Jagged Age

My Thoughts
Avalon Resistance like its predecessor is a game that is more about talking, explaining, and lying to each other than it is about playing a game however it works, and it works well. It does outshine the original it its replay value as it has added multiple optional roles that can be used to spice up the game in different was. This game has you questioning your friends and lets you on how deceptive they really can be,

Components
Most of the components are of really nice, you have thick tiles which are always really nice and multiple game boards depending on how many players you have. If I had one complaint it would be about the paint on the game tiles scratch away too easy which can be a drag when certain scratches if paid attention to could reveal way too much information.

Setup
Setup of the game is pretty easy as there aren’t too many things to setup. First you choose the game board depending on how many people are playing, you deal out everyone’s roles secretly then you give everyone their voting tiles and you’re pretty much done the physical setup the rest is verbal. Generally one person is designated as the announcer and should be familiar with the game, they get everyone to close their eyes and have only the traitors open them, then they close their eyes and put up their thumbs and Merlin opens his eyes to see who the bad guys are and it continues in this fashion depending on the roles put into the game.

Game play
You go around the circle having to choose who will go with you on a quest and if you trust the person next to you or not. Whether the group you selected will get approved after everybody votes on if the group should be allowed to go, or if people will think you are a traitor because you chose not to send yourself. If the vote is in favor of the mission going head then the people chosen are given pass and fail cards and put in whichever they choose. If all the cards are a pass the mission was successful, rinse and repeat. If there is a least one fail card in there then the whole mission fails and you know you have a traitor in your midst… but who could it be? I know its not me so it must be you… or you?

Conclusion
This is a simple game for slightly larger gaming groups. It is relatively easy to teach but can still take some time to have a grasp of what is going on, and potentially a lifetime to master. It will have you questioning your friends and arguing about why something was or was not a bad move. It’s a lot of fun to play and most want to a second play through after their first experience.

My Thoughts
Libertalia is a competitive pirate card/board game based on some role selection. It’s a pretty easy game to learn and play. The theme is enjoyable but still lacks that something special to make you feel like you’re actually a pirate trying to plunder gold.

My Story
I purchased this game on coolstuff for $33 and added it to my cart for two main reasons. The first was I need to add a game around $33 in order to get free shipping 😛 the other reason was because I really wanted a pirate game to play. Now that I’ve played it a half a dozen times I’ve found that although nobody is blown out of the water by the game they enjoy it and find it super easy to learn. I also went a head a upgraded some components to give a little bit of a pirate touch but I’ll get into that under components.

Components
Most of the components are of pretty good quality but there is an excess of them it seems. It’s almost like they added some extra things but they didn’t really contribute to the game all that much. The art on the cards looks great. The cardboard is nice and thick but that being said I went onto EBay and found some metal pirate coins to replace the cardboard ones provided. I find they help you to connect just a little bit more.

1 game board
6 pirate dens
6 score tokens
6 crew tokens
180 character cards (30 for each player)
1 score track
50 booty tiles [4 chests, 6 jewelry, 10 goods, 6 Spanish Officers, 6 sabers, 8 treasure maps, 10 cursed relics]
13 doubloons of value 10
10 doubloons of value 5
45 doubloons of value 1
rules.

Setup
The board has treasure randomly pulled from a bag and added for each day the number depending on the number of players. Each person then gets a deck of 30 cards with pirates of various rank on them. The first person shuffles their deck and draws 9 pirates, then all the other pirates have to take the same pirates out of their deck so everyone has the same nine pirates. The rest of the decks are put aside for later. Every player gets 10 doubloons and the rest are put into a supply pile. You are now ready to play.

Game play
The game is broken up into 3 campaigns of 6 days each. Each day everyone plays a pirate face down so nobody else knows what they played. Once everyone has played their pirate they are all flipped over and put onto the board (ship in order of their rank. Then each day the pirates selected have to divvy up their loot for the day and the highest ranking pirate chooses first so it comes done to know when to play your pirate in order to rank the others. However each pirate also has a special ability which changes every turn up just a little bit that may stop someone fro getting their treasure, or killing of someone else. Once you’ve gone through the 6 days you tally up your doubloons and move your tracker on the scoreboard. Each player then returns all their treasure and takes 10 doubloons for the next round. Each player should also have 3 pirates left over in their hand. The first player will draw six more pirates from the deck and add it to his hand making sure everyone else does the same. So this time round everyone has 6 identical cards and the 3 left over from before. Play continues this way until the end of the 3rd campaign and the person with the most points wins.

