The Great Zimbabwe

2 Plays

For a good while now, I’ve been stuck in a strange Splotter Game limbo.  On the one hand, I have loved my plays of Bus for the nail-biting worker placement stress that it brings to the table in such brilliantly pure way.  On the other hand, I still remember feeling so overwhelmed by the decision space and ripple effect strategies of Food Chain Magnate that Camille and I decided to pack up the game and give it back to its owner rather than invest such an enormous amount of energy and brain power.

Knowing that Bus is Splotter’s most approachable game simply made me hesitant to try anything else, as I wasn’t looking for another behemoth design to add to my collection simply for it to collect dust.  Yet with the recent reprinting of The Great Zimbabwe, I finally wilted to the Splotter effect and picked up my second title from their offering.

The Great Zimbabwe caught my eye because it doesn’t feature an overwhelming menu of cards, nor does it run the risk of lasting 4 hours.  Rather, this game comes with a clean board of land and water spaces on a grid, a handful of resource and artisan tiles, a few simple cards, some wooden player discs, and a pile of money in the shape of cows.  I was also drawn to this game simply because of how unique it feels compared to anything else I’ve ever seen.

The object of the game is to get your point marker to reach your victory requirement disc.  All player discs start at 20 points, yet your personal finish line can move further and further away (up to double your starting distance—40!) if you greedily add any advantages to your tableau.  These advantages come in the form of technology cards, god cards, and specialist cards.  It’s a thrilling temptation to have constantly dangling in front of you, because many of these cards offer mega-powerful, rule-breaking abilities.  So will you attempt to play a quick, clean game using only the standard options at your disposal, or will you plunge into the deep end by enjoying the card-benefits now and worrying about the consequences later?

What you’re doing from round to round is bidding cows for turn order (with the paid cows getting evenly distributed back to all players), and then adding artisan tiles to the board or paying those artisans to help you raise your monuments.  The spatial requirements of placing artisans and accessing their goods is the beating heart of The Great Zimbabwe.  Artisans must be within three spaces of resource sites, and your monuments must be within three spaces of artisans, but a blob of water counts as one big space, and you can use anybody’s monuments as “hubs” to reset your three space limit—sort of like a refuel station.

It makes for a refreshingly unique puzzle, especially once you wrap your brain around it.  I’ll admit, I had to watch a playthrough, read the rulebook, and then watch a How to Play video to finally wrap my brain around this wonky design.  I’ve observed that Splotter doesn’t write the best rulebooks either, so that certainly doesn’t help the onboarding experience.  Fortunately, all that effort has absolutely paid off for us.

At its core, The Great Zimbabwe is a tight economic struggle between all players where every single decision you make has a massive impact on the entire group.  Budgeting your cows wisely between the turn order bids, artisan construction expenses, specialist abilities, and monument raising requirements is vital to a competitive strategy.  When one player appears to be running away with the victory, you can really shake things up by putting out a secondary artisan or raising the prices of your goods to soul-gouging heights.  Such a move just might buy you enough time for a late come-back victory.

In a lot of ways, this one reminds me of some of my all-time favorite Euros including Age of Steam, Brass, and… how about that, Bus.  It’s a game that is not afraid to step out of the way and let the players crash into each other or fly off a cliff as they grapple with the emergent strategies and dynamic game board.

At any rate, I haven’t even won The Great Zimbabwe yet; my two opponents have both gotten the best of me in some absolutely tight competitions, but I’ve come away from these 3-player games hungry for more.  In fact, I would go so far as to say that this is the best new-to-me, published game that I’ve encountered this year.  

Current Rating: 9/10

Switch & Signal

2 Plays

It’s time to make good on my anticipatory blog post from *checks calendar* 1.5 years ago. One of my most anticipated games of 2021 was in fact a 2020 release titled Switch & Signal, so here I am, finally talking about the game after playing it in July of 2022.  I take no blame for the drawn out conclusion, as Kosmos waited 17 whole months before releasing their game in other languages besides German.  As the saying goes: “The best time to release a game is after the hype train is long gone…” or something along those lines.  That’s why we here at Bitewing Games follow the tried and true crowdfunding model of big splashy campaign, small pledge manager rekindling, delay, delay, delay, delay, and then release 😆.

Fortunately, many crowdfunded games get a second wind when they finally deliver to backers and critics as they board the second hype train.  But I’m not sure that Switch & Signal benefitted from a second train or second wind of any kind, as its North American release earlier this year seemed to go largely quiet and unnoticed.  What this one needed was a third hype train, one of critical acclaim and internet recognition to remind us all that this cooperative train game was worth a look.

Having played and enjoyed both sides of the game board (Central Europe and North America), I too can confirm that this is a solid experience. In Switch & Signal, you’ll take turns resolving a departure card before spending your hand of cards as actions.  Departure cards can deploy new trains and/or trigger train movement.  You’ll also have cards that let you push trains even further along their set path, but most of your cards let you manipulate the switches and signals of the train tracks.  The objective is to route your trains toward cube-filled cities so all the cubes can be delivered to a port before time runs out.  Each train can only carry one cube, and they tend to come from all different directions moving at a wide range of speeds, and therein lies the challenge of the game.

These moving trains will constantly be threatening to encounter delays, hit dead ends, take unintended detours, or collide with other trains, so it’s up to you and the gang to keep the trains on task and the cubes en route to their destination.  Switch & Signal poses a simple gameplay loop to rival that of Pandemic, and it provides a solid, unique, thematic, and engaging cooperative experience.  It constantly offers up interesting decisions from which train type to deploy, which risks are top priority, how should your hand be used, which direction should you send each train, and when should you activate your one-time-use helpers?  

Although it’s best to adapt to whatever enters your hand from the draw pile, you can always discard two cards as a wild action.  You’ll constantly be pressured to blow all of your cards in a single turn.  The pressure comes in the form of losing time via inefficient train directing.  Each problem you allow will accelerate your defeat as you spend time tokens and lose departure cards.  But if you can manage to conserve your cards and overlook smaller risks, that often pays off later when you find yourself needing a larger hand in a future turn.

