BGI 403 The One That is Not About A Pipe
Board Games Insider – Join our Guild on Board Game Geek Guild | Like us on FB
Social media:
Ignacy Trzewiczek / Portal Games: website | FB | Twitter | Youtube
Corey Thompson / Above Board TV: website | Youtube
Stephen Buonocore / “The Podfather Of Gaming”: website | FB | Twitter | Youtube
Intro Music: Happy Rock – Bensound.com
Escape the farmhouse with your The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: Slaughterhouse rules summary!
Despite being a huge aficionado of horror cinema, I got around very late to watching The Texas Chainsaw Massacre – too late really, as unfortunately the transgressive, dangerous aura it had when I was young had long rubbed off by that time. This can happen as I finally get around to watching a few films that were once deemed ‘video nasties’, long past the cultural zeitgeist they were born in.
A lot of people would consider it their favourite horror film however, though my taste runs to the fantastical rather than slashers. Be that as it may, this board game version by the sadly defunct Prospero Hall studio could become a tabletop favourite. It’s a tight, lean, enjoyable horror romp in the old Sawyer house that nails its theme and provides lots of (nervous) laughs and tension alike.
One player plays the unhinged Sawyer family, the others the ‘trespassers’ – the clueless young people who stumble across the house and quickly learn the error of their ways. Most actions as a trespasser carry the risk of generating noise tokens that you may have to hand over to the Sawyer player as fear tokens, who can use them to power their actions. Not an original mechanic – The World of SMOG does something similar – but it works perfectly here.
The Sawyer player starts with just one character, but as the panic meter (a big cardboard chainsaw) increases, more characters emerge, culminating in the appearance of good ol’ Leatherface himself. At which point the trespassers are really in trouble. And while the trespassers can quite easily be killed (a clever system of drawing 4 different injury cards), attacking the Sawyers only reduces their number of actions. Everything reinforces the cat-and-mouse feel of the gameplay, as the trespassers uncover horror tokens throughout the house and can briefly hide in rooms for a brief respite from pursuit. The basic rules system is enhanced by several scenarios with different goals, plus a very simple legacy system that adds item cards left behind by previously killed trespassers to the common item card pool.
Unusually, there are no win conditions as such – the goal is simply to survive, which is thematic and all, but raises questions if one player is playing 2 trespassers, and 1 escapes – is that a win, or do you keep playing? One of the game designers told me players can come up with their own ideas about success, and that the goal was to make a game that felt like a horror movie. Which is fine, though this is still a game … anyway, it’s a small issue. There are also some omissions in the rulebook, but all that is fixed in my summary.
Overwhelmingly however, this is a huge success and a fitting swan song for the creative people at Prospero Hall, all of whom, I hope, are still gainfully employed in making more games that blend theme and gameplay with such success.
Oh, right.
Day One’s entry is For Sale …. um, ok. It’s a fine game and all that; but I have no idea why it is a game that “made meaningful contributions to the board game hobby in the areas of innovation, artistry, and impact.”
Day Two is Puerto Rico … OK, this is the “We didn’t put this in the initial class for the reasons you expect, but we are putting it in” day.
Day Three is Memoir ’44 … I prefer Battle Cry, but I understand honoring the much bigger seller.
Day Four is Love Letter … I like Love Letter and I think it’s a good game. I think it’s a bit wild that a small game from 15 years ago is in before …. lots of other games.
I’ll update this post as I notice the games this week (assuming I do).
The sun rises over the misty fields near Nagashino, glinting off armour and steel. The Takeda banners flap in the wind, a warning to the Tokugawa warriors holding the hilltops. Every decision counts, every step could tip the balance of power. As the leader of your clan, Takeda, you are seeking to reclaim glory and lead your samurai through the chaos. Now is the time to win this sandwich chess, this Hasami Shogi from Lemery Games.
The post Hasami Shogi (Saturday Review) appeared first on Tabletop Games Blog.
What is the best coffee drink? You don’t need to provide the right answer; you just need to predict what everyone else is going to say!
BGI 402 The one about 2026
Board Games Insider – Join our Guild on Board Game Geek Guild | Like us on FB
Social media:
Ignacy Trzewiczek / Portal Games: website | FB | Twitter | Youtube
Corey Thompson / Above Board TV: website | Youtube
Stephen Buonocore / “The Podfather Of Gaming”: website | FB | Twitter | Youtube
Intro Music: Happy Rock – Bensound.com
Control the city with your City of the Great Machine rules & reference!