Conclusion
This is a simple competitive game that I can bring out and play with just about anyone as it’s really easy to teach. The pirate theme is always easy to convince people to play, so it’s not hard to find people to enjoy it with. The arrrs will be in full swing before you know it.
All in all this game is fun, and worth trying out. I’m still looking for a pirate game that has that something special. I’ve been wanting to try Merchants and Marauders but it’s out of stock everywhere, and I backed Privateer on Kickstarter but it is on hold until further notice.
If I find the game I’m looking for I’ll come back and edit this to let you all know 😛

My Thoughts
Castle Panic is a co-operative game, and it’s pretty easy… I’ve never lost. I will say it’s more of a challenge with more people, but it’s still not too hard. That being said it is really easy to teach and is a great gateway game. All that being said, the game is enjoyable and I’ve liked playing it solo as well.

My Story
I saw it for the first time on The Table Top with Wil Wheaton and thought hmm, that looks like an alright game, something I could get my wife to play. Then it left my mind and I moved onto bigger and better things. Then I heard about Dead Panic coming out and I was like awesome, same game with a little bit more to it, and a theme I like marginally better. So I started waiting for Dead Panic’s release date and continued on my merry life. Well then I was on vacation this summer and checked out a FLGS to my dismay they were having a sale… I couldn’t resist. First game was full price, then the next was 20% off and the next was 40% off… and of course after looking through the selection found two games I wanted but couldn’t waste the 40% off my next game and continued looking. The only game left that I remotely wanted/didn’t have was Castle Panic, I did a little research via the smartphone and discovered Dead Panic wasn’t going to be out for another month or two. Well I grabbed it thinking Castle Panic would be a better theme for my wife anyway. I played my first round solo as I like to do to get the piece punched out rules learnt and find it easier to teach others once I have experience. When I was finished winning my first play through, I set it back up and played again. Good sign. I have now played it with others and although nobody is blown out of the water by the game they enjoy it and find it super easy to learn.

Components
• Game board
• Rulebook
• 49 Castle Cards
• 49 Monster Tokens
• 6 Walls
• 6 Towers
• 1 Tar Token
• 2 Fortify Tokens
• 6 Order of Play Cards
• 12 Plastic Stands
• 1 Die

Setup
You fill the center with the 6 towers surrounded by the 6 walls for protection.
You place 3 Goblin, 2 Orcs, and 1 Troll on the outside ring.
Give each player on of the Order of Play cards.
Put all the monster tokens in a bag or cup or even face down on the table as a draw pile.
Shuffle the Castle cards and deal a hand to each player leaving the remaining cards as a draw pile. The hand size depends on the number of players.
1-2 Players – 6 cards
3-5 Players – 5 Cards
6 Players – 4 Cards

Game play
Each turn has up to six phases each labeled on the Order of Play Cards for reference

1. Draw up to a full hand of cards depending on the amount of players

2. Discard and draw 1 card (optional)
Side note, in a 1 player version you can perform twice

3. You may trade one card with one person in this phase (optional)
Side note, in a 6 player game you can trade twice.

4. Play as many cards as you can to defend the castle

5. Move monsters forward one ring

6. Draw 2 new monsters tokens one at a time and put them on the board by rolling the dice.

The game ends when either the last Tower is destroyed by the Monsters (in which case the players lose) or all 49 Monster tokens in the game are played and all the Monsters are slayed (in which case the players win).
In one variant you can keep the monsters you slay during the game to see who was the best monster slayer/the best hero, but you’ll have to gauge your play group beforehand to see if they would like that or not.

Conclusion
This is a simple co-op game that I can bring out and play with just about anyone. There is never really any worry or tension that you are going to lose however you can’t help but feel bad when a monster destroys a tower. This game doesn’t have any player elimination which is nice for a lot of people. However there is a variant where everyone gets a certain tower to defend and if that tower is destroyed so are they, and that makes for a more competitive game.

