It's October 31st... All Hallows Eve... or Halloween. I was curious what games included the word "Halloween" in the title. There are actually quite a few, however most don't look all that good. Here are the three I found most interesting. Halloween Party This recent Kickstarter campaign looks quite interesting. The artwork is really well done. The components look nice. If the game plays as well as everything looks, then this could be a winner. The video preview is fun to watch, CLICK HERE to see it. For more details on gameplay and photos, check out their Kickstarter campaign. Halloween Published by Quined Games in 2017, Halloween looks like a promising tactical board game. Though I haven't played this game, it does peek my interest. Players are demon lords controlling ghosts. Earn more Haunt Points than your opponents to win the game. Components and artwork look nice. I'm interested to give this one a try. To get the full description and see more photos, follow my link to the Board Game Geek listing by Clicking Here. King of Tokyo: Halloween King of Tokyo is a hugely successful game franchise, fun to play with family and friends. Believe it or not, I haven't played any of the games from this series. When searching for "good" halloween titled games, this one kept drawing me to it. Fun artwork and a game that has proven itself over the years. If King of Tokyo: Halloween sounds like your cup of tea (or witches brew) then Click Here to see the full description and photos on BGG. Final Thoughts
It was very interesting to see how many games used the word "Halloween" in the title, yet how few seemed to be worth playing. Many of the titles seemed to be small or independent publishers or just gimmicky games sold for the novelty. Some were foreign titles that didn't necessarily appeal to me. Some games looked OK... however, just not enough to include here. Perhaps I missed a few diamonds in the rough. Maybe you know of a game with "Halloween" in its title that is worthy of some love. Please post your suggestions in the comments. Also, if you've played any of the games mentioned and want to weigh in with your thoughts, please share. Happy Halloween everyone. Game on!
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Recently I attended a game night at my friend Troy's house. He has a large game collection and is gracious enough to host gaming at his place often. Last week I got the chance to play Hit Z Road while at Troy's. Game Overview Hit Z Road is a game for 1-4 players, designed by Martin Wallace. A relatively easy-to-learn resource management game with a hint of press-your-luck. The game is rated to play in 30-60 minutes, however ours took a bit longer as we had to set up the game followed by a quick overview and teaching of the rules. Troy included additional cards as we were modifying the game to play with five players. He is quite skilled at taking a game and modifying it to match our player count. I never feel like I didn't get the proper game experience. This game was much the same, as it felt like the game played as it should, even though expanded to accommodate five of us. The basic setting of the game is that you are playing a board & card game that has been cobbled together by someone after a zombie apocalypse. The game components are made to look like old, beat-up playing cards, bottle caps, name tags, etc... Players gather a group of survivors and bid their resources each round for a pair of cards which represents the path your tiny group of survivors is taking. The pair of cards indicates how many zombies will need to be fought, resources found along that path, any special items or special rules, as well as any victory points that may be on each card. Using special dice, survivors attempt to kill the zombies that they face along their selected path. Players use the resources of Gas, Adrenaline, and Ammunition to help defeat or avoid the zombies and other obstacles. Play progressively gets more difficult and in the end some of the players may get eliminated. The surviving player with the most victory points wins the game. Thoughts about the game
Other than a slightly longer game, I believe adding a fifth player worked well. I believe the experience was probably spot on to how a four-player game would play. Out of the five of us, three survived to the end, with Mark taking the win. The game is easy to learn/teach. The components are a lot of fun. The graphic design and artwork created to look like found items and leftover pieces adds to the visual appeal of the game. This one is easy enough that families can play, yet has enough decisions and strategy that heavier gamers can find enjoyment as well. The dice element does add a bit of luck that can truly make or break a game, but that's part of the fun. The resources help players manage the luck to a degree. Martin Wallace continues to amaze me with his versatility in game design. Overall, I really liked this one. If you like my overview of the game, you might consider Hit Z Road. You can find it for very reasonable pricing online (user $30). Follow