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Château is a brand new roll and write game coming to Kickstarter on February 7, 2023. You can follow the campaign here on Kickstarter.

Château is a quick to learn family game where you take on the role as an architect constructing the blueprint of a stunning château in Europe. Players select a Château and try to be the first to completely fill in all the squares on their boards by utilizing polyomino shapes.

One thing that is important to know, Château is a print and play game. This means that a physical copy is not provided, only the digital file and you are responsible for printing. This is quite important since not everyone has easy access to a color printer.

Recommended Components:

  • Two six sided dice
  • One pencil per player
  • printed Château Board per player

A career as an elementary teacher has prepared me well for a print and play game. I could not resist “teacher-ing” up my copy the game. While the intent is for players to print and mark their Château with pen or pencil, I raided my classroom and used dry erase pockets paired with dry erase markers. This allowed me to reuse the printed boards.

My next step is going to be to laminate the sheets with my personal laminator with heavier thickness laminate to make the boards more durable and again eliminates the need for reprinting.

Roll of 2 or 3

Optional Components/Tools

  • Dry Erase Pockets (find them here on Amazon)
  • white board/ dry erase markers
  • Laminator and laminate sheets
  • Cardstock

Gameplay Overview

  • 1-99 players (you are only limited by the copies printed)
  •  Ages 7+
  • 15 min playtime

Before the first roll of the dice, each player marks five adjacent squares on the player board to their left. Players roll two dice and simultaneously mark their boards to resolve. Each number on the die represents a certain outcome, which the board depicts. The two dice give you two outcomes per roll. Overall the number rolled for 2-5 is the number of adjacent squares you mark. There are some exceptions based on special abilities which vary by Château. (This is explained further below)

Options with roll of 5
  • 1 – Catapult, This is the one roll that results in interacting with another player’s boards. When a one is rolled, it is resolved first, and the players all mark on square on the board of the player to their left. A space containing a hammer may not be marked.
  • 2- A two square polyomino
  • 3 – A three square polyomino
  • 4 or 5 – for most boards you have four and five polyomino shapes respectively and must choose one to use and mark it off, and may not use it again.
  • 6- Item, Items are scattered throughout each Château. When a six is rolled each player selects one items and marks all of the squares off containing that item.

Hammers

The Château all have hammers, and marking a space with a hammer allows you to mark an additional space. When players mark a hammer they may mark any other square, including another hammer. Thus gaining the ability to mark another additional square. Other players may not mark hammers in the initial five polyomino shape marked nor when a Catapult is played.

Individual Bonuses

Each Château has a unique bonus listed in the upper right hand corner of the board. Players announce their bonuses at the beginning of the game, before the first dice roll.

Château in the Base Game

Base Game and Expansions

In the preview file I received it contains the base game and two expansions. There are five château in the base game The United Kingdom expansion includes three châteaus. The Scandinavian Expansion includes three expansions.

Family Game Assessment

Château grabbed our family and friends right away. We played with mixed ages and still learned the game in just a few minutes, and by the third roll of the dice, the game flowed quickly and easily. Out of pure chance, we had quite a few ones roll. There was laughter and just a little frustration when we once again passed our boards to the right. Inevitably, our plans were thwarted as the opponent marks a square of their choice. The tension certainly built up as we looked around and some people had more complete boards, and we could see them closing in on the win, with the rest of us just a few squares behind. The game was such a hit after the first play that we immediately wiped of the boards, picked new Château and played again.

Game in progress with Chateau in a Dry Erase Pocket

Having actual architecture featured creates a link to geography and history which adds a layer beyond the game. The artwork is beautiful and accentuates each location. With the expansions, the available Châteaus cover a wider geographic range, offering more history to explore outside .

The number of Château is fixed, however, by printing additional copies, the player count in nearly infinite, since players will make unique choices with the placement of polyominoes. The format of all players using the same two dice to make their choices on squares they mark, allows a significant flexibility in player count.

