Dale Yu: Review of Vineyard

 

 

Vineyard

  • Designers: Roberta Taylor, Eduardo Baraf, Katherine Waddell 
  • Publisher: Pencil First
  • Players: 1-4
  • Age: 13+
  • Time: 60 minutes
  • Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4dmUrX2
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Welcome to wine country! Vineyard: A Winemaking Game is a 1-4 player game about making wine in a delightful, sun-washed valley. Move workers through the winemaking steps and choose your upgrades. Become a specialist, find the perfect moments to benefit from the activities around the vineyard, and enjoy a streamlined experience of crafting wine!

Set out on a winemaking journey to create sumptuous wine! Choose how to leave your impression by playing action cards, collectively moving workers to locations around the vineyard, and deciding your unique upgrade path. Will you push your luck to get more done, or focus on building up improvements?

  • Shared Worker Placement allows all players to move every worker, setting up future actions and benefits to try to take at the best time.
  • Quick, Engaging Turns keep gameplay moving for everyone with open information as you maximize your important role in the winemaking process.
  • Unique Location Actions provide ways to gain advantages and leverage other 
  • players’ decisions or use clever tactics to temporarily block workers.
  • Ongoing Upgrade Choices give you ways to upgrade-as-you-go with unique specialties and improvements to build your own path to victory.

What is Shared Worker Placement? All players at the table are able to play action cards to move the workers around the vineyard. You do not play a specific character, but choose how to best guide all of the workers! There may be turns when you set up an excellent upcoming action… But will you be the first to take advantage of it? Keep an eye on your fellow players and find the best moment to showcase your winemaking expertise!

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Dale Yu: Review of dnup

dnup

  • Designer: Kei Kajino 
  • Publisher: asmodee
  • Players: 2-5
  • Age: 8+
  • Time: 15-20 minutes
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Your goal in DNUP is to empty your hand of cards.

Each player starts with eight or ten cards in hand, with each card having different numbers (from 1-10) at top and bottom, e.g. 1 and 7. Pick up all your cards at once; you can rearrange cards from left to right at any time, but you can’t revolve them. (Don’t worry, the indexing of the cards lets you know what number would show up if you were to revolve the card!) 

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Alison Brennan: Game Snapshots – 2026 (Part 14)

 

 

New-to-me games played recently include …

CAPER: EUROPE (2022): Rank 514, Rating 7.6

A nice little 2 player with multiple ways to score points, the tug-of-war at each of three locations being just one means. Each turn you play a card to one of the locations and then you swap hands (ie if there’s nothing ideal, play the card you don’t want your opponent to play). The card effects have more score conditions, or move the tug-of-war, or take a stolen good (for set-based points) and so on. Six rounds. Form a strategy based on the cards you see. It’s all over in 20 minutes, easy to teach, easy to play.

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Dale Yu: Review of Twisted Trumpets

 

 

Twisted Trumpets

  • Designer: Matthew Rodela
  • Publisher: Play to Z
  • Players: 2-4
  • Age: 8+
  • Time: 30-45 minutes
  • Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4uGuAAp
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Twisted Trumpets is a lively, competitive tile-laying game where you vie for the prestigious title of “Royal Bugler” by crafting the most whimsical trumpet in the kingdom!   The game ends when a player completely fills all but three squares on their player board. You’ll finish that round, then all players take one final turn. Everyone tallies their scores based on the length of completed pipes, sets of flags, notes surrounding birds, public objectives, and private goals. The player with the most points wins and becomes the new Royal Bugler!

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Dale Yu: Review of Let’s Go! To France

 

 

Let’s Go! To France

  • Designer: Josh Wood
  • Publisher: AEG
  • Players: 1-4
  • Age: 10+
  • Time: 45 minutes
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

You are travelers planning and experiencing your own dream vacations to France. Explore Paris, soaking up art, history, and delicious food through its many tourist attractions and hidden gems. Using over 100 beautifully illustrated cards, you will discover activities and strategically place them to create your six day itinerary. While puzzling out your optimal activities, you will plan your trip to one of four marvelous regions of France. Will you bask in the sun along the French Riviera or explore the historic castles of the Loire valley?

 

Play competitively or solo, earning victory points by successfully balancing the two halves of your vacation, making the most out of your interests, and managing your time well. The most points wins, but everyone has the chance to create a memorable vacation. 

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Mark’s Top 100 Games: The 2026 Edition

Every couple of years (or so) I blog through my top 50 or top 100 games over on my personal blog, akapastorguy. In 2022 and 2024, I shared that list with our faithful readers here at the OG… and I’m back to do it again.

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