All in all this game is fun, and worth trying out. Maybe I’ll look into the expansion for more difficulty. Or ******* up and buy Dead Panic when it comes out in a month or so.

My Thoughts
Zombicide is a co-operative game, where for once if you don’t want to work co-operatively… you will fail. Also lots of co-op games tend to be on the bland easy side… Zombicide took that mentality and flipped it on its head. This game can kick your *** really quick if you aren’t on top of your game. The big thing is how many people you play with, if you play with 1, 4, or 5 you don’t get to utilize all your characters… without breaking the rules that is. For every character you don’t use you are at a disadvantage. All that being said, this game is awesome and one of my favorites.

My Story
I did some research on which zombie game I thought would be my best option, I then decided on Zombicide and found it at my FLGS and then saw the price tag. I had coincidentally chosen the most expensive zombie game as well as the best, weird how that works. Well I ponied up and paid the nice lady at the till and brought it home to check it out. Sadly I had some yard work with the wife to do before I could open it up. The anticipation was killing me so when I finally got to it and open it up I was stoked. I got the plastic off and open the box and thoroughly inspected all the components… they were pretty awesome. I then opened up the rulebook and started reading. After getting slightly confused about something’s I went online and discovered this game had so much more to offer as well as clarifications of all the rules. Scenarios galore, character printouts, the works… I was impressed. I then started playing a solo game to test it out I went through the tutorial and the first scenario; and that’s when I knew I had gotten my money’s worth I knew there was so much more to see and I was already in love with the game.

Components
The game comes with four different types of zombies, as well as six unique survivors. The plastic is of pretty good quality, but the detail on them is phenomenal. There are a couple decks of cards, but they are tiny. The good news is you don’t have to hold them one pile just flips to spawn zombies and the others sit on your player board as your items.
There are lots of card board cut outs that are of pretty thick quality so they are pretty nice the game board is 9 large cardboard pieces that are double sided. The player board is nice but it is kind of a pain to slide the level up bar as it can wreck the player card and you have to pick it up and move your cards to do so. There are some standard red D6 dice, nothing to report there. The last thing to mention is the box, you can’t nicely put everything back in the box, and you will have to figure out a way to store your components nicely.

Setup
In the rule book there are 10 scenarios and as I mentioned earlier a plethora of downloadable scenarios, as well as a scenario generator program that you can install and make your own scenarios.
To start the game you find the scenario you want to do and layout the corresponding tiles, doors, zombie spawn points, cars, and whatever else the scenario holds.
Each person selects a character:
1 Player – 4 Characters = 4 Character Total
2 Players – 3 Characters Each = 6 Characters Total
3 Players – 2 Characters Each = 6 Characters Total
4 Players – 1 Character Each = 4 Characters Total
5 Players – 1 Character Each = 5 Characters Total
6 Players – 1 Character Each = 6 Characters Total
So as you can see 2, 3, and 6 players are the best options.

Gameplay
Each player takes their turn in order utilizing three actions (depending on their characters level). Their available actions are move one space, attack, opening a door or searching (Within a building or car once per turn). Certain actions and items create noise. For example, a crowbar is silent and doesn’t attract zombies, the chainsaw… well it’s a little louder. This is important on the zombie turn and directs them to where they are gonna go/eat.
Once everyone is done their turn the fun starts and the zombies get a turn.
The zombies turn is broken up into two major parts, the move/attack part, and the spawning part.
First the zombies will either move towards the closest survivor/loudest noise or attack them if they are already there. Each zombie only gets one action with the exception of the runner who gets two. (Two wounds and you die)
The spawning starts by drawing cards from the zombie deck and they tell you how many zombies spawn where.
This concludes the zombies turn and starts the next players turn.
As each character kills a zombie they get experience which is tracked on the player card. Once a character has enough experience they level up. This unlocks a new ability for the character, but it also changes how many zombies spawn from this point forward. This means you have to be careful that one character doesn’t level up faster than the others or the rest of the team will be bait before you know it.

Also as you go you will have to open up doors on buildings, when this happens you spawn every room depending on the cads flipped over. This should be considered earlier rather than later as you want the doors open before you are spawning the highest level of zombies.