Final Thoughts

Château is a great game for families. The cost is quite reasonable and affordable, and even if you use more premium materials, such as card stock, and lamination. The cost per board for a family size set is low. The rules are so simple, the game takes just minutes to set up and learn, making it accessible and fun for a huge range of players both in age and experience. This is one to watch for the Kickstarter launch and back on day one!

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There are times when game recommendations come from unexpected sources. I was quite surprised to hear about a game going to Kickstarter through a fan page for the small company Svaha

Frya is a card stacking game abstract strategy game with 68 cards which funded on Kickstarter in 2021.

Game Overview

  • 1-4 players
  • Ages 4 and up
  • Playtime 5-25 minutes

Gameplay

In Fyra, each player selects a “team” color. The goal of the game is to be the player with the least of your color showing when you run out of cards. Each card has four corners. The corners may be the same or different colors in the four colors: purple, yellow, blue, red.

To begin the game, two cards are placed in the middle next to each other face up. Each player receives three cards. On their turn each player puts down only one card. The must match what is under it exactly. If a portion of their card (one, two or three corners) match what is under it they draw a card at the end of their turn. Part of the card may hang off the end, and the pile grows outward with each turn.

If a player is able to match all four corners of their card they do not need to draw a card. If there are no matches at all the player puts their card adjasent to the cards and must draw two cards. When a player runs out of cards they are out of the game.

To scorce, the player who has run out of cards counts the number of corners with their team color showing at that point of the game. Play continues until only one player remains with cards.

Family Game Assessment and Final Thoughts

Fyra is a game with a wide appeal and wide accessibility, playable by children ages 4 and up. That said, it has enough strategy for grown-ups. With no text to read and only colors to match Fyra is approachable by every level of gamer. An additional feature is the distinctive designs on each color to accommodate players with color blindness or play in poor lighting. The rules are very easy to learn. The game teaches in just a matter of minutes at a rough minutes. Even with the easy rules, the strategy is challenging. This is a game that is easy to learn and hard to master.

Where to Find Fyra


What do you think? Sound off in the comments and let us know your thoughts!

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Buy Abandon All Artichokes on Amazon!

There is nothing like a day spent in the garden. In Abandon All Artichokes you are trying to get an assortment from the garden and have no artichokes. Abandon All Artichokes has won multiple awards including: Geek Dad Game of the Year, Parent Choice Silver Honor, and American Tabletop.

Overview

  • Publisher: Gamewright
  • Ages: 10+
  • 2-4 Players
  • Game Style: Deck Building (deconstruction)
  • Components: 100 Cards
  • Playtime: 20 minutes

Abandon All Artichokes is a fast paced deck building/ deconstruction game where players are trying to take their personal decks and draw a hand without artichoke cards at the end of their turn. A deck building game has players curating the cards that are in their deck to optimize what they draw.  Players accomplish this by both discarding and adding different cards to your personal deck.

Gameplay

To begin the game players have ten artichoke cards as their personal deck.  The remaining non-artichoke cards are shuffled and create The Garden Stack.  From this a field of five cards create the Garden Row. Then players draw five cards (out of their ten) into their hand. At the beginning of the game they are only artichoke cards.

On your turn players complete five phases.

  • Replenish: Refill the field of five cards in the Garden Row by drawing and placing cards from the Garden Stack
  • Harvest: Select one card from the Garden Row and add it to your hard. It may be played at any time during your turn
  • Play: Play any number of cards from your hand, however you must be able to fulfill all the requirements on the card.
  • Discard: Discard all cards in your hand face up to your personal discard pile.
  • Draw: From your personal deck, draw five new cards.

When you draw the five cards at the conclusion of your turn, if there are no Artichoke cards, you loudly declare ”Abandon All Artichokes” and you win.

