Reviews

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.

Keyflower remains a group favourite, though Merchants can grow teeth when some of its buildings meet the score-doubling rule. The answer is already on the table; you simply need to remember to use it.

Skyrise is an easy continuous-bidding game with plenty of room to get in each other’s way. Racing, area dominance and Roxley’s usual production quality turn a three-minute teach into a properly lively table.

Ra is a classic Knizia with a clean foundation and more mechanical assurance than its first impression suggests. At four, though, the tile draw kept it at arm’s length for me.

The Barracks Emperors is a lean, deceptively nasty GMT trick-taker that turns feral with the right four players. It is less convincing below four, but at full strength it is an easy blind buy.

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.

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.

Homeworld Fleet Command sells a strong dose of Homeworld nostalgia, then hands you an unfinished game whose rules are permanently under repair. The first two games are tolerable; the real campaign begins when you have to fight the rulebook.

Age of Steam is a formidable game, provided you match the map to the group. Germany at five delivered proper conflict, sustained pressure, and a generous helping of table bullying.

Inventions: Evolution of Ideas already looks capable of standing beside Lisboa and Gallerist after two plays. Its rulebook is poor, but the game itself is far cleaner and more approachable than the warnings about brain-burn suggest.

Vijayanagara takes the familiar COIN framework and bends it into a focused, strictly three-player conflict. You need not care about the setting to appreciate how well the game has been arranged.

Salton Sea packs a luck-free economic game into Devir’s small-box format, built around one notably clever premise: money is also your action supply. It is perhaps a little too tidy for its own good, but remains an accessible, satisfyingly demanding design.

Fleet: The Dice Game makes fishing with dice and a marker feel like the obvious thing to do. It is a roll-and-write that works beautifully for younger players and adults alike, especially at three or four.

Autumn is a tiny, quick game for two, with two trees competing for space by shedding leaves. It lasts about as long as a break, but leaves a lovely melancholy little scene on the table.

Battle Line: Medieval is trick-taking with knights: quick to teach, brisk to play, and far tenser than its plain premise suggests. For two players wanting half an hour of direct conflict, it is an exceptionally honest choice.

Starship Interstellar asks for a long teach and a long first game, then pays that investment back with real decisions and a close, talkative finish. It is a large game that does not mistake exhaustion for achievement.

Black Rose Wars: Rebirth takes the excess of the first edition and turns it into a far smoother, better-paced experience. It is still a colossal box, but now it earns its space much more convincingly.

Shipwrights of the North Sea: Redux is a refreshed chance to see where Garphill began. For anyone who came to the publisher through its later work, it is mostly a reminder of how far it travelled.

Sankoré: The Pride of Mansa Musa is a serious contender for my eurogame of the year: dense, highly integrated, and satisfyingly demanding without turning the table into an AP strike.

Artifacts does not rebuild Boonlake; it adds exploration and asymmetric tools where the design needed a little more pressure. It also has the good manners to make the game shorter.

Prussian Rails is an honest little railway game with shares and enough actual game to earn its place. It does not reach Iberian Rails, but its brief running time and basement price make it an easy recommendation for the railway-curious.

Poo Poo Pets is a real-time dice game with a huge whistling plastic poo, which is at least honest about its main selling point. Its lovely dice and a firm application of house rules can turn it into a decent Yahtzee-like game for small children.

Evenfall is a competent blend of worker placement, set collection, and light engine building that moves nicely with three players. Its uneven council members, however, give the opening draw more influence than it has earned.

Fighters of the Pacific is a resolutely abstract, zero-luck game of mass air combat in the Pacific theatre of the Second World War. It is not selling simulation; it is selling clean decisions on hexes, and it does so rather well.