This game was brought to my attention by a great review on Charlie Theel’s Player Elimination website, and as usual, Charlie didn’t steer me wrong (well, there was that Fate of the Fellowship review, but there’s always an exception to the rule). City of the Great Machine is one of those rare games I like so much in which mechanics and theme are inextricably intertwined.
It’s a one-vs-many struggle set in a steampunk city dominated by a mechanical overlord – sort of George Orwell meets H. G. Wells. Players are Revolutionaries trying to inspire citizens to riot against oppression; the Great Machine has time on its side and a legion of automata to quell the dissent.
City of the Great Machine blends hidden movement, resource management, and asymmetric gameplay in a wonderfully thematic package – and it can also be played solo or co-operatively. It’s a stunning production with an excellent artwork, a well-written rulebook and comprehensive support material, and some very nice miniatures as a bonus. I enjoyed this at 2 players, but I’m very much looking forward to to playing this at a higher player count so players can scheme amongst themselves in the presence of the Great Machine (the rulebook expressly tells you to refer to players as Revolutionaries or the Great Machine, in one of many thematic touches). And, dare I say it, its theme of revolution against autocratic technology is more relevant than the glossy layer of steampunk initially leads you to believe.
There’s a wealth of strategic material in the rulebooks, but this summary distills the rules into an easily digestible few sheets. And of course, it’s available on my app, Tabletop Codex!
Happy new year, everybody! I hope it will bring you much joy. I also hope it will bring you board games (which is basically the same thing). The question is, however: Which games? – Here are a few 2026 releases which look most intriguing to me. Long-time readers of this blog will notice that this year’s list is a bit longer than usual – there are just so many fascinating games scheduled for release this year!
As always, don’t take this as a shopping list (neither for you nor for me). Your taste in games and your discretion how many new games you want to chase decide what will end up in your shelf (and, hopefully, on your table)!
After that reminder, on to the games. As all of them are set in human history, they are ordered from most ancient to most recent.
1-3 players, up to 90 minutes
Once the greatest Roman politician-generals outgrew to confines of the republican power-sharing agreement, the Republic was bound to fall. Yet it was not predestined that it would fall to Caesar. In fact, two of his associates/rivals, Pompey and Crassus, might as well have taken the diadem… if they had played their cards better.
Triumvir casts its players as the three mightiest power brokers of the last years of the Roman Republic. They will attempt to parlay their wealth, popularity, and military force into political success (in an adaptation of the negotiation mechanic from Engelstein’s and Herman’s previous cooperation Versailles 1919). Whoever settles the issues in the senate in their favor and deals best with the challenges in the rebellious provinces is poised to become the First Man in Rome…forever.
You can still pre-order Triumvir at the P500 price of $60.00 (regular price: $101.00). Release is expected for March.
4 players, 60-120 minutes
I have a fondness for the early modern period, this time when so many old certainties in Europe were shattered by revolutionary new developments – from the printing press over the discovery of America to the Reformation.
Neither King Nor God focuses on the struggle over military, religious, and commercial supremacy in Western Europe, with the Pope, the Holy Roman Emperor, and the Kings of England and France as the four protagonists. The players will send their courtiers to the big cities of Europe. These courtiers range from merchants over generals to assassins, each with their own action, forming a neat stack in each city. Once all courtiers are placed, each city’s courtier stack is resolved top to bottom – so, the last courtier placed is the first one to resolve! There are a lot of tactical considerations involved in which courtier you’d like to trigger early or late, and as they are placed face-down, also a good deal of bluffing.
I had the opportunity to play Neither King Nor God at last year’s SPIEL in Essen. Our Holy Roman Emperor attempted to spread Protestantism in Germany and waged war against the Pope for control of Venice, while France and England expanded their commercial networks on the continent and clashed over Normandy. Everyone had a great time!
The limited pilot edition of Neither King Nor God can be ordered for € 69.00 and will be shipping in mid- or late January. Sound of Drums aims to have the full epic edition ready for SPIEL in October 2026.
2 players, 150-180 minutes
The European revolutions of 1848/49 are generally considered failures. After all, the ancient régimes had returned to power everywhere but in France, and even there the Second Republic was soon overthrown by Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte. Yet for months it looked like all of Europe could shed the old order in favor of liberalism, nation-states, and maybe even – gasp! – democracy. And even when the revolutionaries were defeated, they had changed the way the game was played: From then on, politics was conducted in public, with parliaments, parties, and newspapers, and the forces of liberalism and nationalism had to be taken into consideration by even the most conservative of monarchical governments.
