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Five Nights at Freddy's: Night of Frights Game WBG Score: 6.5 Player Count: 2-4 You’ll like this if you like: Explorers of the North Sea, Five Nights at Freddy's, Horrified. Published by: Funko Games Designed by: Prospero Hall Five Nights at Freddy's started as a survival horror video game back in 2014. It was a cult classic due to it's "jump scare" moments and creepy animatronic characters. Obviously, like anything with a hint of success, this has now become a board game! There are a few out there. Two listed on BGG, and then this one, currently not listed strangely. But very much in existence, look, there's the box... And a pretty cool box too! It has a pizza box style and opening, and the fake tear so you can see the minis within. Very tempting on the shelf! Let's get it to the table and see how it plays. Set Up Place the main board and circular scare tracker board into the centre of the table. Each player will choose one of the four characters, placing their mini into the main dinning room, along with the camera standee, and their character token face down into the zero space onto the circular board. Shuffle the Action cards and deal each player three cards, four to Freddy if he is playing. Then place all the item tokens face down on the table and flip five at random, placing them into their corresponding numbered rooms. Then, place all the miss tokens into the bag along with one guard token, and place this by the board. Shuffle the event cards and place them face down on the table, then decide who the starting player will be and give them four of the action tokens. You are now ready to begin. How to Play Starting with the first player, players will now take it in turn to run through two steps. First, you will draw two items and place them into the specific room shown on the token. Then, you can take up to four actions. These are to move, pick up items in a room you are in, play one of your action cards, or make an attempt to capture the guard and win the game if you meet the requirements. When you collect enough items as a free action you can spend these in the required room to increase your characters position on the scare tracker. Each room has it's own requirement, such as two pizzas, three different items, or one of each. If you discard the right items in the right room you can move up the scare ck. This also allows you to flip over the marker to the scary side, meaning you can now attempt to capture the guard. The further up the scare track you are, the better the chance of success you will have. There are only so many times you can attempt this in the game, and if you run out of tries, the guard will win, and all players will loose. So, it is best to get your self up the scare track before you attempt this. When you are ready to make an attempt at capturing the guard you need to make your way to either room one or two. When there, you can flip the top event card and carry out its actions. This could be a chance to remove some miss tokens or to add a second guard token from the bag you are about to pull from to increase your chances, or you could be given an extra action. These cards also work as the game timer. When there are no more event cards left, if the guard is still free, all players loose. If there are more event cards left you can then take the bag and pull out as many tokens as your current position on the scare tracker. If you pull out the guard token, you win. If you pull only miss tokens then you must flip over your character token on the scare tracker, re-draw your actions cards up to your hand limit (this is the only way to get them back) and play continues. Is it Fun? Playing as one of these scary animatronic characters is a wild ride. If you are a fan of this franchise then I think you will enjoy all the little nods to the videos games. If you are new to this world, and a seasoned board game player, this could be a little simple for you. But if you have not played that many modern board games, you may find the pick-up-and-deliver mechanic, and the build process of developing your scare level a lot of fun. Pulling the tokens from the bag when someones attempts to capture the guard is a tense and fun affair. Knowing the game could be over right there and then makes everyone focus on the pulls. They become a main part of every game. Obviously this is very much luck based, but you can increase your chances by giving yourself more pulls. I have found that on average, the bag pulls will be attempted three to four times before a game ends. But with the people I have played with, we have all built up our scare level to at least five or six before we made our first attempt. So, this very much depends on the tactics of each player. The art style in this game is lifted directly from the video games. If you are a fan of that then I think this will be right up your street. When playing with people who had played the video game, they were thrilled by the art. People who had not played the video game understood what was happening, and the reasons for the style. But this is very much geared up for fans of the games. The four minis included are bright, well made, and look great. They are a little on the small side, but fit the board perfectly. As little collectables for fans of the games, I am sure they will delight many fans. Each character has its own unique power too. This small amount of asymmetry is a nice addition to the game. It's fun to try the game out with each character and to see how their powers can help you. I enjoy playing this game on its own merits. I am not a huge fan of the franchise, having only played the VR version a few times, and being genuinely terrified by it! Although my friends did seem to enjoy watching, and filming me play!! But the board-game version is a fun, simple, family friendly game that plays quickly, usually in around 20 minutes, but offers some real tension. Especially with those bag pulls. Turns move smoothly, and everyone will be involved throughout. Moving, collecting, and upgrading their position on the scare track. Building up to an attempt to capture the guard. The bag you pull the tokens from is a long paper bag. It's perfect for this mechanic. When your hand and forearm is in it, you cannot see what is in there as your hand will take up all the room. So there is no way to cheat, really! Although, we do give the bag a good shake each time, as per the rule suggestions. I would recommend this game to anyone who is a fan of the video games, and wants to see how this works in board game format. I can see this being a highly sort after collectable game for the hard-core fans, but one that I hope they have a lot of fun with as well. It could be a great gateway game to bring more video game fans over to board games. Funko Games are doing some great things with various IP's right now. I am excited to see what they come up with next. One thing you can certainly say is true for all these film and video game conversion, is that Funko always stay true to the source material. And with Five Nights at Freddy's: Night of Frights Game they have certainly done that.

Starship Captains WBG Score: 8.5 Player Count: 1-4 You’ll like this if you like: Explorers of the North Sea, Star Trek films or shows, 51st State. Published by: Czech Games Edition Designed by: Peter B. Hoffgaard Starship Captains was one of the most popular games at Essen Spiel 2022. It ranked 8th on the 'hot-list' on BGG's preview. I was very keen to get this one to the table for myself to see what all the hype was about. The cover art intrigued me. This is not a children's game, as much as the cover may suggest otherwise. It instantly drew me into the lore of the game with the obvious science-fiction nods. But what kind of game is this? Let's beam it to the table and see how it plays. Set-Up I won't go through everything here, it's best to just follow the rule book which is excellent and very clear. The main part is to lay out all the components, give each player a ship mini and board, and two of each workers, called ensign's, plus one cadet. Place one of each worker into the ready room on your ship board and the others into the waiting line. Then give each player one medal, seven damage tokens, a tech board, and five promotion rings. Then place one triangle token on each space on the main board, then replace each triangle with the appropriate card. Either a mission card, station tile, or leave as a numbered tile. More of that later. Placing the triangle in this way allows for a variable set-up each game. Next, place one cadet and medal per player and the home station triangle into the subsequent rounds set up spaces at the top of the board, ready for mid round set-up. Then, finally, each player places their ship mini into the central starting home base and the game can begin. Initial set-up can take a while as you need to make the ship minis, and fold down and stick together the double sided ship boards. But it's all very simple and won't take long, and then it is done for ever. And who doesn't like a bit of arts and crafts in space? How to Play Playing Starship Captains is very simple. On your turn, you can do one of two things. Either, activate a room in your ship. Or complete a mission on the planet your ship is currently at. On your ship you have access to four rooms. Each one is coloured and can only be activated by the matching ensign. (Which means flag by the way. One flown on a ship to symbolise the vessels nationality. I had to google it too). So, for example, if you want to fly your ship one or two spaces on the board, you simply move one of your red ensigns out of your ready room on your ship, tap the red sign for the room you are activating, move the ensign to the back of the crew path leading back into the ready room, and move your ship. That's your turn done. It all just takes a brief moment. The other three options when using rooms and crew are to fight a pirate with a yellow ensign, research a new technology with a blue ensign, or repair some damage on your ship with either of your ensigns or a cadet. Fighting a pirate can only be done if you are on a planet next to a pirate token. These are placed on the board during set up, but many more come during the game. You take one damage every time you fight one, but then instantly gain the benefit on the pirate token. This will either br to gain one android which acts as a wild ensign, or to collect one random artifact and one medal. The medals are used to either promote your ensigns to Commanders, which doubles their efficiency. To train a cadet to become any ensign. Or, finally to exchange any ensign with any other ensign. The artefacts can be used in matching pairs to have extra turns. They all come showing two mains room colours. If you get a matching pair you can discard those two artifacts to enact that colours room, just as an ensign would. The pirate token you defeated is then flipped and placed into your cargo hold for end game points. There are some tech cards which can increase the value of the defeated Pirates. The third main room allows you to research new technologies. This gives you the chance to pick one of the eight tech cards laid out during start up to add to your tech board. These cards will give you end-game scoring options, benefits that can be used during the game, or additional rooms that can be used with the matching ensign just like the main starting rooms. When placed on the tech board, if you match icons that are on the edges of the card with a card already there, like the wrench and medal symbols below, or on the board itself, you will also gain additional benefits. Such as additional movement for your ship, one medal, or the opportunity to remove one damage token. This begins the main part of why this game is fun, the combo's! More on that soon. The final option available to you when you activate a room is to repair one damage from your ship. Although you have now learned how additional rooms can be added to your ship as you play the game. So, that's rooms. What about missions? Well, if you are on a planet with a mission card, instead of activating a room, you can complete this mission. You do this by moving the card from the board, and placing it into the slot beside your transporter on your ship board. You must then move one, two, or three ensigns, cadets, or androids to your transporter bay, depending on how many lines on the mission card there are. If the crew member matches the colour of the line, you will gain that benefit. If it doesn't you can still complete the mission but you cannot get the reward. Sometimes, this works in your advantage, as not all of the benefits are good. For example, you may get damage from completing them. But you'll still get the points if you fulfill the crew requirements, even if the colour doesn't match. The crew will then go to the back of your queue, they are exhausted for this round, and you will flip over the card and keep it by your board. They will be used for end game scoring, based on the number on the bottom right. This is the main way to score big in this game, but it uses a lot of crew. There are some planets with space stations orbiting them, which allow the first player there each round to gain a benefit. Such as gaining a new android, or an artefact and one repair action. When done, the token is moved to the top of the board to be replaced at the start of the new round. When you run out of crew, or if you ever decide you want to, you can pass. When all players have passed, the round ends. You will slide all your exhausted crew forward back into your bay leaving just three behind. This is how you get new crew for the next round, but also is the most satisfying part of the game. Check it out. I often do this over and over, just for fun. You will too! You will then distribute the 'new stuff' you set out for each round to all players. In round two you will get one extra medal, and before round three and four, one extra cadet. At this point, you will also refresh any space stations that were used by moving the token back down to that statsions card. Then move the first player