Let's Take the Shortcut (Review of Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion)

Gloomhaven is king of the hill over at BoardGameGeek (it's the number one ranked game of ALL the games), but then along comes the little sibling. Will the upstart show up their older relation? Or can they cannot compete with the bigger version? 

For those who don't know anything about Gloomhaven, it was created by Isaac Childres and it is BIG. Twenty-two pounds of miniatures (18-ish), scenarios (100-ish), boards (a bunch) enemy standees (like a zillion), and every token and card imaginable (immeasurable). It's a cooperative campaign-style game with some legacy elements (stickers added and whatnot) taking place in a fantasy world created by Childres. You choose one of the starting characters and level up as you progress through the campaign, making choices that affect what happens to your party and what your character becomes. There's a whole lot more, but you can read about that in my review of the original game here.

in 2020, Childres made some kind of deal with Target to bring a scaled down version of Gloomhaven to the shelves, something that more than just hardcore gamers could get into it. Jaws of the Lion was born and contains around 25 scenarios, 4 characters, but still a buttload of enemies to battle and cards to acquire. How does Gloomhaven: Lite compare with the original? Let's find out together.

Don't Cry over Spilled Milk or Zombies (Zombie Kidz: Evolution Review)

This week my daughter was eager to play just one more game of Zombie Kidz: Evolution so that we could open up the very last envelope. So eager, in fact, that when she opened the box she spilled some of the pieces into her cereal and milk. After a few tears and the wipe down of a few pieces, we were ready to go for our final game of the campaign!

It's not often that I have a game that one my kids begs to play, but that was certainly the case here. From when we opened the game Christmas morning to our final envelope opening on January 8th, we played the game a total of thirty times. But, why? Was the draw for her enough to make it a good game? How did it feel for a parent playing it with her? 

First, an overview of the game. You play cooperatively as a group of kids protecting your school from zombies. On your turn you spawn new zombies, move, and then remove/kill/scare- away/insert -your-age-appropriate-verb-here zombies. Your job in an individual game is to get two kids(you can play up to four players) in a entranceway together and lock the gates. If all four gates are locked, you win. If the pool of zombies is empty (i.e. they're all on the board), you lose. Without spoiling anything, as you play the game multiple times and complete missions, you open secret envelopes (13 in total) that change the rules of the game and add more elements. This, to my knowledge, is the first legacy-style game geared towards kids. How successful was it? Let's find out!

Master Mapsmith (Review of Cartographers)

I've really been enjoying the roll 'n' write and flip 'n' fill kick that the board game world has been on lately. What I feel like I've been missing, however, is a fantasy-themed one. Well, voila! Cartographers is here! It's not really the battle that I was hoping for - you're actually a cartographer, a mapmaker, scouting and mapping out the lands for your king. You work through summer, spring, autumn and winter, each season bringing with it different objectives and scoring conditions (indicated by random cards each game). You need to be sure to plan for the current season as well as future ones or you'll miss out on some points.

Each season you flip cards from the deck which will give you a terrain type (farmland, water, village, or forests) and a tetris-style geometric shape for you to draw onto your map sheet (the game comes with a pack of 100 of these and they are double sided with an easy side and more difficult side). The objective cards will direct you to place certain terrain types in certain arrangements to score the most points. There are also ruins that you may need to play on sometimes and also mountains. If you surround a mountain completely, you receive some gold. Watch out though - some cards involve a monster ambush! In competitive play, the person next to you will draw this ambush on your sheet and in solo play there is a pattern they follow for placement. Either way, any spaces adjacent to them left unfilled will lose you points at the end of the season.

It's Euro-Tastic! (Review of Terraforming Mars)

If there were a Euro game that I was going to play and review, it was going to be this one. Not because I love the theme (growing bacteria on Mars? When do I get to stab someone with a sword?), not because I love the artwork (so many neutral colours...), and not because I love moving cubes around (soooooo many cubes). It's because it's the number four ranked game on BGG and EVERYONE in the solo guild says it's amazing! Well, EVERYONE can't be wrong, can they? Even though I'm an Ameritrasher through and through, I can still enjoy cube pushing, right?

Only one way to find out.

First of all, though, let's make sure you know what Terraforming Mars IS. I think that I would summarize it as a hand- and resource- management game with some area control mixed in there. You're trying to make Mars habitable by changing it, increasing the planet's oxygen, temperature, and amount of water. Raising these three also raises your Terraforming Rating (TR) which also increases your income. That's good, because you'll need money to play cards and perform the standard actions that will allow you to increase the big three. The cards include a variety of things from strip mining, crashing meteors into the planet, launching nuclear bombs, and growing bacteria. Different actions will also allow you to increase your income and production of plants, energy, heat, steel, and something else.

