May 6, 2016 Reviews Doctor Panic It’s here. Doctor Panic, the first co-op game to ever feature a whoopie cushion, or a hairnet, or a needle and thread, is now available in shops. Best of all, it’s every bit as dumb as advertised! There’s never been a game that demanded SU&SD’s attention more. Time for … Read more
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Greedy Greedy Goblins is a simultaneous play, strategic tile placement and bluffing game.
Players lead a clan of goblin miners who want to gather the most valuable collection of gems. Coins are scored for gem tiles on the mines you have claimed, with bonuses for dynamite tiles — but if there is too much dynamite, the mine (and all the riches within) are destroyed!
In more detail, players sit around a circle composed of cave game boards and the guildhall game board, with sixty mining tiles placed face-down within this circle. Each round, while playing at the same time, players use one hand to look at one mining tile at a time, then place it on one of the cave game boards. At any time, a player can claim the guildhall or a cave by placing one of their three goblins on the board, after which no more tiles or goblins may be placed on this board.
Once everyone has placed all of their goblins (or decided not to place them), players resolve the boards. The goblin on the guildhall draws a minion card that provides a special ability, while each goblin in a cave scores coins based on the gems, diamonds, dynamite and monsters found there; these goblins can also take minion cards if minion tiles have been placed in the cave. Dynamite multiplies the value of a cave, but three or more sticks blows the place up, costing you coins.
If someone has one hundred or more coins, the game ends and whoever has the most coins wins; if not, set up another round and go digging again.
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You get aboard an aircraft with an adventurers team to perform many trips through the cities of Celestia and recover their wonderful treasures. Your journey will not be safe, but you will attempt to be the most rich adventurer by collecting the most precious treasures!
At the beginning of a journey, all players place their pawns within the aircraft; the players start the game with 6 cards in the hand (or 8 depending on the number of players). At the beginning of each round, one player is chosen to be the captain of the trip and he throws from 2 to 4 dice so as to determine the weather that he should face (fog, lightning bolts, killer birds or pirates). He must then play the appropriate cards to go on the journey and reach the next city (a compass, a lightning arrester, a foghorn or even canons).
Before that the captain plays the appropriate cards, each player has to decide whether or not he will stay within the aircraft:
– to get off is to ensure the victory points by exploring the city;
– to stay is to try a trip upto the next city in order to catch more precious treasures.
But beware: if the captain is unable to discard the appropriate cards, it is the crash down! All remaining passengers get back empty-handed and a whole new journey beginswith all players on board.
During his journeys, each explorer can try to pull out of the game with fabulous objects ( a jetpack, astronomy glasses… ) or by changing the trip ( modifying the travel or abandoning an explorer in the city ).
As soon as a player earns treasures valuable for at least 50 points, the game is over.
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Quinns: What’s the world coming to? It’s Expansionanuary in May!
This week we’ve got news that all sorts of SU&SD favourites are getting improved and expanded, starting with Widow’s Walk, an expansion for bizarro horror movie simulator Betrayal at the House on the Hill. The spooktacular new box will add 50 new haunts, 20 new rooms and lots more.
And that’s not even the best bit. Let me walk you through why this announcement totally blindsided me.
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April 29, 2016 Reviews, The Opener Celestia, New to Games?, Quick Games It’s time once again for you to place your evening in our large, spindly hands. Following on from Arboretum and Pasta With Trees, why not invite your friends over for a game of Celestia and a fluffy frittata? Lovely push-your-luck mechanics? Check! Little cardboard … Read more
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Quinns: For this review, I want you to imagine blackjack in a blender.
Picture a table of spilled drinks and creased tuxedos. Picture a group of players all trying to go as high as possible without going bust, but there’s eight different hands going on at once, anyone can claim any hand as “theirs”, and you’re all the dealer, there are no turns and you can play as fast as you like. Oh, and none of you can see anything. Except when you can.
Does that sound like fun? Of course it does. Let’s talk about Richard Garfield’s new game, Greedy Greedy Goblins.
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April 25, 2016 Learn to Play Mysterium, SU&SD Recommends, New to Games?, Creative Games, Card Games We reviewed Mysterium so early (and so breathlessly) that we never got to do a video on it. Gaw bless these rules explanations for letting us fix that! Mysterium didn’t so much replace Dixit as murder it in the … Read more
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Inspired by Lovecraft’s impossible dimensions, we’ve attempted to squeeze a game of Eldritch Horror, one of the most epic board games of all time, into a single Let’s Play video! And to make our lives even harder, we squeezed in both the Forsaken Lore and the Under the Pyramids expansions.
Anyone who missed Quinns’ review of this disasterpiece can find it right here. In short, this is an absolutely bizarre game. Alternately epic and personal, scary and silly, too generous or too unfair, it’s a tremendously hard thing to review. But it’s also fascinating to watch. So pull up a pew, get yourself a beverage, and see if this slimy, tentacular box has a place on your shelf.
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Matt, Paul and Quinns have met once again to create a board gaming Voltron! Albeit one with three hearts and no brain. Games discussed in this prestigious 40th episode include And Then We Held Hands, Ra,Through the Ages, FUSE and A Fake Artist Goes to New York. If you’re looking for the Tuesday Knight Games podcast featuring Matt, you’ll find it right here. We also chat about board game boxes and sustainability and end with a lovely interview with Plaid Hat’s lead designer and lead art director Isaac Vega, who wants to tell us all about the new standalone expansion for Dead of Winter: The Long Night. In case you missed our review of Dead of Winter, you’ll find that here!
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Paul: Quinns, what’s going on? Why is there a spotlight? Why’s there a leather chair? What happened to our usual set?
Quinns: Paul, ask me some questions entirely at random!
Paul: Oh God what now.
Quinns: Also I’ve set up a countdown clock and buzzer!
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