Top Games: UK Games Expo 2017

Convention season is upon us and in less than two weeks the UK Games Expo will be opening its doors to the crowds with first looks at some of this year’s big titles and a chance to highlight some of the best and brightest from the UK’s indie scene!

It is a fantastic convention, giving you plenty of opportunity to play games old and new, a packed schedule of seminars and events, major retailers, and a plethora of new releases and upcoming titles to try out. I would whole heartedly recommend you come along, even if only for a day!

This is a list of games that I am most excited to try out, organised alphabetically by publisher but it is by no means comprehensive. Be sure to check out Slickerdrips’ excellent geek list of (nearly) all the new games on show here, or Tabletop Together’s tool for planning your visit, to see what else there is on offer. But only after you’ve read this. Obviously!

Pocket Mars

In this era of big chunky Mars games maybe we all need something small and dependable to whip out of a pocket at a moments notice? Perhaps Pocket Mars could be the one! The aim is to get as many of your colonists into the buildings of Mars as possible, and you’ll get them there through clever play of multi use cards that can be played, or prepared – turning it into a module for one of your buildings and triggering a cascade of actions. All in just 15-30 mins. Mars has never been settled so quickly!

Available to buy from Board & Dice booth H2.

Superhot Card Game

Superhot is the super slick first person shooter video game where time only moves when you move, perhaps the best candidate for directly converting an FPS into board game form, because of the decreased dependence on twitch responses and being able to think through your moves before you act. Not that I’ve forgotten about the wonderful Adrenaline. It features some light deck building elements, overcoming enemies to add into your hand, reminiscent of the excellent Friday. Superhot the Card Game was Kickstarted not too long ago and I’m certainly curious to see whether it lives up to its promise!

Available to buy from Board & Dice booth H2.

Codenames Duet

Codenames is a brand that is certainly being spun out in all sorts of directions right now but its latest iteration is different enough for me to be very interested in trying out. Intended to optimise the two player experience, thus is a fully cooperative version of the classic game. Current information suggests that both players are spy master and guesser, with double sided clue cards that only give a portion of the agents you are looking to find, and a different assassin. Then again I have it on good authority that the game has changed quite a lot since anyone last played a prototype, so who knows! Regardless, I’m very interested to see just how they’ve made this new approach work.

Codenames Duet will be available to demo at CGE’s booth B12.

That’s a Question

The new party game from Vlaada hopes to continue the success of Codenames and I am definitely curious to see if such a feat can be pulled off. But if anyone can make lightning strike twice, it’s Vlaada. He’s basically a game design lightning rod. This falls very much into traditional party game territory, with combining cards with question prompts to present one player with a choice of options (the example being which would you hate to lose more, Facebook or Doors?) that they choose between, and everyone else trying to guess what they’ll do.

A prototype of That’s a Question will be available to demo at CGE’s booth B12.

City of Kings

A recent Kickstarter that smashed its way to some $200,000+ this is one of the big success stories of the UK Indie scene recently. If the great sword on the cover wasn’t clue enough, City of Kings is set in a fantasy world, shattered by malevolent forces. In classic JRPG style, you and a band of friends are on a quest to overcome this evil and right the many wrongs in your way. But facing you is a procedurally generated army of monsters with some 10,000,000 possible encounters. That’s enough zeroes for anyone! I can’t wait to see this system in action.

City of Kings will be being demoed at booth C3.

By the way, a second big UK success story in recent months was Sub Terra, a terrifying game of hide and seek with man eating monsters in a cave. Definitely a game you should check out but since I’ve already played it, I’ve not put it on my list of games to check out, but maybe it should be on yours? Available to play at booth E7.

Barcelona: The Rose of Fire

Stepping outside of the hotness quickly, Barcelona: The Rose of Fire was a title released last year but that slipped, for the most part, under the radar. It tells the story of the great expansion of the city of Barcelona in the late 19th Century. But what it really wants to get you thinking about is the inequality between the rich and the poor in Barcelona at the time. While constructing for the wealthy brings you victory points, ignoring the poor and the unemployed builds resentment that may bubble over into revolution.

Barcelona The Rose of Fire can be demoed at Devir’s booth E22.

