selection games (there’s gotta be a better descriptor for it out there) Vaalbara was that game for me. There’s something about this genre of games that I find kind of infuriating but also really tense and fun in the same way you might find a game of poker but without the massive dip in your bank account afterwards (note to self: get better at poker) That moment as you carefully work out your plan for the round, pick your card and dubiously place it face down on the table just hoping that someone else hasn’t foiled your best laid plans. Then the tense waiting and the reveal as you find out if you’ve even got any chance at all of your plan working, or if someone has had a better plan than you. Even worse, they’ve had the same idea but they happen to be the one winning the tie this round. That one little card flip can be the line between a low scoring round or a high scoring round. Having played quite a few games with this mechanism I've really come to love it…..for the most part, there’s been one exception so far. 12 explorers of such lethal cunning. In Vaalbara you’ve only got 12 cards in your deck but all of them are good. There’s none that I look at when they come into my hand where I think urgh, why is this even in here. However, they’re not all going to be good all the time, some are quite situational, but they’re not going to be so situational that you’ll only play them once in a blue moon. For example, the carpenter is going to get you 3 points per Forrest in your realm which is mainly going to get played over something else if you’ve got a few forests. Some cards let you swap cards from your realm or the deck or even swap between rows and here’s where a touch of “hate swapping” if that’s a thing, comes in. Generally you’ll be doing it to help yourself but now and then swapping out a mountain that you know someone else wants is pretty fun. Some cards will have you getting a reward depending on where you come in the turn order, or which cards your neighbours play and these are some of the most tense in the game because they’re always a gamble. They can be genuine mini nail biters. A lovely little touch with these cards is that you’ll only be against your two neighbours which means that the odds won’t change across the player counts except for two players Carpenter No 5 The low and high initiative cards have a great risk/reward factor to them. The lower cards (meaning you’ve more chance of going first) will generally give things to other players but it may just be worth it to get what you want. The higher cards have the better benefits. The Farmer, No 12 (which incidentally isn’t a follow up to Mambo No 5) lets you double the rewards of the land you take but is like the famous box of chocolate as in, you never know what you're gonna get. One game Vaalbara frequently gets compared to is Libertalia and even though I like that game, one thing it does that I find fiddly (I’ve only played the new Winds of Galecrest) is the tie breaker. I know they’ve made it easier for the new version but for some reason my brain still has trouble figuring out which way it reads, I know this is probably more a me problem. Regardless, Vaalbara takes out any uncertainty and makes tie breakers nice and simple. You look at the card on top of the deck which has a colour sequence and there’s your tiebreaker. I love it. This does bring me to one of my little issues with the game and that’s determining colours. Every card in every deck is only discernible by its card back meaning that when you check for tiebreakers and even when you need to see who’s card is next (because I guarantee you’ll forget) you need to turn the cards over. Now I know this is a little niggle and it takes a second to flip a card over, but I think just the addition of a symbol in the player colour on the front of the card would have made things so much smoother. They’ve added this to the cards on board game arena and it doesn’t cover any of the game's beautiful artwork. In exploration, there’s safety in numbers. The two player game falls a little flat for me because you’ve now only got that 50/50 chance of one of those “before your neighbour” cards working or failing and it makes it a little less interesting for me and I think that’s the best way to describe the two player game. There are also cards that don’t work quite as well, or are just less interesting in general. The fighter #1 (as mentioned previously) is now not worth keeping in your hand to rack up points since at best you’ll only get one out of it. The bard (#2 give two points to a player of your choice) and the falconer (#6 steal two from the player who played before you) can easily turn into a back and forth coin swap. I much prefer the better choice of lands you get with more players, it just makes for a more interesting decision over the cards you play and the land you could get. This decision gets better as the player count scales up which makes this a game that I’d much rather play with as many as I can and I honestly think that 3 may be my minimum player count for this one. The box for Vaalbara looks cool. It’s got this drawer that pulls out that makes access to the game quicker and whilst it’s a cool concept, it’s one big flaw is that, like any drawer that’s put on its side, it slides out. It doesn’t take much for someone to accidentally pick the game up by the wrong end and before you know it the game you took such joy in packing away so quickly, has deposited itself on your floor and now you're playing hunt the coin. On the subject of coins, I don’t love them and most of the people I’ve played this with haven't either. Coins are great in most games but because here you’re constantly taking coins and changing them up every round it just feels fiddly and annoying, especially as everyone is trying to do the same thing at the same time. I’d much rather there was some kind of scoring dial. I know it’d add to the cost of what is essentially a £20 game but I think it’d make for a much smoother experience. What, no Dora? If I’m looking to get my role selection, Libertalia style fix but in a smaller box and in around half an hour then Vaalbara is the first game I’m going to grab. In fact, I may even go to grab it over some of the others regardless! Now if we could just get a Dora the explorer expansion pack?