token to the next player and begin the next round. The game runs for four rounds, and the player with the most points at the end is the winner. There is a line of text at the back of the book for each score from one to 75, that describes your score in a more story driven way. They are hilarious and well worth enjoying as a group at the end. As you fight the pirates, the opportunity to do this again will diminish. You only start with a few on the board, and you can only fight them once. However, as you complete missions, there is a very clever mechanic whereby the new missions are added to the board, and the countdown to the pirate uprising develops. Let me talk you through it. When you complete a mission, you take that mission card from the board. You will then take the highest number triangle token that is still face up and move that to the place you took the mission card from and flip it over. You will then add a new mission card onto the place you took this triangle token from. This does two very clever things. First, it shows all players where the next mission card will appear. They will always be placed onto the space of the current highest face up triangle token. Secondly, you all know when new pirates will come. The count down is there for all to see. As when you flip the final 'one' triangle, this is when the pirate uprising begins, and more pirate tokens appear. You must flip all the triangles back to being face up and place a pirate token on each one. Then move the pirate out onto its corresponding space, (matching the colour of the pirates exhaust and the trails from that planet) so long as there isn't already a pirate there. Is it Fun? Playing Starship Captains is a lot of fun. For me, it is all about the combos. Maximising the efficiency of your turns by getting extra crew, actions, or bonuses. The combos, when you get them, are so satisfying. This is how you will start to score well in the game. I went from scoring 20's and 30's in my first three games, to getting 40's, then 50's and 60's in later games. I was doing the same thing, just being more efficient. Getting tech cards early helped, and choosing the right ones so that they worked with my engine as well as possible. But will you enjoy this? Well, there are three main things to consider if you are thinking about buying this game. 1. The potential down time for any player after passing if other players have multiple turns left. 2. The simplicity of gameplay as perceived from the box art. 3. Your thoughts on the sci-fi world this game is set within and how this works for a board game. Well, don't just take my word for it, let's hear from designer Peter B. Hoffgaard himself. It is for sure inspired by Star Trek. I grew up watching TNG in the 90s and loved the bright outlook on the future of humankind. It could have worked as licensed game, but I always wanted the freedom to make references to other sci-fi shows and movies, and the freedom to control how much humour we want to add in the game. Also I wanted to have fun doing some fun and silly world building. I know the cover of the box might not scream medium weight euro game. But I really want to challenge that all euros should look beige and brown, and not all sci-fi games have to be dark, black and filled with horror. I wanted an art style that's fun and visually appealing even to non-gamers. Also I would personally love it if more games would look like that. If you [complete] a lot of missions in a round where [other] players do very few. First off, the core way you can get points is by doing missions, so yes this is something you need to do if you want to win the game. What I think makes it interesting is that the same crew you need to do missions is the same you need to move your ship, battle pirates and get tech. So it's all about though choices. If you only do missions and ignore tech and pirates I would argue you would loose to a player that knows the game. About the wait time. There can be some wait time if you're very aggressive with missions, or if some player is very good at extending their turn with bonus actions and androids (and none of the other players do that). But I actually don't mind it seeing what other players do, and if you play with players of equal level this wait time will be very minimal. It's normally just a matter of a few extra actions for one player. Well, there you have it! Thanks Peter, well put, and I would agree with all of that. Starship Captains is definitely a game that grows with repeat plays. It's not that you have to play it over and over to understand it, or enjoy it. But you will, like any game, get better with repeat plays. And getting better in this game means you can utilise more combinations. And combinations are fun! Incredibly satisfying, and generally mean you will score better. You may get this from play one, but I would wager it would take a couple of plays at least. It took me five, but I do play most games quite quickly. Maybe I just need to pause and think more! I would recommend this game to anyone who is looking for a mid-weight game to play with their friends of family, in under an hour, that offers a brighter and more colourful art style than the usual euro game. Starship Captains is very simple and my son (9) instantly took to this, beating me on the first two games by a long way! He enjoyed the options available to him, despite the simple ruleset. I think this is the perfect game to sit down with your children with, if you are looking to take them to their next step of gaming. It could be the perfect gateway game too for friends new to the hobby. And, of course, it goes outwith saying, this is perfect for any fan of Star Trek. I want to keep getting better and better at this game. I've taken great satisfaction from developing my understanding of the best strategies. And after multiple plays, I'm left with a strong desire to keep playing, to try and improve my scores, and to trial out new strategies. All in the search of those juciy combos! Starship Captains is a simple but addictive game that will be a firm favourite in our house for many years to come.

Ted Lasso WBG Score: 7 Player Count: 2-6 You’ll like this if you like: Magic Maze, 5-Minute Dungeon, Jungle Speed. Published by: Prospero Hall Designed by: Funko Games If you haven't watched Ted Lasso yet, where have you been?! It's one of the best drama comedies I have seen recently. And it is not just for football fans. It's full of romance, comedy, drama and a whole lot more. Just like this new party game version from Funko Games. Let's get it to the table and see how it plays. Set Up Place the game board and location mats into the center of the table. Shuffle the event cards and place four in a face down pile on the circular board. These represent the four rounds of the game. One new event is revealed each round offering a new specific rule just for that round. Shuffle up all the trouble tiles and place them all in the biscuit box, face down if possible. Then, shuffle the character cards and place one face up in each location, drawing a trouble tile for each symbol on the character card for each location. Place Coach Lasso standee on the space in the Coaches office location, and then Coach Beard onto the Training Pitch. Empty the cardboard spacer in the main box, and then place the football dice into this. The box acts as a dice tray in the game. Cool huh! Then shuffle all the Believe cards and deal them out evenly to each player, face down. How to Play Now, set a two minute timer. There is a free app to use, with some thematic sound effects if you prefer. Its pretty cool to use, although quite tense! But I feel that adds quite a bit to the game. Then, flip the top event card and ensure everyone has read and understood each characters power and location effect. Then, start the timer. All players will look at their cards and starting with the dealer, one player chooses one colour. All players then play all their cards of this colour face up in front of them. They can use their biscuits cards if they wish as well. They are wild in the game. Players can then discuss how to use these cards. There are three ways to do that. The main way is to place them into one of the two spaces that currently have either Coach Beard or Coach Lasso in them. Each location has a number of trouble tiles with different coloured faces on them. You need to play a card that matches each coloured face in order to remove the trouble tile. The second way, is how you move the coaches to a new location. Place a card face up into the move a coach space on the main board and them move one coach to a new location. The final way is to place the card face down into the self care area. Then, at the end of the round, any group of five cards here can be used to get rid of one trouble tile at any location. But remember you are up against the clock, and whatever rule the event card displayed that round. Once all cards on the chosen colour are used, the next player will choose another colour and the game will continue. When the timer is up, you must stop playing. If players use all their cards before this, just stop the timer. If anyone has any cards left in their hand when the timer goes off, you loose three moral (points). If any characters have not had any believe cards placed in front of them, then you must add one more trouble token to this location. Then, you can remove as many trouble tiles as you can. Matching the cards you played to the colours on the trouble tokens. If any location is left without any trouble tokens, you can then score this character. They are free of troubles and ready to reward you with juicy morale! Move the point tracker the required number of spaces on the score track located around the top of the box, now dice tray. Or, if it was a footballer that scored, it will show a number of football icons instead. This shows how many times you can roll the dice, scoring points for whatever you roll. Remember, if you have five or more self help card cards you can remove one extra trouble token. Then, replace any removed scored characters with a new character card, flip the next event card up, replace any required trouble tokens into new character locations, and shuffle up and go again. The game has four rounds, and you need to try and reach 45 morale points to win as a group. Anything less, and the group looses. Morale was not high enough, and everyone reaches for the biscuit tin/pub. Is it fun? There is so much humour in this game. On the cards there are some very amusing quotes and jokes from the show. But you won't ever really have time to read this in the game. But try and take some time between rounds to read a few out oud. Especially if you are playing the game with other fans of the show. There are so many nods to the TV programme in this game. From the obvious things such as the characters, sets, quotes, and theme, to more subtle things such as the biscuits and pink box they come in. When I saw that, I genuinely said out loud, "Oh, what a nice touch." And I was alone at the time, setting up! All the characters are themed so well, and the art is direct photography from the episodes. Which is some games, just doesn't work. But here, being from a live action TV show is the right choice. It looks good, comes with clear and simple symbols, and adds to the overall theme. The box that becomes the dice tray is awesome. More games should do this. What a great way to use the box. It's so simple and yet so thematic and pleasing. This is also the score tracker too, which works very well, although the clip is quite stiff, and instead of sliding it, I have to take it off and replace it each time. For fear of ripping the artwork. The dice is pretty cool too. The shape of a football, and with lots of sides, it wobbles and rolls a perfect amount. Not so much you get board waiting, but the perfect amount to make it look like a ball rolling around a football pitch. But you asked a question. It is fun? And I seem to be stalling. So, let me answer this now. Yes, it really is a lot of fun. This game looks a bit cheesy. Or maybe even like a lazy TV spin off money maker from the box alone. But inside is a game much like the show. Full of charm, character, and a lot of laughs. The frantic rounds of trying to pick the right card based on which characters need what, and where the coach minis currently are is challenging, and tense under the time pressure. More so with your friends all shouting at you. But then once a colour is picked, you then need to decide how to best use those cards. How many do you need to put where, and can you place a few before using one to move the coach to help another character out. All under time pressure. It's funny to see how well you have done, when the timer ends you can then calmly go through each location to see if you plans have paid off. Often you will find a random extra card you don't need, or a colour that was never useful here and you will wonder why and how it got there when all players insist they were not the one to place it! But getting it right feels good. Removing the troubles and scoring a character rewards each player with a warm sense of achievement. I would recommend this to anyone who is looking for a new fun party game to play with a group of friends who have enjoyed the show. Would people have as much fun playing this had they not watched the show? I would say no. And evidence for me of playing with and without fans of the show proves this. But it was still be entertaining for them, but a lot of the charm was lost on them. So, really this is for fans of the show. But most spin off products are, right? I found most of the games of Tad Lasso I won, but as the great Roy Kent once said, "Enjoy your trophies for winning nothing." Winning or loosing, it is great fun. But the game seems well balanced to allow you to mostly achieve success in the final round. But I did have a few occasions where we smashed it and won in round two! But generally speaking, I would say the scoring is well set. And of course, they are your only options. Win, or loose. “If God would have wanted games to end in a tie, she wouldn’t have invented numbers.”

