In the most distant reaches of the world, magic still exists, embodied by spirits of the land, of the sky, and of every natural thing. As the great powers of Europe stretch their colonial empires further and further, they will inevitably lay claim to a place where spirits still hold power - and when they do, the land itself will fight back alongside the islanders who live there.Spirit Island is a complex and thematic cooperative game about defending your island home from colonizing Invaders. Players are different spirits of the land, each with its own unique elemental powers. Every turn, players simultaneously choose which of their power cards to play, paying energy to do so. Using combinations of power cards that match a spirit's elemental affinities can grant free bonus effects. Faster powers take effect immediately, before the Invaders spread and ravage, but other magics are slower, requiring forethought and planning to use effectively. In the Spirit phase, spirits gain energy, and choose how / whether to Grow: to reclaim used power cards, to seek for new power, or to spread presence into new areas of the island.The Invaders expand across the island map in a semi-predictable fashion. Each turn they explore into some lands (portions of the island); the next turn, they build in those lands, forming settlements and cities. The turn after that, they ravage there, bringing blight to the land and attacking any native islanders present.The islanders fight back against the Invaders when attacked, and lend the spirits some other aid, but may not always do so exactly as you'd hoped. Some Powers work through the islanders, helping them (eg) drive out the Invaders or clean the land of blight.The game escalates as it progresses: spirits spread their presence to new parts of the island and seek out new and more potent powers, while the Invaders step up their colonization efforts. Each turn represents 1-3 years of alternate-history.At game start, winning requires destroying every last settlement and city on the board - but as you frighten the Invaders more and more, victory becomes easier: they'll run away even if some number of settlements or cities remain. Defeat comes if any spirit is destroyed, if the island is overrun by blight, or if the Invader deck is depleted before achieving victory.The game includes different adversaries to fight against (eg: a Swedish Mining Colony, or a Remote British Colony). Each changes play in different ways, and offers a different path of difficulty boosts to keep the game challenging as you gain skill.

Read more less

Gloomhaven: Buttons & Bugs is a solo play game, with an original campaign story written by Isaac Childres, that features a playstyle similar to Gloomhaven in a fraction of the size.Gloomhaven: Buttons & Bugs is set after the events of Gloomhaven and Forgotten Circles. The Aesther recluse Hail has earned a reputation for being highly instrumental in saving the city from recurring disasters, and she absolutely hates it. Wannabe heroes are constantly barging in on her studies at the Crooked Bone, looking for help in becoming famous themselves — not to mention all the demons that come by looking for vengeance. She briefly considered moving, but as that would require effort, she instead just placed an enchantment on her front door: Anyone who attempts to open it becomes miniaturized and therefore is no longer a problem.Your character is one such wannabe hero. In an ill-advised attempt at fame, they try to visit Hail, and poof. Now they're the size of a mouse and have entered an entirely different realm of lawlessness and self-preservation. They must find a new way into the Crooked Bone to convince Hail to return them to their previous size.Each scenario is a single card, pitting one mercenary against a handful of enemies with simplified actions and AI. Each mercenary has a hand of just four double-sided cards, but they can be used twice — both the front and the back — before they are discarded. Attacks are resolved using a die in conjunction with a modifier table, and both the table and the mercenary ability cards can be improved as you level up throughout the campaign.—description from the publisher

Read more less

Trouble is brewing off the shores of Catan. Though your thriving communities have begun to grow into majestic cities, your success and wealth have caught the attention of marauding invaders. To ensure the collective security of the island, you must stand together and muster an army of the bravest knights.Maintaining an army while also advancing your society is no simple task, but the greatest leaders thrive on a good challenge. Huzzah

Read more less

Climb the social ladder — or kick it over. The trick-taking game Tax the Rich features a deck depicting characters of various social ranks from the Poor to the President. Each round begins with a simple bidding phase to determine both the trump color and the number of tricks required to score bonus points. The winner of the bid must then acquire the required number of tricks, together with their ally. The game is played as a trick-taking game in which the highest social ranks are the strongest cards. However, if at any time all remaining cards in your hand have a flag symbol, you may trigger a "revolution" by revealing your cards. This flips the social hierarchy upside down so that the lowest-ranked cards become the most powerful. Having called for a revolution, you stand publicly exposed, playing the rest of this round with your cards face up. The game includes thirteen rule cards that add variety by giving certain character cards special abilities related to their profession: Workers "unionize", the Billionaires "power grab", the Police "stop and frisk", Scientists "debunk" etc. You can play with random rule cards or use one of the scenarios suggested in the rules. With an optional variant, players can also collect cards with a feminist icon to trigger a feminist revolution, boosting the value of all female characters. —description from the designer