I wanted to clarify the review policies we work to here at WBG. Any questions, please reach out to me directly at jim@whatboardgame.com I will happily answer any questions or concerns. 1. We do not accept payment for reviews or previews anymore, but did so on three occasions. I have in the past accepted payment for previews. It was for three Kickstarter prototypes that wanted coverage as a time priority. It was during the pandemic. I did not have the usual financial security from my day job and I accepted a small figure to create content for the publishers. It did not feel right and I have not done it again since, nor do I expect to ever do so again Although if that changes I will make that very clear. But I have to be honest and say a big part about why I accepted the money on these occasions, was that it was flattering that anyone would consider my channel worthy enough of payment. There was some vanity present, no doubt. I declined the reviews initially as I was too busy and they then replied and said, what about if they paid. In the coverage I did for them, I have marked all posts, reviews, and YouTube videos with very clear notifications. This is what it says. This is a paid preview. The publisher paid for this preview to be made. The payment did not affect our opinions but we want to acknowledge the payment here. This is at the very top of the preview and the title also included the word "Paid". The money did not make me feel more inclined to be favourable to the game, but I was aware of the unconscious bias it may have on me. I therefore offered minimal opinion and gave the games no score. As this was a preview, not a review, this would have been the case anyway. The content was really just a rules run down. In my opinion, all the money did was bump the game forward in the queue for me and force me to do the work sooner. I always have a long list of games I want to review or preview, and these three payments made me work on these games sooner as I felt obligated to get the content out asap for the publisher/designer as they had paid. But it did not make me say anything that I otherwise would not have said. It just made me say, as otherwise I would not have had time. And say it sooner. This is another reason I don't want to accept payments again. It adds an unnecessary time pressure I would otherwise rather avoid. Other people who accept money for previews do so for their own reasons, and I have no issues with that. For me it is not an issue as long as it is declared. I just personally don't want to do this anymore. I love games, and enjoy writing about them. That is why I am here. The website has a significant cost for hosting and domain names and email etc. But that is my choice to pay that. No one else should have to cover that in my opinion as this is not my job. If it were, that would be different. 2. Our Previews have no scores and minimal opinion. If I am not playing a final copy of a game, where things may change, I feel this should be a preview and not review. The distinction for me means I cannot rate the game, and should avoid as much opinion on the game as possible. Simply as it is not a finished product. Although I do want it to be helpful, so I do include what I currently like and dislike about the game but mention where possible, parts of the game that may change in the finished version if I have that information. 3. We do receive free review copies of games. I personally cover hundreds of games a year and I could not afford to do that if I only reviewed the games I paid for myself. There are multiple review networks on Facebook where publishers reach out to people like me and ask for help. I also get contacted directly via email and on Instagram. I have also created relationships through meeting designers, publishers, and distributers at various conventions which leads to conversation where I am offered games. I accept these game under zero obligation other than to cover them on my channels at some point. I accept them so I can offer more reviews here than what I could otherwise afford. The increased reviews mean increased traffic to the site, but the site is not monetised in anyway, so it makes no difference to anyone or to me financially. I do get a kick out of our growth from a personal pride level, and feel a lot of this is down to the quantity of posting. Which is assisted in a big way by the review copies. So there is that benefit I suppose. But free review copies do not change my stance on game. They do not compromise my integrity. They do not sway me either way. But I appreciate if others think they must. All I can say is that they don't do so consciously, and I am mindful of the unconscious bias. When I accept a review copy, I do not promise what I will do with the game. I do not promise timings, or any favourable opinions. Or any specifics on anything. I simply agree to post something, at some point. But the free game has to affect me somehow, right? Unconsciously, or consciously, there is some extra bias created here based on the gesture alone. However, I am mindful of that, and I am not about to sell my integrity for the price of a game. I second guess every point I make to make sure I mean what I say. Generally speaking, I can see the good in most games, although we have plenty of low score reviews on this website. But I think my main bias is my love of the hobby. I like a lot of games as I like games. The free game for me doesn't affect the score consciously. The fact that I have played a game, with friends or family, and got away from screens and work and the stresses of life. That is my biggest bias and would affect any game. When I see a game that looks bad, or simply appears to be not for me, I generally decline the opportunity to review it if one is presented to me. I do not have time to review every game. So, I pick and choose the ones that look good to me, or interest me in anyway. I am not always right with this early assessment, and some games I think may be great, turn out to be disappointing. Others I turn down, turn out to be great. But this early filter does mean that the majority of games I review are games I want to play and think are probably going to be good. I see it as my duty to find what makes each game enjoyable for a certain type of person when I review but never to the point of ignoring what doesn't work in the game. I will happily comment on any problems when I see them. But most games I review do OK here as that early filter gets rid of most of the bad games. I also feel there is way to much negativity in this hobby for what is essentially just adults enjoying a pastime playing with toys. Let's be honest. I love games. But I don't want to over analyse them. This is how I like to think when I review a game. What's good about them? What is bad? Is it fun? Who might this be for? That is how I like to cover games. I feel it gets to the route of a review a lot more quickly. I feel a review serves one main purpose. Helping people decide if a game is for them or not. There are obviously lots of other side benefits, but this is the one I want to focus on here. So this is why I do it like I do it. I would welcome any comments on the above. And am sure things will change and adapt as I learn more. Jim Cohen. May 21st 2023. Updated April 2024

The Mystery Agency: The Man From Sector Six WBG Score: 8.5 Player Count: 1-6 You’ll like this if you like: Exit, Unlock. Published by: The Mystery Agency Ltd. Designed by: Henry Lewis This is a review copy. See our review policy here SPOILER FREE REVIEW Have you heard of The Play That Goes Wrong? Well, it has been running in London's West End since 2012. You can get a flavour for it here. The main writer behind this is a chap called Henry Lewis. And in 2020 he decided to put his writing skills to the test and create an escape room style puzzle board game. This launched, as most things go, on Kickstarter and over 1,000 backers brought his vision to life. This lead to follow up releases, and now this new box of tricks, The Man From Sector Six. It's ridiculously good. But there is only so much I can tell you in this spoiler free review, but I will do my best to give you a flavour. If you have any more questions drop me a line and we can talk in more detail. But, without further ado, let's get this to the table and see how it plays - spoiler free! How To Set Up The Man From Sector Six Open the box and take out the zipped folder and loose newspaper page. On the inside of the box, you will see some basic instructions that will instruct you to scan a QR code. When you have done this, you will have a choice of games to log into. Select "The Man from Sector Six" and enter your password as shown on the box. You can then choose to play with a timer or not. It's up to you. You will now be able to access your first clue, which will start you on your adventure. You will also have a website asking for the input of the name of a person. This will be your final answer in the game, so don't worry about that for now. How To Play The Man From Sector Six Throughout this game, you will be presented with a series of puzzles to solve. There is a linear path, but initially, it will not be overly apparent where this path starts. Although, opening the padlocked folder does seem like a good idea. Once you have done this, the options of things to look at and study will grow exponentially. However, keep a keen eye open and you will see your first goal. Solving this will be crucial to the way the rest of the puzzles unfold. And that is all I can really say without spoiling anything. You will have to use all your wits to solve various puzzles, get codes, input answers to weave your way through this mystery. If you ever get stuck, there are two hints for each puzzle, and the ultimate answer. Looking at these will add on time to your game clock if you have chosen to play that way. I suggest always giving yourself five more minutes thinking time before you use a hint. I think most of the time you will get there. Good luck! Is It Fun? The Mystery Agency: The Man From Sector Six - Escape Room Board Game Review Wow! We had an amazing experience with this game. It is very much a one and done. But we have reset the package and can now give it