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Twilight Imperium: Fourth Edition

Twilight Imperium (Fourth Edition) is a game of galactic conquest in which three to six players take on the role of one of seventeen factions vying for galactic domination through military might, political maneuvering, and economic bargaining. Every faction offers a completely different play experience, from the wormhole-hopping Ghosts of Creuss to the Emirates of Hacan, masters of trade and economics. These seventeen races are offered many paths to victory, but only one may sit upon the throne of Mecatol Rex as the new masters of the galaxy.

Lead one of Ireland’s first peoples and perform legendary exploits in Inis, a two-to-four player board game designed by Christian Martinez and lavishly produced by Matagot. Inis immerses you in Ireland’s mythological era, its fierce heroes, enchanted objects, and beautiful mist-covered landscape. Your goal in Inis is to become Ireland’s first High King. Among your allies are the warrior Cuchulainn, the beautiful and tragic Deirdre, and the exiles Diarmuid and Grainne. Your tools include a magical spear, horses made out of sea-foam, a god’s cauldron, and all the cards you can gather into your hand.

In Cosmic Encounter, each player is the leader of an alien race. The object of the game is to establish colonies in other players’ planetary systems. Players take turns trying to establish colonies. The winner(s) are the first player(s) to have five colonies on any planets outside his or her home system. A player does not need to have colonies in all of the systems, just colonies on five planets outside his or her home system. These colonies may all be in one system or scattered over multiple systems. The players must use force, cunning, and diplomacy to ensure their victory.

This week on the website Matt discovers that you *can’t* just stuff things inside of a jacket in order to recreate David Byrne’s signature look. We also made two new friends, one of whom is most definitely not alive – the other one? We’ll leave you to decide. Find out why City of the Big Shoulders, this caramel rainbow of brown and beige pieces, has captured a tiny piece of our heart..

After the great Chicago Fire of 1871, the brave men and women of Chicago sought to rebuild their once-great city, and rebuild it they did. Over the next 60 years Chicago experienced an economic golden age, making such great progress that it hosted The World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893, followed not long after by a … Read more

Ava: Hey there peoplefolks, welcome to another bright, shining week on Shut Up & Sit Down. We’re nearly at the end of the wintery void, and right now there’s sun falling on me and it feels like hope. Wahey! What are we hoping for this week? We’re hoping for a stream, a review and a podcast, and you know what, it’s all actually going to happen. (Terms and conditions may apply) On Tuesday we’re streaming the potion-popping extravaganza that is Quacks of Quedlinberg, and we’re even going to chuck in the currently German-only Alchemists expansion. We promise it won’t be as chaotic as when we tried to do this with Excalibohn. We’ll be slightly more prepared for those explosive potion notions. Wednesday is review day, and all I am permitted to say is that Matt will be talking about a game that got him so excited he dressed up all fancy, and may have an appearance from the newest, least-living member of the team. Finally, on Friday we’ve got a lovely little podcast special, with Tom, Quinns and myself having a chat about what we’re planning and dreaming of for our first, perfect game night once all this *gestures vaguely* is a bit less diseasey. Without wanting to get too serious, what hopes are you hoping right now, folks?

In what is clearly the 131st episode of the Shut Up & Sit Down podcast, Matt, Tom and Ava are going to continue recent pod-tradition and natter about just the one game, thanks. That’s right, it’s Faiyum! A game about being both (a) in Egypt and (b) confused! Happens to the best of us. We’re going to be chatting about how it really works, how it sort of works and how it doesn’t work in a hodgepodge chat about one of the stranger board game offerings of 2020. We had some technical difficulties with this one, so apologies if things feel a bit bumpy. It suits the game in question!

The oasis-like basin Faiyum was artificially built 3,900 years ago by enlarging the Bahr Yussef channel that connected to the Nile to create a regulated flood plain. During the Middle Kingdom of Egypt, this swampland was slowly changed into farmland under the aegis of pharaohs such as Amenemhet III and Sesostris II. They ordered their … Read more

What’s historical, great fun, set in medieval Germany and has two thumbs? THIS GUY! Wait, that can’t be right

Look, the point is we’ve done a review of a marvellous new edition of perhaps the greatest eurogame ever made. The new Hansa Teutonica Big Box isn’t actually any bigger than the old edition, but it’s not any more expensive, either, which is a truly fantastic thing. We implore you to take a look.

The players act as traders trying to get victory points for building a network of offices, controlling cities, collecting bonus markers or for other traders using the cities they control. After controlling a line between two cities with your pawns you can decide to build an office (and maybe also establish control and/or get a bonus marker) or to get a skill improvement from some of the cities.

Players have to improve their traders’ “skills” for the following effects: getting more VP from offices in their network, getting more available action points, increasing the number of available pawns, and getting the right to place pawns and get more special pawns.

Twilight Imperium: Fourth Edition

Inis

Cosmic Encounter

Review: City of the Big Shoulders

City of the Big Shoulders

This week on Shut Up & Sit Down…

Podcast #131 – A Petulant Pharaoh

Faiyum

Review – Hansa Teutonica: Big Box

Hansa Teutonica

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