Despite hitting all the right notes, Switch & Signal is not able to overcome the usual weaknesses of the cooperative genre.  The opportunity for quarterbacking is wide open here, and alpha gamers will struggle to resist bossing their teammates around when those precious cubes and time tokens are at stake.  Even worse, there’s really no benefit to having more players at the table.  It’s effectively a solo game where your turns are divided among all the participants.  Yet as a 2 player game, it’s perfectly fine.

The bigger issue, at least for me, is that I already feel like I’ve seen and experienced everything that Switch & Signal has to offer.  As with many other cooperative games—once you’ve conquered the challenge and sampled the entire menu, you lose the hunger to come back for more.  Tweaking the difficulty by subtracting a departure card or two isn’t interesting enough to keep me coming back for more.  It’s far different from a competitive game, where the interactive struggle between players continually breathes new life into the core gameplay loop.

I’ve found that my favorite cooperative games tend to contain at least one of these key ingredients:

• Virtually Endless Content.  Games like The Crew and MicroMacro (and their sequels) keep me coming back for more because there is always a new objective to overcome or a fresh case to crack.  When games like Switch & Signal offer nothing new and enticing to rekindle my curiosity or push me out of my usual strategy or stretch me beyond my current skill level, then I quickly lose interest.
• Brutally Challenging & Thoroughly Tense Gameplay.  Cooperative games don’t always have to be packed with content or variety to hold my attention—sometimes all I need is a good challenge.  Despite having “seen it all,” I’m happy to return to games like The Mind, Regicide, or Siege of Runedar because I know these titles will put up a good fight.  These are all games that destroyed us on our first few plays, yet they allowed us enough hope to not give up entirely.  With Switch & Signal, we won both of our plays.  The first session was thrillingly close, mind you, but I’d prefer to lose my initial attempts at a cooperative or solo game rather than conquer it instantly.

The good news is that the rulebook implies that designer David Thompson has concocted expansion content for Switch & Signal to help give the game a longer lifespan.  The bad news is that Kosmos took 17 months to localize the game to English, and even 2 years after its debut there are no signs of any expansion being brought to life.  But even if the core game experience ends up being all that we ever get, I suppose it remains a solid train ride that is worth the trip, and even the occasional revisit, for folks who can spare the investment.

Current Rating: 7/10

Longboard

3 Plays

One aspect I appreciate about Reiner Knizia’s ludography is that it spans a wide spectrum of genres and styles… You have epic cooperative challenges such as Lord of the Rings and Siege of Runedar, family friendly romps including Quest for El Dorado and Whale Riders, dynamic and deep strategy games including Babylonia and Stephenson’s Rocket, simple lively crowd pleasers like Soda Smugglers and Rapido, unique and novel concepts including Tajuto and Pumafiosi, and tense 2-player tug of wars such as Royal Visit and Battle Line.  If I were to reduce my collection down to purely Knizia designs, I would still have a great game to satisfy almost any group or setting.

Not only does he provide a wide spanning breadth of offerings, but he also plunges deep into various genres by iterating on his most compelling concepts.  You’ll find some of the key tile placement ingredients of classic Through the Desert in Blue Lagoon and Orongo.  You’ll enjoy the shared incentive betting of Winner’s Circle in Equinox.  You’ll recognize the clever scoring of Ra in Sumatra and Ra: The Dice Game.  And you’ll spot the game-of-chicken auctions from Taj Mahal in Beowulf: The Legend and Karate Tomate.  If you find something you really love about a Knizia game, odds are that you can find that favorite flavor with a unique twist in several other designs in his catalogue.

Longboard is another such game that sees Reiner iterating on the core concept of a popular game series—namely Lost Cities.  In both games, players are committing to runs of cards in various colors by playing ascending values into their personal tableaus.  The difference in Lost Cities is that your hand remains hidden from your opponent, yet you are strictly limited in hand size and constantly forced to play or discard cards far earlier than you’d like.  With Longboard, you don’t have a private hand or even a card limit.  Rather, your supply of cards is public information and open to a form of thievery—forced trades.

In Longboard, your turn consists of two actions of your choice: draw a card from the deck and add it to your supply, take a card from your supply and add it to your tableau, or swipe a card from an opponent’s supply and replace it with higher value card(s) from your own supply.

Those two key differences—public hands and forced trades—go a long way in making Longboard feel drastically different from Lost Cities.  Other differences include a wider player count (2-4), randomized objective cards (for bonus points), and milder scoring.  You’ll still be punished for not completing a surf board that you started, but the punishment is merely 1 or 2 negative points rather than Lost Cities’ 10 or 20 or more.

Of course I enjoy the Lost Cities style of tense card play that Longboard provides, but I appreciate it most for how it stands out in my collection.  When an opponent displays a highly coveted card in their supply that would be perfect for one of your growing longboards, you’ll spend the next few moments desperately hoping that nobody claims it before your next turn.  You’ll let out a sigh of relief if it survives the gauntlet, only to realize that the only way you can acquire that card is by giving up one or more valuable cards from your own supply!  What if your forced trade helps your opponent more than it helps you?  What if you give up a card that you’ll need later?  How will you spend your two actions?  If you leave cards in your supply for too long, they’ll get swiped away right before you were planning to play them.

Within this casual space of 20 to 30-minute gaming, Longboard certainly hits the spot.  Folks who prefer tighter, spicier, and more punishing experiences in this field are likely to prefer Lost Cities or Arboretum.  But if you enjoy exploring the differences, then you’ll certainly find something to appreciate within Longboard.

Current Rating: 7.5/10

Carpe Diem

1 Play

Carpe Diem!  Seize the day!  A game with such an ambitious title must surely be an ambitious design, correct?  Well… if only.