to friends. And the game even recommends you do this. At the end you get detailed instructions as to how to do this as well. It's great. Just use a separate piece of paper for your notes as you go so you don't spoil anything in the game. Simple. There is no folding or cutting. Resetting the game is an easy operation. Even though I will only play this game once, it will live long in my memory. Some of the puzzles are incredibly clever, and the process by which you will solve them will make you feel incredibly satisfied. Now, of course, like all games of this nature, there is the possibility you will get stuck and have the complete opposite feeling. Becoming confused on one puzzle is frustrating and can make you feel annoyed. And this did happen to us twice. The first time, I missed one vital clue midway through, and we got stuck. I did not want to use a hint, but eventually when I did, it did not help us at all as I had missed something prior to this and the hint made no sense. The clue told me what I needed to do, but I did not really understand why or how as I had missed something before. Eventually, I had to read the hints and answers for the previous clue that I had already solved to see what I had missed, and there it was. A glaring mistake made by me, overlooking a crucial clue. This can be frustrating. It's hard to say how often this will happen to other people, but I can only think it a possibility if it happened to us. With a game of this nature where you are free to look and study multiple things, there can be times when you are not quite sure what to look for or where to start. The hints list the puzzles in chronological order, so this can help in this way. You can see a timeline of where you are and where you need to go. But I feel there should be a way to input something into the system when you have solved something so you can then see the hints for your solved puzzles, without being penalised on your time. Or penalised less so you can check you covered everything. You prove that you got the puzzle solved by putting something in, but then can see if there is anything else you missed? But outside of these minor irritations, that can always arise when you are trying to solve puzzles like this (you don't want them to be too simple) this is a box of delights. The story is genuinely interesting. The production is through the roof. As you would hope for this price point. And I cannot wait to share it with friends and talk to them about their experiences with this after they play. The mystery, suspense, and sense of discovery felt throughout is unparalleled for me, and I would rate this much higher than the Exit or Unlock games, but the price point again is crucial here, when comparing. If you are a fan of solving puzzles with your family or friends, then I would highly recommend this game. It doesn't come cheap so you need to decide for yourself if 2-3 hours is enough value for a £50 game. Even if you can then give/sell to other friends. It's hard to subjectively say if I would do that myself having been given the game for free for purposes of this review. I think I would. I would pay that for an escape room experience, which I tend to avoid due to my claustrophobia. So this is a better option for me, and similarly priced. With no locked rooms! So, yes. I think I would pay this money. And if I had, I would be happy with my purchase because I loved every second with this game and cannot wait to share it with other people. As soon as we finished all my family asked for me to get another one. They all loved the experience, and the shared sense of satisfaction we had as we inputted that final name was something that will live on for a long time for us all. If you are interested in trying this for yourself, head over here.

CDSK WBG Score: 7 Player Count: 2-16 You’ll like this if you like: Any trivia game Published by: Randolph Designed by: Vincent Burger This is a free review copy. See our review policy here By Steve Godfrey A game about trivia you say? Where some questions ask you to list things in order to gain points? Ok then! Welcome to the first ever (I’m assuming, please don’t look it up and burst my bubble) board game review challenge game. How many quiz shows do I “expertly” shoehorn into this review 1 point for each answer at the end, let me know how well you did in the comments. Let’s hope you don’t draw a Blankety Blank. Answers at the end How to quiz Open out the box and reveal the scoring track, get together in teams (as many as you want) and then find something to use as scoring tokens for each team and you're all set up. On your team's turn, look at the space you're currently on and get another team to pick a card of that type. There are four types: Curious - precise or bizarre subjects. Delightful - Music, movies and sports. Seasoned - Grown up type stuff (not that type of grown up, it’s not that sort of game) Knowledge - science, nature, geography and history. Regardless of the type each card will ask “on a scale of 1 to 10 how well do you know……..” for example! Blockbusters. The team then has to determine how well they think they know that subject and pick a number between 1 and 10. Each card will have 10 questions on it and they'll get asked a question based on the number they picked with one being the easiest and ten being the hardest. If they get it right they score that many points and move that far round the track. If not then you go Pointless for that turn. If a team starts on a challenge space (it looks like a ticket) they answer a challenge card. These could be to answer some questions and get a point for each correct answer or they could be, name as many…….Family Fortunes hosts in 30 seconds style questions. Teams on the last space need to answer a “hurry up and win” card. These will have a variety of question types as well. Get this one right and you win the game. Get it wrong and you get to panic as you watch opponents ride that big old Wheel of Fortune to try and catch up to you. Become the Oracle. The problem with a lot of trivia games is you either know the answer to a question or you don’t. Some you can guess at, but for the most part if the questions aren’t going your way then you’re not gonna have a great time and it can be so easy to feel stupid as you see other players storm ahead to victory with no way of you getting the points to catch up. CDSK is a trivia game that does its best to try to alleviate that and give everyone a chance to feel like they’ve not just gone the quiz equivalent of going toe to toe with one of the chasers from The Chase. Not least because you’ll be in teams….unless you decide to go head to head which could be Quite Interesting. In terms of difficulty the questions range from, you should easily get this, think the first question from Who Wants to be a Millionaire to, yes, you have just accidentally walked on to the set of University Challenge….. well maybe not quite that hard. Depending on your team there can be a really nice dynamic as you try and gauge how far you want to push your knowledge of each subject. At some point some will say, “I reckon we go 5 on this one” and without fail someone will say “nah, at least a 7.” It’s then you’ve got to decide how much you trust this Mastermind's knowledge of that subject, It’s a genuine gamble. You want to go as high as you can, but you also don’t want to go too far above your means because it’s always best to get a question right and move somewhere than to get too ambitious and not move at all, especially if you're in a category where your team isn’t the strongest. It might even be a good strategy to go for the questions that would move you and Bullseye you onto your preferred subjects. The challenge spaces change things up and add a bit more of a group dynamic, especially the timed challenges. For example, name as many yellow characters that don’t come from the Simpsons in 45 seconds and get a point for each correct answer. At which point everyone will be shouting out answers and it all descends into chaotic fun. When it comes to game length you’ve got a classic and an express starting space for a shorter game. Definitely use the shorter game if you’ve got a few teams because it could be a loooong one but other than that go with your gut. I think the shorter game is perfect for an end of the night game but if you’ve got a few smarty pants on a team then it could be quick enough that you could reset and start again. If you like it then you’d better put a band on it. So production wise I’m kinda torn on this one. On the one hand I love the fact that the board opens out from the box and it sets up in seconds. On the other hand the magnetic clasp on the box (on my copy at least, I can’t speak for anyone else’s ) isn’t that strong and takes no effort for it to get nudged open. I had an incident where the box got flipped on its side in a bag and the box opened and there were cards everywhere. My worry is that if all the boxes are the same then anyone who stores their games vertically could have the same thing happen when pulling the game off the shelf and a bit of weight pushes the lid open. I’m also not sure on the decision to not provide score markers and have teams pick their own. Again on the one hand it keeps the cost down and makes for a bit of a creative flair for the players. Seeing a Lego minifig run round the board after a little superman toy is fun and is definitely in keeping with the spirit of the game (the rules and some of the cards themselves can be pretty amusing) But I do worry what will happen in the situations where you don’t have anything to hand that’s small enough to use. Of course there’s nothing stopping you throwing a couple of odd nick knacks in the box just in case. There’s enough room in there but because of the potential clasp problem I wouldn’t make it anything too heavy that’s gonna put your box in Jeopardy We’ve had fun with CDSK (the name doesn’t do it any favours though), there’s laughter to be had for a quick end of the night game or as an addition to an evening of party games. I’d happily throw this in my bag to be put into the mix. Maybe not throw, more, gently place, with maybe a band around it. So did you get all 12? I’ll put the answers in the comments.