The Guild Of Merchant Explorers WBG Score: 8/10 Player Count: 1–4 You’ll like this if you like: Blue Lagoon, Cartographers Published by: Alderac Entertainment Group Designed by: Matthew Dunstan, Brett J. Gilbert By Tom Harrod It’s hard to imagine a world without maps. When driving to UKGE in Birmingham, I had a moment of uncertainty when my Sat-Nav got confused. Its system was out of date, and when I had to travel along a new stretch of motorway, I prayed it would re-sync itself. When it did, after a scary five minutes, I breathed a sigh of relief. I could relax for the rest of my journey… But there were once an era when crews relished such a challenge of heading off the edge of the map. Cartographers filling in blank spaces on their maps. Or, sketching them afresh, as the expedition progressed. That’s what you’re doing in The Guild Of Merchant Explorers – venturing out into the far-flung corners of the kingdom of Tigomé. The Queen demands you update the maps of old. Creating new villages, once you’ve ensured the land is safe. Building and reconnecting new trade routes. Discovering mysterious towers, and investigating ancient ruins. Sounds fantastic, right? But how does the game itself flow as an experience? The Elevator Pitch: What’s It All About? The Guild of Merchant Explorers is a 1-4 player game by designers Matthew Dunstan and Brett J. Gilbert. This isn’t the duo’s first collaboration. They’ve also created the likes of Elysium, Chocolate Factory, and Roll For Adventure. The core mechanism is network-building, as you spread out across the map and link up locations. The aim? Score points for completing various challenges – some of these venturing into set collection. Each player gets an A4-sized player map, with cubes and Village markers in their colour. The map itself represents Tigomé as a kingdom. Terrains range from grassland to desert, mountains to open oceans. Comprised of a hexagonal grid, there’s a large capital city in the centre. This is where your expedition begins: a commissioned venture from the queen of Tigomé, herself! The turns of the game have a ‘bingo’ characteristic to them. Six Explore Cards get shuffled, and drawn one at a time. All players react to the Explore Card drawn, in a simultaneous manner. Five of these six cards show terrains on them, such as 1x desert hex, or 3x ocean hexes, for example. Once flipped over, all players then get to explore that quota of said terrain type. Let’s look at how Exploring works first, and then I’ll explain scoring. Hexploring Tigomé On your first turn of the game, you have to explore adjacent to your capital. Makes sense, right? This represents you setting off on your grand journey. To explore, you place an Explorer (one of your cubes from your supply) onto the corresponding terrain hex. Subsequent Explorers must sit next to either the capital, or fellow Explorers. Think of this like the marvellous ‘journey’ maps in the Indiana Jones movies. (You know, where Indy flew from A to B.) The dotted line – or here, your cubes – represented him travelling. The Explore Cards are so simple, yet compelling in the challenge they present. The Explore 1x Mountain Space card tells you straight away that this is the toughest terrain to traverse and cover. It’s a slower terrain type to fill up and traverse. There’s no direct statement to which era you’re in, you can imagine the technology available in Tigomé at the time. Mountain ranges were, no doubt, dangerous and arduous to travel through. The Explore 2x Grassland Spaces works the same as the Explore 2x Desert Spaces card. You get to place two Explorers, but they don’t have to be adjacent to one another, per se. They do have to obey ‘The Golden Rules of Exploration’, though. Players must always place Explorers (their cubes) adjacent to one of their other Explorers, or their capital, or a Village. (I’ll explain Villages, later.) These two cards allow players to spread out and explore in two different directions. Tigomé is a fictional land, but its terrain ratios match that of our own. There’s more water than there is any other land type. This is why the Explore 3x Sea Spaces card allows you to travel so far. At some point, you’re going to have to set sail to charter those far-flung lands unknown. The catch is that the sea hexes that you explore have to form a straight line. So while you cover more ground with this card, it’s not as flexible as the, say, Explore 2x Desert card. You can always opt to explore up to the three hexes in a line, but efficiency gamers will wince at not taking full advantage! And talking of flexibility: the fifth card grants you options-galore. This one’s called Explore Any 2x Adjacent Spaces. You can explore any two hexes, of any terrain type – even if they’re different from one another. They have to be adjacent to one another, though. The most interesting card of all though, is the Era I, II and III Cards. Era Cards: Modular Bingo In the first round (A.K.A. Era), you shuffle in the Era I Card in among the other Exploration Cards. Once it gets flipped, each player gets given two Investigation Cards, and they get to keep one. These are all powerful, asymmetrical exploration actions, and you get to take this action straight away. It could be something like ‘Explore 3x Mountain Spaces and 1x Sea Space, in any order’. Or, ‘Explore 5x Sea Spaces’! Or ‘Explore 1x Grassland Space, and then Explore up to 5x Spaces adjacent to this Grassland Space’. The choices all seem fantastic, because they let you cover so much more ground! And only YOU can take this particular action. You get to keep this card to use again, later in the game. Because at the end of the first Era, all six of the Explore Cards get shuffled again. Only this time, you add an Era II Card in, too. When the Era I Card gets drawn in later rounds, each player gets to activate their Investigation Card again. And when the Era II Card gets drawn, each player receives another two Investigation Cards; once again, keeping one. There’s an Era III Card for the third round, too. In Era III you’ll get to play your Era I Card and your Era II Card again, plus pick another Investigation Card. In the fourth and final Era, you don’t gain another Investigation Card. Instead, another Explore Card does get added, but it’s a I/II/III Card. When drawn, it allows you to pick which of your three Investigation Cards you want to play. It means in Era IV, you’ll get to play each of your Investigation Cards, and one of them twice! These Investigation Cards are amazing for not only providing mega-boosted turns. They also inject a true modular layer of discoverability for all players. There’s always the potential with simultaneous ‘bingo’-style games that players can copy one another. That goes out the window as soon as players gain unique Investigation Cards. You explore in radical, polarised ways, and that’s crucial for competitive and compelling gameplay. So… How Do I Score? The aim of The Guild of Merchant Explorers is to earn the most coins over four rounds. Some hex spaces provide a stated quota of coins for exploring them. When you cover the space, take the stated number of coins from the supply. The map’s split into a series of regions – a region being a contiguous section of the map consisting of the same terrain type. Once you’ve Explored an entire region within one Era, you place a Village within that region. You remove one of the Explore cubes (on a blank, non-coin hex) and replace it with a Village token. When you do this, you earn coins in accordance to the Era you achieved this. So in Era I, you earn 1 coin for each Village you place. In Era II, you earn 2 coins for placing a Village, and so on. A Little Bit Of Brass At the end of the Era, players return all their Explorer cubes from their map back to their supply. You leave only the Villages. In the next Era, when Explore Cards get revealed, you place Explore cubes on your map, adjacent to either your capital, or a Village. Did designers Dunstan and Gilbert take an inkling of inspiration from Martin Wallace’s Brass with the Villages aspect? (Or even Blue Lagoon?) This reminds me of the lower-level Industry Tiles in Brass getting removed after the Canal Phase. This is a brilliant rule. If you’re not careful, it’s not just points you’re missing out on if you fail to complete a region before the Era’s finished. It’s also a vital launch-pad for exploration for the start of the next Era. You can’t afford to start each Era out of your capital each time! You can re-explore the same hexes in later Eras. (And often, you have to; you can even re-explore coin spaces, earning the coins all over again!) You cannot earn the reward for completing a region a second time, though. In that regard, it’s a waste of Explorers. There’s also four Discovery Spaces on your map, which tend to be in the four corners of Tigomé. They’re considered wild (meaning you can explore them by any terrain action). When you explore them, you place a Tower on the space. You gain coins every time you discover one of these spaces – 6 / 8 / 10 / 14 coins. So if you can Explore all four of them, that’s an impressive 38 coins! Various Ruins sit scattered across the kingdom. Some are shipwrecks, others as spaces within desert or grassland. If you explore a Ruin, you place a Treasure Token underneath it and draw a Treasure Card. These are all beneficial bonuses, ranging from extra coins, or getting to place an extra, wild Explore cube. That’s often key to a good turn! So often you can fall one Explorer short. Other Treasure cards offer end-game scoring, thus incentivising you to Explore in certain areas or manners. You can only get goodies from a Ruin space once – you can’t ransack it a second time! You’ve already nabbed the loot! Last of all, there are various Cities across the map. They’re waiting to gain re-connection with the wider kingdom of Tigomé. If you can link up two City spaces in the same Era, you’ve created a trade route between them. Each City has a value of 2-5. You multiply the two City’s values together and earn that many coins. The you cover up one of the Cities, meaning you can’t use it for another multiplier, later in the game. (But you can still use the other one.) A Flip And Write – Without The Write The scoring methods all feel positive, because often you’re picking up coins every other turn. (If not more often so, especially during the latter Eras.) The way in which you earn points for completing regions feels akin to the scoring involved with completing sections in Castles of Burgundy. One could argue that Stefan Feld is a master of ‘point salad’-style games, and Guild of Merchant Explorers also provides this. However, the simultaneous bingo nature of it and the network building has a strong a flip-and-write vibe. Only there’s no ‘write’ in this game; it’s more like flip-and-place. Because of that, this is very much a heads-down, multiplayer solitaire experience. You are at risk of some players cheating with