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Review: Seafall

Joy of joys! The latest SU&SD review has arrived at port, having completed its grand tour of Seafall. Ah, see how it’s sitting low in the water? It must be carrying a tremendous cargo of opinions and insight. That, or it’s leaking.

If you haven’t heard the hype around this game, all you need to know is that it’s designer Rob Daviau’s third legacy game following on from the amazing Risk Legacy and Pandemic Legacy. But while those two games were fairly straightforward, Seafall is an ambitious epic. In other words, it’s the most exciting box we’re expecting to review all year. So what are you waiting for? Click play! Watch. And be amazed.

Paul: Ah, you’re here, dear reader. Excellent. Come closer, come closer, and let me tell you the torrid tale of mushroom corruption that is Crossing. It’s a tale of riches and of theft, of cunning and of deception. It’s a tale of gems and fungi, like none you’ve ever heard before. Are you sitting comfortably? Are … Read more

Quinns: Games News is EXPLODING into action today with news so exciting that the entire team is under doctor’s orders to lie down for a week. Why? WHY? There’s only the success of the Dear Leader Kickstarter. That’s all! And they’re still accepting late pledges!

Paul: Yes! Terrific! What good news! This isn’t propaganda at all and we’re very excited to see this game do so extraordinarily well! Oh God-

Quinns: KEEP SMILING.

Gather close to the fire pit, everybody. Paul and Quinns want to tell you about the last of our favourite games from Gen Con 2016. This one’s called Inis, it’s the third game in the series that brought us Cyclades and Kemet and, frankly, it’s a little bit perfect. Not only is Inis the best game of plastic soldiers running around a map that we’ve played all year, it manages that with a 5 minute rules explanation and – look ma! – no dice.

The only problem is that Inis isn’t out yet. English-language distributors don’t always get a lot of Matagot’s stock in, either, so pre-order at your local retailer to avoid disappointment. And have a fantastic weekend!

Oh dear! After a metaphorical explosion of our recording equipment at Gen Con ’16, this is all we could salvage from our two live shows. Please don your protective masks and take turns passing the blasted husk around. The first 30 minutes of this ash-smelling podcast feature Paul, Quinns and our miniatures columnist Eric Tonjes discussing some highlights from the show, including the Runewars Miniatures Game, Pandemic: Reign of Cthulu, Arkham Horror: The Card Game, Conan and the real-time tile laying game of 4 Gods. Exciting, right? Not as exciting as the second half, friends! Paul and Quinns were able to snag an interview with a little designer by the name of Vlaada Chvátil. But this doesn’t have to be a disaster-cast. Did you go to Gen Con, or have some otherwise transcendant board gaming in the last few weeks? Why not leave us a comment telling us all about it!

Quinns: Right! Some of you might have heard that I got married this weekend. It was a blissful day and went entirely as planned, except for my Mum providing inexplicable amounts of cream at the picnic which I suspect will be a running joke among my friends for the next four or five decades.

But something I had no idea was happening was a surprise stag party organised by my best man, Paul Dean. Because I love birds, he took us to do falconry. Then Matt Lees only went and brought his fancy lenses along.

So while I was totally unable to upload last Friday’s podcast, please enjoy this replacement gallery of myself, Matt and Paul meeting a load of beautiful birds.

Lots of love, everybody. SU&SD will be getting back up to speed this Wednesday.

On your turn in Zum Kuckuck!, you take one standing stick and put it on the nest. If both ends of the stick have the same color, you may choose to lay an egg on it. Otherwise, you take another stick whose top color is the same as the hiding color of the previous one, up to three sticks. After laying an egg or putting the third stick with different colors, your turn ends. There are penalties for a stick touching the ground or eggs falling from the nest.

The first person to lay all of their eggs can then put the cuckoo on the nest and win the game.

Paul: I am glad that I will never lay an egg.

I will, thank the heavens, never have to strain to squeeze one along the length of my oviduct, before groaning as I expel it from my cloaca. I will never birth a child in a form in which they might accidentally roll away. Nature has determined that such things need not concern this human male.

I am, nevertheless, a nest-builder. This I cannot deny. I’ve just moved home and the process of unpacking, arranging furniture and buying a rug is, I reckon, basically identical to building a nest. I make a snug, safe space for myself, into which I can cram everyone and everything that I want to take care of. Then I sit atop it all, making sure nothing can escape.

This is why I’m so good at Go Cuckoo.

Paul: Phew, the votes are in! First of all, let me extend our enormous thanks to all of you for taking the time to fill out our polls and to vote for your favourite designs.

The three winners pulled away from the pack with a full quarter of the votes all to themselves, but with over 10,000 votes cast on Facebook, Twitter and Disqus, there was a lot of love for all the designs and it was a tight race. What’s more, the five that came in from fifth to eighth place had a difference of just forty votes between them. At times, it was a tight contest where every vote counted. Are you ready for the final result?

Paul: You know what they call the city that never sleeps?

Quinns: New Yo-

Paul: That’s right! The city of Games News! Even while we and half of the rest of the industry were away at GenCon, the games news just came coming. It flowed like liquid, a wave rushing across the internet, a great deal of it gushing straight out of a valve left open by Fantasy Flight. The peak of that tsunami was surely Runewars, their tremendous miniatures game announcement.

And make no mistake, this is a big deal. Runewars (not to be confused with the board game of the same name) is Fantasy Flight striding boldly into the fantasy miniatures battleground, building on their experience with smaller scale games like X-Wing and Armada. There will be similar movement templates and command dials, but this time combined with the army-scale fantasy combat of, well, of Warhammer.

Review: Seafall

Review: Crossing

GAMES NEWS! 29/08/16

Review: Inis

Podcast #46: One Miniature Vlaada

A wedding! And some birds

Go Cuckoo

Review: Go Cuckoo

Announcing: The Shirt my Feelings contest winners!

Games News! 15/08/16

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