Kickstart Your Week! Blizzards, Grilling & Dice
Snowblind: Race for the Pole
Extract from the diary of Robert Scott, commander of the Terra Nova Expedition. Weather: Dire. Moral: poor. We’ve been pinned down by storms now for too long. Supplies are down to last few cans of beans. I’ve been trapped in this tent with Oates for days now and his flatulence is just the final straw. Will he not take it outside for just once!
Snowblind is no joke, no lark through the snow. This is bleak, this is brutal, this is merciless. My God, have you seen the art of this game?? It’s terrifying! And so crazily evocative! Man, I love it. You’ll be racing to reach the South Pole, but to get there you’ll need to set up a relay of supplies and camps, slowly progressing across the ice locked continent. However, you are always at risk from exposure to the elements, and you can never say for certain how bad the weather will turn. Every action you take in this game increases the risk of suffering brutally, through the simple mechanic of collecting dice that will determine the damage you take.
So, this is a game of pressing your luck. You can play it safe, but you’ll never make it to the pole. There’s only so much time before winter when the ice flow returns and your expedition is trapped. But push too hard and you’ll never make it back… I love the theme and feel of this game, and have a good feeling about the dice exposure mechanism. Definitely one to check out!
Snowblind disappears into darkness April 21st.
Yakitori
Yakitori, a fast paced grilling style from the streets of Japan is now a delicious Euro game crafted entirely from laser cut wood. Now, anyone who’s run a BBQ knows how it works. You put your meat or vegetables on a skewer and lay it over some nice hot coals. When you’ve taken the grilling action, the food will be ready to serve, but if you can time it just right it’ll be even better. But don’t wait to long or that delicious meat will eventually… slide off the end of your skewer on to the floor. Damn, I hate it when that happens!
Really this is a cool way of tracking the timing of your grilled goods, the purchased foodstuff moving along the skewer tracker each turn, requiring you to time your actions carefully. Those actions take place thanks to a dice based worker placement system where the dice value determines the order particular actions can be taken which can be immensely important because of the market. The food you buy and sell has a varying value that moves up and down depending on supply and demand, so you are as much betting on the market fluctuations as you are cooking delicious meals (who knew yakatori cooking would be so difficult?) Making matters better or worse players can manipulate the prices in this market to benefit themselves or skewer their opponents.
There’s so much good stuff going on in this game, so many decisions, so much interaction, and so much reward for good timing and skilful play. When I pick games for these lists, I tend to look only at the game, and not let price dictate my decisions so… fair warning. This one’s a bit expensive. To be frank, unless you’re in the US, there is no way I can recommend this game (sadly, cos I really like the look of it!) For US backers, the cost is still high considering there’s no art, but it is entirely made from laser cut wood, which will certainly make for a unique game on the shelf.
Yakitori’s up April 22nd.
Dice Bazaar
“Ah! Welcome to my Dice Bazaar! Home to fabulous items, such as this vase! Won’t it look lovely in your home? And only…”
Dice clatter across the counter top.
“2 4 3 5! A true bargain!”
This is Dice Bazaar, although perhaps that should be Dice Bizarre (yeah? Yeah? Anyone…?) for the proprietor of this stall is not interested in money so much as… people matching what he rolled? Still, what emerges looks to be a quick, fun game! The price for each of the merchant’s goods is set by rolling dice and to obtain a good, a player need only match the merchant’s dice. However, each item requires more dice to match than the last, making it harder to obtain the more valuable items. And in a neat trick that is sure to have you cursing each other and your luck, as soon as a player takes an item the merchant changes his prices! Immediately screwing anyone who had been trying to match that item but wasn’t fast enough. I can only see that being hilarious and adding real tension to your dice rolls!
The items you collect have a value that determines your standing at the end of the game, but they can also be trashed to let you change the value on one dice if you contribute it to the next most valuable item. You are therefore offered the choice of chasing after the more valuable items, or building up a collection of cheap items that can be used to accelerate your acquisition of the better goods later. All in all, the game is hardly ground breaking, but it sounds like a very entertaining filler!
Actually this was a top pick of mine back in January but sadly it didn’t quite meet it’s funding goal. Fortunately it’s back for a second shot meaning I got to reuse a perfectly good game description! Did you notice? 😉
The Dice Bazaar closes April 22nd.
Other Great Games
Battle For Souls – Aiming to fund a second edition and an expansion of this game, a battle between heaven and hell for the souls of mankind. This is a card driven game in which tempted souls act as both victory points and a type of currency for obtaining more powerful abilities. The expansion adds various assymetrical elements like secret objectives and player powers, as well as various additional decision points. Ends Apr 19th.
Don’t Mess with Cthulhu – A hidden role game featuring investigators trying to prevent Cthulhu from awakening and cultists trying to stop them. Each player has limited information about the cards in front of them, and collectively the investigators are trying to find the elder signs hidden in the deck. If they ever hit Cthulhu, however, it’s all over. I love the sound of the game but why, WHY, did you have to change the theme from the original Timebomb guys?? We don’t need more Cthulhu!! Ends Apr 20th.
Stockpile: Continuing Corruption – An expansion to the well regarded stock market game Stockpile. This adds new investors, bonds (can purchase for risk free interest), commodities & taxes (1 added to each stockpile. Looking to collect a set and avoid any taxes) and forecast dice that add a new way of pairing forecast cards and company cards. Ends Apr 22nd.
Houdini’s Poutini – This is a light card game about trying to collect the right items to complete an escape card. Mechanically this does not look to be the most deep or strategic game, but the theme, of a group of magicians trying to escape Houdini’s dinner party due to his awful cooking, but trying to avoid offending him, is hilarious! Ends Apr 23rd.
Downsize – You are the head of a company trying to make more money while getting rid of employees. Each turn you quite literally discard one or two employee cards to trigger an action that depends on their respective types, in order to gain money. But if you’ve not got rid of your entire hand by the time the money runs out, it’ll all be for nought! Ends Apr 24th.
Image credit belongs to Board Game Geek users rob_vz, PlayerToTheLeft, Battle of Durak, Tinyelvis, T Worthington, Bsobol1, W Eric Martin and LewisShaw.
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