regards to taking coins, because you’ll never pay attention to their map. (Of course, the best way to tackle cheats is to not play with them again!) It can be tricky to keep on top of your own scoring though, especially when you achieve multiple things in the same turn. There are public goals for players to shoot for, with rewards for completing them first. That’s often a trait seen in other roll-/flip-and-writes, such as Welcome To… and Demeter. For some gamers, they’ll see that as a negative feature. Others will revel in the fact that the solitaire game they’re playing is an enthralling one. They’ll be too busy enjoying solving their own puzzle to care. The puzzle is, of course, trying to complete certain goals in time before the end of each Era. You can – and will – card-count, with regards to the Exploration Cards. You’ll come to know which ones remain to flip; you don’t know which order they’re in, though. So a big part of the conundrum is figuring out how best to cover as much land, given the cards still left to play. This is especially the case for cards such as the Explore Any 2 Adjacent Spaces. The flexibility involved means you can attempt to plan ahead for multiple scenarios. But don’t rely on a shuffled deck of cards coming out in the order you need! Pastel Maps You Want To Explore Art, as always, is subjective. Some folks might take one look at these maps and find them dull. To my mind, there is beauty in artist Gerralt Landman’s pastel tones. The maps have clear boundaries and texture between the terrains. There’s reminders for how regions/Villages and Towers score along the bottom. The drop-down view of the kingdom gave me similar vibes to seeing Dungeons & Dragons maps. This isn’t a Red Raven Games kind of set-up, though. (It’s not like Near & Far or Sleeping Gods, where there’s mini Events waiting at every set of Ruins.) You’re not going to discover what or who lies inside within the Cities, Towers or stretches of terrain. This isn’t about narrative opportunities. Theme-wise, they might have missed a trick here. But you have to assume an expansion is on the horizon, and if Dunstan and Gilbert could inject a series of Events, then wow. This would open up Guild of Merchant Explorers to a whole new audience! As it stands, this has a powerful appeal to those who adore pattern-building games, with weak theme. I’m excited about the potential for how this can grow, though… There’s also four different maps available (they’re all double-sided). They’re a glossy thin cardstock, with each map providing with it tweaks on gameplay. The Kazan map, for example, has volcanic regions which players cannot explore. These act as obstacles, forcing cumbersome movement and therefore smarter in-game decisions. Each map has with it six public goal cards, and you play with three each game. So in that regard, there’s a healthy dose of replayability here. Final Thoughts On… The Guild Of Merchant Explorers The game says to keep coins face-down throughout, and reveal your total at the end. However, I found this a little too fiddly, seeing as most of the time you’re earning 1-4 coins. The coins are all identical on their backs, which I understand is mean to create a Big Reveal at the end. Most of the time I ended up keeping my coins face-up and swapping them for smaller change most turns. Five 1s for a 5, five 10s for a 50. When you’re looking to score over 100 points in coins, you can’t be taking 100 coins over the game; that’s not practical! The Villages and Towers look great when they start to spread out across your map. Their silhouetted presence provides a pleasant view. It’s something of a contrast to the bland Explorer cubes. Standard meeples would be too big for this scale. I also appreciate small components would become too awkward. Cubes, while not exciting, are at least practical. They’re mere pawns in the grander scheme of things. They’re clear to digest at-a-glance. But if you’re used to custom meeples, then you might feel underwhelmed with these. You can also solo this in 30 minutes and marvel in every second of it. The solo mode is an inflate-your-ego goal, where you aim to get a high score. There’s no real AI opponent… But then, that mirrors the multiplayer game, too. It’s a way to learn the game, before you introduce it to others. Due to its short length and gratifying gameplay, it is an addictive experience, though. You’ll want to play it again and again. Overall, there’s plenty of tasty decisions throughout, regardless of which map you play. (Avenia is, without doubt, the easier ‘beginner’ map.) The Guild of Merchant Explorers never feels overwhelming, but boy, is it one heck of a satisfying chin-stroker. You’re exploring to cover the map, rather than discovering what’s there. As it stands, I love the efficiency challenge that Guild… presents. But if it could toss in a narrative to show what we actually uncover when we visit these locations, though? That would be phenomenal.

Mada WBG Score: 8 Player Count: 2-5 You’ll like this if you like: Port Royal, Kariba, Kawaii. Published by: Helvetiq Designed by: Sophia Wagner Helvetiq have made a number of beautiful small box games that I love. Tucano and Kinoko are two recent favourites. Whenever a new one comes out, I am always instantly intrigued. They always seem to pack so much game into these tiny boxes. When Mada was announced, I was instantly intrigued. I googled what the word meant. In Hindu theology it means "arrogance, excessive pride, obstinacy, stubborn mindedness" so I was interested what this had to do with a card game. Then I checked out the mechanics. Push-Your-Luck! Ah! That all makes sense then. Let's get it to the table and see how it plays. Set Up This has to be one of the easiest games to get to the table. Shuffle the deck and deal three cards to each player, then place the remaining cards face down on the table. You are now ready to play. That really is it! Maybe use the time saved to pop the kettle on? How to Play Players will then take it in turns to either pick up a card or place a card down in front of them. You can only place a card if you have one that either matches the current face up card previous placed, or raises it. You can only have three cards in your hand at a time, so if you have three cards already, all you can do is play a card. If you do no have a card in your hand that you can play, and you already have three cards, your only option is to take the top card from the deck and play it blind. If it matches or beats your top card you play on. If not, you are out. Whenever someone is out, all other players will then remove their top card and keep it face down by them for end game scoring, and then place the rest of their pile into the current discard pile. All players that didn't loose can then discard as many of their current hand as they choose, or keep them for the next round. The loosing player must keep all their hand. The next round then begins with some players starting with some cards in their hand, and others perhaps not. There are three extra cards in the deck. The single Lemur card that allows you to take the top card from your pile and place it with this Lemur card at the bottom of your deck, thus lowering your current top card. If you have a few cards on top of your pile with the same number, this card will drag them all to the bottom. The Scorpion card must be instantly discarded as soon as it is drawn. You must also discard one of your hand cards with this if you have at least one more in your hand. A great way to get rid of a card from your hand that you don't want. The double Lemurs card allows you to swap your current deck with any other player, discarding the Lemur card into the general discard as you do. Some real mischief can be done with this game. Rounds will run until someone has five face down scoring cards and then the game ends. The cards score not for their numerical total, but for the number of flowers on the cactus. So the two would score one, the seven would score three, and the 13, the highest card in the deck, would score six. Is it Fun? Playing Mada is so much fun. Deceptively so. As it is such a simple game to learn and teach, and as there are so few options on your turn, you may be forgiven for thinking this won't be that entertaining when you play. But as you get into this little beauty, you will realise just how entertaining a few cards with a few simple rules can be. The push-your-luck element is clear. But changing decks with other players, drawing a 13 blind, when that was the only card that could save you, or using a wild card to extend your run a few more turns is so satisfying. There is a little bit more strategy that you first think in this game too. When you can see other players all with higher numbers down, you can safely assume the end is nigh. So, at this point, it may be a good idea to play one of your higher cards, even if you could play a lower one, so that when the round ends you score more points. But of course, the game could run on longer than you anticipate, as other players play 13 after 13, use wild cards, or get lucky with the blind draw. So, you must always plan a few turns ahead when possible. Looking at your cards, you feel like you have so few options. Play a card, or draw a card if you can. But that limitation creates tension. And that tension creates a real enjoyment. Of course, it won't always go your way. But rounds of this game can be very quick. An overall game can run between 10-20 minutes depending on player count and the luck of the draw. So, you can always just play again if you didn't get the cards you wanted. And I am certain that most times, the winning player will fancy another game too. The games are fast, fun, and full of great moments. The surprise of a late deck switch when you have a nice build of numerical cards to play on top of your current low card, to then have that switched to a high card you cannot beat with your current full hand, only to then draw blind and hit a 13... The cries of joy and shock from the other players will fill the room constantly from moments like this with Mada. I have really enjoyed playing this game, and would rate it as one of my favourite small box games from Helvetiq so far. It is so quick to play, but offers to much, I find myself reaching for it before, between, and after most game sessions right now. And seeing as I play pretty much every day, that's a lot of plays. I would recommend this game to anyone who enjoys short filler card games and is looking for something new to add to their collection. It is perfect for anyone who enjoys push-your-luck or hand management games, or games with lot's of thrills and spills. I am truly enamoured by this wonderful little game, and can see myself playing many, many more times. Being so small, with such a simple game mechanic, it's perfect to take with you to restaurants or pubs too, no mada the space available, this games works. (Sorry, I had to do it at least once).