Conclusion

This is by far the best co-op game I have played to date and has a new feel every time I play. The best part is the tension actually builds and you are never sure if you are going to make it out alive or not. This game draws everyone together but is kind of lame when someone dies early as they have to sit and watch. I’m trying to figure out a new variant that you could find a new survivor in another building when opened but not sure if that would break the game or not. Also there is a dumb rule where if a survivor is in a space with a zombie you can’t shoot the zombie until after you have shot your friend. This should be changed, but once you are aware of it you can avoid the situation and do alright. All in all this game is fantastic, and worth trying out.

What Is Forbidden Island
Forbidden Island is a lite cooperative game for 2-4 players that can be played in 30 min. Each player has a special ability to help you move around the board to capture four items. Meanwhile the island is sinking so you must move fast and prioritize. Once you’ve got the four items, your team must GET TO THE CHOPPA!”

Components
The components are decent in quality. The four treasure items are molded plastic pieces that look and feel awesome. The board is made up of 24 double-sided tiles and a water meter which are of nice thick quality. There is a deck of 58 cards with nice round edges. There are 6 player pawns are the most generic pawns you’ve ever seen but are thankfully made of wood. However, the biggest downfall is the game comes in a tin box, it holds the game well, but where do you put it on the shelf?

Setup
1. Create Forbidden Island: Shuffle the 24 Island tiles and randomly
place them face up (non-blue and white side) into a grid as follows:
First make a 4 x 4 square of tiles in the center of the playing area. Then place 2 tiles next to each of the 2 middle tiles on every side of the square. (Important Note: Leave a small gap between the tiles.)
This forms the Forbidden Island and your pawns will move on it like a game board.

2. Place the 4 treasure figurines – The Earth Stone, The Statue of the Wind, The Crystal of Fire, and The Ocean’s Chalice – around the island. Your team will try to capture these treasures during the course of the game by discarding 4 matching Treasure cards on a corresponding Island tile. Take a moment to locate the 8 tiles on which you can claim treasures. Each treasure can be claimed on one of two tiles, as indicated by the symbol in the bottom left corner:
3. Separate the cards into three decks according to card back:
Flood deck (blue back), Treasure deck (red back), and Adventurer cards (6 cards).

4. Shuffle the Flood deck and place it face down on one side of the island to form the Flood draw pile. Draw the top 6 cards (1 at a time) and place them face up next to the draw pile to form the Flood discard pile. For each card drawn, flip the corresponding Island tile over to its “flooded” (blue and white) side.

5. Shuffle the 6 Adventurer cards and randomly deal 1 to each player. Each of you will take on the role of an adventurer with a special power that only you can do during the game. Take a moment to read aloud your roles and powers written on the bottom of the cards so that your teammates know your strengths. You’ll find the game will be easier to win if you cooperate and take advantage of these special powers. Take a pawn matching the color of your Adventurer card and place it on the corresponding Island tile. (Look for the matching pawn icon in the lower right corner of the Gates and Fools’ Landing tiles.) Put any extra Adventurer cards and pawns back in the box. Note: It’s OK to start on a flooded tile.

6. Thoroughly shuffle the Treasure deck and deal 2 cards to each player. Place your cards face up in front of you so that both you and your teammates can easily see them. If anyone gets a Waters Rise! card, give them a replacement card and shuffle the Waters Rise! card back into the Treasure deck. Place the Treasure deck face down by one side of the island. Note: There will be a Treasure discard pile right next to the Treasure deck.

7. Place the Water Level marker on the left side of the Water Meter and set it to the appropriate starting difficulty level, according to the type of game you want to play. (For example, if this is your first time playing a cooperative game, set it to the Novice level.)

Gameplay
Each player’s turn consist of doing up to three of four possible actions, drawing two cards, and then flooding the board. The available actions are to move to an adjacent space (but not diagonally), shore up a tile (un-flood a tile), give a treasure card to another player on the same tile, or capture a treasure by turning in four matching treasure cards.
Now to break the rules, each player has a different role that allows them to break the rules in a certain way:
The Explorer can move diagonally
The Messenger who can give a Treasure card to another player regardless where they are on the island.
The Pilot may move to any tile once per turn for 1 action.
The Navigator may move other players up to 2 adjacent tiles per action.
The Diver may move through one or more adjacent missing and/or flooded tiles for 1 action.
The Engineer may shore up 2 tiles for 1 action.