Despite the impact of the revolutions, barely any games have covered them. Jules Félisaz’s 1848 seeks to rectify that in an ambitious manner, covering the political, military, intellectual, and social dimensions of the revolutions in all of Europe. Félisaz relies on a mix of tried-and-true CDG mechanics – the “mandatory opponent events” from Twilight Struggle, the spatial layout of societal groups from 1989, and the escalation through decks from Paths of Glory, adding its own twists where appropriate (for example, overlapping scoring regions based on nationality (German, Polish, Italian…) and empire (Russian, Prussian, Austrian).
You can still pre-order 1848 at the P500 price of $46.00 (regular price: $72.00). Release is expected for March.
1-3 players, 30-45 minutes
Let us not say there are only wargames on this list. Look, here’s a peace game!
Making peace is generally a complex business, and so it was in the case of the Russo-Japanese War (1904/05): The Japanese, emboldened by their military success on land and sea, demanded a large financial indemnity as well as the cession of Sakhalin. The Russian tsar refused to consider either. Yet with revolution rampant in Russia and the Japanese government close to financial collapse, both sides needed to end the war. Their delegates at the US-mediated peace conference of Portsmouth had to figure out how to balance peace, national interest, and saving face.
In the classic two-player mode, the opponent players represent the delegates of Japan and Russia at Portsmouth who negotiate over Japan’s demands. Their hands of cards represent diplomatic approaches – listening or emphasizing, acquiescing or threatening. More aggressive stances are more likely to carry the day on any given issue, but the more lopsided a round of negotiations is, the more tensions will rise on the side of the loser. If they are pushed too hard, they will resort to war – and the other side will bear the blame for not being ready to compromise.
Other player counts see US president Theodore Roosevelt join as either as a third player or the solo role. In either case, Roosevelt is an “honest broker” whose goal it is to find an equitable resolution to the conflict.
Peace 1905 awaits its Kickstarter campaign in the second quarter of 2026. The game will be released in late 2026.
1-4 players, 120-180 minutes
Hammer and sickle are, of course, the symbols of communism. Yet ideology aside, they speak of the material basis of modern societies – the food that everyone needs to eat, and the industrial production that is required for everything from building houses to waging war.
This economy underlies Hammer and Sickle, a multiplayer treatment of the Russian Civil War after the October Revolution: The industrial cities (mostly in the north and west of the collapsing Russian empire), marked by hammers, produce Firepower – provided that their workers are fed with Food (from the sickle-marked rural provinces in the south). Otherwise, the workers start to rebel.
The result is a delicate balance between Food and Firepower, exacerbated by the factions’ asymmetries: The Bolsheviks, for example, have easy access to a lot of hammers, but might find themselves short of sickles; but the opposite might be true for the White Army operating from the south. In addition to the game’s (loose) two alliances of Revolutionaries (Bolsheviks and Anarchists) and Counter-Revolutionaries (White Army and New Nations), new alignments might develop…
Alex Knight has shown his ability to turn a complex political-military struggle into a compelling board game with the Spanish Civil War in the intriguing Land and Freedom. I’m sure he’ll do the same with Hammer and Sickle.
You can pre-order Hammer and Sickle at the P500 price of $62.00 (regular price: $97.00). Release is expected not before the third quarter of 2026… which might turn into 2027, but I wanted to include the game here anyway because it just seems so fascinating.
1-2 players, 20-40 minutes
Matthias Cramer has got the range. He has designed great epics like Weimar: The Fight for Democracy, but he is also a master of the short form. His Watergate is a knife fight in a phone booth… and Lenin’s Legacy promises to be cut from the same cloth.
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was the dominant figure of the new Bolshevik government of Russia, but his health started to fail him soon after the October Revolution. Behind the scenes, his lieutenants jockeyed for position to succeed him – and the two likeliest candidates were Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin. While they differed in their politics – Trotsky wanted to advance the “world revolution”, Stalin advocated for “socialism in one country” – and their power bases – Trotsky was the creator of the Red Army, Stalin controlled the Communist Party – they had one thing in common: Their drive to take power.
Lenin’s Legacy lets its players fill their shoes and struggle over the army, the party, and the regions and politicians of the Soviet Union in a card-driven game with a twist: Almost all cards are selected from an open market. The players hold only one card each… but they can gamble on playing the opponent’s card (without knowing what it is)!
You can still pre-order Lenin’s Legacy at the P500 price of $37.00 (regular price: $59.00). Release is expected for March.