Toko Island WBG Score: 7.5 Player Count: 1-4 You’ll like this if you like: Hanabi, Dodo, Memory Published by: Helvetiq Designed by: Marie Fort, Wilfried Fort How to play video here Designers Marie and Wilfred Fort, are the team behind many successful family games. Dragomino, Valley of the Viking, and Unlock Kids to name just three. I was excited to see what their partnership with Helvetiq was going to bring, seeing as Helvetiq always make such aesthetically pleasing games. Seeing this set up at Essen intrigued me. The box art is quite mystical to me, and board has some real table presence. Let's get it to the table to see how it plays. Set Up Place the two boat titles down together and place the island board into the box to form the main playing area. Shuffle all the treasure pieces and place them into the holes face down on the island, making sure to fill in all the gaps. Note, some spaces hold up two or three treasure pieces. Then lay the Cupboard of Curiosities sheet down on either side A or B depending on which mission you are trying. Draw the square action tiles from the draw string bag and place them face down at random onto the boat onto the 16 spaces, then flip them over. Finally, draw the cards you are using the for current mission. There are four missions in total, each with their own ruleset and scoring mechanisms, with three levels of difficulty for each. Simply pick the cards with the correct coloured symbol on the reverse to match your desired level and adventure. Shuffle these card and place them face down into the boat, flipping the top card over. You are now ready to travel to Toko Island. How to Play Toko Island is a cooperative experience. Starting with the first player, then in turn, each player must choose one of the tiles on the boat. These represent two things. First, the symbol on the tile itself shows where on Toko Island you can dig. The rake lets you dig on the sand. The Shovel is for the forest. And finally, the pick axe lets you dig on rock in the centre of the island. And secondly, the x1, x2, or x3 symbol next to the tile tells you how many times you can carry out this action. Either digging up one, two, or three treasures from the area shown on the tile. You can then flip over the set number of tiles in the designated area. You are looking to match a treasure token with the current card shown on the boat. If you do, you can move that token over, placing it into the cupboard of curiosities. This not only shows you what you have collected thus far, but also what is left on the island. Then, move the card you collected from the top of the pile and place it next to the boat, flip over the next card, and the turn moves to the next player. If you do not flip over any matching tiles to the current card, then you must flip them all back over. Trying to remember what each one was, in case one of the upcoming treasure cards shows that symbol. The next player must now choose their tile and so on. This continues until either all of the treasures have been found, or you run out of tiles. Each mission has its own way to score and interpret your success, but as with most family games, the fun comes from the matching of symbols. And the drama, when with only a few turns left, you manage to find that final symbol. Which seems to happen a lot on this game. The balance is spot on. Is it fun If you enjoy memory games, then yes. You will have a lot of fun with this game. It is quite simple, being advertised as for ages 6 and up, which I would very much agree with. I enjoy the beautiful aesthetics of this game, and the high production value with all the components. And I like the sense of adventure and history in this game. Each of the four missions is based on four real adventurers from history, and the prizes you can win are all based on real instruments used in the past. I enjoyed discussing these people and items with my children as we played... Prizes you say? Yes, I will get to that! As you complete each mission on each difficulty you will be rewarded with cards to place into a folder that tracks your success through the game. These cards are double sided and can be flipped over to their silver shiny side when you complete missions at harder levels. Show me a child that won't get excited about this! To be fair, show me a gaming adult that won't get a little bit excited about this! I know I did. As you complete rows and columns in this book with your cards, you can unlock special powers to use on later games. These comes in the form of tiles that can be placed into the front of your boat in subsequent games. They all have a one time only use, but offer a nice option to either carry out additional actions, flip over extra treasure cards, or transform any tool into one other type. This is a nice development in the game, and you feel genuinely rewarded (both in shiny and useful things) for playing the game multiple times. Something I think is sometimes missing in other games. You should want to play games again because they are fun. It should be as simple as that. And this game is fun. But with a family game, it is nice to offer some gamification into the process. It works very well and adds to the replayability and satisfaction from 'completing the game' in a huge way. Toko Island is a very simply game. There is not a lot of strategy in it. But there is more than you first think. As the cupboard if curiosities shows all the possible tiles available, as you mark them off as you gather treasure from the island; you can use this knowledge to increase your chances of success. For example, if you are looking for Fossil, and you have so far gathered two large fossils, you know from looking at the cupboard of curiosities that there are two medium and two small fossils left. As such, you want to pick a tool that will allow you to flip only this size of tile over. It is a simple strategy to employ, but it works well, increases your chances of success, and makes the hunt feel less random. But of course, the main tactic and strategy is your memory. Working as a team to try and remember where that fossil was when you flipped it over three turns ago is the key. It is a fun team game to play and helping each other out in this way feels great. It is highly rewarding to remember correctly when others have not, and you manage to get the treasure you were after. There are many team cheers and high fives as we play this game. Thankfully, my children have a much better memory than I do, so we do ok most of the time! I would recommend this game to any family looking for a new game to play as a group. It is perfect for younger gamers who want to feel like they are playing a more complex and heavy game, when in fact the rule set and strategy is very simple. But it looks and feels bigger as you set up and play Toko Island. And the rewards from the trophy cards and tokens keeps you coming back for more, game after game. There is a delightful calming nature to this game. It just looks and feels so relaxing. But the later stages can be tense. When you only have a few tiles left to find the final few treasures, turns can be dramatic, stressful, but highly rewarding if you can remember correctly where the right treasure is. Or, just get lucky! Toko Island is a wonderful experience and a great game to win together as a family. If you loose, it sure is quick enough to just rack up and go again. Which you will want to do, game after game, to get all those shiny cards into your trophy booklet.

