SU&SD Recommends 10 - Shut Up & Sit Down

Almost a Review: Lancaster

Quinns: One leathery fruit borne from the article on my board game collection was a lot of people telling me to finally play Lancaster. “It’s a classic,” they said. “I’d never turn down a game of Lancaster,” they said.

We’ll get to what I thought of it, but first I owe this game an apology. I realise now that I’d mentally compartmentalised Lancaster in the same place as Alhambra- a weird box that was continually being printed by Queen Games long before Shut Up & Sit Down began, that would be printed long after we’re gone.

I remember finding a copy of Alhambra Big Box in my friendly local game store in 2013. “What is that game?” I asked a staff member, and we both gawped at it as if it were the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Today Quinns and Matt have joined forces to teach El Grande, one of the grand old girls of board gaming. This box is every bit as charming and dangerous as she was back in 1995, and with stock availability of the new “Big Box” still excellent, she remains a very smart purchase.

Any requests for what game we should teach next? Please first check that someone else hasn’t requested the same game as you, in which case you should just upvote their comment!

What happens when immovable critics meet unstoppable sales figures? Find out in our long-awaited review of Ticket to Ride, followed by our review of new, giant box Ticket to Ride: Rails and Sails! Which is basically Ticket to Ride².

Do you have a favourite Ticket to Ride memory? A favourite board? A favourite train? Let us know in the comments! If there’s any justice in the world, these comments will be a veritable hotbed of Train Chat before the day is through.

September 19, 2016 Learn to Play Dead of Winter: The Long Night, Heavy Games, SU&SD Recommends, Bluffing Games, Cooperative Games It was two years ago that Paul and Quinns ordered you guys to buy Dead of Winter. Today, we’ve got fantastic news for everyone who disobeyed us! Dead of Winter: The Long Night is a … Read more

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 you ready for the story of the tiny little game that was full of wonder? Then I’ll begin.

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!

In honour of the Rio Olympics Games, Quinns has done a review about diving! Just like in the Olympic Games, Captain Sonar is a contest where two teams dive beneath the seas and try and destroy one another with high explosives, drawing one another’s movements on sheets of acetate.

If you regularly play games with a group of six-plus feisty men and women then you’ve got to watch this video. Captain Sonar isn’t just fun, it’s like nothing else you’ve ever played. And even if you can’t get those numbers together, Captain Sonar will do backflips to accommodate you. Literally.

Have a fantastic weekend, everybody.

Captain Sonar should be arriving in shops any day now. Pre-order at your local retailer to avoid disappointment!

We delight in throwing curveballs, so here’s a video you’d never have expected. A fat Let’s Play of fantastic miniatures game Infinity, with scenery provided by the excellent people at Battle Systems!

The truth is that ever since our spirited review of this game last year, Matt and Quinns have been collecting Infinity together with a few of their friends, and anything we’re interested in, we want to show you why. So we ended up making the above heartfelt half-hour, demonstrating just how tense and dangerous this game is. Enjoy, everybody.

NOTE: There’s about 45 seconds of insane strobing in this video, especially during the final interview segment. Rest assured that Quinns is working on a fix.

[Team SU&SD grows ever-stronger! Please give a warm welcome to game writer Jon Bolding, who comes bearing gifs. Enjoy, everybody.]

Bolds: Welcome! Welcome to Medieval France’s fabulous Loire valley, and its jewel, its shining, brocaded, wine-and-cheese-filled capital city of Orléans.

Orléans has a lot in common with those ever-popular “deck-building” games, in that you’re still accruing little somethings to go in your something, but each something is different, and has a different purpose – and your something, certainly, is different from everyone else’s something. In Orléans these somethings aren’t cards, but are little circular people, and you stuff them in your personal bag like a kind of hungry giant saving them for later, never quite sure what delicious treat you’ll pull forth when you go plunging in for a snack.

Ugh, peasants again? Why don’t we ever have Boatmen? Love Boatmen. The little crunchy paddles and rafts. The delicate waterlogged texture.

And speaking of crunch, Orleans is a good deal heavier than most deck-building games. Really, what we’ve got here is a fabulous fusion of a “building” game and a heavy eurogame, and it’s almost entirely delicious.

Following on from our early review of Mysterium and our video that teaches you the rules, today we’re rounding off our coverage with something a bit special. It’s our most ambitious Let’s Play EVER, featuring both more cameras and more dressing up than ever before. We’re also playing exclusively with the new characters, locations and weapons found in the new expansion, Mysterium: Hidden Signs!

Huge thanks to T.D. for the set-dressing on this one, and to Leigh and Jessi for being thoroughly excellent 1920s psychics.

Everyone else, have a great weekend!

Almost a Review: Lancaster

How to Play El Grande!

Review: Ticket to Ride AND Rails & Sails

How to Play Dead of Winter (and The Long Night)!

Review: Crossing

Review: Inis

Review: Captain Sonar

SU&SD Play… Infinity!

Review: Orléans

SU&SD Play… Mysterium: Hidden Signs!

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