After playing five other Stefan Feld games, I can definitely confirm that Carpe Diem is also a Stefan Feld game 😆.  The point salad force is strong with this one.  You’ve got your turn order track (which will score you points at the end of the game).  You’ve got your resource collection (which will convert into points at the end of the game if you haven’t spent them on points earlier).  You’ve got your tile drafting and placement (which will gain you resources and/or points when you complete buildings and fields).  And you’ve got your objective card selection (which will score you points both during the game and at the end).  Indeed, Carpe Diem is a Feld, through and through.  Unfortunately, it’s the most soulless Feld of the six I’ve played and perhaps the most soulless Euro I’ve played this year.

What do I mean by soulless?  Well the tiles consist of plain old rooftops and fields—blobs and rectangles of red and grey and purple and brown.  The resources are coins, fish, bread, leaves, grapes, and chickens—you know, Roman stuff.  The primary driver of points is a large display of bland objective cards that demand things like: “Pay 2 chickens for 4 points,” “Build a green building for 3 points,” “Build a gray building for 3 points” “Build two fields for 5 points,” and so on.  The tile placement is like Carcassonne (connect matching sides of square tiles), but with all of the competitive joy sucked out.  The tile drafting consists of moving your person to one of two spots and selecting one tile from up to four options—move, take, place, rinse, & repeat.

The design is fine, mind you.  The decision making is substantial and the mechanisms are coherent.  There’s nothing here that would make you hate the game, necessarily.  Yet Carpe Diem is devoid of any personality whatsoever.  Where is the imagination here?  What makes this one stand out in any way from the haystack of Euros both old and new?  What kind of experience is this immersing players in aside from a bone-dry efficiency puzzle?  The game only lasted an hour, yet somehow it felt like two.  If I had to accuse any game of being generated by a lifeless algorithm—just input a few mechanisms and let it spew out an instant answer—then Carpe Diem would be my chief suspect.  I suppose that’s the most efficient way to make a game.  Seize the day, indeed.

Current Rating: 5/10

Sumatra

1 Play

Despite my being a huge Knizia fan, there are certain releases that even I will pass on (or at least hesitate to purchase), one of those being Sumatra after it garnered a lukewarm critical reception.  But the fact that I enjoyed Ludonova’s other Knizia Games (Babylonia and Siege of Runedar) is what led me to finally try Sumatra.

Despite having a pretty box cover, I imagine that Sumatra didn’t make a huge splash upon its release largely because of its simple premise and recycled concepts.  No particular aspect of the gameplay necessarily leaps out at onlookers and demands to be explored.  All you’re doing in the game is drafting from a public pile of tiles or moving your tiny traveler to the next space.  There are no lively auctions or crunchy economics or elaborate puzzles to acquire what you need—simply pick a tile or march onward!

The most engaging aspect of this island excursion game comes from the combination of the player-driven tempo and clever set collection scoring.  You and your opponents travel around the island in a large pack, as if you are following a tour guide and exploring the flora, fauna, scenery and villages while interacting with inhabitants and collecting local crafts.  If one player strays ahead of the pack, then the others are forced to catch up, but they can linger behind just a little longer to squeeze one more tile out of that site.

The never-ending question that the game poses to players is this: Which is more worthwhile—hanging back to soak in the available opportunities or racing ahead for first dibs on yet unknown mysteries?  It’s a game of opportunity costs where you’ll constantly be missing out on some expedition experiences because you were too focused on others.  Sometimes you’ll resent your fellow travelers for pulling you away from exciting encounters; other times, you’ll quickly grow bored of an area’s offerings and push the tour ahead far sooner than others are ready for.  Honestly, it’s a brilliant theme for a set collection game, even if it’s a bit quirky.

You’re not only gaining encounters with and memories of people and wildlife, but you’re also managing your travel equipment and hunting for GPS signals.  Each player gets a large travel notebook for collecting their tiles, and each row presents a unique incentive.  All tiles will score you positive or negative points at the end of the game, but some will earn you bonus point badges or bonus tile drafts along the way.  

The inhabitant row presents a competitive majority track, where you’ll be rewarded or punished for having the most or least inhabitant tiles, respectively.  The craft row provides snowballing points that pushes you into becoming an obsessive collector once you get a taste of the island materialism.  The flora and fauna must be combined in pairs in order to score, but you can push your luck and spread them out because you’ll only score the higher valued tile from each pair.  GPS devices and reception tiles also form pairs, but rather than score points on their own they help you to discover lost/unobtainable tiles.  Villages are great to visit, but the entire row is all or nothing scoring depending on if you have more pairs of GPS/reception tiles than village tiles.  Volcanoes are high risk and high reward, as they should be, scoring you negative points or positive points depending on if you acquired enough equipment to match the volcano.  And finally, the equipment row is vital in that all your tiles in a column are invalid unless that column has at least one equipment tile, yet stacking three of a kind in one space can lead to a 15 point swing from equipment and volcano points—so will you stack or spread your equipment?

While you’ll spend the entire game wrestling with all of these competing incentives on your personal board, you’ll also be gunning for the bonus point badges that are awarded to the first player to collect x amount of tiles in a row or column.  This badge mechanism is an essential element that helps maintain a tension of table competition and tough decisions.  It makes Sumatra feel less like a lazy, rejuvenating vacation and more like a stressful, demanding adventure.

Sumatra presents yet another example for why Reiner is a master of compelling set collection and interesting scoring.  Although, folks who are familiar with his broader work will recognize that Sumatra borrows much from other Knizia classics, most notably Ra.  Sumatra takes the fascinating set collection of Ra and combines it with the tense player-driven tempo of Whale Riders.  This combination makes for a solid design and an enjoyable experience, yet the purity and simplicity of Sumatra also means that it struggles to stand out from its peers.