Wonder Book WBG Score: 8 Player Count: 1-4 You’ll like this if you like: The Goonies: Never Say Die, Scooby Doo: Escape From The Haunted Mansion, Cantaloop. Published by: dV Giochi Designed by: Martino Chiacchiera, Michele Piccolini Rule book here Disclaimer. This game was provided for free for purposes of a review by the publisher. This review will only show parts of the game available to you at the start of chapter one to avoid any spoilers. Open up the board in Wonder Book, and you will be treated to a pop-up delight! It is seriously impressive and will draw you in from the off. The box art is stunning... And the inside is even better. Just check this video out to see how impressive this is! OK, with all that peacocking out of the way, let's get the game to the table and see how it plays. Set Up Starting Wonder Book is very easy. There are six chapters (called adventures) for you to go on. Each neatly arranged in a different deck of cards. Take the first deck out of the box and open it up. This will talk you through the basics of how to play the game. It is worth having a quick read of the short rules too, that will explain the basic premise. But you will pick it up pretty easily if you have played similar games before and you could go straight to the cards and use the reference guide on the back of the the rule book if you wanted. Lay out all the health tokens, two bad guys (Wyrm's) for each player playing, and the different decks of cards, shuffled and placed face down. You are now ready to start your adventure. read the opening dialogue and intro on the first few cards. Welcome to Oniria! Or at least, the gateway to it. It wasn't going to be that easy now was it? How to Play I cannot say too much about this game without giving away spoilers but I will give you the basics so you can get a flavour. You will be working your way through six chapters in a cooperative adventure. On your turn, you can take three actions. This is mainly to move, fight, pick up sparks (to activate your special power), interact with an item, or use a special skill (with your sparks). Players can play in any turn, whatever the group feels will best suit them in the game. When all players are done any Wyrm's present will then take their turn. You do this by flipping one card from the Wyrm deck. This will show how many Wyrm's to add to the play area and how many actions they will take. There are sometimes some special actions as well, but again, no spoilers here. As you progress through the game, more cards will be added to the Wyrm deck that increase their powers, but below are two cards from chapter one to show you how they look and work. As you play through the cards used in each chapter, new characters will be introduced, magical items will appear, and all sorts of surprises will be encountered. As new powers, items, and objects come into the game, it will all feel very simple. Just follow the cards. I would love to share all the exciting things you will see in this game as they are amazing, and also quite unexpected at times in terms of how they are delivered. But I wouldn't want to spoil anything for you. All I will say is there is something very cool each chapter. Below is a very minor spoiler, but you will learn this very early in chapter one, but skip on to below this picture if you prefer. At the start of chapter one, you will be asked to flip over the book to show the back page. This becomes the play area for this first part of the game. On it, you will be collecting sparks to activate your skills, interacting with objects you place there, collecting items, and fighting the Wyrm's! But more will come, very soon! Ok, you are safe again. Fighting is the only disappointing part of the game. It's pretty basic. Just rolling some dice that show either success or failure. But you can re-roll for the cost of one health. And you will get extra powers as the game progresses. But the initial fights feels a little stale. However, each character has their own way of fighting, using different numbers of dice in different ways. It's just a shame there are not more options for each individual character. The dice create the main issues in the game. If you win, it is largely because you rolled lots of hits. If you loose, it is because you rolled lots of fails. And loosing means you have to go through the chapter again. It won't take that long to complete each chapter. Between 40-60 minutes depending on player count and player age. But repeating missions for younger players can be frustrating. The rules suggest that when you are done with the six chapters, you may want to play the whole thing again, to see what you missed and maybe get another ending. There are six in total. But I am unsure if this will be that appealing to most. It feels like a one and done to me. Which is fine. I loved the five hours I had playing through these chapters. I felt there was a lot of value to this, and have reset the game to gift to a friend to play with their family. But, repeating missions or the entire game is not something I can see myself doing. However, going through the game this first time was wonderful and very much enough for me to justify the cost of the game. It really was quite magical. Is it Fun The sense of adventure in this game is high. Superseded only by the huge sense of discovery. Some of the tricks this game throws at you are sensational. I was blown away at some of the little things you could do, or find as the game developed. When it was over, I was gushing and wanted to tell everyone about what I had done. I want to do that here too! But, you know... spoilers!! So, all I will say is that if you have children between six and ten, there is no game right now I would recommend higher if you want some quality family time based around a game. The dice throws are luck based of course and may put people off, but this is the only down side to the game. The rest of it is brilliant, and I think most people would really enjoy it. My family certainly did. We played through the six chapters in three nights. Only one chapter needed to be replayed as we lost, and we enjoyed doing it again. Although we did race through it the second time somewhat, knowing what was needed and how best to navigate through it quickly. There are certain points in the story where you must make a choice, stay and fight, progress forward, help a friend. That sort of thing. Playing chapters again gives you a chance to change your decisions here and see what path the story weaves this time. It is fun to do this, but there are not enough changes in each chapter to really make you want to do it again. But if you have to repeat a chapter then this is a nice option to have. The game will throw some interesting dexterity based mini games at you and your fellow adventurers. These are fun to try, quite unexpected, but link into the story very well. Playing these the first time is a a lot of fun. Repeating one mission, I did enjoy having another opportunity to do these again. I would highly recommend this game to anyone looking for a story based adventure game to play with their children. Anyone who wants a game to add an element of discovery to their table will be very happy with this. Wonder Book looks amazing from the off, and continues to deliver with some exciting surprises along the way. The story is interesting, and winning the game feels highly satisfying, if somewhat easy. It feels like you are completing a story. Your actions affect your ability to progress your characters through the adventure and your reward is a (blank) ending. Remember, no spoilers! I look forward to see what the publisher and designer does with this game next. A new version? Expansions? Added chapters? I hope I am not done with it. I enjoyed my time on Oniria immensely, and cannot wait to go back.

Something Wild WBG Score: 7 Player Count: 2-4 You’ll like this if you like: Simple card games, Kompromat, Fluxx. Published by: Funko Games Designed by: Prospero Hall Something Wild is a series of card games, themed across multiple IP's, including Marvel, Disney, Star Wars, and Dr. Seuss. They all play the same, but can be mix and matched into bigger games. This review will cover the basics of the game, as well focusing on the Baby Groot version I have. That's right, Baby Groot! I know!!!! So, let's get it to the table and see how it plays. Set Up Separate the playing and bonus cards. Shuffle both decks and deal three cards to each player. Then place the bonus cards face down on the table next to the Baby Groot and turn one face up. It should look something like this. Have a play with Baby Groot for as long as you feel necessary, then start the game. How to Play On each players turn, they will draw one card, then place one of their cards face down in front of them. Players are looking to create sets of the same numbers, or runs of the same colour. If you create a set or run of three cards, you can discard these cards and take the current face up bonus card as your own. The first person to get three bonus cards wins. The bonus cards all have a colour matching the cards in the deck. When you play a card down that matches this colour, or any card with the Baby Groot symbol shown on the 'one's,' you can take the Baby Groot mini and place it in front of you. The player who has the Baby Groot mini is about to use the face up power card, or any power card they have previously taken, if you choose, on their turn. You will either take Baby Groot from another person, or from the centre of the table if it is near the start of the game and no one has claimed him yet. Is it Fun Playing Something Wild is fast, fun, and quite addictive. Games can be over very quickly, sometimes in less than five minutes in a two player game. I often play multiple games, playing a best of three of five. The bonus cards offer very strong powers that affect the game a great deal. You can complete sets with any number, have extra turns, or even swop cards with other players. Using the power cards well will greatly increase your chances of winning. The art on the cards is bright, and a lot of fun. The characters all look like the Funko Pop characters you can collect, and are very appealing to younger players. The icons on the cards are very clear, with just the number and colour needing to be identified. But they have symbols too to make the game work for people who suffer from colour blindness. The baby Groot is adorable and worth buying the game for alone! He is useful in the game, identifying who can use the power cards, but just looks so cool as well. I can see how collecting these games could become as much fun as playing them. I want all the little characters now! The only other icon to look out for is the symbol on the Baby Groot cards, but this is clearly labelled. Making this game very accessible and suitable for children from six and up. With my family, when finished playing, they will just 'play' with the cards for ages afterwards. Organising them into colours, or groups. Playing little games with them. It's how I got the idea for these photos. However I would say the icons on the power cards are a little less clear. There is a very simple to use and understand reference guide in the rules that you can leave open for your first few games as you learn. But I do feel this could have been made easier for younger players with more clear icons. Or even just if they had written the meaning on the card itself! There is plenty of space. If you collect multiple versions of this game you can mix any two sets. You will shuffle all the playing cards together and give each player one pile of power cards for a more varied game. The concepts are all generally the same, but the theme obviously changes from box to box. Something Wild is one of those games I would recommend to anyone. I can see myself gifting multiple copies of this game in the future. It is perfect as a gift for a child's party, or a stocking present. The game is so accessible with light and easy to understand rules that anyone could play this. And there is a theme to suit most people. My children are already eyeing up a few more sets! As am I in truth. And the game is fun to play. It's quick and easy, and the perfect filler game. It will fit in most bags, or any pocket out of the box. I can see this coming to a lot of restaurants and pubs with us in the future. Although not Baby Groot. No, he is staying proudly on display atop my gaming shelf.

