Diplomacy.

That's a word with power. The art of diplomacy has shaped the course of human history more than any army ever could. Wars have been avoided and empires preserved or dismantled entirely through the right conversation at the right moment. It is the oldest game humanity has ever played, so it makes sense that someone turned it into a board game.

Turning back to 1959, a certain Allan Calhamer designed Diplomacy. A game that spotlights the messy, treacherous, and deeply human act of negotiation. Dice were not welcome here. Players wrote down their orders in secret after tense talks with their opponents, and the table rarely survived intact. It resonated with many people, including John F. Kennedy, which tells you everything you need to know about what kind of game this is.

Despite its importance, Diplomacy was never destined to be a household name. People are aware of it the way they are aware of chess, with a vague sense that it is serious and probably not for them. It sits in a niche within an already niche industry, respected by the people who know it and largely ignored by everyone else.

JFK Would Need to Relearn This One 

Then Renegade Game Studios announced a card game spinoff.…

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I have a secret to tell you. I like Monopoly Deal. Not love, not champion, just like. In the crowded basement of casual card games, it earns its keep. Put it this way, given the choice between Monopoly Deal, Exploding Kittens, and UNO, Deal is getting picked every time.

Yet there is a trend quietly taking over the casual card game space where publishers are releasing meaner, nastier versions of their existing games. UNO Show 'Em No Mercy, Flip 7 with a Vengeance, and now Monopoly No Mercy are all cut from the same cloth. More take-that and suffering for the people sitting across from you. Where this trend is coming from, I genuinely have no idea.

Cruel Details

The goal hasn't changed from the original. Collect three complete property sets, build your own portfolio while raiding everyone else's, and be the first to get there. What has changed is the action cards, some of which would qualify as war crimes in certain jurisdictions, and the addition of debt chips.

Debt chips are the most radical departure from the original formula. Money flows in and out fast in Monopoly No Mercy, and there will be moments where you simply cannot cover what you owe. That is…

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Maybe it's my old age catching up with me, but I don't have time for 3-hour marathons unless it's something truly special, like Hegemony. A Familiar Find caught my eye with wonderful artwork and stellar graphic design, with the box promising a fun family experience in under an hour. So when Darrington Press offered a review copy, I said yes.

You play as a fantasy familiar gathering ingredients for an adventurer. The game is apparently set in a fictional campaign world from Critical Role, although my connection to that entire media empire is a glowing 404 error. The core mechanic has you claiming one of three available card piles per turn, with players seeding those piles from their hand to set themselves up for a future turn or nudge an opponent toward something they don't want. Not every card is a gift or even face up, making the game feel like a "pick your poison" for a good portion of the time.

Familiar Territory

Winning is as straightforward as the premise. You're collecting ingredients into sets, either 2 sets of 4 or 4 sets of 2, for example. There's also an instant win condition where collecting 3 Astral Essence cards ends the game in your favor. The flip side…

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REM Racers. A name I didn't expect to hear again. Around this time last year, I reviewed the REM Racers board game, and as the name suggests, it's a racing game, a futuristic one at that. The box art is high-fidelity, the components are fantastic, and all of it would lead you to believe I'm about to gush. Instead, this was one of the least enjoyable gaming experiences I've had in a long, long time. I'm trying to be professional here.

So when they announced a card game version, I was a bit taken aback. From what I understand, the original wasn't well-received, and that usually doesn't earn you a spin-off. Then again, card games are cheap, and this one promises a runtime of roughly 20 minutes. Is it an improvement? Is it a good game? Am I going to stop asking questions? Yes.

They Did It Again

The title's a bit of a spoiler: it's a race. Everyone picks a pilot with a unique ability, and the goal is to finish first. But since there's no board or physical race track, the whole thing plays out pretty abstractly. Player positions are tracked by lining up everyone's car card in a row, first place to last. The track is represented by the "curve deck," a series of cards…

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