Family Game Assessment

Once again, Gamewright has made a great family game. The mechanics of deck building in this game, and the deconstruction nature of the gameplay are both a great gateway to other deck building games. The deconstruction element is a more unique game mechanic and Abandon All Artichokes presents it in a way that is easy to learn.  This game is a “one round teacher”, meaning that by just playing through one round, players then completely understand the game play.  While the age recommendation is 10 and up, this is a game that can scale down to age 8 especially if they are an experienced gamer. With the quick 20 minute playtime, it is an easy game to find time to play as a family.

Conclusion

The EFG team got our first of look at Abandon All Artichokes at New York Toy Fair 2020. We knew it would be a hit once we played a round. This is a great addition to any family gaming collection.


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A Nessie pokes their head above the water.. then another appears…and another…and another. See if your monster can dominate the loch in this family strategy game Block Ness. In this game you’re using three dimensional pieces to try to add on to your monster and create the longest monster.

Buy Block Ness on Amazon!

Game Overview

  • Age 8+
  • 2 to 4 Players
  • Playtime: 15 minutes

Game components

  • Game board (pegboard style)
  • 4 sets of 12 loch monster pieces

Game play

Players begin with only the head and tail of their monster in the water. On their turn players add one piece onto their monster, either at the head end or the tail end. Once you place the new monster segment, move the head or tail piece to indicate the end of the creature. Players must make sure that their new pieces their pieces are adjacent to one of the head or tails of their monster. The pieces must be placed horizontally or vertically. Players will need to cross over other pieces of competing monsters, but they must be a taller height than the piece they are going over.

A player is out when the they no longer can place a piece to the head or tail of their monster. This occurs when there are no more available pegs, or your monster is blocked by other monster pieces.

The size of the play space also scales based on the number of players. The shade of blue indicated the play space, so fewer players have a smaller space they are competing to take over.

One tip we found very helpful was to sort all the pieces by size. Sorting the pieces shortest to tallest it allows players monitor what pieces remain. This helps strategizing how to use those to best build their monster.

Family Game Assessments

Block Ness is a wonderful family game. The rules are easy to learn, but with a plethora of strategy incorporated into the game. We have played with a mix of adults and kids and everyone was able to pick it up quickly. It was so natural for the kids one of them actually won the game.

While there is player elimination, it occurs very late in the game. Typically there is only another turn or two before the game is over. Gameplay is fast and a whole game usually is 15 to 20 minutes.

This is a fun light game that is great for any collection.

Final Thoughts

If you want a light family strategy game, Block Ness fits that need. It is easy to play with a range of ages and skill levels within the same game.


What do you think? Sound off in the comments and let us know your thoughts!

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Every week the EFG staff will be defining a gaming term that is either confusing or ill-defined. Please leave a comment with any terms you are confused by and we will try to include them in future editions!


The gaming definition this week is a term that is applicable to board and card games: Godzilla the Board/Deck

Godzilla the Board/ Deck is a term used in board and card games to describe the action of knocking the items askew. If a player Godzillas the deck, they have knocked a pile or piles of cards over. To Godzilla the board is to knock over or displace tiles, meeples, cubes, or other game components.

When playing games with kids or clumsy adults (like me) having a player Godzilla the Board or Deck may be a common occurrence. The key feature differentiating a player Godzilla-ing the Board or Deck verses disrupting the game in anger is motivation. Godzilla-ing is an unintended action due to clumsiness, and emotion is not a factor.

Games with more pieces, small pieces or pieces/cards which need to be placed on top of one another are more susceptible to be Godzilla-ed. Tile laying games are also easily to Godzilla the board as players place a tile and knock a bunch out of place.

Strategies to minimize Godzilla-ing the board/deck

  • Keep the pieces and cards within easy reach of players
  • If motor skills are a challenge for one or more players, minimize the number of pieces that they need to interact with
  • Space out components as much as possible.
  • If possible, avoid players having to reach across the board, and instead have the player(s) get up and move around the table.

What do you think? Sound off in the comments and let us know your thoughts!

You can also look at our other board game definitions from previous weeks here!

What do you think? Sound off in the comments and let us know your thoughts!