After that, a player draws two cards and discards down to five. There are a three types of cards in the deck:
Treasure Cards – To collect the treasure
Special Items Cards – Allow you to do something helpful to complete your quest
Flood Cards – They are your enemy and flood the island on you.
At the end of the players turn, they draw between 2-5 flood cards, depending on the current water level. When a tile is drawn, it is flipped to its flooded side. If a tile is drawn while flooded, it sinks into the abyss and is removed from the game. If both tiles associated with a treasure sink before that treasure is collected, the game ends, and you lose.
The game ends when all four treasures have been collected and all players get to the chopper. While there is only one way to win, there are several ways to lose:
Losing a treasure tile before the treasure is collected
Losing the helicopter tile
Losing any player to the sea
Letting the water level get too high.

My Thoughts
This game is a super-lite cooperative game. It is a very family-friendly game and for people that don’t like losing. The challenge isn’t that great if you work together and one “Type A” personality will make sure everything goes exactly as it should. The game is maybe 30 minutes so it doesn’t take too long to play, but rarely do you want to play it back to back. The game is super simple to setup teach and play so you don’t have to worry about the confused player in the group and there never seems to be a case of analysis paralysis as everyone is working together on each other’s turns.

In short, I’m not a big fan of the game but I understand it is necessary as a gateway for certain players. And although it isn’t too engaging for me I can enjoy my time playing it with others.

What Now?
You thought this was going to be about Pandemic didn’t you? While it is in fact about the newly released Forbidden Desert. It’s not really a sequel to this game but it’s also made by Gamewright and very similar in design. It adds a few more things and is a good next step for someone wanting more complexity with this game platform.

Why I bought it
After spending way too much money on board games in a short while I found I bought a bunch of games I wasn’t that fond of. This in turn made me do more research on every game before I bought them. Well King of Tokyo was one of the first games I saw while trying to find a new game and at first glance I was hooked right in. I knew from right then that I had to have the game.

What is it?
King of Tokyo at its core is Yahtzee… on steroids. You have five dice up to three times in order to get the dice roll you need. Like Yahtzee there are a 1, 2, and 3 on the dice, but that is where the similarity’s stop. These dice have a fist for attacking a heart for healing and a lightning bolt for energy. You are a monster that has ten health and you either need to gain 20 VP to win or to be the last monster standing. You can also use your energy to buy supporting power cards that put a nice twist on the game.

Pros
Super Quick learning curve
Quick game play with very little down time
Custom dice… I really like custom dice
Most components are top notch and pleasing to the eye/touch

Cons
Player elimination sometimes happens a little too early
(See my tip for the game to fix this)
The actually monsters are a little bit of a letdown, minis or something 3D would have been way better

Was it worth it?
Currently the MSRP is $39.99 and yes, it is worth every penny.
The replay value of this game is huge, I have shown it to multiple groups of friends and they all want to keep coming back to it. It is super quick and really easy to teach others to play.
I believe that there is room on any gamer’s shelf for this as it is ranges from good up to great for all gaming group types.

Family Gamer {Good}
I’ve played this with my nephew at the age of 5 and although he didn’t understand all the game he loved playing as a partner to someone and helping with the dice.
Social Gamer {Good}
If you are with a social group this is very easily a social game. Maybe not the first time play through but after that for sure
Strategy Gamer {Good}
This game isn’t known for strategy and has a large luck factor to it. However I was recently playing a five player game where two people were eliminated and the game remained close as we developed strategies to stop the others while preparing ourselves for victory.
Casual Gamer {Great}
This is the best game I know the casual gamer. The can learn it and know what’s happening by the end of their first turn, and the game isn’t too long that they will be overwhelmed.
Avid Gamer {Great}
The avid gamer can see the game for all it’s worth and enjoy it, knowing they can play it with anyone and still enjoy their time.
Power Gamer {Good}
Power Gamers may not be in love with this game but can still enjoy a quick round of it on their gaming night to get everyone warmed up.

So the premise here is that it is in the future after a devastating ice age has claimed the earth. Most of everyone is dead and the remaining survivors are banding together into tribes to survive.

