Contributor
TheTrainSpotter
A mechanisms obsessive. Never reviews a game in isolation — always reaching for what it borrows, what it refines, and which other titles sit next to it on the shelf.
154 reviews
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Review Viscounts of the West Kingdom
Viscounts of the West Kingdom turns a rondel into something less predictable and, consequently, more compelling. The shifting card supply blunts long-range planning, but it does not blunt the design.
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Review Raising Chicago
Raising Chicago is a Spiellworx gem that slipped beneath the radar: a pure, luckless auction game whose modified Walrasian market is as disciplined as it is explosive.
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Review Inferno
Inferno wraps a severe Euro framework in sinners, punishment and Dante’s journey through ten circles of Hell. Its economy and scoring pressure are properly interactive, though it is noticeably better with four players and depends on the Guardians in use.
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Review Galactic Cruise
Galactic Cruise is a lavish medium-weight euro with striking table presence and six interlocking systems; on a second play, it proved far more adaptable than it first appeared. The early card variance and the price remain reservations, but the underlying design is thoroughly satisfying.
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Review Mistborn: The Deckbuilding Game
Mistborn: The Deckbuilding Game makes its familiar deckbuilding framework answer to its setting rather than merely wearing the licence. Metal management gives a real reason to build broadly instead of pursuing a single colour.
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Review Unstoppable
Unstoppable is a demanding co-op and solo boss fighter whose card crafting pushes it well ahead of Aeon's End. It asks for real planning, and a little patience with the rulebook, but it has the depth to repay both.
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Review Caylus
Caylus is still a lean, tightly constructed German-style euro whose mechanisms need no decorative excess. Its pivotal building races will not suit everyone, but they go a long way towards explaining its reputation.
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Review Aquatica
Aquatica is a restrained, lightly asymmetric engine builder with a genuinely fresh exploration idea at its centre. It does not try to do too much, which is precisely why it works.
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Review Daitoshi
Daitoshi is Garcia working at a much larger scale: a heavy euro full of systems, yet disciplined in the way those systems connect. It is for players already comfortable with this particular dialect of design.
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Review Resafa
Resafa is a fresh, breezy euro from Vladimir, using six dual-action cards to organise a satisfyingly dense game. It is clever and balanced, building to a proper finale without making the table work for it.
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Review Stephens
Stephens is an odd, mildly abrasive euro whose factory mechanism deserves attention, even if the surrounding design does not always cohere. It is one for committed eurogamers looking beyond the standard recipe.
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Review 18Rhl
18Rhl offers two maps with clearly different priorities, but it does not do much to refresh the familiar 18XX formula. RHL is agreeably manageable, though its competition for the right networks is tighter than it needs to be.
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Review Ezra and Nehemiah
Ezra and Nehemiah revisits familiar Phillips territory but turns it into a distinct, demanding tableau builder. Its routes to victory offer real texture, even if their relative value shifts sharply with player count.
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Review Black Forest
Black Forest is Uwe returning to resource wheels, forests and production chains, with enough of its own twist to avoid feeling like a rerun. It does not produce a thunderclap of surprise, but it is plainly more compelling than Atiwa.
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Review Minos: Dawn of the Bronze Age
Minos: Dawn of the Bronze Age is a medium-weight euro that gives tableau building and area control more life than its unpromising first impression suggests. Its Cretan setting is doing real work rather than merely decorating the box.
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Review Intarsia
Intarsia is a polished mosaic game with enough hand-management pressure to engage, but not quite enough freedom to distinguish itself. Its resemblance to Art Society is clear, though it does not feel as fresh.
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Review Civolution
Civolution is a hefty, tightly constrained mechanical successor to Burgundy, where a sandbox does not mean unlimited freedom. Its scoring has one awkward seam, but the wider design comfortably survives it.
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Review Mistwind
Mistwind is a tight hybrid of worker placement, network building and pick-up-and-deliver, with airships and scoring objectives that demand real planning. It is an independent production whose rare preference for five players makes it especially worth noting.
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Review Andromeda's Edge
Andromeda's Edge takes the framework of Dwellings of Eldervale and builds a denser, more modular engine game around it. It demands time, careful faction selection and a tolerance for administration, but under the right conditions it proves the richer design.
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Review Railways of the Lost Atlas
A fantasy-world 18XX that lets the players build the map, then makes them live with what they have made. It is modern in outline, but still properly tight where the pressure belongs.
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Review Dinosaur Island: Rawr 'n Write
Dinosaur Island: Rawr ’n Write preserves the larger game’s flavour in a smart roll-and-write built around dice selection, placement, drawing and spatial planning. Its special characters and buildings may be rather too powerful, but the underlying design is sound.
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Review Path of Civilization
Path of Civilization gets past its entirely reasonable first-impression warnings with a civilisation game that genuinely supports five simultaneous players. Its opening draws can be awkwardly random, but its pace prevents that irritation from becoming a burden.
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Review Lofoten
Lofoten packs a notably demanding set-collection game into 45 minutes, built around a dynamic personal rondel that makes each choice matter. It is clever and volatile, even if it never quite settles whether it is a filler or a full main course.
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Review Border States
Border States dresses a symmetrical area-dominance game in the American Civil War, then turns it into a chain of contests over historical battlefields. There are clever ideas here, though its staying power feels limited.