1-2 players, 30-45 minutes
Many of the games in this post are very zoomed-out, grand strategic affairs. The counters you push move armies, the cards you play shake nations. Yet there is also something very charming about games operating on the micro level, and you get exactly that with Night Witches.
You are on the Eastern Front of World War II, serving in the all-women 588th Night Bomber Regiment of the Soviet Air Forces. You have no more than two biplanes at your command in every mission… and they are old, slow, and vulnerable. Still, your goal is to harass the invading German forces with these low-flying, hard-to-detect, and hard-to-engage craft every night, do damage as much damage as you can (or, at least, wear the enemy out with constant nocturnal attacks), and make it back safe.
You can play each mission separately or in a ten-mission campaign which allows you to carry over upgrades, and either solo or as a two-player cooperative effort.
Night Witches awaits its Kickstarter campaign in the second quarter of 2026. The game will be released in late 2026.
1-4 players, 60-480 minutes
This game has been long in the making. I’ve referenced it as ready for pre-order eight years ago, and have been intrigued by its premise since then. The Berlin Airlift was the largest airborne logistics operation ever, and for it to render the Berlin Blockade (on the ground) void, hundreds of planes had to arrive every day in Berlin with fuel, food, spare parts, and medical supplies, notwithstanding the limited infrastructure, the often rough weather, and every so often, Soviet interference.
This immense logistical task fell to the US Air Force and the Royal Air Force, each of which is represented by two “squadrons” (players) in the game. The players strive to contribute the most to the effort with their squadron, but their internal competition sometimes has to take the backseat when a joint effort is required to confront Soviet interference or keep the morale of the Berlin population up.
John Poniske’s original design has been taken on by Terry Simo. The Berlin Airlift is now ready for production. It can still be pre-ordered here at the reduced price of $55.00 (later MSRP estimated $75.00). Publication is expected for the third quarter of 2026.
And which 2026 games look most exciting to you? Let me know in the comments!
Happy new year, everybody! I hope it will bring you much joy. I also hope it will bring you board games (which is basically the same thing). The question is, however: Which games? – Here are a few 2026 releases which look most intriguing to me. Long-time readers of this blog will notice that this year’s list is a bit longer than usual – there are just so many fascinating games scheduled for release this year!
As always, don’t take this as a shopping list (neither for you nor for me). Your taste in games and your discretion how many new games you want to chase decide what will end up in your shelf (and, hopefully, on your table)!
After that reminder, on to the games. As all of them are set in human history, they are ordered from most ancient to most recent.
1-3 players, up to 90 minutes
Once the greatest Roman politician-generals outgrew to confines of the republican power-sharing agreement, the Republic was bound to fall. Yet it was not predestined that it would fall to Caesar. In fact, two of his associates/rivals, Pompey and Crassus, might as well have taken the diadem… if they had played their cards better.
Triumvir casts its players as the three mightiest power brokers of the last years of the Roman Republic. They will attempt to parlay their wealth, popularity, and military force into political success (in an adaptation of the negotiation mechanic from Engelstein’s and Herman’s previous cooperation Versailles 1919). Whoever settles the issues in the senate in their favor and deals best with the challenges in the rebellious provinces is poised to become the First Man in Rome…forever.
You can still pre-order Triumvir at the P500 price of $60.00 (regular price: $101.00). Release is expected for March.
4 players, 60-120 minutes
I have a fondness for the early modern period, this time when so many old certainties in Europe were shattered by revolutionary new developments – from the printing press over the discovery of America to the Reformation.
Neither King Nor God focuses on the struggle over military, religious, and commercial supremacy in Western Europe, with the Pope, the Holy Roman Emperor, and the Kings of England and France as the four protagonists. The players will send their courtiers to the big cities of Europe. These courtiers range from merchants over generals to assassins, each with their own action, forming a neat stack in each city. Once all courtiers are placed, each city’s courtier stack is resolved top to bottom – so, the last courtier placed is the first one to resolve! There are a lot of tactical considerations involved in which courtier you’d like to trigger early or late, and as they are placed face-down, also a good deal of bluffing.
I had the opportunity to play Neither King Nor God at last year’s SPIEL in Essen. Our Holy Roman Emperor attempted to spread Protestantism in Germany and waged war against the Pope for control of Venice, while France and England expanded their commercial networks on the continent and clashed over Normandy. Everyone had a great time!
The limited pilot edition of Neither King Nor God can be ordered for € 69.00 and will be shipping in mid- or late January. Sound of Drums aims to have the full epic edition ready for SPIEL in October 2026.