You are the leader of one of these tribes. Resources, tools, medicine, and mercenaries are all in scarce supply. Now you must fight against other tribes for survival.

The leader who gathers the largest tribe will come out the winner… uh survive the ice age?

*** WHAT I LIKED ABOUT THE GAME ***

First things first, my title. My group of friends are very gun shy around games that are fantasy based, wizards and dragons and the likes. Everything in that genre is Dungeon and Dragons, and they wont go anywhere near it. This theme however is something they were able to get behind and play, so bonus points there.

*** WHAT I DISLIKED ABOUT THE GAME ***

We had just played Quarriors previous to this game and nobody had any issues with the dice/deck building mechanic.
However the first thing I noticed about this game is it was somewhat difficult for some to pick up on. When we played there were two gamers in the group and two non-gamers in the group. So myself and the other gamer picked up on the game right away, while the non-gamers struggled for the majority of the game. I kept helping them along and it was almost like a light bulb came on when they finally got the game. I’m just not sure why they could understand Quarriors and not this. I feel fairly confident they would be able to play it and enjoy it a lot more their second play through, but by the time they got it on the first play it was too late for them to do anything.

*** GAMEPLAY ***

The average turn consists of four actions of which you can complete as many of them as you would like but never using the same action twice. Each card will be cable of doing multiple actions depending on if you can equip them with tools or not but you have to decide each turn were you want to use them as they can only be used once.

Draw
Certain cards will allow you to discard them in order to draw new cards into your hand.
Simple, but I found most of them only let you draw one card which may not be any better than the one you are discarding. It can be good in a pinch, but it’s a gamble for sure.

Dig
You may go digging in the junkyard once a turn which could result in getting something pretty decent for your hand or… it can quite literately be a card called “junk”
This action is usually worth it but as the game goes on there tends to be more junk and less items that will help you as you can discard cards to the junkyard to clear them from your hand if you like.

Recruit
This is were you get some good tribe members, you will need either food or medicine, maybe even both to recruit certain people but it is always worth it.

Skirmish
Here is the fun part you have to choose each turn how many people you want to send out to fight. The more you send, the more likely you are to win a contested card, which is always really good. However by choosing cards to go out and fight you are taking them away from other activities that would otherwise be making your deck better. If you loose the battle you have nothing to show for it. If you win… well that’s a different story.

*** EVALUATION ***

I really enjoyed the game, it was a great spin on the deck building genre that I can really get behind and convince others to as well. There are also expansions put into this release copy of Arctic Scavengers where you can build buildings, sabotage or snipe people, even being a cannibal that keeps it really interesting.
I recommend this game, but just know that some people aren’t going to pick up on it right away.

Skip-Bo

This game is nothing spectacular that you need to go tell everyone about however it is still good enough to keep around in any collection.

Game play

Each player is given a 30 card deck (you can easily change this number for a longer or shorter game) which is face down in front of them with only the top card upright and five cards in their hand.
There are four community piles in the middle that each player alternates playing on and then four individual piles in front of each player for their temporary discards. Each player will play cards in the community piles from 1-12 (With the occasional wild skip-bo card) while trying to eliminate their deck of 30 cards. The first player to do so wins.

Typical Turn

The player will pick up cards bringing their hand back to 5 cards.
They will then play the cards in their hand, from their deck and temporary discards until they can no longer play, then temporarily discard a card to one of the piles in front of them. (Once you cover up a previously discarded card it cannot be played again until the one on top of it is played)

What I like about this game

This is an easy game to teach anyone to play, and not only can they enjoy it on their first play through but depending on the cards they get they can even win against a veteran player.

What I love about this game

My wife who isn’t a big gamer really likes to play this game, and it has encouraged her to play many others.

What I don’t really like about this game

It can be a little repetitive, and there is a lot of shuffeling to do. The cards can get warn out but because there are so many of the same types, worn cards don’t really give away anything.

What I hate about this game

There are times when you cannot get one specific card for a long time while you watch other players zoom right through their deck. This usually happens to everybody at some point so it evens out but when it doesn’t it can be very frustrating.

In Conclusion

It has been a solid little game that has gotten a lot of play time, and because it is small it travels really well and can be played without very much surface space.