Wow! What an epic few days that was! There is something special about the Essen Spiel. It feels bigger, more significant, and more of an event than any other convention or expo that I have been too. And why is that? I cannot say for sure, but there are a number of contributing factors. The physical size. This year we had six main halls to explore and play in. All mostly used up. It’s a massive event in the literal sense. The number of new games launching at Essen is vast. It fits perfectly into the run into Christmas so publishers aim to launch at Essen to get the big PR push right at a peak buying time. The location. The fact that many see Germany as the spiritual home of modern board games, with so many great designers, publishers, and games coming out of Germany over the last 30 years. And of course, some of the biggest awards and prizes in our industry are of German origin. But all in, none of this really sums up the feeling created by going to Essen for this bonanza of games! Meeting friends from all over the world at Essen feels special. People flock to this convention in their thousands and it’s a wonderful opportunity to meet old friends and make new ones. It’s the people that make it. So, with that, here is my run down of my experiences of Essen with my own personal highlights. I will also include a few tips for anyone who plans to go in the future. Highlights. Best Game I played – Excavation Earth. Oh my! What a beauty this is! And the choices available are numerous and wonderful. Best Game I bought – Golem. I am stupidly exited about this one and look forward to featuring on more detail soon. Although Bitoku looks amazing too. Best small box game – Riverside is a delightful roll and write from the designer behind The Magnificent. It plays beautifully and has some wonderful options. Best Party game – Taco, Cat. Goat Cheese, Pizza. Every time I walked past this stand I stopped for a quick game and had some hilarious experiences with different people. I bought two copies! Best Game coming to Kickstarter soon – The Fog: Escape from Paradise. This game looks amazing and is coming to Kickstarter 2022. I hope to feature more on this here soon. But in short, its fantastic. Best Stand – I liked the IELLO stand where they had many games set up and multiples times for each one, and the box for each game set up was raised up high so you could tell from afar what was there. There was plenty of people on hand to each you, and a separate area to buy so the queues for each didn’t cross over. The Paleo stand was probably the most physically impressive with a large and very cool set-up. Top Tips Parking – Book your parking before hand and get to the spiel around 9-9:15 if you can. The show starts at 10, and the near by car parks get busy. Parking on site is not expensive, and there are plenty of sites if the closer ones are full up. But there will be queues forming if you come later. But be mindful of the local traffic too if it’s a weekday, it’s a little busy around 8:30 due to commuter traffic. Although this year, everything seems quiet most the time due to the reduced numbers. How busy is it? What’s the best day to go? – Thursday and Friday are typically quieter due to the locals coming for weekend. So, if you want a slightly more sedate experience, Thursday should be your day. But it will still be packed! However, this year was an anomaly with the covid restrictions for international travelers and high risk visitors making numbers overall seem way down. And of course, even with less halls and space being used this year, it was still busy and on occasions crammed. But even at its peak in 2019, it still felt large enough to cope with all those people and stands or queues never get too crazy. How to get in – There are a number of entrances, and everyone tends to go to the one by hall 1 as they want to get into the main part first. As such, the queues here are bigger and fill up quicker. If you head round to the entrance by hall 8 you will find the queues much shorter and move a lot quicker. You will obviously enter the convention in a completely different place though. But this year, it was handy as it was right by the stand for Golem which was the game I wanted to get first! Where to stay – There are several hotels close by and in the near by town, but they get booked up quick and are expensive for this period of the show. But there is an after-show buzz to enjoy! I have stayed both times in Dusseldorf. It is a 25-minute drive and has a lovely Old Town to visit in the evenings. And the hotels are much cheaper. But it does feel like you are out of it in the evenings, and you miss some of the buzz. Sold Out! – Prior to the Spiel, there will be many hyped games. The BGG hot list is the main way this seems to happen, and with just a few hundred thumbs up, a game can rocket to the top of the list. This will then often lead to long queues at these stands on the first morning. This year, this happened for a few games, and some of these sold out. The UK edition of Ark Nova going before the show evening opened, with the 9-10 am slot reserved for exhibitors, seemingly being enough to shift all copies of that game! So, if you want something specific, get there early on the first day, or pre-order. Even if the publisher is not advertising a pre-order, you can still reach out to them directly and ask to do that. Language barrier – Every person seems to speak multiple languages at the show. Exhibitors often have handy badges with national flags on showing their spoken languages. If you are looking for a demo or help, it will always be close by. The staff at all stands are amazing. If you are looking for a copy of a game in a specific language, again, this will be possible. Most are German language, but there are plenty in English too. But often the price will be better in German, so look out for those language independent games! And don’t forget, you can download most rule books in any language online. Food – In between some of the halls there is a long thin hall with a few exhibitors, but mostly food stands. Donner kebabs, Burgers, Burritos. That type of thing. There are a few tables and chairs to sit on, but not loads. A lot of people end up on the floor. You can bring your own food if you want. The prices are all reasonable. But the choice isn’t huge. Queues are fine. People seem to eat at various stages in the day. There is nothing really local bar a nice bakery about 10 minutes’ walk south, unless you want to drive. Playing games – Exhibition space at Essen is at a premium so often stands will only have a few tables to play games on. They obviously fill up quick for the bigger and more popular games. Some stands will have sign up sheets to book in slots, but if you want to try something specific then I suggest you go there early. Waiting for a slot is a chance to learn the game and still a great experience watching others. When playing yourself, be mindful, if you are playing a long game, the person demonstrating the game may not want you to play the entire game. They will want to maximise the amount of people who get to try it so may only want you to play a few rounds or turns. Most of the smaller or less popular games you can play the whole thing, but just be mindful of this expectation upfront for the bigger ones and perhaps clarify that at the start so you don’t end up disappointed. If you want to play a game that requires more people than your group, then most stands work this out quite well for you and group people together. Buying games – This is easy. Buy what you want! But I would suggest you try and seek out the popular ones first. And any that you are unsure on, try to play it first. Also, don’t be suckered into deals you don’t want. Many popular games will be at a stand with a 3 for 2 deal. They know they have a hot property and will try and use that to encourage you to buy other games from their archives. This is all fine if you want them, but we all have limited budgets right! Carrying games – This is the hardest part of the show. You will see people with trolleys, suitcases, all kinds of ways to get their purchased cardboard home. There are stalls selling great cases and portable fold up trolleys at the show. So, if you don’t have one, you can still get one. They are very reasonably priced. There are also shipping companies there, ready to package up your new games and send them to you, again for very reasonable prices. Or you can just put them into a carrier bag provided by the publisher that sold them to you! But be mindful, if you buy a few, and you buy early, then your arms, shoulders, and hands are going to hurt! What to bring – Comfy shoes! You will do a lot of steps! A drink. There are not that many places to buy them and you will be talking a lot! As such, perhaps some throat sweets too! Wear light, comfy clothes. Its warm enough inside for t-shirt only. But be mindful that outside, it’s the German Autumn, so a coat or jumper for the evening or queue outside in the morning if you plan to get there early will be welcome. Cash v Card – Obviously this is your preference. But note, some stands unbelievably only take cash. Even some of the bigger stands and they won’t always display this clearly. Worth checking before you queue up if you don’t have both. There are cash points here, but not many and they are hard to find with terrible sign posting! Worth having a bit of both and bring it with you! __________________________________________________________________________________ That’s your lot. Essen is an amazing experience and one I hope everyone gets a chance to have at least once. If you plan to go next year and have any questions just let me know or drop them in the comments below. See you there in 2022 and happy gaming!

Flee Fi Fo From How many games are there about immigration and the racist attitudes towards this? Yeah, none is my guess too? I was very interested to talk to the team behind Flee Fi Fo From when they contacted me and told me they would were set up at the Essen Spiel of 2021. Speaking with Hash at the fair, it’s clear that the team behind this don’t want Flee Fi Fo From to be seen as a controversial game, or even overtly about immigration. But it is. This does not stop this being fun. This is a really enjoyable game despite the serious theme. And the game handles it very well. It doesn't take this serious matter and disrespect it or make light of the matter. Nor does it throw it in your face. It just raises the debate. Playing Flee Fi Fo From… actually, before I get to that, I have to cover the name. It’s obviously a bit of a play on words. And I get the idea behind it, but I am not a fan. I hope the name doesn’t affect the games chances of success. But I fear it may. There is a tenuous giant theme in the game which this name builds on, but there are no actual giants seen or used when you play this game. It's more the threat they are bringing. However, I played a very early prototype so maybe this will change. But even if giants do appear, I still worry about this name. It is too much of a gimmick for me. Ok, onto the game. But before I do, I must say the board is an early pro-type and does not include final artwork. In Flee Fi Fo From, you play as an all-seeing clan leader, trying to re-order the entry of various villages, fleeing the never seen giants, to seek safety within the confounds of the town walls. During set up, various meeples of different colours are randomly set up in a pyramid shape, gathered outside the doors to the city. On your turn, you will be able to choose from a variety of actions depending on if you are in the action or reset phase. Players will take it in turns in these two roles, a clever way the game makes one player do the game admin but make it feel like part of the game. This works very well. If you are in the Action phase, you can choose to take two actions from four options. This is largely about authorising villagers to come into the city and swapping villages positions in the queue outside to make sure you let the right ones in. A key part of the game, and the underlying theme is the colour of the meeples. There will be a “priority” set up which will determine the class structure in the game based on the meeples colour. This can change throughout but if you ever break priority, in that you move a lower-class citizen before you move a higher class one, you will be penalised. Sound familiar (insert name of localised and relevant politician to where you live here)! If you can manipulate three meeples of the same colour to be in a group, you can then use the riot action to move them all into the castle. Again, the priority rules will come into effect here. You can always break priority, but the penalty will affect your rating shown on the top of the board which has a swing of points from positive 12 to negative 12. You are punished if you don't follow the law and prioritise the higher class citizens. As you move the meeples on the board, players will also be looking to complete objectives, dealt to them at the start of the game. This could be certain marching orders of meeples on the board, attaining a certain order to the priority positions, or getting a certain colour of meeples into the castle. As you move the meeples through he different actions, you will be trying to maintain the order set in the priority to avoid being penalised, whilst fulfilling objectives, and rescuing villagers. The first player to do set numbers of these will also score additional points. The Reset player will then run through two of four options themselves. They can maintain the flow of the villages or bring the knights into play by adding them to the board. This could be as it is a side objective for them or they want to change the order of the meeples. The game ends when either all villagers have been saved or too many knights have retreated from the battlefield. Players score based on their completed objectives, end game bonuses, their penalty or positive points based on the priority, and the total amount of villagers saved. Playing this game feels familiar and fresh at the same time. I love games where I am thinking about different things at the same time. The private objectives you are looking to complete are simple enough to rattle through a good few in a game, but not so easy they don't give you that little endorphin rush each time you tick another off. The movement of the meeples and the patterns you try and create feels a little abstract in parts, but the theme is always present. It is hard to pin this game down. It has parts of many different games and mechanics within it. But the overall package is one that I very much enjoyed playing. I look forward to seeing what the final art for this looks like, and if the team behind this stick with the name. They certainly seem like smart bunch and have come a long way already with this clever and enjoyable game. I hope it does well and successfully funds. Not just for the fun it will bring to many tables around the world, but the conversations it will start too. When the kickstarter goes live I will add a link here.

I spoke with Mark Cooke, the founder of AireCon, about how his convention has been set up in a very special way. Like many people, I find conventions daunting prospects. I love them. Don't get me wrong, but the size, noise, and huge numbers can be a difficult thing to face. Mark has thought about this and has created ways to play with strangers that is simple, non-confrontational, and hassle free. If you are travelling alone or in a small group and want to find other people to play with, Mark can help! Mark has considered the noise and how this affects some people, and created side rooms for quieter gaming. Mark has even introduced specialist support to give those with social anxiety the help or just listening ear they need. You can find out how Mark has done this, and his top tips for what to wear and what to pack to a convention here. What a guy!