Bunny Kingdom: In The Sky WBG Score: 8 Player Count: 2-5 You’ll like this if you like: Small World, Blood Rage, Bunny Kingdom Published by: IELLO Designed by: Richard Garfield Bunny Kingdom is a brilliant game. I will assume you know about the base game if you are reading this review for the In The Sky expansion. For anyone out of the Bunny loop, very briefly, Bunny Kingdom is a drafting area-control game. Players will be dealt a hand of cards, from which they take two before handing the rest to the next player. They will do this until all cards are drafted. The cards will mainly give them the opportunity to put a bunny of their colour onto a grid based board to create what the game calls a Fief of their bunnies. Other cards allow you to add buildings or resources to certain spaces of the board. Your points are tallied by multiplying the buildings' turrets in your fief by the resources you have in the same area. There are multiple rounds and by the end the board gets very busy. Scoring can be tricky from a visual perspective, there is a lot to take in. But the game itself is a lot of fun and one of my families absolute favourites. Points get well into the three figures, and as much as it is a struggle to score at the end, we all love it! So, we were all very keen to try this expansion. Thankfully, it did not disappoint! Let's get it to the table. In The Sky introduces SEVEN new main new concepts. Let's look at them all one by one. A whole new board! The first main addition to this excellent expansion is the new board. Set-up to include In The Sky is pretty much the same as the base game, except for shuffling in the new cards, adding in the new components to the board, and placing this new shared board down on the table. It's all very simple to include as any good expansion should be. The new board shows the Great Cloud. You can place bunnies and build Fiefs on this new board like the main board, and add buildings to it so long as you meet the buildings requirements. The new board does not have a grid system like the main board, rather five rows marked by golden clouds, and then five spaces in each. So, the card showing one cloud and a number one will be placed in the first spot on the top left. This is the unicorn card shown below. One my daughter particularly likes! But in a game that is all about creating large groups of your own controlled Fiefs, why would you want to separate your bunnies onto a different board in this way? Well, much like the Sky Towers in the base game, Rainbows can be used to link two different Fiefs. Rainbows The Rainbows act exactly as the Sky Towers do, connecting two pairs of Fiefs. There are two sets in the game and they connect the two boards. Having the second board is a great way to create more space, and using the rainbows is a good way to still allow for the bunnies on each board to be connected. I think the main benefit from introducing the second board was to increase the games' capacity from a maximum of four players to a five. Without an extra board, all those extra bunnies would start to get on top of each other. The only other solution would be to remove some bunnies and cards per player creating a shorter, smaller game. I would say the extra board is a good solution. But remember how hard it was to score at the end of a four player game? Yeah, well, try now with five sets of bunnies and a separate board to add up! It gets a bit confusing! But that's a problem for the end of the game. The actual game experience is fantastic. Carrotodels You may have noticed that rather enticing looking five tower building in the picture above. Well, these are the new brilliantly titled Carrotodels. They will instantly add a multiplier of five to any fief you create. The sad news is they only count if your total strength in a fief with a Carrotodels is less than five. If you have a strength higher than five without the Carrotodels included, then the Carrotodels is ignored. You can still go over five, much to some reviewers confusion (no names mentioned Tom, ahem!) but if you go over five without the Carrotodels you don't count the five it would usually add. Make sense? Great! If not, don't worry, it will when you play. Chimneys One of my favourite additions that this expansion brings is the Chimneys. There are two in the game, and when drafted, players can build the Chimney onto the Great Cloud Board. Then, during the harvest phase where players score points each round, you can select a basic resource that is present in the Fief that contains the Chimney, and then all of your Fiefs on the original main board can have access to this resource too. Essentially, whatever resource you make up in the clouds can now be thrown down the Chimney for your ground based bunnies to use too! A Fifth set of Bunnies I think the main reason people will buy this expansion is to turn it into a five player game. For that, the main thing you need is more bunnies! The new colour is purple. They look great and stand out perfectly against the board and other red, black, yellow, and pink bunnies from the main game. Which, of course when it comes to end game scoring, is crucial! You need to be able to separate the different colours easily, and this colour works great. Coins The game now has coins. Fans of the base game may wonder how these work, well, its surprisingly simple. They give you points at the end of the game by multiplying the number of coins you have collected by the number of luxury and wonderous resources you managed to get. Simple! But how do you get the coins? And what are wonderous resources? Well, give me a second... There are two main ways to get your paws on the coins. The first is via the Tax Collector card. There are a number of new Parchment cards in this expansion. They function just like the parchment cards in the original, and are all ways to get more points. Apart from the Tax Collector card which simply gets you two coins. The second way to get coins is through creating districts. A district is any fief that contains two or more bunnies. Place one bunny down, all good. Add a second bunny that is orthogonally adjacent to it, you have created a district. Congrats! Take a coin. So, what about those Wonderous resources? Wondrous Resources See that huge Chicken up there? That's a Wonderous resource that is. Produced on a new Luxury farm. There are 12 new cards all with a location on the new board that bring a new Wonderous resource. They act just like the Luxury resources in the main game, and allow players to add extra scoring options to their fiefs. And that's it! A lot more to take in, but it all blends very smoothly with the base game. As with any expansion, I always ask myself three questions when adding something new to a game. Is the game better with this expansion included? Did it add much complexity to the set-up, rule teach, and game play? Would I want to include the expansion every time I play? 1. Is the game better with this expansion included? Yes. I find it hard to judge games with and without expansion sometimes. The experiences are always different. But not necessarily better or worse. With this expansion I would say it is objectively better. I like the extra options it brings. The second board is a nice addition and adds some interesting choices when you are drafting. I find some players will focus on just the main board whereas others will look to the new board for a bulk of points. But either way, coins will be earnt by all players, and this is a huge and fun way to score extra points. 2. Did it add much complexity to the set-up, rule, and game play? No. Its all very simple. Set-up is increased by maybe 30 seconds. The extra rules take perhaps 5 extra minutes to explain to someone who knows the base game. In the actual game, perhaps there is 10 additional minutes added to the game length as more cards are being drafted. However, and this is a bigun'! The end game scoring, which was already quite complicated, especially in a four player, is vastly more complex, especially with a five players. But always with the second board added. Remember those times you were working out which fiefs are connected by a Sky Tower, well you have a lot more of that with the second board and rainbows. It's totally worth it, but I would say this is something to consider. 3. Would I want to include the expansion every time I play? I think I would yes. Certainly when ever I play in a five you will have too. But I think in a two to four I would always chose to add this in. Not for people who hadn't played the base game but definitely with anyone who had a good grasp of the main board. I like what it brings and personally would always prefer to have it included now.