Century Spice Road

The big new family release that has been teased all over social media over the last couple of months, Century Spice Road involves spice cubes, engine building and a Splendor-like essence. I still really like Splendor, so I’m super excited to see how this compares. Plus, it’s by the designer of Spectre Ops, it’s got great art and (confession) I’ve already bought it so am really just encouraging you to check it out too!

Century Spice Road will be available to buy from Esdevium at booth A29.

The Godfather: Corleone’s Empire

The Godfather is Eric Lang on worker placement, where the workers occasionally beat each other up or unleash the full fury of a drive by shooting. Battle for control of New York as one of the mafia big wigs with your gang of specialised workers and a healthy dash of hand management. This is going to be one of the year’s hot titles!

The Godfather will be available to visit/demo at Esdevium’s booth A29.

Wordsy

I’m not a huge word game fan, but Wordsy has me interested. Simply giving you a set of consonants and your imagination in a race to come up with the best word possible. Cunning bonuses are on offer for for being first to come up with  word, and for scoring more than the player that comes first! Plus, its from the designer of last year’s title The Networks, which is a lovely little game. Definitely giving this one a go!

Wordsy is available to buy from Formal Ferret Games at booth D8.

1066 – Tears to Many Mothers

1066 is one of the few dates school children across the UK ever remember. It is the start of the history of England as a single nation and it all begins with a climactic battle between the Saxon King Harold, and the Norman King William. This two player card game recreates that famous Battle of Hastings in a CCG style combat game, but with none of the collecting or the deck building, making it perfect for players like me! It has already won a bunch of accolades during its development and is coming to Kickstarter very soon. This is a great chance to try before you back!

1066 Tears to Many Mothers will be available to demo at booth D14.

Carcosa

Carcosa wins my award for most hauntingly beautiful box art of the list. It also sounds a little like Lovecraft Carcassonne, which will either have you irresistibly drawn to it like a moth to the flame or driven raving from the room in horror. Key for me will be whether the shifting landscape of Carcosa can offer enough to differentiate itself from that staple classic, and whether that haunting box art will be so well represented on the tiles within…

Carcosa will be demoed at booth D20.

Frogriders

Something more in the family strategy game bracket, Frogriders sees a colourful array of plastic frogs engaged in mock battle. A simple concept, made more interesting as whenever you capture a frog by leaping boldly over it, you must choose whether to keep it for scoring or trade it in for its special ability. Frogriders might not be a game I would normally dwell on for too long, but this comes from the same people as the excellent Flamme Rouge and 13 Days, two of my favourite titles from last year, and I’m very interested to see what they have done with this.

Frogriders will be demoed at Pegasus Spiele’s booth D4.

Alien Artifacts

The first of Portal Game’s big titles available to demo, Alien Artifacts is a 4X card game with a turn structure that sounds as smooth and slick as a high tech space ship should be and features an engine building style ramp up of the best kind. Honestly, if this plays as well as it sounds I am going to be all over it!

Alien Artifacts will be available to demo at the Portal Games booth, B21.

First Martians

Portal Games, part 2, is the First Martians, aka The Martian The Board Game, aka Robinson Crusoe in space. You and your friends get to experience the joys of building a first outpost on Mars. Joys like a hostile, freezing, near vacuum environment, malfunctioning equipment that is the only thing keeping you alive, and probably a few potatoes. This is from the designer of Robinson Crusoe after all! I imagine you’ll be left feeling something like Arnie at the end of Total Recall. In the best way possible, of course. I already have my pre-order placed for later in the year (only demos will be available at the UKGE) so I hope it lives up to everyone’s expectations!

First Martians will be available to demo at the Portal Games booth, B21.

The Cousins’ War

The Cousins’ War takes us back to the war of the roses, a decades long conflict for control of the English crown that has forever left a rivalry between Northern rose gardeners. However, true to designer David Mortimer’s form, this battle of influence and bloodshed will be over in little more than half an hour. Manoeuvring for the best location for battle, bluffing, and some healthy area control squabbling all adds up to an intriguing 2 player title that I’m very keen to play!

The Cousins’ War will be for sale from Surprised Stare Games, booth T9.

Will you be attending the UK Games Expo this year? What games are you excited about? Drop me a comment and let me know!