I know, Scythe by Stonemaier Games has been out since 2016 and has had a couple of expansions released as well, including promo packs with additional encounter cards. So chances are you have already heard plenty of reviews about this game and maybe own it yourself, but I still felt it's worth reviewing, because I am sometimes surprised by how many people still don't know Scythe.
Yes, it is nearly the end of 2018, so it is time to list Tabletop Games Blog's top 5 games of the year. It has been a great year for tabletop games in general, and I have been lucky enough to play no less than 23 games over the year, including playtesting, PnPs, online games as well as games played during our weekly games night and at MeetUp sessions. So I thought choosing 5 out of those 23 games would be a good number.
It has been a couple of months since I last updated my tabletop player profile, as per Quantic Foundry's online form. So it's time to do it again and share the results with you. See the links at the bottom of this article to complete the form yourself, which I highly recommend, and my previous results.
Rise of Tribes by Breaking Games looks like your normal area control game with the usual random terrain made out of hexagonal tiles. The game is set in ancient, prehistoric times, and you move your tribe members around the terrain, collect resources, craft tools to upgrade your tribe's abilities and generally do things that you will have seen before in other games. However, look closer and you will see that there are at least two interesting mechanisms in this game, which make it stand head and shoulders above the rest.
I had the pleasure of trying the prototype PnP version of Chai by Deep Aqua Games, which is due to launch on Kickstarter on 4 December, so keep an eye out for it. The aim of the game is to collect resources, in this case flavours and additives, to fulfil the outstanding tea orders for customers, which give you points. It's the classic mechanism of completing contracts or quests, like in so many other games. However, the twist is how you collect your resources from the market, which creates a really interesting puzzle which forces you to think ahead and work out what you need versus what other players may need.
My latest review is for Battle Ravens by Daniel Mersey and published by PSC Games. Just for disclosure, it was PSC Games who kindly sent me a review copy, but that didn't influence my view of the game. It's a war game set in Viking England and due to launch on Kickstarter on 20 November 2018, so keep an eye out. You either take the side of the Norse or the Anglo-Saxon armies, who face each other's shield walls on the battlefield. Your aim is to puncture three holes in your opponent's line to win the game by manoeuvring your warriors and attacking with your six-sided dice. However, the clever twist to this game is that your actions are determined by how many raven tokens you place on your six battle spaces. It creates a bidding element which means that being the first player isn't necessarily an advantage.
Inspired by Tweets following the recent Essen Spiel 2018 by a fair few people, I thought I write about one of the reasons I love the tabletop games industry: wanting to play a game whenever, wherever. In fact, many of us try and see a game in everyday activities. It is usually not about being competitive, but much more about being playful, having imagination and sharing an experience with other people - or it can be about beating your own best score, whether this is in a competitive, co-operative or solo game.
Most tabletop games are aimed at three or more players, with possibly a two player variant - and maybe even a solo option. However, more and more games coming out recently are either specifically aimed at two players only, or are designed to be played with two or more players. There is a choice between co-operative and competitive games, anything from light to heavy games and with virtually all types of game mechanisms found in other multi-player games.
In a previous article (see Co-op or competitive?) I showed what my tabletop player profile looks like, as per Quantic Foundry's online form at https://apps.quanticfoundry.com/surveys/start/tabletop/ - which I highly recommend to everyone. In the article I said I would check my profile monthly, which didn't come to pass as other things got in the way. However, I have now completed the survey again and unsurprisingly, my profile hasn't changed a huge amount, but the subtle differences are interesting. You can see the latest results at the end of this article - and the previous results in the article Co-op or competitive?
People play tabletop games for different reasons. If you are part of different game groups, you probably know how the attitude to playing games can change. Some people are really competitive and do everything they can to win the game. Others are quite casual and often like the social side of playing games.