That's the gist of how you play. But did I like it?

The Oblivion of Dinosaurs (Review of Dinoblivion)

If you've been following my blog or my reviews at all, you've probably picked up that I LOVE deckbuilders and that Goblivion (check out the review and playthrough) was one of my surprise favourite games of 2019, making its way to my number four solo game of the year. Well, when I heard that the wonderful Jean-François Gauthier was launching a new and improved deckbuilder on Kickstarter, it was a must-back for me! I've had the game for about a month now and it has gotten to the table a lot. That's one of my favourite thing about both of these games is their quick set up and play time. Rather than just making a new Goblivion with a few gameplay and component tweaks, Gauthier created a game that was a completely different type of deckbuilder.

Goblivion feels familiar as a castle defense game. Enemies come closer and closer to your castle and you need to train your troops to take them on. In Dinoblivion, the premise and execution is much different. You are a cave-person tribe attempting to survive in a prehistoric jungle (I don't know how accurate to history this is, but I'm suspending reality a bit because it's a board game). Dangers include dinosaurs, opposing tribes, cannibals, and piranhas. You start off with a deck of ten cards (nine standard and one variable chief card) and you use these to build up your tribe. You need to collect and manage various resources: food, dinosaur pets, and new babies. Food and babies allow you to "purchase" new cards: items and tribes-people, respectively.

Left Him in the Dust (Review of Clank! Legacy: Acquisitions Incorporated)

While there is a lot of buzz around legacy games these day, there aren't actually that many true legacy games around. A legacy game is one that is a campaign style (multiple sessions connect to each other), but your choices and actions leave a lasting "legacy" on the game. This usually comes about through adding stickers, tearing up cards, and/or writing on boards. I could be wrong, but I believe the first, or at least most well known, of these games is Risk: Legacy. That is not one I've played, but I have played three more-or-less legacy games now: Charterstone, Gloomhaven (see that review here) and now Clank! Legacy. I've spent the last nine months playing through the game with my friends Stirling and Brennan and this past Saturday night we played our last game (read about that here). 

Time to Move? (Review of Railroad Ink: Blazing Red Edition)

Roll 'n' Writes have been all the rage lately and one of the more popular series are the Railroad Ink ones. They have two versions out currently (Blazing Red and Deep Blue) and there are two more on Kickstarter right now (Lush Green and Shining Yellow). I'm a relative newcomer to the Railroad Ink game, playing Deep Blue with my family during the winter and getting Blazing Red for my birthday in April. In my review I'm going to talk about both games as the base dice are the same and it's just the expansion dice in each version that are different. I'll talk about those separately.

Railroad Ink is a perfect game for solo players or for those who like to do their own thing and not affect or alter what anyone else is doing. Each player is basically building their own railroad tracks and roads without interfering with each other. I believe the current Kickstarter versions do have more player interaction, but these first two do not. In the game you roll four dice (or six, adding two of the expansion dice) and draw the roads and railways pictured (you must include all four dice on each round - the expansion dice have different rules depending on the scenario). Your goal is to connect the exit arrows on the side of the boards to each other. The more of these you connect, the more points you score! You also score points for your longest road and railroad, for building in the middle nine squares, and you lose points for any dead ends. If you're playing with an expansion, you can gain more points depending on the scenario it puts you in. Winner is the player with the most points after 7 rounds (6 with expansions).

Get to the Choppa! (Review of Burgle Bros)

I need to confess something right up front - I really enjoyed the 2001 version of Ocean's Eleven. A film critic I am not, but I know what I like. Clooney and Pitt really crack me up with their character's in that movie. It's been a long time since I've watch the movie, however. Maybe it's time to break it out again?

Either way, you don't need to watch the movie to get a vintage, heist feel - you can just play Burgle Bros! I often describe this game to people as "Ocean's Eleven: The Board Game." Burgle Bros is a cooperative heist game. You work your way through two to three levels of a building, looking for loot. You have several different actions you can take on a turn and each character has a unique personality and special action. As you move around the building, you can rush into rooms (more dangerous) or peak first (more time wasted). You need to balance this approach as you try to avoid the guards moving about. You need to find the safe on each level of the building and crack the combination (using a distinctive dice system) and then find the stairs to the next level. The final staircase gets you to the roof and your chopper.