Waterfall Park WBG Score: 7.5 Player Count: 3 - 5 You’ll like this if you like: Chinatown, Sidereal Confluence, Cosmic Encounter Published by: Repos Production Designed by: Karsten Hartwig This is a free review copy. See our review policy here By Steve Godfrey Waterfall Park is a game about building up a floating theme park that has, you guessed it, waterfalls gushing down all four sides! Let’s just hope they’ve got some amazing damp prevention! Regardless of that….Welcome, to Waterfall Park, How to get your ducks in a row. Set up by giving each player five money, a set of plot tiles in their colour and placing the round marker tile to the correct number of players. Deal out a number of cards to each player based on the round tracker for that round. Each player then looks at their cards and discards two. The cards will all show a number corresponding to a plot on the board and a handy picture reference so you can easily find it. All of the discarded cards will get shuffled back into the deck. All players then reveal their cards and will place a plot tile in their colour on each of the spaces of the cards they’ve chosen. The used cards will then get removed from the game. Everyone will then get dealt out a number of attraction tiles (again depending on the round and the player count) which will then get revealed in front of them. Then starts a round of negotiation. You can negotiate with anyone and you can even weigh in on someone else’s negotiation and anything is up for trade. Well, in game anyway. Remember that because I almost lost my house in a trade for some bowling alley tiles. It’s a good thing we checked the rules because my wife would have been mad…….Anyway, in this phase you can trade money, attractions and plots. The only thing you can’t do is trade with tiles that have already been placed and you can’t trade for anything to be removed off the board. Any immediate deals you accept you have to honour. But if you make any deals that resolve in the future, we’ll, then you can feel free to screw over your friends. Just don’t expect them to be friends for much longer if you do. When everyone has finished negotiations each player then places their attractions on their plots. You can place as many of them onto the board as you want and any you don’t are simply kept for the next round. You’ll then score points (money) for any complete and incomplete sets of attractions of your colour. Each attraction type will have a number on them. To complete an attraction you need to have that number in your plots adjacent to each other. Each attraction has enough tiles to make two complete sets. When you score, each incomplete attraction will be worth an amount of money depending how many you have in that set. A complete attraction scores the same way but will be worth more money. Play four rounds and the player with the most money at the end will win. Duck Tiles a woo hoo Negotiation was never a mechanism I thought I’d take too particularly well when I started gaming. However with a few games of Twilight Imperium, Sidereal Confluence and a couple of other games that featured negotiation I'm slowly starting to come around on it. Then Waterfall Park crossed my path and that was a real test of my tolerance for it because it’s pure negotiation. Sidereal Confluence comes close but it’s got other mechanisms that are just as prominent. So with that in mind I think the first thing I should say is, if you don’t like negotiation in any form, for whatever reason, then this is absolutely not the game for you as that’s literally the entire game. So if you want to leave the review now I’ll completely understand. Make sure you leave via the gift shop and check out all of our merch, we’ve got duvet covers….no, seriously! “Let me guess, we’re about to go over a huge waterfall?” “Yep” Still with me? Awesome. When you first read the rules you’ll be forgiven for thinking that the card phase and placing out your plot tiles are just procedural elements of the game. Oh no my friend, In fact this is where you’ll be starting to set up potential trades before the real negotiations have started. It’s not just about keeping which plots are beneficial to you. It’s just as useful to keep cards that you can see your opponents want in order to give you a bargaining tool for later rounds. It’s weird but I find myself hard pushed to keep a little devious smirk from my face as I lay a plot tile in a space that I know someone else is after. Maybe it's a good thing that I’m not in any form or property development, I’m not sure I’d like businessman Steve based on this. Normally when it comes to reviews I try and talk about some of the clever mechanisms, some fun design ideas that have been thrown in to add some in twists and turns or even some great thematic elements. Waterfall Park doesn’t really have any of that. You literally get some cards to choose from, get some tiles and then the designers, much like a teacher who needs an in lesson time break, sits at their desk and hides behind the rule book for a cheeky nap and gets you to discuss amongst yourselves and, when you're done, score up. Now I’m aware that this all sounds really negative, but it’s really not, because this freeing, simple rule set IS the clever twist that makes the game fun, not having intricate and complex rules is what brings the game to life. In fact the rules and freedom it gives you is so much that if it were a shorter game you’d almost be calling it a party game. It doesn’t need to throw in anything fancy to mix things up because the players will be making their own twists and turns while they’re negotiating. The freedom it gives you makes for a more strategic and interactive game than a lot of games with full rule sets that I’ve played. When the negotiation phase starts there’s one hurdle you need to get over though and that’s, who starts first? The first few seconds will no doubt feel like a Western style stand off as you’re all staring at each other wondering who’s going to kick off proceedings. When someone finally takes it upon themselves to start things will go thick and fast and you’ll probably hear someone say “aww I was gonna ask them for that.” which could well be the starting conversation for another trade. One thing is for certain, you need to be quick in this game. Making a deal could be something as simple as a straight swap or it could be something that will take a bit more persuasion and trying to find exactly what will tip other players into making that deal is the name of the game (not literally). The harder they are to break the more satisfying it becomes as you see them slowly start to wear down until finally they relent and the deal is done. Clever people will no doubt try to math out every little offer and hold the game up (luckily it’s not happened In any of my plays) but being as it’s all simultaneous the longer they take the more chance they have of missing out on other potential deals going on around the table. “Sharp rocks at the bottom?” “Most likely” Being a game that’s so reliant on the people around the table, Waterfall park runs the risk of falling flat with the wrong group or even if one player isn’t willing to play in the spirit of the game. It could really