Reviews

Conquest & Consequence promises an even more explosive three-player confrontation than my beloved Triumph & Tragedy, but on my first encounter its rules became the real obstacle. I very much want to give it another chance, yet newcomers to the system should clearly start elsewhere.

La Belle Époque is an asymmetric area-control game about pre-war Europe, with simple rules and a smoother flow than its rather modest production suggests. It asks for time and some tolerance for dice, but it stays interesting on the table until the end.

Car Wars Sixth Edition finally gave me the youthful obsession I used to read about in magazines and newsgroups, albeit two and a half years late from Kickstarter. It is not the old, intricate lifestyle game, though: it is a fast, polished celebration of vehicular violence with excellent miniatures.

Founders of Teotihuacan is an unusually light and short Board & Dice release, with a few good ideas but without reaching its potential. Its action-selection system provides the necessary friction, yet its tile-laying core remains somewhat flat.

Zapotec is a tightly constructed light-medium game of around an hour, with satisfying escalation and meaningful choices. Its concern is that the optimal opening is very narrow, and falling behind early can leave a player out of contention.

878 Vikings: Invasions of England may not be new or especially widespread, but it remains an underrated, noisy war game. Especially if, like us, you are hooked on The Last Kingdom, it has a very easy excuse to return to the table.

Almoravid has a thematic, promising system, but its rules—especially its supply rules—can make the first encounter thoroughly frustrating. I liked it a lot in play, yet it is not the digestible game I want it to be just yet.

1822CA is a heavy, very enjoyable train game, provided you love auctions and do not arrive completely unprepared. For me, 1822 is a necessary stop before heading into the Canadian Alps.

Ascension: Deckbuilding Game has a few awkward design corners, but I keep enjoying it without a second thought. For an honest brawl with two or three players, it remains one of my top picks.

Dead Reckoning gave us a campaign full of cannon fire and aggressive play, with the Mariposa confirming — obviously — the superiority of purple. After 8-9 plays I still rate it highly, but I now have reservations about its ending and the campaign’s structure.

Red Flag Over Paris felt like a clear improvement over the series’ poor start with Fort Sumter, but not an interesting enough one to win me over. The rules make sense, yet the game I played mostly landed as a shrug-worthy “meh.”

Tabanussi: Builders of Ur has the clever ideas I expect from Tascini, but in my first plays it felt more like a prototype that had not settled all its loose ends. At four players, though, it proved noticeably stronger and more engaging.

Corrosion entered my collection almost out of stubbornness, and it ended up pleasantly proving me wrong. It is a tight, cerebral production game where action programming is not merely one element of the design, but its entire engine.

Lizard Wizard takes the core of Racoon Tycoon, moves it into a market for spell components, and, to my mind, works it out noticeably better. It remains a pleasantly chaotic game with plenty of push-your-luck, though, not the answer for anyone already tired of its predecessor’s laid-back nature.

SYNDICATE looks like an ambitious interplanetary conquest game on paper and on the table. Once play begins, though, its ambition feels like it launched without a landing system.

I approached Origins: First Builders under a cloud of dire predictions and came away far less negative than expected. It is not a blind-buy recommendation, but it certainly does not deserve burial either.

Foundations of Rome is a Kickstarter beast that was delayed as much as it possibly could be, yet it reaches the table with enough spectacle to justify every cubic centimetre of its enormous box. Beneath the impressive plastic buildings sits a friendly gateway game with a little more depth once the expansions enter the picture.

Seeders from Sereis: Exodus is an unusual, heavy engine builder where bidding and familiarity with a huge card deck make all the difference. It is not for every group, but it offers something genuinely different to players who can handle take-that and kingmaking.

Hellenica: Story of Greece is an overloaded, slightly awkward spectacle of Ancient Greece that nevertheless hides a surprisingly lively game for large groups. Don’t approach it for historical reverence; approach it for plastic, noise, and fighting over a map.

Twilight: 2000 Fourth Edition gave my group the grounded, tactical RPG change of pace it wanted after a Dune campaign that was not holding our attention. It is polished and entertaining, provided the GM is ready to put in work once the core box material runs out.

Gaia Project gave me exactly what I expected: a smoother Terra Mystica, with a satisfyingly brain-burning session that still did not completely win me over. A good mental exercise, but a fairly dry experience.

An evening whose plans changed twice: from the grand Conquest & Consequence to something lighter and flashier for three. Legacies came to the table as the backup choice that better suited the mood of the moment.

Rococo: Deluxe Edition is one of those lavish reprints that does more than look good on the shelf: it proves to be a pleasantly durable euro as well. With the jewellers expansion, its high-fashion proceedings become a little more forgiving while remaining substantial.

Beyond the Sun still moves me just as much as it did in its first plays. More than a year later, it has not faded at all; it remains one of those games I want in my collection.