"Now the trumpet summons us again, not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need; not as a call to battle, though embattled we are – but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle..."– John F. KennedyIn 1945, unlikely allies toppled Hitler's war machine, while humanity's most devastating weapons forced the Japanese Empire to its knees in a storm of fire. Where once there stood many great powers, there then stood only two. The world had scant months to sigh its collective relief before a new conflict threatened. Unlike the titanic struggles of the preceding decades, this conflict would be waged not primarily by soldiers and tanks, but by spies and politicians, scientists and intellectuals, artists and traitors. Twilight Struggle is a two-player game simulating the forty-five year dance of intrigue, prestige, and occasional flares of warfare between the Soviet Union and the United States. The entire world is the stage on which these two titans fight to make the world safe for their own ideologies and ways of life. The game begins amidst the ruins of Europe as the two new "superpowers" scramble over the wreckage of the Second World War, and ends in 1989, when only the United States remained standing.Twilight Struggle inherits its fundamental systems from the card-driven classics We the People and Hannibal: Rome vs. Carthage. It is a quick-playing, low-complexity game in that tradition. The game map is a world map of the period, whereon players move units and exert influence in attempts to gain allies and control for their superpower. As with GMT's other card-driven games, decision-making is a challenge; how to best use one's cards and units given consistently limited resources?Twilight Struggle's Event cards add detail and flavor to the game. They cover a vast array of historical happenings, from the Arab-Israeli conflicts of 1948 and 1967, to Vietnam and the U.S. peace movement, to the Cuban Missile Crisis and other such incidents that brought the world to the brink of nuclear annihilation. Subsystems capture the prestige-laden Space Race as well as nuclear tensions, with the possibility of game-ending nuclear war.Components (original edition): 228 full colour counters  22"x34" full colour map  103 event cards  2 six-sided dice 1 24-page rulebook 2 full colour player aid cardsComponents (2009 Deluxe edition and after) 260 full colour counters  22"x34" mounted map with revised graphics 110 event cards 2 six-sided dice 1 24-page rulebook 2 full colour player aid cardsTIME SCALE: approx. 3-5 years per turnMAP SCALE: Point-to-point systemUNIT SCALE: Influence markersNUMBER OF PLAYERS: 2DESIGNER: Ananda Gupta & Jason MatthewsMAP, CARD, & COUNTER ART: Mark SimonitchA deluxe edition, published in 2009 includes the following changes from the basic game: Mounted map with revised graphics Two double-thick counter sheets with 260 counters Deck of 110 event cards (increased from 103) Revised rules and player aid cards Revised at start setup and text change for card #98 Aldrich AmesUpgrade kit for the owners of the previous version includes the following: Mounted Map with revised graphics New card decks Updated Rules & Charts

Read more less

Featuring classic gameplay and gameboard, this game contains 2,400 questions in 6 categories: Geography, Entertainment, History, Art and Literature, Science and Nature, and Sports and Leisure. Players move around the board answering questions. When a player lands on a category space, they'll earn the corresponding coloured wedge if they answer the question correctly. The first player to collect 6 different coloured wedges and answer a final question correctly wins!

Read more less

Ticket to Ride: First Journey takes the gameplay of the Ticket to Ride series and scales it down for a younger audience.In general, players collect train cards, claim routes on the map, and try to connect the cities shown on their tickets. In more detail, the game board shows a map of Europe with certain cities being connect by colored paths. Each player starts with four colored train cards in hand and two tickets; each ticket shows two cities, and you're trying to connect those two cities with a contiguous path of your trains in order to complete the ticket.On a turn, you either draw two train cards from the deck or discard train cards to claim a route between two cities; for this latter option, you must discard cards matching the color and number of spaces on that route (e.g., two yellow cards for a yellow route that's two spaces long). If you connect the two cities shown on a ticket with a path of your trains, reveal the ticket, place it face up in front of you, then draw a new ticket. (If you can't connect cities on either ticket because the paths are blocked, you can take your entire turn to discard those tickets and draw two new ones.) If you connect one of the westernmost cities (Dublin, Brest, Madrid) to one of the easternmost cities (Moscow, Rostov, Ankara) with a path of your turns, you immediately claim a special cross-continent ticket.The first player to complete six tickets wins! Alternatively, if someone has placed all twenty of their trains on the game board, then whoever has completed the most tickets wins!Ticket to Ride: First Journey features the same gameplay as the first Ticket to Ride: First Journey game, but with the players claiming track in Europe instead of in the United States.Part of Ticket to Ride series.