bring down a game session so definitely make sure people know what they’re getting into before they play the game. You never know though, this game could be one that brings them out of their negotiation shell and ignites some sort of ruthless trading streak that’s been lying dormant and before you know it they’ll be going on about the price of orange crops (I know a Wolf of Wall Street or Wall Street reference would have been perfect here but I’ve not seen either of them so Trading Places is the best I’ve got.) As the player count goes up so does the chaos of the negotiation. Again this is something that some won’t be for everyone, personally I think it’s a lot of fun, it gives a real trading floor feel, but it’s definitely worth letting people know about. One downside of the chaos is that you may find a few people reaching over each other as they try to move plot tiles and it could be easy for the board to get knocked. In a clever little bit of design the plot tiles have notches on the underside of them and the board has holes in to slot them into to keep the tiles in place. It’s such a great, and let’s face it, fun solution. It doesn’t stop things moving completely however. We’ve certainly dislodged plot tiles on the odd occasion as we’ve been trying to move them around, but It’s a heck of a lot better than having loose tiles on the board. Theme wise it’s fine. I’ve not played the original Chinatown that this is a reprint of but I’ve seen it and I much prefer the look of this one. Quite honestly it could have been any theme but I personally like the fact that they’ve gone for something as fun as this. It’s a fun production, the coloured plot tiles make it really easy to determine what belongs to who and it’s certainly made it a more appealing looking game to try and entice more people to look into it. Plus the board looks great when it’s all filled up at the end of the game. “Bring it on” TLC once sang “don’t go chasing waterfalls” and while I agree that chasing a non moveable body of water is folly, I do think that if negotiation is your thing then you may want to go chasing after Waterfall Park.

Cytosis WBG Score: 8.5 Player Count: 2-5 You’ll like this if you like: Century Spice Road, Raiders of the North Sea, Viticulture Published by: Genius Games Designed by: John Coveyou This is a review copy. See our review policy here Cytosis is a game set within the cell of a human. It has been developed by countless doctors and scientists, and offers a unique educational experience within a board game setting. From my limited understanding of the science behind this, everything is accurate, if a little simplified. But there is a learning opportunity there for sure. Although I would argue, the benefit is more to inspire and intrigue a younger audience than fully educate. But then this is just a board game after all. But is the game any good? Let's get it to the table and find out. How To Set Up Cytosis There are two sides to the board. One for a two-player game, and the other for three, four, or five players. Pick the side you need and place this onto the center of the table. Then take all the macromolecule cubes, separate them into their four different types, and place them into separate piles, along with a separate pile for the ATP tokens. Next, separate the deck of cards into the three types; Event cards, Goal cards, and Cell Component cards. Shuffle each deck separately, then deal 10 events cards into a face-down deck for a two or three-player game, 11 for a four-player game, and five for a 12-player game. This will act as the game clock, when the final one is drawn, that will be the last round. Then choose three, four, or five random goal cards for a two, three, or four or higher game. And place these face up next to the main board. Then deal four face-up cards from the Cell component deck onto the spaces for them at the bottom of the main board. If you are playing with two players note you need to remove three Alcohol Detoxification cards before you do this, placing them back into the box. Then deal each player three of the Cell component cards. All players will choose to keep two from these three, discarding the third card, creating a discard pile next to the rest of the deck in the process. All players will then take the four flasks (three in a four-player game and just two in a five-player) two Transport Vesicle disks, and three markers in their player colour, placing one of the markers on the zero space on the Health score tracker. Give one player the first player token and two ATP tokens, The next player takes three tokens, the next four, and so on. All players can now choose to take two additional resources from the ATP token, black mRNA cubes, or the yellow Lipids cubes. Finally, place the two grey flasks onto the space for them on the main board. These can be used at any time by any player during any round for an additional action, just pay the shown cost. You are now ready to play. How To Play Cytosis This is a classic-style worker placement game, where players will take turns placing one of their Flasks onto one of the many worker placement spots on the main board to carry out that action. The game flows over multiple rounds, tracked by the Event deck, with players placing all their flasks each round. As players place their flasks, one at a time, in turn order, they will carry out the action shown at the space where they position their flask. This is mainly to get resources, new cards, process and then complete the cell components cards, or take the first player marker for the next round. Taking resources or cards is easy. Simply place your flask in the appropriate space and take the card, for the shown cost (the far left card is always free), or for a resource; take as many as are shown, or pay the appropriate cost for the available exchange. For example, at the Mitochondria, you can take three or two ATP for free, or pay one green Carbohydrate cube to take six ATP tokens. In classic worker placement style, the spaces are at a premium, and the first person to go to each area typically gets the best deal. Going first and planning your turn order is crucial. Resources are taken to complete Enzyme, Hormone, or Alcohol Detoxification cards. This is done by paying the shown resources on the card in exchange for the benefit at the bottom, namely, health points. The Enzyme and Alcohol Detoxification cards are fairly self-explanatory, but the Hormone cards take a little more explanation. You first need to place your flask into the appropriate space, based on which card you are looking to complete. This is clearly shown on the board itself. Then place one of your Transport Vesicle disks onto the open space in this area and then exchange the necessary amount of black mRNA cubes for the required amount of red Protein cubes. Place these onto the Transport Vesicle disk you just placed here. On a subsequent turn, place a second Flask into the lower area where you can now add in the other Macromolecules. Either adding green Carbohydrates or yellow Lipid cubes. Finally, on a third turn, place a third Flask into the Plasma Membrane area, place the card you are completing face up on the table for all to see, pay the required ATP