Make sure to keep your eyes on Engaged Family Gaming for all of the latest news and reviews you need to Get

Your Family Game On!

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Quest and Cannons:The Risen Islands takes place in a fanciful world where the characters from one of three nations: Dwunny (Dwarf-bunny), Porcs (Pig-Orcs), or Delves (Duck-Elves) battle for resources. The nations have three characters , each with special traits. Players move their characters around a hexagonal map exploring, collecting, completing quests and battling other nations. Ultimately the goal is to gain Prosperity points. This is the first game from Short Hop Games.

  • Age: 14+
  • Play Time: 20-120 minutes (20 minutes/player)
  • Plays 1-6 players
  • Gameplay mechanics: Pick up and Deliver, variable player powers, hand management

Quests and Cannons has multiple modes of play giving players many options. The game can be played in solo mode, with up to six players in a free for all, as a 2 verses 2 or 3 verses 3. There are also guidelines for map setup, but even within the guidelines there is a significant amount of variability. With so many choices on game play and board set up this game will feel fresh and exciting with each new play.

Quests and Cannons is coming to Kickstarter on September 21, 2021. Click the link to check it out!

Components

  • 6 player ship dashboards
  • 18 sail tokens
  • 6 wooden player ships
  • 50 Resource tokens (10 of each kind)
  • 24 Cannon tokens
  • 6 Traveler’s Dice
  • 24 Cargo slot covers
  • 54 Ammo dice
  • 30 Hull damage tokens
  • 9 Character stands
  • 3 Dwunny Champion Tiles
  • 3 Porc Champion Tiles
  • 3 Delf Champion Tiles
  • 21 Tri-hex Terrain Tiles
  • 15 Single-hex Terrain Tiles
  • 3 Trading post Tiles
  • 3 Starting Kingdom Tiles
  • 3 Outpost Tiles
  • 18 Island Feature Tokens
  • 6 Score trackers
  • 39 Coins
  • 45 Quest cards
  • 18 Map clues cards
  • 45 Loot Cards

Game Play Overview

There are quite a few different elements to game play, actions players can take and choices to consider for players. Without getting into every choice, there are some key features of the game to know. Players are working to gain Prosperity Points to win, and Prosperity Points are earned by completing Quests, following Map Clues, and attacking other ships.

Resources found on the island

Types of Spaces

There are eight different types of spaces you may encounter, different seas affect you movement.

  • Calm sea: one movement  points space
  • Stormy Seas: Two movement points space
  • Treacherous Sea: must roll die, with a roll on 1,2,3 your ship takes hull damage.
  • Impassable Terrain: can not be moved through

Other Spaces include:

  • Outposts: upgrade their ships, or deliver resources for a quest, repair their ship, buy ammo, sell resources
  • Trading Post: trade or sell resources
  • Starting Spaces: return completed map clues, repair their ship, buy ammo, sell resources
  • Islands: explore: gather resources, gain Quest Cards
Sails add one movement

Turns

A player’s turns consists of using three action points. There are different combinations of actions players can take, which give lots of options within three simple choices. On a player’s turn they can:

  • Move one space in any direction (sails add one additional movement per sail), different terrain (noted above) costs different movement points
  • Gather resources from an island
  • Attack, fire your cannons at an enemy player

Free Actions

In addition there are free actions as well. These give players even more options on their turns, though there are limitations since these are dependent on being at certain locations.

  • At a Trading Post players are able to exchange resources for others resources they need or to sell resources for coins.
  • At Outposts players can spend resources and coin to upgrade their ship. Outposts are also a location for players to complete Quests by delivering the resources.
  • Starting spaces are where players can return their Map Clues, and most importantly gain a Prosperity Point when they do so.
  • Both the Outposts are Starting Spaces allow you to also repair your ship, buy ammo, and sell resources, Loot cards, or Map Clues
Player Board keeps everything organized!