2 players, 150-180 minutes
The European revolutions of 1848/49 are generally considered failures. After all, the ancient régimes had returned to power everywhere but in France, and even there the Second Republic was soon overthrown by Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte. Yet for months it looked like all of Europe could shed the old order in favor of liberalism, nation-states, and maybe even – gasp! – democracy. And even when the revolutionaries were defeated, they had changed the way the game was played: From then on, politics was conducted in public, with parliaments, parties, and newspapers, and the forces of liberalism and nationalism had to be taken into consideration by even the most conservative of monarchical governments.
Despite the impact of the revolutions, barely any games have covered them. Jules Félisaz’s 1848 seeks to rectify that in an ambitious manner, covering the political, military, intellectual, and social dimensions of the revolutions in all of Europe. Félisaz relies on a mix of tried-and-true CDG mechanics – the “mandatory opponent events” from Twilight Struggle, the spatial layout of societal groups from 1989, and the escalation through decks from Paths of Glory, adding its own twists where appropriate (for example, overlapping scoring regions based on nationality (German, Polish, Italian…) and empire (Russian, Prussian, Austrian).
You can still pre-order 1848 at the P500 price of $46.00 (regular price: $72.00). Release is expected for March.
1-3 players, 30-45 minutes
Let us not say there are only wargames on this list. Look, here’s a peace game!
Making peace is generally a complex business, and so it was in the case of the Russo-Japanese War (1904/05): The Japanese, emboldened by their military success on land and sea, demanded a large financial indemnity as well as the cession of Sakhalin. The Russian tsar refused to consider either. Yet with revolution rampant in Russia and the Japanese government close to financial collapse, both sides needed to end the war. Their delegates at the US-mediated peace conference of Portsmouth had to figure out how to balance peace, national interest, and saving face.
In the classic two-player mode, the opponent players represent the delegates of Japan and Russia at Portsmouth who negotiate over Japan’s demands. Their hands of cards represent diplomatic approaches – listening or emphasizing, acquiescing or threatening. More aggressive stances are more likely to carry the day on any given issue, but the more lopsided a round of negotiations is, the more tensions will rise on the side of the loser. If they are pushed too hard, they will resort to war – and the other side will bear the blame for not being ready to compromise.
Other player counts see US president Theodore Roosevelt join as either as a third player or the solo role. In either case, Roosevelt is an “honest broker” whose goal it is to find an equitable resolution to the conflict.
Peace 1905 awaits its Kickstarter campaign in the second quarter of 2026. The game will be released in late 2026.
1-4 players, 120-180 minutes
Hammer and sickle are, of course, the symbols of communism. Yet ideology aside, they speak of the material basis of modern societies – the food that everyone needs to eat, and the industrial production that is required for everything from building houses to waging war.
This economy underlies Hammer and Sickle, a multiplayer treatment of the Russian Civil War after the October Revolution: The industrial cities (mostly in the north and west of the collapsing Russian empire), marked by hammers, produce Firepower – provided that their workers are fed with Food (from the sickle-marked rural provinces in the south). Otherwise, the workers start to rebel.
The result is a delicate balance between Food and Firepower, exacerbated by the factions’ asymmetries: The Bolsheviks, for example, have easy access to a lot of hammers, but might find themselves short of sickles; but the opposite might be true for the White Army operating from the south. In addition to the game’s (loose) two alliances of Revolutionaries (Bolsheviks and Anarchists) and Counter-Revolutionaries (White Army and New Nations), new alignments might develop…
Alex Knight has shown his ability to turn a complex political-military struggle into a compelling board game with the Spanish Civil War in the intriguing Land and Freedom. I’m sure he’ll do the same with Hammer and Sickle.
You can pre-order Hammer and Sickle at the P500 price of $62.00 (regular price: $97.00). Release is expected not before the third quarter of 2026… which might turn into 2027, but I wanted to include the game here anyway because it just seems so fascinating.
1-2 players, 20-40 minutes
Matthias Cramer has got the range. He has designed great epics like Weimar: The Fight for Democracy, but he is also a master of the short form. His Watergate is a knife fight in a phone booth… and Lenin’s Legacy promises to be cut from the same cloth.
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was the dominant figure of the new Bolshevik government of Russia, but his health started to fail him soon after the October Revolution. Behind the scenes, his lieutenants jockeyed for position to succeed him – and the two likeliest candidates were Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin. While they differed in their politics – Trotsky wanted to advance the “world revolution”, Stalin advocated for “socialism in one country” – and their power bases – Trotsky was the creator of the Red Army, Stalin controlled the Communist Party – they had one thing in common: Their drive to take power.