costs, remove the Macromolecules on the Transport Vesicle disk, and gain the shown points. When you complete the Steroid or Hormone cards, you and other players will also score one or two points for each previously completed card of the same type. Enzymes simply score you a set number of points, but will then score additional bonus points based on how many you completed in the entire game at the end, shown on the bottom of the card. And the Alcohol Detoxification cards score one point at the time of completion, but then extra points at the end of the game based on how many you did in comparison to the other players, again as shown on the card. In a two-player game, note the bonus scores for these cards are just five and two. Ignore the eight-point max. The only other thing you will be doing during the game is placing your colour cubes onto the goal cards. There are a few choices here, and the first person to place their cube on each one will score an immediate Health point bonus, so it pays to move fast here. Although you will then commit early to that goal. Typically these are about completing different types of cards and will reward you with additional points at the end of the game based on how many of those cards you completed. Focusing you on those cards for the remainder of the game. Once all players have used all of their flasks, you will move into the refresh phase. Here, all players will retrieve their Flasks, ready to be used again in the next round. Then remove the leftmost Cell component card, slide any remaining cards to the left and add in more from the deck so it is full again. Then reveal the top card from the Event deck and read it aloud to all players. This will typically affect the next round by adding in a bonus resource into one area of the board or reduce the ATP cost of the Cell Component cards for the upcoming round. A new round begins, unless there were no new event cards, in which case final scoring now occurs. All players will score one point for any group of four black mRNA cubes or yellow Lipid cubes, one point for any three red Protein cubes, and one point for any two green Carbohydrate cubes. Players then total the amount of Alcohol Detoxification cards they completed and score the shown points based on the player count. Then total the completed Enzyme cards and score based on your personal completed amount. Two points for two cards. Up to 14 points for five completed Enzyme cards. Finally, check the Goal cards and total any points scored here by all players who put cubes there during the game. The most health points wins. Is It Fun? Cytosis Board Game Review This game was first published in 2017, which is important for the context of this review. The game itself is fantastic - a tight, perfectly executed worker placement game with interesting scoring options, satisfying turns, and a novel and well-executed theme. However, it really does offer nothing new in the grand scheme of things. This game came out five years after Lords of Waterdeep, a game that really set the tone for modern Worker Placement games. You can read more about this game and its mechanisms here. So, some may expect more. Modern-day games need to stand out for one of three reasons: They offer something new mechanically. They do something old, but better. They offer a unique, interesting, or well-executed theme. I would say Cytosis only really ticks the final box here. But I still rate it an 8.5. This is because I review games in isolation. This game is an 8.5. It doesn't offer that much new. Many other games have done similar things before. And it doesn't necessarily develop these old tricks in any meaningful way. But it does execute them well, and the game as a standalone entity is good. I offer the context for your benefit, depending on if you have many other worker placement games on your shelves already. In that case, I would suggest the theme is the main criteria here. And if you are into this theme, then get this game. If not, and you already own other worker placement games, this may not be for you. Personally, I like it in my collection as a natural progression from Century Spice Road, to teach new gamers about modern games, mechanics, and get them into our hobby. I own many other Worker Placement games, but I will keep this in my collection for two others reasons. I like the theme, but I the thing I enjoy most about this, is the way they have executed the progress of the Cell Component cards which is incredibly satisfying. AS I mention above, it feels like Century Spice Road in that you are collecting a certain resource and exchanging it for another. But instead of this being in a simple set-collection, hand-management game; it is done in a worker placement style game. Hence is being a perfect follow on to this game for new gamers. But that also means that it scratches multiple itches as I play, because completing these cards, much like in Century Spice Road, is not easy, which brings me to my second reason. The game is incredibly tight. There is only one space to complete the cards on the two-player side of the board, and just two on the three-player or more side. I like my worker placement games to bring an element of a race to it, which this game does so well! Let's look at a typical turn in any given round. A new Event card has just made the Carbohydrate production in the Plasma Membrane double as efficient, but only for the first player. The first free card is incredibly juicy, the only one of its type currently face up available, and you really want it. But all three spaces in the Rough ER and Smooth ER are full, and there are only two spots in the Golgi Apparatus which you know people in the Rough ER and Smooth ER are going to want to progress down to. If you don't take one of those, you may miss out on your chance this round to complete your current Cell Component card. And don't forget, the first space at the Nucleus, Mitochondria, and Smooth ER all reward higher than the second, getting their first matters. And of course, only one person per round can add a goal marker to the goal cards and claim the first player token. There is a lot of choice. It is all good. And you can only pick one. Beautifully tight! I really enjoy my time with this game and would recommend it to anyone who finds the theme interesting. It executes it very well, comes with a separate manual explaining all the terms, (so can be used as a teaching aid with your children), and plays incredibly smoothly. As mentioned, it doesn't necessarily offer anything new in this field, but if you want a pure player worker placement game, with satisfying scoring, and an incredibly tight and rewarding feeling as you play, you can't go wrong with this game. Lords of Waterdeep, is still the granddaddy here for me in this mechanic, but Cytosis will be my new go-to when it comes to teaching people this mechanic if they are looking for something simple, easy to teach, fun to play, and they find this theme interesting. Lords of Waterdeep is potentially a little alienating in this way, as the theme is so typically 'fantasy'. Which obviously isn't everyone's cup of tea. Whereas science is real, and perhaps a little more accessible and appealing to some newer gamers.