Whale Riders provides a lightning quick action efficiency romp.  Ra delights with agonizing auctions and nail-biting push-your-luck rounds.  Both of these games are also surprisingly great from their lowest to highest player counts.  In many ways, Sumatra feels less enticing, more niche, and somewhat redundant.  It’s a questionable addition to my collection with limited shelf space and even more limited opportunities to get these games to the table.  The game also takes a hit when one compares productions and approachability—where Ra (the newest version) puts everything you need to learn and remember about the setup and scoring directly onto the player boards, Sumatra presents bare player boards and a single, clumsy side aid.  Sumatra also desperately needs yet is bafflingly missing a score pad to help players tally their scores across the 9 rows of tiles and extra badge tokens.  

In spite of all these drawbacks, I still found myself enjoying Sumatra.  Maybe it’ll happen sooner than I think, but right now I’m reluctant to get rid of the game.  I’m keen to revisit this solid experience with further plays, but it probably won’t hit the table nearly as frequently as the rest of my Knizia collection.

Current Rating: 7/10

Green Team Wins

1 Play

Green Team Wins is one of the hot new releases from Origins Game Fair 2022 targeted squarely at parties of any shape or size.  The objective is simple: Get on the Green Team, stay on the Green Team, and win.

This game comes loaded with 12 player boards and markers, but you could even combine two boxes into a mega-group bonanza.  That’s because the gameplay is pacy and light.  Everyone is asked the same question, there are three types—fill in the blank, best of three, this or that.  These questions can be things such as: Curly fries or Waffle fries?  Captain ______?  Euro Games or Ameritrash Games (this one is from the Board Gamer promo pack)?  Then, all players will secretly write down an answer—either one that aligns with their preferences or one that they predict will be the most popular.  Finally, all players reveal their answer with the most popular response becoming the winner.

A winning answer will allow you to jump from the orange team to the green team and score one point.  From there, you want to try and continue your hot streak, as you’ll get two points with future correct answers as an existing green team member, and you’ll be demoted back to the pitiful orange team the moment you don’t choose the most popular answer.

It’s silly, simple, and quick.  Those who prefer to get more nuanced or strategic party games to the table (e.g. Codenames, Decrypto, Wavelength, So Clover, etc.) will likely be left unsatisfied.  On the other hand, it’s basically impossible to be upset with a crowd-pleasing game that only lasts 15 minutes (unless your group insists on playing it 10 times in a row, I suppose).  Plus, I can’t think of any game that engages this large of a crowd this well (we’re talking 12, 15, or 20… if you have a second copy), so it definitely has a place in the right gathering.

Current Rating: 6/10

Wonderland’s War

1 Play

Another title from my “games I’d love to play but I’m too cheap to buy” bucket list is the recently released Wonderland’s War, which I’ve heard is a killer combination of Quacks of Quedlinburg and Rising Sun.

I’m already a fan of these genres—push-your-luck, bag building, and area control—and Wonderland’s War is a newborn baby of these parent genres.  More specifically, it’s a baby that has had its milk spiked with caffeine and steroids.  Those who acquire a copy of the game (especially the deluxe Kickstarter edition) will also likely need to knockout a wall in their home to give it ample space to reside.  This isn’t your average newborn, it’s a Paul Bunyan-sized baby.

The bits and bobs and tokens and trays know no bounds, but at the end of the day the most important part of the game is it’s gameplay experience.  You’ll be adding troops to various regions of Wonderland, acquiring more recruits into your bagged army of tokens, gaining powerful Wonderlandians to aid your conquest, unlocking asymmetric character abilities to use to your advantage, striving to avoid madness which plagues your supply, embarking on secret quests to gain bonus points, and pushing-your-luck in bag-draw battles.

Normally, in an area control game such as this, the number of troops in a region equates to the amount of strength you have against your competition.  In Wonderland’s War, that is not the case.  More troops is still a good thing, but that only means you have a better chance of surviving the battle long enough to score points from the region.

Your strength in a region, and thus your ability to score 1st or 2nd place points, is mainly determined by whatever “ally chips” you draw from your bag.  Just like Quacks, all players involved in the conflict will simultaneously draw tokens one-by-one from their customized concoction of chips.  These chips have unique types and strengths, and their abilities are dependent on whatever ally cards you set out for that session.  One ability will score you bonus points, another with double the strength of the next chip drawn, and other might trigger your character ability.  There are as many ally card abilities as there are sands of the desert sea.  So with all these possible combinations, you are unlikely to want for more variety.

But as all push-your-luck games go, it’s possible to draw the bad things out of your bag—namely madness chips.  These will progressively weaken your presence on the board until you evaporate from existence, assuming you or your opponents don’t bow out first.  So deciding when to quit drawing and concede a battle can be a tough but vital decision—2nd place region points are better than no points at all.

Another reason you might back out of a heated battle comes from the secret Quest cards which encourage you to do things like end a battle in a specific location at a specific number of strength which will reward you with 3 points for doing so.  This can be a disheartening decision to those who bet on you winning the battle only to discover that you had ulterior motives.  But more than that, these quests feel unexciting, arbitrary, and undermining when compared to the focus of the game.  Much like other games with private objective cards that are drawn mid-game, you can easily draw yourself into an objective that you already accidentally completed just as easily as you can end up with a hopeless dud.

For me, the real meat of Wonderland’s War comes from the combination of unrestrained bag building, engaging push-your-luck battles, and competitive jockeying for region control.  If the box was half as big and the playtime half as long, I’d be twice as eager to plunge further down this rabbit hole.

Current Rating: 7.5/10

Beowulf: The Legend

1 Play

Beowulf: The Legend is yet another seemingly forgotten Knizia design from nearly two decades ago.  In board game years, that practically makes it an ancient artifact.  This is one that I never hear anyone talk about aside from Mark Bigney of the So Very Wrong About Games podcast.  Yet this is actually one of Mark’s all-time favorite Knizias.  While we don’t exactly agree on everything (Babylonia is, in fact, a masterpiece Mark!), there is no denying that the man knows his Knizias.