Lenin’s Legacy lets its players fill their shoes and struggle over the army, the party, and the regions and politicians of the Soviet Union in a card-driven game with a twist: Almost all cards are selected from an open market. The players hold only one card each… but they can gamble on playing the opponent’s card (without knowing what it is)!
You can still pre-order Lenin’s Legacy at the P500 price of $37.00 (regular price: $59.00). Release is expected for March.
1-2 players, 30-45 minutes
Many of the games in this post are very zoomed-out, grand strategic affairs. The counters you push move armies, the cards you play shake nations. Yet there is also something very charming about games operating on the micro level, and you get exactly that with Night Witches.
You are on the Eastern Front of World War II, serving in the all-women 588th Night Bomber Regiment of the Soviet Air Forces. You have no more than two biplanes at your command in every mission… and they are old, slow, and vulnerable. Still, your goal is to harass the invading German forces with these low-flying, hard-to-detect, and hard-to-engage craft every night, do damage as much damage as you can (or, at least, wear the enemy out with constant nocturnal attacks), and make it back safe.
You can play each mission separately or in a ten-mission campaign which allows you to carry over upgrades, and either solo or as a two-player cooperative effort.
Night Witches awaits its Kickstarter campaign in the second quarter of 2026. The game will be released in late 2026.
1-4 players, 60-480 minutes
This game has been long in the making. I’ve referenced it as ready for pre-order eight years ago, and have been intrigued by its premise since then. The Berlin Airlift was the largest airborne logistics operation ever, and for it to render the Berlin Blockade (on the ground) void, hundreds of planes had to arrive every day in Berlin with fuel, food, spare parts, and medical supplies, notwithstanding the limited infrastructure, the often rough weather, and every so often, Soviet interference.
This immense logistical task fell to the US Air Force and the Royal Air Force, each of which is represented by two “squadrons” (players) in the game. The players strive to contribute the most to the effort with their squadron, but their internal competition sometimes has to take the backseat when a joint effort is required to confront Soviet interference or keep the morale of the Berlin population up.
John Poniske’s original design has been taken on by Terry Simo. The Berlin Airlift is now ready for production. It can still be pre-ordered here at the reduced price of $55.00 (later MSRP estimated $75.00). Publication is expected for the third quarter of 2026.
And which 2026 games look most exciting to you? Let me know in the comments!
This is the 2 player game from one of my favourite games, Everdell is such a fun game with so many enjoyable characters and such a lovely town that you can build and explore and enjoy to your hearts content.
This is such a fun version of the game that takes so much less time to play yet doesn’t lack any of the fun of the original game If you are looking for a two player that will give you a lot of joy this is it and once you have played it , it can leave you so much more time to play again or play until another player turns up.
I was pleasantly surprised how much fun this game was and am very glad to have it in my collection. This is as much of a complex game to enjoy just a bit simpler to play. Using your critters to build your town to make the most points and win the game. In this case the critters are hares and tortoises, so you must ask yourselves are you slow and steady or likely to end up in a hedge somewhere wandering what happened.
Have fun and Happy Gaming! You can order this at: https://www.bgextras.co.uk/everdell-game/everdell/everdell-duo
After realising that they had not only inadvertently brought an alien lifeform onto their freighter, but that the alien was a vicious and terrifying predator, the crew had only one choice. Armed with whatever they could find on their commercial vessel, they started sweeping the ship one section at a time. Yet, their fear and terror led to rash decisions, which meant a crew member got sucked out into the vacuum, and another was blown up by a hastily made explosive device. To the crew, it was life and death, but to the alien, it was all a game, and This Game is Killer: Alien on Board by Ivan Turner from Smirk & Dagger Games with art by Grafit Studio.
The post This Game is Killer: Alien on Board (Saturday Review) appeared first on Tabletop Games Blog.
BGI 401 The One About The Case For Reprints
Board Games Insider – Join our Guild on Board Game Geek Guild | Like us on FB
Social media:
Ignacy Trzewiczek / Portal Games: website | FB | Twitter | Youtube
Corey Thompson / Above Board TV: website | Youtube
Stephen Buonocore / “The Podfather Of Gaming”: website | FB | Twitter | Youtube
Intro Music: Happy Rock – Bensound.com
Peter checks out Kings of War for the first time with the new 4th Edition!