Read more less

The desert heat is relentless but so are you... Gravel sprays out from under your tires and your car gives a sickening lurch as it begins to spin out. Clutch. Shift. Gas! Your engine roars and your car leaps into the next turn on a perfect line; you're still in the race but you'll have to watch for loose gravel on the track. Heat: Rocky Roads introduces two new racing tracks. IN the South Africa Grand Prix you will face treacherous gravel on the track, requiring careful management of your car and nerves of steel. Victory on the Germany track will hinge on how you deal with the fast pace of the newly build chicanes along the long straight away. Take part in the 1966 Championship season and take advantage of a new innovation, the sliding Skirt, to surprise your opponents and slipstream to victory!

Read more less

In Small World, players vie for conquest and control of a world that is simply too small to accommodate them all.Designed by Philippe Keyaerts as a fantasy follow-up to his award-winning Vinci, Small World is inhabited by a zany cast of characters such as dwarves, wizards, amazons, giants, orcs, and even humans, who use their troops to occupy territory and conquer adjacent lands in order to push the other races off the face of the earth.Picking the right combination from the 14 different fantasy races and 20 unique special powers, players rush to expand their empires - often at the expense of weaker neighbors. Yet they must also know when to push their own over-extended civilization into decline and ride a new one to victory!On each turn, you either use the multiple tiles of your chosen race (type of creatures) to occupy adjacent (normally) territories - possibly defeating weaker enemy races along the way, or you give up on your race letting it go "into decline". A race in decline is designated by flipping the tiles over to their black-and-white side.At the end of your turn, you score one point (coin) for each territory your races occupy. You may have one active race and one race in decline on the board at the same time. Your occupation total can vary depending on the special abilities of your race and the territories they occupy. After the final round, the player with the most coins wins.Clarifications: available in a pinned forum post.

Read more less

Delve deeper than ever before in CLANK! Catacombs: Lairs and Lost Chambers!Strange sounds have been heard beneath the catacombs...Brave the lairs of the enigmatic Sphinx, the petrifying Medusa, or the formidable Living Statues.Discover lost Chambers, each with a unique power found nowhere else in the dungeon. Collect trophies of your adventures to help your legend grow!—description from the publisher

Read more less

Battle of Hoth is a game of heroic and fast-paced battles of miniatures that's set on the ice planet Hoth and reenacts one of the most famous scenes of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.Using the popular Command and Colors system, players take turns choosing command cards each turn to activate units and decide how to move and attack, across seventeen scenarios included in the box.For a deeper gaming experience, players have the option to add leader cards to their battle for support from six iconic Star Wars characters, or they try the two multi-scenario campaigns in which successes and failures shape the next battles.

Read more less

Draft dice and use the tools-of-the-trade in Sagrada to carefully construct your stained glass window masterpiece. In more detail, each player builds a stained glass window by building up a grid of dice on their player board. Each board has some restrictions on which color or shade (value) of die can be placed there. Dice of the same shade or color may never be placed next to each other. Dice are drafted in player order, with the start player rotating each round, snaking back around after the last player drafts two dice. Scoring is variable per game based on achieving various patterns and varieties of placement...as well as bonus points for dark shades of a particular hidden goal color. Special tools can be used to help you break the rules by spending skill tokens; once a tool is used, it then requires more skill tokens for the other players to use them. The highest scoring window artisan wins!

Read more less

Unmatched Adventures: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is the second title in the co-operative Unmatched Adventures series. Play as Leonardo, Raphael, Donatello, and Michelangelo to take down Shredder or fight off Krang. They'll be joined by a host of TMNT characters. —description from the publisher

Read more less

In Nekojima, “The Island of Cats” in Japan, an electricity network is developing to supply the various lively districts of the island. The installation of electric poles becomes more complex due to the narrowness of the territory and its curious population of cats strolling on the cables. Nekojima is a wooden game of skill and dexterity in which you have to keep an entire installation in balance. Players take turns placing or stacking denchuu — 電柱, or electrical poles — respecting the locations without any hanging cables touching. Be careful not to be the one to bring down the structure. This game requires reflection, concentration and skill. In competitive mode, the player who knocks down the structure loses.In cooperative mode, the goal is to go as far as possible. —description from the publisher   + More

Read more less