I waited far longer than I should have to try Beowulf: The Legend.  Frankly, the theme and production aren’t the most approachable in Reiner’s catalogue.  While the art is evocative, it doesn’t exactly stand out from the thousands of other games that feature dragons and swords.  Even worse, the game board features a winding trail of 36 microscopic spaces with text and icons that almost require a magnifying glass.  Unboxing the game and cracking open that rulebook for the first time required an unwavering drive to get the game played and trust in Knizia’s design chops.

Going into our first play, I understood that Beowulf shared some similarities with it’s more popular sibling, Taj Mahal.  Players manage their own hand of cards and must decide how to commit their cards during sequential auctions; yet knowing when to quit an auction (or not even attempt it) and settle for a lesser reward is equally important.  The two designs branch off in different directions from there.

Players act as comrades to Beowulf as he progresses through the legendary events of his story.  The player who has earned the most fame over the course of play will be crowned victor of the game and successor to Beowulf himself upon his passing.  The tabletop experience takes you through a series of minor and major events.  Minor events present players will quick, simple decisions to help them prepare for major events which can be a couple different types of auctions.

Players will either bid simultaneously or, more often, in a clockwise cycle where the highest bidders (or last to pass) will get first-dibs on the bonuses of the event.  Some of these rewards aren’t bonuses at all, rather they can be scratches or wounds that become massive problems if a player accumulates too many by the end of the journey.

Each auction is tied to a couple different card suits (out of five possible options), and thus these are the only cards you can play from your hand to gun for the best prizes.  The brilliant twist here is that you are not fully restricted by what is in your hand.  Each time it’s your turn to raise or match the bid, you can actually start your turn by choosing to take a “Risk” action.  This simply means that you will flip over the top two cards from the deck—any cards that match the current auction’s suit requirements are automatically added to your bid.  But this optional action isn’t called “Risk” for nothing.  If your two revealed cards do not match the current auction’s suit, then you are immediately eliminated from the auction and you must take a scratch token (three scratches turn into a wound, and three or more wounds will decimate your end-game score).

So not only are a playing a game of chicken against your opponents—deciding when to commit all your resources against a competitor versus when to pull back and reserve your cards for a potentially better or easier prize down the road—but you can also press-your-luck against the deck itself in hopes of scrounging up exactly what you need to stay in the auction.

While the biggest barrier to entry was motivating myself to acquire, learn, and play Beowulf, that didn’t stop me from plunging myself and four other newcomers straight into the “advanced rules.”  This basically adds another type of auction (with money) that we all handled and enjoyed just fine.  And the aged production didn’t get in the way of us having a blast.

I’m honestly a bit baffled that Beowulf: The Legend isn’t more highly rated by BGG users.  An average rating of 6.4 isn’t bad, but it isn’t amazing either.  My hunch is that some folks find it to be a bit too long (our play was much longer than the promised 60 minutes), or too luck-dependent (you can certainly be hosed by the Risk mechanism).  But I was fully engaged from start to finish, and I found the card draw element to be quite thrilling as the cost of busting can be quite painful yet the reward for success is endlessly enticing.  I also had the luxury of playing the game at the strongly recommended 5-player count.  But even then, the game tailors the auction rewards to the exact player count of the session, so I have to imagine that 3 and 4 player games are better than most folks give it credit for.  I’ll likely find out before too long.

Current Rating: 8.5/10

Our next Kickstarter project, Trailblazers, launches on August 16!  The pre-launch page is live where you can click to be notified the moment it launches.  Bitewing Games is only made possible and kept alive by the support of backers and fans of our published games.   Thanks for your support!

Article written by Nick Murray. Outside of practicing dentistry part-time, Nick has devoted his remaining work-time to collaborating with the world’s best designers, illustrators, and creators in producing classy board games that bite, including the upcoming Trailblazers by Ryan Courtney. He hopes you’ll join Bitewing Games in their quest to create and share experiences that, much like a bitewing x-ray, provide a unique perspective and refreshing interaction.

The post 1st Impressions of Wonderland’s War, The Great Zimbabwe, Longboard, Green Team Wins, Switch & Signal, & more! appeared first on Bitewing Games.

Not much of a reader? You’re in luck! This post also exists in podcast form shown below. Happy listening!

It’s about time to kiss (or more appropriately, kick) 2020 goodbye! As we hopefully look forward to a new year of long-awaited returns to normalcy, what better way to get hyped than to peek behind the curtains and get a glimpse of the most exciting board games to come!

I’ve cooked up quite the list with a variety of promising titles that might just deserve a spot on your wishlist. Several of these games were also explored in my Kickstarter Case Study: How to Win Backers and Fund Projects. Let’s see what’s on the 2021 menu…

Oath: Chronicles of Empire and Exile – Q2/Q3 2021

We might as well start off with my most anticipated game of 2021. Cole Wehrle’s magnum opus is right around the corner. With the publishing passion of Leder Games, the artistic flex of Kyle Ferrin, and the design chops of one of the industry’s hottest designers, we’ve got a recipe for success in Oath. Along the lines of Root and Pax Pamir, Oath is a highly strategic, cutthroat, and political game that best suits a group of regular players.

This title innovates upon legacy and campaign designs by taking the results of one game and integrating them into the objectives and setup of the next. Nothing is scripted or predetermined, rather the game organically follows a meta narrative controlled entirely by the decisions of the players. The ripple effect of players’ actions will be felt by all for games to come, and they can even keep record of this fascinating history in the Chronicle Session Journal (included in the kickstarter copies or likely to be available directly from Leder Games).

Kemet: Blood and Sand – Summer 2021

The area-control darling, Kemet, has been an established favorite for nearly a decade now. In 2021, Matagot will be releasing version 2.0 with a completely revamped presentation, improved rules, and new gameplay. Matagot’s legendary dudes-on-a-map trilogy has proven its worth to me with the incredible card-drafting Inis and solid auction-style Cyclades; Kemet is the remaining classic that I have yet to try, and Blood and Sand appears to be worth the wait.