It’s a brand new year – the 14th! – for the Esoteric Order of Gamers, and I’m kicking it off with a new project – Kings of War by Mantic Games! Will this be your new favourite game of fantasy battles? Stick with me over the coming weeks as I unbox, build, paint and play (and of course, make a rules summary for) this rank and flank fantasy tabletop miniatures game.
Step into the role of a United States Postal Inspector and work your way through three cases of increasing difficulty, each inspired by a real-life crime.
Another year has passed, and it's once more time to announce the winner of Tabletop Games Blog's highly sought-after and extremely prestigious Top Table Award of 2025. The top slot for this year will join the hall of fame alongside previous years' board games that made it to the number 1 spot on the podium. The winner of the 2025 award will be in the company of Charms, Enemy Anemone, Pax Pamir: Second Edition and others.
The post Top Table Award 2025 (Saturday Review) appeared first on Tabletop Games Blog.
Why, hello there. How have you been? It’s been a few months. I’m doing well, enjoying my retirement from the blogosphere. I’m not really back, I just wanted to pop in and give my annual recap of all the new-to-me games played in 2025. Plus, I’ll be picking the winner of the prestigious Spiel des Jesse award at the end. Thanks for joining me!
We’ll start with the new-to-me games. I’ll be providing a rating for each on my patented Yeah-Meh-Bleah scale (which, for legal reasons, I probably should let you know is NOT actually patented).
by playing this game. It’s good – I liked the system of taking things at your own pace and deciding when to recall your workers. As cool as the tree looks, I can see that thing being very annoying. RATING: Yeah.And now, on to the nominees for this year’s Spiel des Jesse. Long time fans may know the criteria already, but here it is again for anyone new to this space: any game is eligible for the award if I played it for the first time during 2025, and as long as I played it at least twice. This cuts out a few games that probably would have made the nomination list, including Daybreak, River Valley Glassworks, and Everdell, among others. From the games that were eligible, here’s my shortlist:
This was a tough year to decide – all of these are great games, but I don’t know how much any one of them stood out over the others. Still, there can only be one, and I think that this year it will be…
I really like the drafting in Meadow, and the way the cards interact to form new combos and scoring opportunities. It’s a beautiful game, plays well multiplayer and solo, and I like it a lot. So, that’s my pick, and it joins Argent: The Consortium (2014), Colt Express (2015), Burgle Bros (2016), Clank! (2017), Azul (2018), Rhino Hero Super Battle (2019), Roll Player (2020), The Isle of Cats (2021), Mandala (2022), Fantasy Realms (2023), and Lost Ruins of Arnak (2024) in the exclusive club of previous Spiel des Jesse winners.
Time to crawl back into my hole. Thanks for joining me for this annual recap. Right now, I plan to come back in June or July to do my annual Spiel des Jahres picks, but who knows. Thanks for reading!
Why, hello there. How have you been? It’s been a few months. I’m doing well, enjoying my retirement from the blogosphere. I’m not really back, I just wanted to pop in and give my annual recap of all the new-to-me games played in 2025. Plus, I’ll be picking the winner of the prestigious Spiel des Jesse award at the end. Thanks for joining me!
We’ll start with the new-to-me games. I’ll be providing a rating for each on my patented Yeah-Meh-Bleah scale (which, for legal reasons, I probably should let you know is NOT actually patented).
by playing this game. It’s good – I liked the system of taking things at your own pace and deciding when to recall your workers. As cool as the tree looks, I can see that thing being very annoying. RATING: Yeah.And now, on to the nominees for this year’s Spiel des Jesse. Long time fans may know the criteria already, but here it is again for anyone new to this space: any game is eligible for the award if I played it for the first time during 2025, and as long as I played it at least twice. This cuts out a few games that probably would have made the nomination list, including Daybreak, River Valley Glassworks, and Everdell, among others. From the games that were eligible, here’s my shortlist:
This was a tough year to decide – all of these are great games, but I don’t know how much any one of them stood out over the others. Still, there can only be one, and I think that this year it will be…
I really like the drafting in Meadow, and the way the cards interact to form new combos and scoring opportunities. It’s a beautiful game, plays well multiplayer and solo, and I like it a lot. So, that’s my pick, and it joins Argent: The Consortium (2014), Colt Express (2015), Burgle Bros (2016), Clank! (2017), Azul (2018), Rhino Hero Super Battle (2019), Roll Player (2020), The Isle of Cats (2021), Mandala (2022), Fantasy Realms (2023), and Lost Ruins of Arnak (2024) in the exclusive club of previous Spiel des Jesse winners.
