Dale Yu: Review of Wispwood

Posted on February 20, 2026 by Dale Yu

 

 

Wispwood

  • Designer: Reed Ambrose
  • Publisher: Czech Games Edition
  • Players: 1-4
  • Age: 10+
  • Time: 30-45 minutes
  • Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4qi9zcR
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Is that a light at the end of the… branch?

A curious cat prowls into the forest, lured by flickering lights of all colors dancing through the trees. What are they? Oh, the wisps from the old tales! Each one sparkles with charm and mischief, carrying a unique personality. Can you guide them just right and make your forest the brightest?

Welcome to Wispwood, a magical place populated by glowing wisps. On your turn, choose a wisp tile and a shape to place in your personal grid — your very own growing forest. Each wisp has desires about where it wants to shine, and even the magical trees have preferences! You’ll aim to meet their expectations across three scoring rounds. Between rounds, the forest shifts — fading and expanding — yet the wisps you’ve already placed remain, shaping the possibilities ahead.

With each game, new goal cards redefine the wisps’ whims, ensuring your forest grows in a unique way every time. Enter the forest and explore the magic of Wispwood!

 

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Dale Yu: Review of Kingdom of Dice

Posted on February 19, 2026 by Dale Yu

 

 

Kingdom of Dice

  • Designer: Reiner Knizia
  • Publisher: mandoo games
  • Players: 1-4
  • Age: 8+
  • Time: 30 minutes
  • Amazon affiliate link: 
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Once upon a time, in a distant continent, there was the Kingdom of Dice.

 

The King of Dice was getting old and, having no heir, he announced a grand contest to secure a successor. Aspiring rulers from far and wide are invited to enter the kingdom and prove their worth. Their task? To win the hearts and favor of the kingdom’s inhabitants in just three days.

 

You quite fancy the throne. Each day, try to get as close to the castle as possible to win over the most influential inhabitants of the Kingdom of Dice!

 

Players roll dice to achieve a valid result. If they succeed, they will place one of their markers on the board. At the end of each round, based on the positions of their markers, players will encounter kingdom inhabitants who grant points. At the end of the third round, the player with the most points wins the game.

 

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Dale Yu: Review of Natera: New Beginning

Posted on February 18, 2026 by Dale Yu

 

Natera: New Beginning

  • Designer: Eric Fugere and Hugo Tremblay-Ledoux 
  • Publisher: Horizon Games
  • Players: 1-4
  • Age: 14+
  • Time: 35min/player 
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

In Natera: New Beginning, you play as a sentient and intelligent animal tribe, exploring and controlling areas abandoned in a bright, post-humanity world. With the help of your unique tribe leader and your explorers, you will explore, build authority, and take control of four distinct areas. Doing so will unlock new, more powerful tiles and allow you to establish settlements to further cement your presence. Improvements with human science will unlock powerful bonuses on a tech tree. Collecting the most venture points after four seasons will prove you are the animal tribe that adapted the best to the new Natural Era.  The game includes 150+ basic and advanced exploration cards featuring discoveries, improvements, science, and forty unique specialist cards, allowing each animal tribe to navigate and explore different strategies every single game.

 

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Dale Yu: Review of Map Masters 

Posted on February 17, 2026 by Dale Yu

 

 

Map Masters

  • Designers: Ian Sebastian Bach, Cédrick Caumont 
  • Publisher: Captain Games
  • Players: 1-5
  • Age: 10+
  • Time: 30-60 minutes
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Map Masters is a dungeon-crawling card game in which you must create your path, card by card, through the dark rooms of your dungeon in search of legendary treasures. Dive into Map Masters, a thrilling adventure in Solo, Cooperative, or Competitive mode.

In Map Masters Versus Mode, each player builds their own Dungeon using 5 cards. Once their Dungeon is created, each player draws their Path to collect as many Discoveries as possible that match the round’s Objective. Next, players count the points of Discoveries along their Path that match the Primary and Secondary Objectives in order to earn Victory Points (VP). Along the way, players also collect Coins, which they can use to purchase new Cards or Tokens from the Market. Each turn player will also chose to use the Optimizers they encountered and improve their deck.

In Map Masters Co-op Mode, Players will jointly manage groups of adventurers. In order to accomplish a mission, players should discuss strategy both before and during the game. After the setup and the market phase, players will explore the dungeon.Clockwise, each player will place a card on an empty space of the tableau and draw a new card. Once a group mini can be connected to an objective, players should trace its path. When the mission requirements have been fulfilled, the game is won!

Every game is a new challenge to overcome, every card a crucial decision.

 

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Alison Brennan: Game Snapshots – 2026 (Part 8)

Posted on February 16, 2026 by Dale Yu

 

 

New-to-me games played recently include …

12 RIVERS (2025): Rank 6164, Rating 7.2

12 marbles of different values drop down 12 chutes which gradually coalesce until there’s only 1 channel left. You need specific marbles to fulfil contracts so the gamble you face each round is whether to spend a lot and place your dam high up (and hopefully acquire exactly the high valued marble you need) or spend low and place your dam low down and get whatever’s left – the gamble being if you don’t spend max, will someone spend even more, steal the marble you want, and leave you paying lots for a dam now worth closer to nothing. Repeat for 5 rounds. There are some special effects to mix things up and increase your gambling risk. It’s playable, it’s pretty, but it didn’t make me give a damn.

Rating: 6

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Dale Yu: Four recent Expansions – Heat Rocky Roads, Luna (Galileo Galelei), Terra Mystica Fan Factions, Cities: Achievement Boards and Theaters

Posted on February 15, 2026 by Dale Yu

 

So, just got a chance to play through a number of recent expansions, and I thought it would be nice to package up the previews/reviews in one piece.   I’ll include the link to our review of each base game – if you’re unfamiliar with the base games, go read that first and then come back to learn of the additions included in each of these expansions!

 

 

Review of Heat

Review of Galileo Galilei

Review of Terra Mystica

Review of Cities

 

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