Ecosystem WBG Score: 8 Player Count: 2-6 You’ll like this if you like: Misty, Cascadia, Azul Published by: Genius Games Designed by: Matt Simpson This is a review copy. See our review policy here Ecosystem is a remarkably straightforward game that you can easily grasp, understand, explain, and play in less than thirty minutes. After playing, you'll likely feel calm, content, and perhaps even a little bit more knowledgeable. It appears that this game was designed with this in mind, and it succeeds. Setting aside the fact that shuffling so many cards of this size without damaging them can be quite a task, I am a fan. But how does it play? Let's bring it to the table and see. How To Set Up Ecosystem Shuffle the cards and then deal out ten cards to each player. Give each player a scoring aid. You are now ready to start playing! How To Play Ecosystem Players will now choose one card from the ten in their hand to keep. They will place this face down in front of them, starting their own personal ecosystem. When all players have chosen, pass the remaining nine cards to the player to your left and flip over the card you just placed face down so that it is now face up. Now choose one card from the nine in hand and do the same thing, passing the remaining eight left. Continue until all cards have been chosen and all players have ten cards in front of them. Cards must be placed adjacent to a previously played card. This is orthogonal, not diagonal. So, to the left, right, or above or below a previously played card. In total, you will create a five by four grid. Five along, four down. So, you must also not break this size. When this is done, grab another load of cards, deal ten more to each player, and run round two just as you did round one, but now passing to your right. When round two is over, score your ecosystem using the handy score sheet. Players will go through each animal, scoring them in turn. Players will then total all cards that had no effect. Players will then score based on their ineffective cards. The Diversity scoring. To see how each card scores, take a look at the below guide. Is It Fun? Ecosystem Card Game Review Ecosystem is one of those simple small box games that you always are happy to play. It's simple but rewarding. Small but substantial. And I always want more after one game. The distillation of drafting and tableau building is a classic mix in card games, and with this theme, you will be instantly absorbed in your new little world that is being formed right in front of you. You can play this game so many different ways. Getting into the stream or Meadow game early can make the chase for those cards, as well as those that work with it such as the Dragonfly and Trout a real battle. As you make your Ecosystem, you can see the other players own tableau forming at the same time. You will start to get an idea as to what they are chasing as well as be on the lookout for the cards you want for your own area. Do you take the Stream card now, knowing there were none left in the hand of cards you just passed to your left, but there is only one trout card in this hand? Will anyone else take this card before it comes back around to you again? There is something so therapeutic about playing this game. Even when your Ecosystem is not quite working out as you like, it still looks beautiful. But when it clicks and all comes together, which it usually does, it feels wildly satisfying. There is generally a good card, and as much as you won't always win, you will often create some interesting combos and get a decent score. However, the final three to four cards can often catch people out. Your options for where you place cards at this point are obviously limited. And the type of card that could be placed to score well, or score at all becomes significantly reduced. The Diversity point system really comes into effect here. I would recommend this game to anyone who likes set collection, tableau building, or drafting games, and is looking for something that they can get out and play quickly in most situations. It works in the pub, as a filler at game night, or a light family game.

Wingspan Asia WBG Score: 8.5 Player Count: 1-2 (1-7 with base game) You’ll like this if you like: Everdell, Lost Ruins of Arnak, Furnace. Published by: Stonemaier Games Designed by: Elizabeth Hargrave I am a huge Stonemaier fan, and this game was provided for free for purposes of review. But this has in no way affected my opinion or score, but I want to declare that here for transparency. Wingspan first came out in 2019. You can read my review here. There have been two expansions for this hugely popular game so far. First, the European expansion which offered new cards, and then the Oceania expansion, which added yet more cards, a new player board, and a new food type. Now, we have the third expansion, Asia. It brings more cards, a 6-7 player flock expansion, and a whole new stand-alone two player duet mode. Let's get it to the table and see how it plays. Set Up The main feature of this expansion is the two player Flock mode. This allows for two people to play a full game of Wingspan using components exclusively from this box. The main game is not required. It does not quite have all the rat-a-ma-taz of the full game. The component wow factor from the bird feeder dice tower is certainly gone. But it works incredibly well, is very simple to set-up, and will allow for quicker two players games in future. Duet Mode To play in this mode, lay out the boards for the dice, flock tokens, and cards in the centre of the table, placing three cards face up on the board the cards, leaving the rest in a shuffled face down pile. Place four random goal tiles onto the duet board. Then give each player a game mat, eight cubes of their chosen colour, two bonus cards to choose one from, and the 15 duet tokens; which are placed on each bird space on their board. Then deal each player five bird cards and one each of the five food tokens. A total of ten items. Players need to decide which of these they want to keep. Just like the main gave, players can keep five of these ten items in any combination. Generally looking to keep the food needed to place their first bird card. Perhaps their second too. Place the rest of the food tokens into a general supply, alongside the other goal cards, and randomly decide which player will go first, giving them the first player token. You are now ready to play. How to Play The game plays exactly like the main game so I won't go into the full rules here. The only difference is the duet board. Each time you place a bird, you will carry out all the usual actions. The only change will be that as you place the card on your board, you will also remove the duet token that there. This will then be placed onto the duet board. At the end of the game you will score one point for your largest grouping of touching duet tokens on the duet board. There are also some spaces that give immediate bonuses such as extra food, cards, and eggs. When you place the duet token, you must place the token into the matching area that the bird was placed into on your board. Also matching either the size of the bird, type of nest, food used to place it, or the direction of its beak on the card. The quick-start guide provided (picture below) is an excellent way to learn the game if you have not played before. Or it can act as a quick refresher if you have not played for a while. Simply give the guides out to each player, run through the set up changes, which affects the cards and food tokens you get, and then run through the steps. It is a truly fantastic way to play Wingspan Asia for the first time, and just like the quick start guide in the base game, gives you everything you need to learn the full game in under one round. Well done to all involved. All games should have this. The other main change in the game is the Flock mode, which can be used to to turn Wingspan and Wingspan Asia into a six or seven player game. Flock Mode In order to speed up the process, in this player count, you will need to have two simultaneous players at any time. This is done by setting the table up as such that you will split the players into two groups of either two threes, or one three and one four depending on player count. Using components from both games, each group will have its own dice and cards to draw from. No "pass me the dice here." Another reason this expansion comes with its own complete set of resources to play this game. Clever huh!? The below turn dial is used. Both pieces are doubled sided to show either six or seven players. As you turn the dial, it will show which two players should be active at each time. Another nice little touch to help remind players when they are active, and speed the process along. Crucial in a six or seven player game. There are not many games of this ilk, size, complexity, and length I would contemplate playing with this many people. Not that Wingspan is that complex, it's just anything above three or four players and I generally move away from anything above light weight. It just gets too long and boring. Here, you can see how the designers have done everything they can to keep the game flowing. It is Fun? A lot of what makes Wingspan so popular, is the gorgeous card art. And a lot of people will want to get this expansion simply to get their hands on the Crested Lark and friends. Just look at them! We also have round end powers now which I love, and are clearly identified by the turquoise blue colour The new powers seem well balanced with the existing cards and offer a nice variety, with lots of new ways to get more food. I would strongly recommend this game to anyone. No matter if you have Wingspan already or not. It is a brilliant way to get this game to the table in a two-player with or without the base game. If you don't own Wingspan, now is your chance to get it for a great cost. If you do own Wingspan, it's your choice if you think you will play the game in a two or six plus. The main benefit of this expansion. If you will exclusively only ever play Wingspan in a 3-4 or solo then perhaps this is not for you. But I would say that is quite a niche audience. As such, I would rate this as by far the best expansion for Wingspan so far, and perhaps even more essential a purchase than the base game. Seeing as it's cheaper more accessible and so good in a two player. I keep saying expansion, which this is. But it also a brilliant stand alone two-player version of Wingspan it's own right.