New to Games? 12 - Shut Up & Sit Down

Unlock!

Unlock! is a series of cooperative card-based escape adventures for up to six players. Each Unlock! game consists of sixty cards depicting objects, maps, and puzzles that can be activated, solved, or combined in an effort to access other cards and areas. The free companion app tracks the time allotted to win the game, while also offering hints and unlocking new, and necessary, elements. When the players believe they have figured out the code to escape each adventure, they will input the number into the app and escape the danger, or lose even more time in finding the real sequence.

Everyone meant to use the cabin only as a shelter for the night, but come the morning the door has been secured by a combination lock, with no one knowing the combination of numbers that will let them leave. The windows are barred as well. An enigmatic spinning code dial and a mysterious book is all that you have to go on. Can you escape from this abandoned cottage?

In EXIT: The Game – The Abandoned Cabin, players must use their team spirit, creativity, and powers of deduction to crack codes, solve puzzles, collect objects, and earn their freedom bit by bit.

In Fresco, players are master painters working to restore a fresco in a Renaissance church.

Each round begins with players deciding what time they would like to wake up for the day. The earlier you wake up, the earlier you will be in turn order, and the better options you will be guaranteed to have. Wake up early too often, however, and your apprentices will become unhappy and stop working as efficiently. They would much rather sleep in!

Then, players decide their actions for the turn, deploying their apprentice work force to various tasks. You’ll need to buy paint, mix paint, work on painting the fresco, raise money (which you’ll need to buy the aforementioned paint!) by painting portraits, and perhaps even send your apprentices to the opera in order to increase their happiness. Points are scored mostly by painting the fresco, which requires specific combinations of paints, so you’ll need to buy and mix your paints wisely, in addition to beating other players to the paints and fresco segments you would like to paint.

Fresco includes several expansion modules, so you can play without expansions for a lighter family game or add in expansions to vary play and increase the decision-making and difficulty, resulting in a very flexible game with a high replay value.

The excitement in the air is electric as the leaders round the last corner and head for the finish line. Each team has used cunning and skill to position their sprinter for this moment, but only one has done enough to pull off the win!

Will your team lead from the front and risk exhaustion? Should you play it safe in the middle of the pack? Could you surprise everyone by striking from the back? Can you time your move perfectly?

Anyone can race, few become champions!

Flamme Rouge is a fast-paced, tactical bicycle racing game where each player controls a team of two riders: a Rouleur and a Sprinteur. The players’ goal is to be the first to cross the finish line with one of their riders. Players move their riders forward by drawing and playing cards from that riders specific deck, depleting it as they go. Use slipstreams to avoid exhaustion and position your team for a well timed sprint for the win.

Diamant is a quick, fun game of push-your-luck. Players venture down mine shafts by turning up cards from a deck, sharing the gems they find on the way down. Before the next card is turned up, you have the chance to leave the mine and stash your finds, including any gems you get on the way out. Why would you leave? Because the deck also contains hazards: scorpions, snakes, poison gases, explosions and rockfalls. When a duplicate hazard turns up (such as a second scorpion), anyone left in the shaft has to flee for safety and loses all the gems they got this turn. The trick is, the more players that leave, the bigger your share in the next card will be.

Enter the gaslit world of Sherlock Holmes in Jack the Ripper & West End Adventures! A brand new standalone game (you don’t need another box in order to play this one) in the Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective series of games, Jack the Ripper & West End Adventures will throw ten entirely new cases cases your way. Six of these cases are one-off adventures, while four others form a linked campaign that challenges you to stop the murders of the notorious Jack the Ripper! With a new map of Whitechapel, newspapers hot-off-the-press for every case, and ten unique casebooks, it’s time to put your mind to the test!

Sharpen your mind, for the dark mysteries that once stood before the great Sherlock Holmes are now yours to solve!

In Watson & Holmes, two to seven players are presented with one of thirteen cases, each accompanied by a series of questions. Players must travel from location to location in order to obtain clues and information, competing to reach the most coveted destinations first and sabotaging their opponents along the way.

Once a player feels they have successfully uncovered the truth, they may approach Watson and Holmes with their conclusion. If their answers are correct, they win the game, but if they miss the mark, the other investigators must continue the search until the case is solved.

Santorini is a non-abstract re-imagining of the 2004 edition. Since its original inception over 30 years ago, Santorini has been endlessly developed, enhanced and refined by mathematician and educator, Dr. Gordon Hamilton.

Santorini is a highly accessible pure strategy game that is simple enough for an elementary school classroom. But with enough gameplay depth and content for even hardcore gamers to explore, Santorini is truly a game for everyone. The rules are deceptively simple. Each turn consists of 2 steps:

1. Move – move one of your builders into a neighboring space. You may move your Builder Pawn on the same level, step-up one level, or step down any number of levels.

2. Build – Then construct a building level adjacent to the builder you moved. When building on top of the third level, place a dome instead, removing that space from play.

Winning the game – If either of your builders reaches the third level, you win.

Variable player powers – What makes Santorini truly special is its seamless integration of variable player powers into a pure-strategy game. Dr Hamilton has designed over 40 thematic god and hero powers, each fundamentally changing the way the game is played.

Honshu is a trick-taking, map building card game set in feudal Japan. Players are lords and ladies of Noble houses seeking new lands and opportunities for fame and fortune.

One game of Honshu lasts 12 rounds, and each round is divided into two phases. First, Map cards are played in a trick and the player who played the highest value card gets to pick first from those played. Then the players use the Map cards picked to expand their personal maps. Each player must expand their personal maps to maximize their scoring possibilities.

Manipulating your position in the player order is crucial for mastering Honshu!

Burgle your way to adventure in Clank!, the new deck-building board game.

Sneak into an angry dragon’s mountain lair to steal precious artifacts. Delve deeper to find more valuable loot. Acquire cards for your deck and watch your thievish abilities grow.

Be quick and be quiet. One false-step and — CLANK! Each careless sound draws the attention of the dragon, and each artifact stolen increases its rage. You can only enjoy your plunder if you make it out of the depths alive!

Unlock!

EXIT: The Game – The Abandoned Cabin

Fresco

Flamme Rouge

Diamant

Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: Jack the Ripper & West End Adventures

Watson & Holmes

Santorini

Honshu

Clank!

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