Family Game Assessment

Quests and Cannons is a more complicated game both in components to manage and choices per turn, than I am used to playing. Even thought the set up takes some time, and there are quite a lot of components to manage it was totally worth the time at the front end once we began playing. The set up did become easier and a little faster once you know the game. As play begins the turns are easy and move quickly, keeping my whole family engaged. There are quite a few elements to keep tabs on, and the ship dashboard organize many of those elements so well.

Quests and Cannons is recommended for ages 14 and up, but with support, scales down a bit. My boys, ages nine and thirteen were able to play, with support. An experienced gamer as young as 9 or 10 and have success playing, especially with a veteran gamer to guide them. Based on how my children took to the mechanics, this could be used as a “gateway game” into a more complex series of mechanics and managing components.

For a family looking to add a game with more complexity to expand their collection Quests and Cannons is an excellent choice. The complex components and mechanics are organizing them in a way to streamline the gameplay making it a great fit for a range of gaming skills.


A prototype of Quests and Cannons was provided for review, so final production may have some changes.


What do you think? Sound off in the comments and let us know your thoughts!

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The team at Runaway Parade Games has taken their hit game Fire Tower and created an expansion with more fire spreading and fire fighting components. They incorporated Firehawks into the game, added new cards, added events, as well as expanded the Shadow in the Wood card. Click here to see the preview of the base game Fire Tower.

Expansion Components

  • 27 Core Expansion Cards (these include a hawk symbol in the bottom right corner to distinguish them)
  • 18 Fire Hawks
  • 1 Shadow Power Card
  • 1 Shadow Die
  • 4 Heavy Wind Cards
  • 4 Lookout Cards
  • 3 New Event Cards
  • 4 Lightning Meeples

Gameplay

The basic gameplay follows most of the original rules with the following changes in the expansion;

  • The starting hand size increases from five to six cards
  • New cards included: Rolling firebrand, A Crown fire, Creeping fires, Helitack’s, Backburns, Northwest, Southwest, Northeast, Southeast
  • Firehawks and special Firehawk cards
  • New events
  • New abilities
  • Expanded The Shadow in the Wood role in games with three or four players
  • Solo mode

Firehawks

Based on the Australian birds, the real life birds carry burning branches to areas not burned trying to flush out prey. In the game, Fire hawks start in a vacant space in the players quadrant of the board. If a fire gem lands on the same spaces of a Firehawk, that Firehawk is activated. The player of the activated Firehawk immediately moves the fire gem to any vacant space on the board adjacent to a pre existing fire gem.

New Cards

The new cards add a few new ways to spread the fire, and a few new ways to put out the fire. What is so intriguing about the base game a fire tower as well as the expansion is that all the terminology is authentic firefighting terminology. The new cards include:

  • Rolling Firebrand is a rolling flaming log, and it allows the player to move any two orthogonality adjacent fire gems two spaces horizontally or vertically.
  • A Crown Fire is what occurs when the fire spreads across the treetops. With this card players can place two fire gems orthogonality adjacent to a fire gem on the board. This card has one special feature and if you have two of these cards you can play both and place up to four cards.
  • Creeping Fires a caused by bits of burning plant matter that spreads the fire to the surrounding trees. To play this card the players can add three gems to anyplace on the board that is adjacent to existing gems and are not orthogonality adjacent to each other.
  • Helitack’s use helicopters to transport in supplies or crews in to support fire fighting efforts. This card allows you to remove two adjacent gems and one other gem that can also be adjacent or separate.
  • Backburns is the strategy of intentionally burning an area in controlled manner to consume the fuel. Playing this card allows players to remove one fire gem and replace it with a firebreak token.
  • Northwest, Northeast, Southwest, Southeast wind cards allows the players to either change the wind direction in either cardinal direction, roll for a new wind direction, or place one gem in the direction on the card.