Hibachi – Fall 2021

Hibachi flew a bit under the radar when it recently launched on Kickstarter, but it appears to be firing on all cylinders as a family-friendly set collection dexterity game. The design is a reimplementation of 2010’s Safranito that retains the core fun it presented.

Players toss poker chips onto a large board in an attempt to center the poker chip’s hole over ingredients and bonuses that will help the fill orders. The catch is that your poker chips are also used as a sort of blind auction for drafting order and other privileges. The value of your chips will stay face-down as you toss them onto the board, so a combination of skillful tosses and wise chip selections will ensure that you come out on top when the chips are flipped and the ingredients are claimed.

Grail Games promises that the leftovers from this Kickstarter will go to retail (or you can late pledge here), so keep your eyes peeled come Fall 2021 if you’re hungry to jump in on this fun feast.

Coffee Traders – May 2021

Capstone Games has gone all out with their debut of Coffee Traders. This heavy economic Euro from the makers of Wildcatters boasts over 650 deluxified, colorful components including wooden donkeys and plastic coffee beans! More importantly, the design promises a meaty, interactive competition within the sprawling coffee industry of the 1970s.

While we’re likely to see a more affordable, standard version of the game down the road, it’s hard not to get behind such an ambitious, beautiful project spearheaded by a highly capable publisher. If you can’t get enough sprawling Euros in your life, then this one is a no-brainer for any group of 3-5 players.

Whale Riders – Spring 2021

Dr. Knizia is on another hot streak spanning back to 2017 with the likes of Quest for El Dorado, Babylonia, My City, and more. Whale Riders brings us another team up of old faithful designer Knizia, ever stalwart artist Vincent Dutrait, and the consistently solid publisher Grail Games.

In this economic race, players must decide how to spend their 2 actions each turn as they ride whales along the arctic coast. You can sail ahead to claim the greatest treasures for yourself, but you’ll be missing out on golden opportunities along the way.

Next year, if you find yourself in need of a simple strategy game with enough subtle tension to satisfy everyone at the table, then you’d be hard pressed to bet against Reiner Knizia.

Undaunted: Reinforcements – August 2021

For fans of the Undaunted series, Reinforcements is the modular expansion you never knew you always wanted. This title will include new scenarios, units, and rules to keep the fun rolling. Compatible with both Undaunted games, this expansion even provides 4-player and solo modes for owners of either version. While the details are still sparse, this series already earned its right to the title of Undaunted when it initially debuted among the top board games of 2019. Undaunted will go down as one of my all time favorite deck builders thanks to its elegant flow and painful decisions. I’m thrilled to have more reasons to dive back into this excellent system.

Anno 1800 – Q1 2021 (English Version)

While the game setup isn’t exactly easy on the eyes, Anno 1800 doesn’t need to look amazing when it boasts the design talent of Martin Wallace, creator of Brass: Birmingham and Age of Steam.

Anno 1800 is based on the popular PC game from Ubisoft, but I’m more interested in what Mr. Wallace has done to create a city building tech-tree game. The German version is already on the market, and early buzz around this medium-weight Euro is positive.

Switch & Signal – 2021 (English Version)

Speaking of German games that have yet to make it overseas, Switch & Signal is a cooperative train game from one of the designers of Undaunted: Normandy. This game is as simple and accessible as Pandemic, yet thankfully it is not another Pandemic clone. Switch & Signal sees players guiding trains across a map of Europe or North America to deliver cargo to its destination before time runs out. Each turn involves deciding how to spend your cards to move trains, adjust signals, and switch tracks to keep engines along the most efficient paths possible.

There’s no official date for when this game hits North America, but we can safely assume that Kosmos is planning to localize and release it sometime next year, as it debuted in Germany just a few months ago.

Don’t Get Got: Shut Up & Sit Down Special Edition – Apr 2021

Don’t Get Got is a clever party game that has been around since 2018. It received high praise from popular critic site Shut Up & Sit Down in their highly entertaining review. Thereafter, Big Potato Games reached out to the funny folks at SU&SD and pitched a collaboration for a special edition which successfully funded on Kickstarter this year.

Don’t Get Got is a meta-game that can be sneakily tucked into the background of a game night, group party, or work environment. Each player receives a small wallet with unique objectives that typically require harmless but ridiculous tasks. These tasks span from “Get a player to compliment your hair” to “Make up a word and get a player to ask what it means.” The catch is that if players suspect foul play, they can call you out on your odd behavior and cause you to fail that mission. The first player to complete three missions wins the game.

I’m hoping to receive this game while I’m still at my General Practice Residency program with 7 other dental residents, where the setting is ripe for getting got!

Ra (New Versions)- 2021

Ra, one of all-time greats of the auctioning genre, has been criminally out of print for years. It’s a game that perfectly mixes agonizing auctioning with precarious push-your-luck mechanisms. 2021 is the year where that changes. Dice Tree Games is a South Korean publisher known for its deluxe productions of Knizia classics including Modern Art and Winner’s Circle, and they have a version of Ra ready to release seemingly any day (the game is listed as a 2020 planned release).

25th Century Games, best known for its Splendor-like 2017 release, Space Explorers, is a US-based publisher planning to release an English version of Ra in Summer 2021 as well. Details are sparse, but this release will be one to keep an eye on for anyone looking to jump into this masterclass design. I reached out to Chad (25th Century Games) and learned that he’s aiming to “create the nicest quality and visual art version of the game to date.”

It sounds like a fantastic way for new fans to jump in or old fans to update their copy. Although for those who already own a copy (Alea, Rio Grande, or Uberplay versions in particular), Board Game Geek will be offering delectable Geek Up bits in the spring! All hail the year of Ra!

Tutankhamun – Jan 2021

Speaking of 25th Century Games, they’ll be releasing another Knizia design that has been refreshed and revitalized in Tutankhamun. Players travel down the Nile and collect artifacts in a race to 30 points. The rules are easy enough for any friends or family, simply move your boat downstream and collect the tile you stop on. The key is to have majority in artifact types and lunge for the special power tiles when the timing is right to end up on top.