King's GameNight Facebook page and keep reading my King's GameNight gaming blog. Game on! I finally had a chance to play the 5th-player expansion for Lords of Hellas. The GameNight crew and I played earlier this week. I'll share my thoughts on the Atlantis expansion and gameplay. The Dark Ages Expansions Pack includes the Atlantis 5th Player Expansion. This adds an additional game board with the island of Atlantis, several new figures and some new game mechanics. This week we played with five players and got to try out the expansion for the first time. For the purposes of this article, I'm going to assume that you have some knowledge of the original game, either from first-hand experience or from blog posts and the like. What gets added When including a 5th player in Lords of Hellas several things are added. The Atlantis expansion requires that you use the Poseidon monument. When adding Poseidon, two new mechanics are added: Ports and Fleets. Ports are indicated by tokens which are placed in a specific region in each land, allowing hoplites and heroes to travel from one land to the next via the sea port. Fleets are an additional attribute indicating fleet ships that can add to your army's strength in port regions. Each player can raise their fleet attribute by praying at the Poseidon monument, thus increasing possible army strength in port regions. The Atlantis expansion itself has many new additions. It includes a new hero, Cleito, as well as the purple army (hoplites and priests) and associated purple army board. A game-board addition is added with the island of Atlantis containing three regions. The new board connects to the original map/board via sea trails and the introduction of ports (mentioned above). Three new quests are added. Three monsters are included: Siren, Cetus, and Talos. Instead of a normal temple, Atlantis includes a "Factory", which when built summons the new monster Talos who is under the control of whomever controls the Inner Circle region with the Factory. Gameplay This week Nikki, Jeff, Dave, Chris and myself gave the new expansion a try. Starting a game with five players is much the same as any other game of Lords of Hellas. After selecting who goes first, the last player gets to pick the hero and faction color of their choice and place the hero and two hoplites on the board. This continues counterclockwise until the first player gets to select his/her hero. Then play starts. This game went as most games of Lords of Hellas, however, It felt like players were selecting different strategies to focus on. Lords of Hellas has four victory conditions and it seemed as if we were fairly diverse in the tracks we were taking. It did feel like adding the fifth player also created additional down-time between plays. Unless you get attacked, there isn't a lot of player interaction between turns. Most of the off-time is spent strategizing or just socializing. In our game, Nikki started off in Atlantis (the new map/portion of the game board) and was able to dominate that area. She seemed content to control that portion of the map and it was difficult for others to attempt to invade. Once Nikki had the purple glory token allowing her to use the usurp special action in the purple land, it was nearly impossible for any other army to control a region in Atlantis. I tried and failed. As play progressed Dave, Chris, Jeff and myself all vied for control of regions/lands on the main board. Monuments were getting built, quests were being attempted and completed, temples built and blessing drafts added to our abilities. As players began to hone in on their selected end-game strategies, I found myself distracted and attempting too many goals, resulting in leaving some areas vulnerable. Chris ultimately took advantage and seized two lands completing one of the victory conditions and winning the game. Final Thoughts
Lords of Hellas is a great board game with multiple strategies and tactics available to all. The wonderful miniatures add to the visual presence. The Atlantis expansion and use of the Poseidon monument added to that experience. It felt like the additions were able to maintain similar gameplay at a higher player count. None of the cards, actions, monsters, etc... ran out. There was plenty of action to go around. As mentioned above, five players can lengthen gameplay a bit, though it didn't seem to be much longer than a four-player game, considering I did take extra time at the beginning to explain the new features, items and rules with the expansion. The additional Atlantis game board does feel a little "tacked on". It sits to one side and the boarder of the original game board visually segregates the two. I do not have the sixth player expansion "City of Steel" however it adds yet another player and a game board. The City of Steel game board in the 6th-player expansion fills the void left above the Atlantis game board. A third party developed a game mat that incorporates all the maps into one. Awaken Realms has since adopted that full 6-player game mat and now created a neoprene mat that will be available