The Shadow

The Shadow of the Wood represents the vengeful spirits of eliminated towers. In the base game the Shadow exists as a single card and has a single time effect. In the expansion, the role of the shadow is expanded and re-imagined. Players can choose to add in The Shadow in a game with three or more players. Any eliminated player immediately becomes the shadow. The Shadow wins the game if all the towers in the forest are burned before the start of the next active towers turn. This feature removes the player elimination element from the game. Once a players tower burns their role merely shifts.

To add to the mayhem, the actions taken by the Shadow have a random element. On their turn the the player rolls a 6 sided die, and performing the action corresponding with that number on the Shadow Power card. Some of the actions the Shadow may take include: Activating a firehawk, place a fire gem, draw three cards and play two. The most interesting option provided a push your luck element. The Shadow players can roll as many times as they want. If the roll is under 5 the Shadow gains a fire gem, and can continue adding gems as long as their rolls are one through four. The player can stop rolling and place the accumulated gems at any time. However, if the player rolls a five or six before they stop, all the gems get discarded.

Ability Cards

Rising Flames adds two new abilities, and like the bucket card in the original game, these abilities have two sides to them. One is the Heavy Wind/ Light Breeze. This card allows the player the one time use of Heavy Wind where they can play as many wind cards as they want, and add fire gems as noted at the bottom of the card. The card is then flipped over and the player has the Light breeze ability for the rest of the game. The light breeze allows the player to play one additional; wind card on their turn and place a fire gem in that wind direction.

The other ability card is Look Out. This one time ability allows the player to draw three cards, play one of them and discard the other two. After using the Look Out ability, players flip the card and gain the Patrol ability. Patrol allows the player to discard on card from your hand without taking that action. Then draw two cards from the deck, play one and keep the other in hand.

Event Cards

Just as in the original game, new event cards go into effect as soon as they are drawn. Also, players have the flexibility to incorporated as many or few events as players want. This flexibility allows players to make the game more challenging.

The new events include:

  • Dry Storm, which is a weather event with lightning but no rain. At the beginning of the game four lightning bolts are placed on the board. These lightning bolts moved around over the course of the gameplay as fire moves into their spaces. Once the Dry Storm card comes up, the player rolls the wind die and adds fire gems in that direction off of each lightning bolt. The lightning strike four times, so this process is repeated three more times!
  • Kettle Flight has the group of Firehaws, move about the board. A group of firehawks is known as a Kettle . Each player in turn order starting with the players that drew the card, can active or add two firehawks, depending on the number of players. Players can also rearainge their firehawks.
  • Mobilization has the player who draws the card then draw one more card than the number of player. They then pick and play one card, and passes the cards to the next player who picks an plays a card. Each player picks a card from these drawn card, and the one extra is discarded.

Family Game Assessment

The base game of Fire Tower is a wonderful family game. Rising Flames add rich gameplay and enhances the game experience. Both the base and the expansion list the age as 14 and up, but it is a great game for much younger players. The prerequisite for accessibility of this game is reading ability, once a player can proficiently read the different cards then they can play the game. The readability needed is typically approachable by children about age seven or eight. A precocious reader who is experience in board games and strategy could be even younger and successfully play. I played with my whole family and my youngest just turned eight, and he needed little help with reading the cards, but still was able to play with little support.

What makes they perfect for the family is there are so many ways to pick and choose different elements in the game to make it easier or harder. Players can pick and choose the event cards they include in the game. For younger players, they can skip the events altogether.

The other element that adds a huge family friendly component is the Shadow in the Woods. This removes the player elimination from the game. With children, it can be very frustrating when their tower burns and they is only a chance the will get to effect the game again. With the expanded Shadow roll now there is no elimination, only a change in roll. This makes the game a better fit for more families.

One final feature that is noteworthy is the firehawk meeples. Fire Tower has a beautiful board that looks more amazing as it fills with fire gems. The fire hawk meeple adds another amazing visual effect to the board.

Conclusion

If you have a copy of Fire Tower it is a must to get the expansion Rising Flames. If you have not played Fire Tower it is a great addition to your game collection, and Rising Flames adds such wonderful new elements, and it is a must buy! For more information you can click here to sign up for the mailing list or get more information.