Dead Reckoning – May 2021

Dead Reckoning is nothing short of ambitious. This mega-project from AEG and John D. Clair (Space Base, Mystic Vale) takes their card crafting concept to the next level. Transparent cards will be combined, flipped, and rotated within sleeves to create a deck-building experience that sends players on a 4X (eXplore, eXpand, eXtort, eXterminate) journey through piratism.

It also features a wildly creative combat system where cubes are dropped onto a battleship that sends them cascading across a battle board, giving a cannonball-like effect that determines the result of the attack by where the cubes land on the board.

This game has so many mechanisms and pieces crammed into it that I’ve opted to leave it on my radar and wait to strike if the reviews come in overwhelmingly positive. It won’t be simple or cheap, but it promises quite the epic adventure.

Kabuto Sumo – June 2021

BoardGameTables.com is back at it with another novel design and gorgeous production. Kabuto Sumo is inspired by coin-pushing arcade games and real-life rhinoceros beetle wrestling. That’s pretty stinking awesome if you ask me.

Players will be shifting the push platform around the sumo ring to line up their move of pushing a piece into the ring in hopes of shoving opponent beetles off. This combination of physics, tactics, and dexterity promise to be a breath of fresh air for any game night. The world can never have too many refreshing dexterity games, and Kabuto Sumo is teed up to be the next one.

So, You’ve Been Eaten – 2021?

That’s right, the game is titled So, You’ve Been Eaten. With a name like that, it has to be good!…. Right?…

After initially rearing its head and riding high on the hotness wave of BGG, news on this title seemingly vanished… like it had been eaten. But more recent updates indicate that they’ve been quietly cramming even more tasty content into the game as they prepare for a Kickstarter launch.

The game claims that it is for 0-2 players. You read that correctly, zero players. A bold miner takes on a massive beast by burrowing into its intestines for crystals as the beast’s immune system fights back. Players can take on the role of either the miner or the beast… or neither?… in a 1v1, 1vGame, or GamevGame showdown.

Bristol 1350 – April 2021

The Dark Cities games have always taken the bones of a classic social deduction game and dressed them in various thematic mechanisms. From witch trials to pirate mutinies to wild west bank robberies to now escaping the Black Plague.

I’ve already played Bristol 1350 plenty of times leading up to my written preview of the design. The timing of this plague-themed game is uncannily coincidental, but the design has been a blast ever since I first tried it two years ago. I’m looking forward to experiencing the full vision that Facade Games had in mind for this quick, engaging gem of a deduction game.

John Company (Second Edition) – 2021?

Wehrlegig Games, the publisher of Pax Pamir (Second Edition), is cooking up their next project in John Company (Second Edition). Designer Cole Werhle’s most recent update reveals that the design has received a complete overhaul to help streamline the rules, focus on the game’s strengths, evoke the period art, and presumably deluxify the production. This heavy political economic romp is sure to be a strategically engaging and historically informative exploration of the British East India Company.

Railroad Ink Challenge – Q1 2021

One of our household’s favorite roll & writes makes an explosive return with Railroad Ink Challenge. The Shining Yellow and Lush Green editions promise player interaction, special structures, and new dice to help keep the puzzle fresh and interesting for series veterans. The development team has also cooked up a cornucopia of extras from an Epic game board to loads of expansion dice.

Iberian Gauge – Summer 2021

Like the previous two games in Capstone’s Iron Rail series, Iberian Gauge already exists among many other cube rails options. These cube rails games possess a common thread of stock investment, railroad expansion, and shared incentives. The key differentiator with the Iron Rail series is that publisher Capstone handpicks a solid design from the many options, gives it the Ian O’Toole makeover, and brings it to the masses. These slim, gorgeous boxes contain a single sheet of rules but pack a huge punch in roughly 1-hour of fun.

Sleeping Gods – Q1 2021

Sleeping Gods was on our most anticipated games of 2020 list, and it’s back again for another round of hype! The good news is that this cooperative exploration adventure is right around the corner, with fulfillment planned to begin in January. Players will be chipping away at this epic adventure a little bit at a time, and they can save their progress and pack it back into the box at any time. I spoke more about how Red Raven convinced me to back their project in my Kickstarter Case Study: How to Win Backers and Crowdfund Projects.

The Crew: Mission Deep Sea – March 2021

Ooo baby, designer Thomas Sing is dipping back into the well in an effort to satiate my unquenchable thirst for more of his brilliant cooperative trick taking. All we know thus far is that we’re going from space to sea, but hopefully Mr. Sing still has a few more tricks up his sleeve to mix up the formula. Either way, I’m all in on this sequel to one of the greatest cards games of all time.

Publishers To Watch

That’s right, we’re not done quite yet! Many publishers like to play their cards close to the chest, meaning that there are surely more hype-worthy games waiting to be announced and planned to be released direct-to-retail than the 19 we’ve already covered. We’ll point you toward a handful of publishers that have been on hot streaks recently and show no signs of cooling down.

• Capstone Games: At the time of this writing, I’ve had the chance to try ten of Capstone’s releases of 2018-2020, and they have all been killer games. 2021 releases will include Coffee Traders, Iberian Gauge, Pipeline Emerging Markets (expansion), and more.

• Leder Games: Most famously known for the deceptively charming and deeply asymmetric war-game Root, Leder Games is banking on their next mega-hit being Oath. But with Oath development wrapping up, they’ve shared that their next big project will be another Root expansion featuring militant factions of a Rat warlord and Badgers (expect a Kickstarter in Q1)! Patrick Leder is also working on his own spin on Twilight Imperium known as Void Lich. And who knows, maybe we’ll get a Fort expansion as well…

• Boardgametables.com: I’ve found that the best approach to take with Boardgametables.com’s publications is to expect the unexpected. They’ve brought us a band touring roll & write, an unchained auctioning game, a thinky pirate treasure deduction game, a trio of pretty fillers, and soon a coin-pushing style dexterity game. Whatever they cook up next, it’s sure to be unique and well-produced.