after Spiele '19 in Essen, I believe. That game mat is going to be added to my wish list. The new monsters add some variation to the game. Keeping with the Atlantis sea theme, Siren occupies only regions with a port while Cetus moves from sea lane to sea lane blocking passage. Talos being controlled by a player adds a fun new dynamic. Poseidon added different blessings and the use of ports and fleets. The fleets ended up not being much of a factor in our game, however I think that's due to lack of familiarity. I can see fleets being used more in future games. A lot of new features, mechanics, figures etc... are added in this expansion, yet it feels natural. It's not a big learning curve to add these if you're familiar with the base game. An expansion well done. All said... I think the Atlantis Expansion for Lords of Hellas is a lot of fun. No real issues or broken gameplay. All the additions added something to the game. If you enjoy a lot of minis, battle, strategy, etc... Then Lords of Hellas and this Atlantis expansion just might be for you as well. Until next time... keep checking out King's GameNight blog and... Game on! Spiel is one of the top two tabletop gaming conventions in the world. Many board game enthusiasts would rank it as the top such convention. Gen Con is the only other convention which rivals it. Each year at Spiele there a large number of new releases which are announced and many available for purchase. I will highlight a few of these expected releases which caught my eye. The 2019 Spiel game fair in Essen, Germany will feature numerous new releases. Many times these games become the most sought after games during the holiday season and into the new year. I have looked at some others' reviews and the list of anticipated releases. Following is my list of several that I was particularly interested in. Cooper Island A game about exploration and colonization. Cooper Island utilizes worker placement, tile laying, and resource management mechanisms. The components and artwork look very interesting. BGG Link Fuji Koro Beautiful components and miniatures. This game sends samurai into the volcano in search of valuable and magical items before Mount Fuji erupts. It has both a competitive and a cooperative mode for up to six players. This one really gets me excited to see and play. BGG Lin Coloma Set during the great western gold rush of 1849, players are trying to strike it rich. Prospect for gold and hire workers and gain other resources. The game board, components and artwork drew me to this one. BGG Link Terramara A worker placement game set in Northern Italy. You play as the chief of a clan attempting to expand and establish yours as the best clan. Though I don't know much about it, there are some mentions of some interesting twists to the typical worker placement game. BGG Link Maracaibo A game set in the Caribbean. Players sail to islands, deliver goods and other actions. The theme speaks to me. This relatively short game designed by Alexander Pfister is a good bet to draw some attention. BGG Lin Planet Unknown Not releasing until 2020, Planet Unknown is a space themed game that looks promising. Searching for resources beyond our own planet, each player must develop their own planet. This game utilizes the recently popular mechanism of polyomino (shape or Tetris®-like pieces). Might be one to look for into the next year. BGG Link Offshore An interesting theme of oil drilling platforms. One point of interest is that it requires temporary cooperation between players. The artwork and theme caught my attention. I hope there's a good game here as well. BGG Link The Refuge: Terror from the Deep Something about the subject matter appealed to me. This game has deep sea divers competing against each other to escape the kraken and make it back to the surface in an escape pod with your cargo. There is also a cooperative mode allowing players to work together to defeat the kraken. The tentacle miniatures on the board add to the interest in this one. BGG Link Dwellings of Eldervale Though I believe this game had actually been announced at other gaming conventions earlier this year, I wanted to include it on my list. Board Game Geek included it in its Spiel preview list of games. My friend and gaming buddy Chris has already backed the Kickstarter for this and others I know have played the demos at conventions. It is highly thought of and I'm excited to give it a try next year when it releases. BGG Link Its always exciting to look at the newest games that are getting ready to be released and imagine how much fun it will be to play them. I'm sure that some will be just as fun and exciting as imagined while others may fall short. My list is just some of the ones that stuck out for me. I hope I've been able to cast a light on some new games that might be interesting for others as well. Let me know what other games you like that are being shown at Spiel in Essen. Send any messages directly via the contact page. Keep checking out King's GameNight blog and...
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