FCC disclosure: a preview copy of Rising Flame was provided for review.


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Days of Wonder has announced Small World of Warcraft a collaboration with Blizzard Entertainment that combines their much beloved board game Small World with World of Warcraft, It will be released this summer for $59.99. 

“A new day dawns on Azeroth. A day like every one before it, and every one after. A day of merciless struggle for the control of the World of Warcraft. Not only is this Small World territory far too tight for everyone, it also hosts the never-ending conflict between the factions of the Alliance and the Horde. Dawn has broken and the time has come to take your place on the front lines.”

Small World is a game all about controlling wildly different races with fantastic powers as they establish control of regions on a game board only to eventually “decline” forcing the player to choose another one. World of Warcraft is a perfect license to pair with it because one of the highlights of WoW is the ever shifting balance between the Alliance and the Horde. 

This isn’t just intended to be a hack-job reskin either. The designer (Philippe Keyaerts) has also included elements like artifacts and legendary items to the game to help mix things up. They are even adding a team-based mode to spice things up.  I simply cannot wait for this game to hit North America this Summer. 

The Trailer

The Game Contents

  • nm6 double-sided boards
  • 16 Warcraft Race banners
  • 182 Matching Race tokens and 15 Murloc tokens
  • 20 Unique Special Power badges
  • 5 Player Summary Sheets
  • 12 Artifact and Legendary place markers
  • 10 Mountains
  • 9 Wisp Walls
  • 4 Harmony tokens
  • 12 Bombs
  • 1 Champion
  • 10 Forts
  • 2 Military Objectives
  • 5 Beasts
  • 6 Watch Towers
  • 110 Victory coins
  • 1 Custom Reinforcement die
  • 1 Game turn track
  • 1 Game turn marker
  • 1 Rulebook
  • 1 Team Variant Rules sheet

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Weird Giraffe Games has another unique game coming to Kickstarter. Tumble Town takes several gaming elements and mixes it with an old west theme. What you get looks like tons of fun!

Can you give us a “Tale of the Tape” for your game?The title, genre, playtime, age ranges, etc.

Tumble Town is a town and engine building spatial puzzle game for 1-4 players that plays in about 45 minutes for ages 8+. Construct the best town in the West before all the building resources run out!

What is the elevator pitch?

Everyone knows Tumble Town deserves to be the best town in the West – so it needs a mayor to match! The Tumble Townspeople are hosting a competition to turn the town tootin’ and boomin’! It’s up to you to impress them with your construction and planning skills! Tumble Town has engine building, dice manipulation, set collection and a spatial puzzle, so there’s something for everyone all rolled up into 45 minutes of gameplay.

When is your Kickstarter going live?

February 25th

Where are you in production/development? How close are you to complete?

Pretty close! We are in the final planning stages for the Kickstarter.

Are there any other games that you think are comparable to your game? ]

Fantastic Factories has dice, engine building, and dice manipulation.

You’re a game designer. You could have made any game you wanted. Why did you make THIS game?

Tumble Town shows that there’s beauty and color in the Old West, where you might not expect that. It’s also a really interesting decision on what kind of town you’re going to construct, whether you’ll choose a building for the power it grants, because it’s made of materials you have, or because you get extra points for constructed buildings with icons or special features that that building has. There’s a lot of choice, but it’s also really accessible to lots of player types. Maybe most of all, you get to build your own town, which is always a great thing and it’s super photogenic.

What was your design process like?

There was a lot to it! There was a lot of trial and error to get a game that was as intuitive as I wanted it to be. We definitely had to streamline and simplify a number of aspects, but I think it’s for the best as it means that players can simply look at the cards, know what they do, and how to build the buildings shown.

What is the number one reason why a family MUST purchase this game?

There’s no other games that combine such a variety of mechanics and choices into such a great package where you feel this satisfied by the creation you made at the end. Every time I play it with new players, they almost always take pictures of their town, that’s how proud of it that they are.