• Eagle-Gryphon Games: With recent killer deluxe versions of Rococo and Age of Steam, heavy hitters like On Mars, on upcoming refreshes such as For Sale Autorama, Eagle-Grypon games is not a publisher to be dismissed.

• WizKids: WizKids has been bringing their A-game recently with the incredible Sidereal Confluence: Remastered Edition, spicy Tournament at Avalon, and juicy Super Skill Pinball 4-Cade, all from 2020 alone. I’m hoping they have just as good of a lineup for 2021.

• Grail Games: This Australian publisher has earned a spot on my radar because of their ability to dig up and dust off the underdog games of yesteryear. Thanks to them, I’ve been able to discover and enjoy Knizia classics including Stephenson’s Rocket and Medici, and I’m excited to try Yellow and Yangtze and Whale Riders. Outside of Hibachi, they have many more exciting plans in the works for 2021 and beyond, including a Yellow and Yangtze expansion, an updated version of cult fan-favorite Fjords, and a two-player climbing card game known as ChuHan from the designer of Race for the Galaxy.

• Osprey Games: This publisher is based in Great-Britain and has drummed up at least 1 killer title every year for the past few years. Those games include Cryptid, the Undaunted series, The King is Dead (Second Edition), and more. They certainly deserve our attention for whatever else they have in mind for 2021 besides Undaunted: Reinforcements.

Designers to Watch

We’ll top this post off with a list of designers that, much like the above mentioned publishers, are on hot streaks of their own. Whenever I catch wind of a new release coming from one of these creative folks, my ears always perk up:

• David Thompson: I’ve talked plenty about David’s upcoming Undaunted Reinforcements and Switch & Signal, and that merely scratches the surface of David’s designs that are hitting the market in 2021. Others include War Chest: Siege (an expansion to Undaunted-like abstract game, War Chest), Soldiers in Postmen’s Uniforms (a WWII inspired solitaire game), Sniper Elite: The Board Game (a hidden moment design based on the video game series of the same name), and Dire Alliance: Horror (a cooperative/competitive tactical deck builder). And those are just the ones we know of. Needless to say, he’s certainly one to keep on the radar.

• Paolo Mori: We’re big fans of Ethnos, a family-weight area majority game that was #8 in my most recent top 50 games of all time list. We’ve also been digging 2019’s Blitzkrieg, a 2-player tug of war game that made a fantastic 1st impression and still holds up after several more plays. There’s no telling what Paolo will do next, but odds are it will be amazing.

• Alexander Pfister: This is the legend who brought us the excellent Great Western Trail, Isle of Skye, Maracaibo, and much more. His latest release, CloudAge, should probably be among the list of games up above seeing how the North American shipment appears to be delayed into the new year (thanks for nothing, Covid!). Regardless, the man is a machine who continues to impress with his designs. I expect to see another big one from him in 2021.

• Wolfgang Warsch: From The Mind to Quacks of Quedlinburg, from Wavelength to That’s Pretty Clever, you know him, you love him, he’s Wolfgang Warsch! After seemingly bursting onto the scene in 2018, Wolfgang has been on a design rampage ever since. Hopefully he hasn’t run out of steam for 2021. You can do it, Wolfgang!

• Kramer & Kiesling: Like Peanut Butter and Jelly, Wolfgang Kramer and Michael Kiesling have been tearing it up together for years with classics such as Tikal or Mexica and more recent releases including our Holiday Board Game Gift recommendation, Renature. Not that they actually need each other, as Mr. Kiesling is the genius behind Azul and Heaven & Ale while Mr. Kramer is mastermind behind El Grande and Downforce. Indeed, these gentlemen should already be on your 2021 watchlist.

• Cole Wehrle: I started this entire post out with Cole’s upcoming design, Oath, and quickly followed it up with his returning hit, John Company (Second Edition), so you already know where I stand here. He’s both a lead designer/developer at Leder Games and he runs Wehrlegig Games with his brother, so anything coming from either company is going to have his fingerprints on it. Why do I appreciate his handiwork so much? Aside from him owning two spots in my top 10 games of all time, I’ve found Cole to be more interested in creating immersive experiences than tossing out gimmicky, shallow designs. He’s churning out arguably the most fascinating designs in the industry with the help of many talented colleagues. Keep it coming, Cole!

• Ryan Courtney: Ryan is the newest published designer among those on this list. In fact, his first game, Pipeline, was categorized as a Lover in my recent revisit of the best games of 2019. His other design, Curious Cargo, continues to impress as well. The man takes “thinky” to the next level, and I’m there for whatever he cooks up next.

• Uwe Rosenberg: It’s breeding!… It’s polyominoes!… That’s right, it’s Uwe Rosenberg. Uwe is one of the all time greats in the industry, and his most recent hits, including New York Zoo and Nova Luna, prove that he’s still got it. He’s always a safe bet when heading into a new year of releases.

• Reiner Knizia: Alongside Cole Wehrle, Reiner Knizia is my absolute favorite board game designer. I own and love more games from Dr. Knizia than any other designer (15 and counting)! He’s best known for his decades old evergreens including Tigris & Euphrates, Lost Cities, and Ra, but he’s been on another hot streak with recent bangers including Babylonia, My City, and Quest for El Dorado. This man is the Willy Wonka of board games, with over 600 titles to his name. Of course they’re not all going to be amazing at that kind of output, but the sheer number golden designs that have come from this one mind is staggering. I’ll take three more decades of Knizia releases, please and thank you.

Hungry for more board game hype? Then continue on to PART TWO of my Most Anticipated Board Games of 2021!

Article written by Nick Murray. To learn more about his tabletop gaming tastes and preferences, check out his blog series: Tabletop Tastes: My Favorite Flavors in Board Games. To follow his designs as they come to fruition, subscribe to our newsletter and follow Bitewing Games on social media!

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