Time to crawl back into my hole. Thanks for joining me for this annual recap. Right now, I plan to come back in June or July to do my annual Spiel des Jahres picks, but who knows. Thanks for reading!
Recommended
Still enjoying The Great British Baking Show as a cozy watch. But even if you don’t watch it, here’s a great phrase — “A total bag of pants” (meaning a disaster). Has entered my lexicon and I’m experimenting with all the “<container> of <garment>” combos. And also watching Prue Leith (an 80 year old proper British Matriarch type, but with an Austin Powers 60’s flair) innocently ask things like “Tell us about your beaver,” or “I am interested in your large nuts” never gets old. Sadly only have a series or two left to watch.
Maybe
The 9th Configuration — An insane 70s movie (although released in early 80) set in a military insane asylum where the inmates apparently have access to a Hollywood prop department to enact whatever crazy stuff they want. Written, Produced and Directed by William Blatty (fresh of The Exorcist) so the studios were willing to let him do whatever he wanted. Some great scenes and mostly great but nonsensical dialogue. I had to watch it in chunks. Definitely a noble failure and not a cookie cutter movie.
Grantchester — A Masterpiece Mystery that is definitely ripping off Father Brown1. (Except that the priest is Anglican? Church of England? In any case, Not Catholic and it’s post WW-II instead of WW-I). But I like Father Brown and this is close enough for me. But as the series goes on it gets less about the mystery of the week and more about the main character(s) being miserable, and lost a fair chunk of the joy2. (Netflix only has the first four of the ten(!) seasons).
In the Mouth of Madness — A (90s) rewatch of which I remembered almost nothing. Attempts to capture Lovecraftian dread, but the execution isn’t quite there. Some genuinely creepy moments but also too reliant on “repeated dream awakenings” and re-used footage. Amazing to think that John Carpenter did this a decade after The Thing, because the monster effects are a step down; less is more would have been so much better here3. But …. any schlock horror movie is elevated by David Warner & Jürgen Prochnow looks very anti-christ-like. Clever ending, but “ah, that’s clever” clever instead of a gut punch. I think it works better if you simply lop off the last few minutes.4
The Long Kiss Goodnight — (90s Rewatch, pt II). Shane Black makes another Shane Black movie. Action movie? Check! Partners who don’t like each other? Check! Banter? Christmastime? Checkity Check! Sadly this isn’t up the the heights that Lethal Weapon started, but its not bad.
Nobody Wants This (S2) — A reasonable ‘comfort food’ romcom/sitcom. Sometimes veers into cringe, but it understands that a romcom/sitcom must be funny (and heartwarming) so that both Mr. and Mrs. Tao will watch.
Under the Skin (book) — Read this after watching the movie (see Sep-Oct). Good, but in a very different way (books can show inner monologues, movies are visual). I think that the near silence of the movie was a good choice, but that necessitated changing the story to make it much more ambiguous. Note — Not for the squeamish.
Wick is Pain — Documentary on the John Wick Franchise. Reasonable if you liked the franchise. What impressed me was seeing stunts that I said “Obvious CGI” in the theater and then discovering that the CGI was only for the environment, not the stunt itself, which was real. (The building fall at the end of John Wick 2)
Maybe Not
Turned Off / Not Recommended
“Oh, Hi!” — I saw this recommended by Marginal Revolution. The plot is that a young couple go on a weekend vacation, find some bondage equipment, he gets tied up and (after sex) reveals that he doesn’t consider this a serious relationship, at which point she leaves him tied up and tries to convince him that she is girlfriend material. BUT nobody is sympathetic. She’s crazy. (It’s established that she considered stabbing her last boyfriend). “Leave him tied up” isn’t played for laughs, and isn’t funny. On the other hand, she’s right. You don’t go on a weekend trip alone after dating for four months and expect her to think it’s a fling. In Re: “Crazy girl” vs “Idiot Boy” I find both guilty. Turned off at the 30 minute mark (or less), tried to continue a few times. Failed. Now re-reading Marginal Revolution I realized that “better than expected retelling of…” isn’t necessarily an endorsement.5
Tenet — This finally showed up on streaming and … man; was Christopher Nolan trolling us the entire time6? “What if I just didn’t have a plot at all, but did as much cool stuff as possible?” Turned off before the hour mark; tried again and couldn’t get through another few minutes. It’s like a Bond movie with truly excellent set pieces and locations. (Off-brand Bond but not skimping on quality). Plus Time-travel special effects. But when you break it open it’s just Nelson Munz “Hah hah!”-ing you, the sucker audience.
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Anmelden