How long has this game been in development?

Almost two years

What obstacles did you encounter making this game?

The end game was a particularly large obstacle that took several iterations to get correct.

What did your first prototype look like?

It was a lot more brown than the current game, but it wasn’t as far off as a lot of games I’ve worked on. The game has always been called some version of Tumble Town, with players constructing buildings out of dice.

Why did you get into making games?

To satisfy my creativity while making people happy!

What other information do you want us to know about you, your company, and/or your game?

Weird Giraffe Games is dedicated to creating engaging games focused on player choices & layered with strategy. We make games that are different and just a little bit weird, but that’s okay, as we’re all a little bit weird sometimes.

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Sushi and dice are a winning combination you will not find on any menu. Sushi Roll takes the popular game Sushi Go and instead of card drafting players draft dice. The game is for ages eight and up and can play two to five players. Like it predecessor it is easy to learn and quick to play.

Components

  • 40 scoring tokens
  • 30 dice
  • 20 pudding tokens
  • 18 menu tokens
  • 12 chopsticks tokens
  • 5 conveyor belts
  • 5 trays
  • 1 dice bag

Gameplay

Set up

To begin, each player takes a tray and places it in front of them. Next, player put the chopstick and the menu tokens in the center of play area. Each player takes two chopstick and three menu tokens to begin the game. The dice are all put in the dice bag and it shaken to mix. The conveyor belts are shuffled, including the one with the red border. Each player receives a conveyor belt. Players draw dice from the bag, the number of dice per player depends on the number of players.

Gameplay

At the start of a round, all players take the dice they drew from the bag, roll their dice, and place them on their conveyor belt without changing them. Next, beginning with the player who has the conveyor belt with the red boarder, player have the option to use a menu token and/or a chopsticks token. The menu token allows a player to re-roll any of their dice, but they must keep the result of the roll. With chopsticks tokens players may switch one of the dice on their conveyor belt with a die on another player’s conveyor belt. The face of the die does not change. These actions may be done multiple times provided the player has the tokens to spend.

Next, the player then selects one die from their conveyor belt and without changing its face places it on their tray. Scoring occurs at the end of the round. If a player takes a Pudding , Menus, or Chopsticks dice they immediately take a token or tokens equal to the number of icons on that face of the die. Players who have a wasabi die and select a nigiri place the nigiri on top of the wasabi, since together they triple in value.

Once all players have selected their die, they simultaneously side their conveyor belts to the left. Each player re-rolls the dice in their conveyor belt and returns the dice to the belt. Players repeat the section steps, and again slide the conveyor belts once everyone has selected. The process repeats until all dice have been selected. That ends the round and players score the dice on their tray. Players take scoring tokens to track their score so far.

To begin a new round all the dice player return the dice to the bag, shaken, and redrawn by each player. Players complete three rounds and calculate final scores at the conclusion of the game. At the end of the game, players count and scored
pudding tokens as well as any remaining chopsticks or menu tokens.

Family Game Assessment

Sushi Roll is a great game to learn the mechanic of drafting. The game has a very simple drafting mechanic using dice. In card drafting players need to remember what cards they saw as the hands were passed. With the dice, the information about available dice is open to all. This open information allowed for more coaching to new or younger players while learning the game.

The trays are well designed to support player and have the information they need to make strategic selections. By listing the different sushi, it allows players to see the values for each piece of sushi. The scoring tokens also allow players to keep track of their score without needing to write it down. This streamlining of information and score keeping also helps the game span generations and abilities.

The game box is a larger box to accommodate all the components, which makes the game less portable than it’s predecessor. It is a worthy trade off to get the additional components in exchange for portability. For anyone that has played Sushi Go, the differences can be picked up in just a few minutes. Those new to the game will find it is easy to pick up and quick to learn.

Final Thoughts

For families that know and love the game Sushi Go, or just enjoy dice and sushi, Sushi Roll is a must addition to any game collection.



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