Nobody Panic! (Review of My First Castle Panic)

While the extrovert in me is suffering from being cooped up inside for the last several weeks, I'm taking this time to indoctrinate introduce my children into the board game hobby. My girls are four (Winnie) and almost seven (Ardyn) and we actually have played lots of games together. Their favourites are Lemonade Shake Up, Raccoon Rumpus, and Richard Scarry's Busytown: Eye Found It! Game (who names these things???).  With my eldest daughter being almost seven, I wanted to start turning the corner into older games, so for Christmas I picked up My First Castle Panic. This is a (very) scaled down version of the regular Panic Attack (which I've reviewed here and played through here). I have games in my collection that have surpassed Castle Panic as a solo or cooperative game, but it's still a mainstay on my shelf as my wife enjoys playing it and it's still a solid and quick to set up solo experience. I went for this simplified version for the girls' gift because it is (a) cooperative, (b) a fantasy setting, and (c) age appropriate for both of them.

Return to Middle-earth (Re-Review of The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-earth)

Just like many of you around the world, I have been cooped up at home for most of the last week or so. I’ll admit, it’s been nice working from home (although teaching grade fours solely online is going to have its challenges) and being with my family full time. That being said, I know this is a very tough time for many people. My heart and prayers go out to the families of those who have lost their lives or jobs or are running into others difficulties. I hope that by standing together as people across the globe, we can slow this thing down and give our scientists and doctors a chance to fight this thing.

Being stuck in the house has given me a good opportunity to get some solid solo gaming in. We’ve played a few family games - my girls (4 and 6) especially enjoy My First Castle Panic and our storytelling cards - but I’ve spent most of my “me” time in my board game nook (my Bud Hole - please watch The Good Place).

Slow Motion Tetris (Blokus)

Most of my gaming is pretty thematic. I like games with stories, characters, choices, things that really make you feel invested and engaged in the game. On Valentine's Day I had the chance to fall back in a love with a very theme-less game: Blokus. I took my daughter to a local cafe and they had a copy for us to play. It was a good reminder that if you're not playing a solo board game, the theme might not matter as much if you have someone great to play it with. This inspired me to do a little review for Blokus and hopefully expose new gamers to the game or help some of you veterans to fall in love again as well.

What is Blokus? Basically, it's a block laying game. You have a variety of different sized blocks (very Tetris-like) that you are trying to play on the board. Your opponents are attempting the same thing. The catch - there isn't enough room on the board for everyone. Also, you cannot play one of your pieces in a way that any edges touch the edge of another of your pieces. However, you must play it so it is touching at least on diagonal of another of your pieces. So you need to try and find ways to fit your pieces in close to yours and between your opponents.

Take Me Out to the Ball Game (Review of Baseball Highlights: 2045)

I'm not anything close to a baseball fan. It's a fun enough sport to play, although I'd rather play basketball, hockey, soccer, football, etc. Watching baseball sounds about as enjoyable to me as watching golf or paint dry. Not to diminish the skills of baseball players (or golfers), it just doesn't make for an entertaining spectator sport (in my opinion). So I entered my Baseball Highlights: 2045 adventure with very little experience or interest about the sport. In fact, I probably never would have picked up the game except that I received it in a trade. I had read good things about it on BoardGameGeek (specifically in the 1 Player Guild's Solitaire Games on Your Table geeklist) and thought, "Hey! Why not?" How did I enjoy my time with America's national pastime? Let's find out together.

Five Minutes of Frantic Fun (Review of 5-Minute Dungeon)

I've always been good at games that have a solid mixture of speed and shouting. My brain thinks pretty quickly and I like yelling at people. Growing up we would play the Cranium games as a family and I always succeeded at guessing the charades, scribbles, and sculptures. There's that app game as well (Heads Up? I think it's Ellen's game) that was a pretty cool fad for a while that everyone played and I enjoyed as well. I missed the 5-Minute Dungeon original kickstarter - I looked at it, but I decided not to the pull the trigger. Later on, though, I had a gift card to Toys R Us and picked it up from there. Wow, am I glad I did! I have since backed the Curses! Foiled Again! expansion (which I received and love) and the just-ended 5-Minute Mystery campaign (which also has a solo mode, woohoo for me!). I even picked up a second copy of the game for my board game club at school.

The remains of battle.

All Hail the King! (Review of Kingdomino)

Kingdomino is my most played, most recommended game. When a new gamer is looking for a game to start their collection, this is the one I tell them to get. When a veteran gamer is looking for something to play with their friends and family, this is the one I tell them to get. With games getting increasingly expensive, it is a joy to find such a beautiful and full game for under $20. There is an unofficial solo mode (I did a playthrough here), but I wouldn't buy this game for just the solo mode - there are much better games to spend your money on if that's what you're looking for. That being said, if you do not have this game and you play games with others, buy it now!