Read more less

Will the Merchants get their goods past the Sheriff?The bustling market in Nottingham is filled with goods from all over the kingdom. Most of it is entirely legal, however, Prince John is looking to make sure no contraband gets sold. He’s tasked the Sheriff to inspect Merchant’s wares, looking for any illicit goods. The Sheriff’s shrewd, but not above taking a bribe to look the other way. Which Merchant will end up getting the best goods through and make the largest profits in the market stalls?In Sheriff of Nottingham 2nd Edition, players take turns playing the Sheriff, looking for contraband goods, and the Merchants trying to stock their Stall with the best goods. The Sheriff can inspect any bag they want, but they must be careful, as they’ll have to pay a penalty if they find the Merchants were telling the truth. This new edition includes updated rules, as well as expansions such as the 6th Merchant, Black Market, and Sheriff’s Deputies.The game box contains 110 Gold Coins, 216 Goods cards, 6 Deputy cards, 6 Black Market cards, 2 Deputy standees, 6 Merchant stands, 6 Merchant bags, a Sheriff standee, a Booty tile, and a rulebook

Read more less

Power Grid is the updated release of the Friedemann Friese crayon game Funkenschlag. It removes the crayon aspect from network building in the original edition, while retaining the fluctuating commodities market like Crude: The Oil Game and an auction round intensity reminiscent of The Princes of Florence.The objective of Power Grid is to supply the most cities with power when someone's network gains a predetermined size. In this new edition, players mark pre-existing routes between cities for connection, and then bid against each other to purchase the power plants that they use to power their cities.However, as plants are purchased, newer, more efficient plants become available, so by merely purchasing, you're potentially allowing others access to superior equipment.Additionally, players must acquire the raw materials (coal, oil, garbage, and uranium) needed to power said plants (except for the 'renewable' windfarm/ solar plants, which require no fuel), making it a constant struggle to upgrade your plants for maximum efficiency while still retaining enough wealth to quickly expand your network to get the cheapest routes.Power Grid FAQ - Please read this before posting a rules question! Many questions are asked over and over in the forums... If you have a question about a specific expansion, please check the rules forum or FAQ for that particular expansion.

Read more less

In 2024, Lookout Games is celebrating the 10th anniversary of another Uwe Rosenberg classic: Patchwork, tremendously popular with players all over the planet, get's a reprint with a brand new color scheme and comes with new artwork. On top, the box will get some extra "bling" and special custom made tokens. Exquisite brand new patterns are designed by illustrators Cecila Mok and Carrie Cantwell. The new skin will replace the original patterns and will be the standard for future reprints of Patchwork. The 10 Year Anniversary Edition contains:1 time board2 quilt boards2 wooden time markers1 wooden neutral token39 cardboard tiles50 cardboard tokensand 1 rule book This edition has one Patchwork: Automa included.

Read more less

In Patchwork, two players compete to build the most aesthetic (and high-scoring) patchwork quilt on a personal 9x9 game board. To start play, lay out all of the patches at random in a circle and place a marker directly clockwise of the 2-1 patch. Each player takes five buttons — the currency/points in the game — and someone is chosen as the start player.On a turn, a player either purchases one of the three patches standing clockwise of the spool or passes. To purchase a patch, you pay the cost in buttons shown on the patch, move the spool to that patch's location in the circle, add the patch to your game board, then advance your time token on the time track a number of spaces equal to the time shown on the patch. You're free to place the patch anywhere on your board that doesn't overlap other patches, but you probably want to fit things together as tightly as possible. If your time token is behind or on top of the other player's time token, then you take another turn; otherwise the opponent now goes. Instead of purchasing a patch, you can choose to pass; to do this, you move your time token to the space immediately in front of the opponent's time token, then take one button from the bank for each space you moved.In addition to a button cost and time cost, each patch also features 0-3 buttons, and when you move your time token past a button on the time track, you earn "button income": sum the number of buttons depicted on your personal game board, then take this many buttons from the bank.What's more, the time track depicts five 1x1 patches on it, and during set-up you place five actual 1x1 patches on these spaces. Whoever first passes a patch on the time track claims this patch and immediately places it on his game board.Additionally, the first player to completely fill in a 7x7 square on his game board earns a bonus tile worth 7 extra points at the end of the game. (Of course, this doesn't happen in every game.)When a player takes an action that moves his time token to the central square of the time track, he takes one final button income from the bank. Once both players are in the center, the game ends and scoring takes place. Each player scores one point per button in his possession, then loses two points for each empty square on his game board. Scores can be negative. The player with the most points wins.

Read more less

The world almost ended 71 years ago...The plague came out of nowhere and ravaged the world. Most died within a week. Nothing could stop it. The world did its best. It wasn't good enough.For three generations, we, the last fragments of humanity have lived on the seas, on floating stations called "havens." Far from the plague, we are able to provide supplies to the mainland to keep them (and us) from succumbing completely.We've managed to keep a network of the largest known cities in the world alive. Things have been tough the past few years. Cities far away from the havens have fallen off our grid...Tomorrow, a small group of us head out into what's left of the world. We don't know what we'll find.Pandemic Legacy: Season 2 is an epic cooperative game for 2 to 4 players. Unlike most other games, this one is working against you. What's more, some of the actions you take in Pandemic Legacy will carry over to future games. No two worlds will ever be alike!Part of the Pandemic series.

Read more less