UKGE 2022 just came and went and it was epic. As the UK's largest board game convention, it was great to see UKGE back to its full scale best after the lock down pause and small scale 2021 show. There were over 20,000 unique attendees with close to 40,000 visits to the three halls and Hilton hotel over the weekend. Pretty impressive considering the way the world is right now. As I said in my show article "Are we still geeks" we are rolling with the mainstream now! 100,000 go to Comic Con in the UK each year, Crufts gets 160,000, and 50,000 go to the British Motor show each year. We are getting there! Article from UKGE show guide. The show was a huge success from what I could see. But it doesn't go unnoticed to me that not everyone had a great time. Some games looking for kickstarter support at the show have cancelled and some attendees looking for other gamers to play with have commented on how hard it was to find people. Nothing in life is ever perfect for everyone, but speaking from my own experience, I had an absolute blast and found it to be incredibly well run. But I hope all the below games find huge success soon, they deserve it. And I hope my tips below may help you if you plan to go in the future. So, without further ado, here are my top 5 independent published games on UKGE 22 and my suggestions for future visits on how to make the most of your time at a busy convention. Top 5 Independent Games at UKGE 2022. Amulet of Thrayax - Trolls n Rerolls - Sadly they just cancelled their kickstarter but I am sure it will be back better and stronger soon. More info here. I love this game, and Tom, the man behind the Amulet, is an absolute gentleman. I saw this game last ear at UKGE and at Airecon this year but didn't have the chance to play it. I met Tom this Thursday at the press event and was blown away by his passion, enthusiasm, and dedication to this game. He was packing up at 10pm Thursday night as I was sitting down to play games so he could drive back from Birmingham to London to then drive back with his volunteer crew ready to set up for the show the next day. I saw Tom on Friday for a demo and the guy was running on fumes after 20 minutes sleep. But this is the reality for an independently run and funded game. A lot of blood, sweat and tears. But thankfully, after my demo of Amulet of Thrayax, a great game too. I instantly backed it. But it has sadly had to cancel due to a lack of momentum, but will be back soon. I would heartily recommend it. Amulet of Thrayax a mix of take-that, area control, very clever card play, and smart timing. The amulet moves around the circular board made up of six districts, affecting all tokens it shines down upon. Playing as one of six eccentric cults, you need to work your way around the board collecting points from harvesting the souls of nobles and peasants in the dystopian city of Bleakpire. Peasants are worth one point each, but are also used for movement each round, and a bidding mechanic for being first player between rounds. The Nobles are worth ten points, but are a lot harder to acquire. On your turn, you can move and must play or burn one Murder card and one Counter card. Moving costs one Peasant for one space, two for two, three for three etc. You can play the cards at any point or burn to play one of you inconvenience tokens. Inconvenience tokens activate at the end of your turn and are another other way to harvest peasants but they wont necessarily all go to you. It depends what players are in the area that the inconvenience token has been placed. Each card has various stages on it, with even more higher powered options if the Amulet is facing your way when you play it. Each district is divided into a protected and unprotected side. Peasant's and Nobel's can move from either side, or be moved into neighbouring distracts. It's a clever, ever changing board, that looks gorgeous, but every part does something functional. It is very easy to learn this game thanks to the layout and thought behind the art. I am gutted this cancelled, and cannot wait for it to launch again. I loved everything about this game. The art, the gameplay, rules, mechanics, and team behind it. 2. ISLA - Ocean City Games - Check out there upcoming kickstarter here. ISLA (pronounced Iz-Lar before we start at Jurassic Park style argument) is from Ocean City Games, the team behind 2020 hit Salvage Hidden Treasures. They are also working on Towers of Ra which looks fun, but next up it's Isla, an explorative roll-and-write using polyhedral dice. Each turn, players roll five dice, and chose to either move to explore the Island, rest to recover their lowest die, or research to select a card showing either the flora or fauna in the island, or maybe even a fossil they discovered. These get you points. The further you travel into the island, the trickier things get. It looks gorgeous, and plays very smoothly. I cannot wait for this kickstarter to launch. 3. Go Ahead Punk - Next Dimension Games - Coming to kickstarter soon. Find out more here. I love hidden movement games and I love the theming of a 1970s American cop film. Add the two together with some really clever mechanics, and I am sold. Similar to other hidden movement games, there are plenty of ways to move around the city. In this game using the freeway, trolley bus, or famous San Francisco Cable Car systems. But, unlike other hidden movement games, this isn't just about finding the other player. One player plays as the assassin and needs to take out three victims. The other player, playing as the cop needs to track the assassin down, and stop any more killings. But each time you find the assassin, they wont just come quietly, they will fight back! The game looks stunning and has some very smooth and slick rules. I am very keen to get this one soon! 4. Psychobabble - Cheatwell Games - More info here. This game draw me in with the gorgeous art, but the simple rule twist made me stay! This is a social deduction game set in the Arkham Asylum where it seems a mass hysteria has plagued the town. But not everyone is mad, and the players have no idea what role they are playing! As a therapist in the asylum, you find a pattern and realise that your patients are not mad at all, in fact, they are all cursed! Well, some are! Their visions all seem the same and you need to solve the riddle of their shared nightmares. Although, real patients who are suffering from insanity bring their random dreams to you as well, which will affect your ability to make a rational deduction. And the other players wont help. No one has any idea if they are insane or not! Designer Kedric Winks was an absolute gentleman, and it made me realise how much the people behind a game mean to me when it comes to the games I enjoy. 5. Cursed Empire Universe - Cursed Empire - A 30 year old RPG that inspired a Dungeon Crawler, two cards games and many more! Find out more here. I love a sprawling universe and there are not many bigger worlds to explore than this. 30 years ago, designer Chris Loizou created an Table top RPG set in the world of Thargos. The universe he created was deep, full of adventure, and has since spawned multiple spin of games, all set in the same world. I was drawn in by this gorgeous map, but the story behind the various games all set in the same world really captivated me. The art is wonderful. So thematic, deeply engrossing and vibrant. The games all looked highly linked to every part of this world, and intrinsically inter-connected. There was so much to explore, and so much to come. Top 5 suggestions to have a good time at a convention - based on things I witnessed there and many complaints I have heard since. The vibe in every convention I go to is generally 99.9% positive. But you get the odd spat here and there. Inevitable really. With so many people, and the physical and mental challenges a crowded, loud room brings this is to be expected. But there are things we can all do to avoid this. Each convention has its own style. Airecon is more for gaming. Essen is all about the exhibitors and international relationships. UKGE seems to sit between these. I sense some always want a convention to be all about one thing over the other. Which leads me to tip number 1. Know what you are walking into. If you are a solo gamer looking for other players, UKGE is not perfectly set up for this. But there are ways you can still have a great time and meet other gamers. Play some demos and start chatting to the other gamers around you. Try some of the talks and events, and see who else may be sat alone there and go say hello. Although, I appreciate, this sounds incredibly daunting to some, so I also suggest reaching out to other like minded people who are going prior to the con on Instagram. Instagram is a very supportive and inclusive community. But sometimes you may need to make the first step as people may not know you are going or going alone and looking for friends. Reach out and say hello to people who you know are going. This is a great way to start a conversation that could end with them asking you for a game when you are there or introducing you to a group that will be present at the show. I for one would be happy for anyone to reach out and say hello to me on insta, and I know many others who would be the same. Jenny from Board Game Family Uk for one. She is amazing at bring new people in and making them feel welcome. Understand the reason for the show. Exhibitors are there to try and cover the huge costs they have put into the last four or five years or their lives, trying to make a game. I appreciate getting to the fair is not cheap and easy for the visitors either, but I saw some unjust behaviour when people were not able to haggle an already discounted price to be even lower from a small independent seller, or got upset when they were asked to cut a demo short for others to sit down and try their game. Just be mindful that they are humans too and probably operating on a tiny budget with minimal profits if any. They desperately need to get as many people to try their game as possible. It's a demo, not full play. But if you want to try the full game, talk to the team there, most I am sure would find time to meet after the convention in open gaming and set up a full game and they would love your enthusiasm. The larger stalls with the bigger publishers and distributers will have less pressure on them but the staff will be mainly volunteers that don't work for the company and are not being paid to be there. They are just having their costs covered so they can experience the show too. If someone cannot teach you the game perfectly have some patience. They are not a professional, probably only just saw the game that day, and may be suffering from the same anxieties many others at the fair have too. Bring your own food and drink. Food and drink is often expensive at a convention due to high rents. Queues can often be long too. So, instead, perhaps bring some food of your own and use this as an opportunity to get some fresh air. Relax outside for a bit, take some time for yourself, refresh, and come back stronger. Still with money in your wallet for games and no time wasted in lines. If you have travelled far, then you can always look at going to a local supermarket, or if that is not possible, reach out to locals who could help. I'd happily bring some sarnies along if only I lived closer myself. Slow down and be open to new things. There is so much going on, you will find it hard to stick to a pre-arrange schedule all the time. Rushing from one end of the hall to another to try and get somewhere will cause you stress, and potentially others too. Moving through the isles can be tricky as it gets busy, some have children or buggies and many are carrying lots of bags! Be mindful of this and don't expect to be able to glide through long distances quickly. Take your time. See what you can spot on the way. Something cool may catch your eye! Hopefully see you at the next one!