But why? Here's why.

TOTAL PLAYS: 40+ competitive, 1 solo

COMPONENTS

So pretty!

The Best Game with the Stupidest Name (Review of Clank!: A Deck-Building Adventure)

It was kind of surprising to me that it's taken so long for me to write a review for this one. It is, after all, my number one solo game (according to BGG's 2019 version of the People's Choice Top Solo Games, I am the only one who ranks it this high) and I am currently enjoying a foray into the legacy version (and, perhaps, am addicted to it). 

"Why, oh wise and enlightened Theo, is this your favourite solo game?" This is probably what you're asking yourself right now. Well, let me tell you.

First of all, what IS Clank!? It is a deckbuilding adventure. Period. Ok, if that's not enough, it's a deckbuilder (a mechanic that has you starting with a weak deck of cards that you build up and customize as the game goes on) that also has you moving around the board (more rare for a deckbuilder). Your mission is to thieve as much loot as possible from a dragon's den (or spider or ape lord or mummy, depending on the expansion) before they kill you. You are also competing against other adventurers, trying to secure the most loot and survive. 

"Fun" Fun or "Challenging" Fun? (Review of Spirit Island)

If you are into board games and haven't heard of Spirit Island, then you must have been living under a rock over the last couple of years. It has been making a lot of buzz, especially in the solo community, as one of the best games around. Do I agree with that assessment?

TOTAL PLAYS: 10 solo, 5 co-operative

COMPONENTS

There is nothing to complain about here. The art is beautiful, evocative, colourful, fun! The one major complaint I have about the artwork is that the boards have two sides. One is colourful and easy to use, but not very thematic and realistic. They have a more realistic side, but it's impossible to tell which areas are which. Not very usable.

To Review or Not to Review?

Ok, the answer to that question is obviously "to review." The real question is WHAT should I review? I was going through all the reviews that I've done so far and was transferring them to BoardGameGeek, hoping to hit a bigger audience, when I realized there are a lot of games that I love that I have no review yet. I know that I originally starting review all of these games when I was working on my Top Solo Games of 2017, but I've missed a lot since then.

Really, this post is more for me to keep track of what I want to review yet and probably not so helpful to you. But hey, now you'll have an idea of where I'm going to go next and what to look forward to. Here are the games that I've played enough to write reviews for in the near future:

Fantasy Bookkeeping (Review of Unbroken)

There are not that many solo-only games that get released (only Friday comes to mind off the top of my head as another option), so when one is created, it's a pretty big deal for the solitaire gaming community. Unbroken had some really stellar hype when it came out on Kickstarter and I jumped on that hype. Yes, the hype has turned into straight up drama as the shipping issues and customer service problems has been quite the distraction from the actual game. Now, I received my copy several weeks ago and I feel like I've played it enough to get a good sense of the game. So, what do I think?

Middle-earth is Overrun (Review of The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-earth)

This week I finally finished my grand adventure in Middle-earth. It did not end well. In the final scenario, my heroes were overrun by the forces of evil and the land was swept into darkness. We fought bravely, but in the end my fellowship succombed to fear and perished. This does not set things up nicely for the fellowship of the ring - poor Frodo will be down a few members as he heads into Mordor.

Does this game suffer the same fate? Or does it rise up to conquer the critics?

So Many Cards, So Little Money (Review of Heroes of Tenefyr)

Heroes of Tenefyr is a co-operative, fantasy deckbuilding game. I must begin my review by confessing that I have not played the full retail/Kickstarter version, only the free print-n-play that was offered during the Kickstarter campaign. Due to this, I won't be able to make many comments about the components, but I'll discuss the artwork a little bit.

One to four players choose a hero (bard, thief, barbarian, or cleric) and build their starting deck of 6 zeroes, 6 ones, and 1 class-specific card. In a solo game, you choose two heroes, take both of their special cards, and add 12 ones and zeroes to your deck.

There are ten dungeons that you and/or your companions can venture into it. There are two of each level, 1-5. The 1 level dungeons are the easiest and the 5 level are the most difficult. Obviously, the payout for each dungeon matches the difficulty. You can enter these dungeons in whatever order you want, but be warned, the harder ones are impossible to beat early in the game. When a dungeon (containing 4 random cards) is completed, the players receive a reward as well. These rewards including scrapping bad cards from your deck, adding new cards to your deck, attack bonuses, giving cards to other players, putting cards on top of your deck, and more