I love the variety of games you get at Gen Con. There are the big name, high strategy games that appear on lots of lists but I have a soft spot for the slightly goofier titles and perhaps nowhere is that seen more than in the many different sorts of dexterity games. Twin City Games was showing off Dino Dunk! Deep Freeze, a sequel to their disc-flicking game of soccer with special disc powers. Asmadi had a cool preview of Mystic Curling Club, coming to Kickstarter soon. Finally, I got to see Yubibo in person at the Jelly Jelly Games booth. I think of it as a sort of one-handed cooperative Twister. Each of these publishers also had other games on display (Animals in Espionage, Innovation Ultimate, and Fixer, respectively) but it’s the dexterity ones that really captured my heart.

Twin City Games

Dino Dunk! Deep Freeze

Front and center of the Twin City Games booth was Dino Dunk, a sort of dexterity-based soccer game from 2018. It’s sold out, but Twin City is launching a Kickstarter at the end of September for a remake/sequel with an ice theme, Dino Dunk! Deep Freeze. The gist of Dino Dunk Is a sort of carom version of soccer/basketball involving teams of discs, with special powers, and an egg ball, all played on a nice roll-up neoprene mat.

Each player has several discs (1 large, 3 medium, 1 small) that they can flick around the board in an attempt to get the tiny dino egg (ball) disc into the lava crater. (The blue and red backstops are basically backboards you can bounce off if needed.) Players alternate every two flicks. If you “control” the egg on your turn you can also shoot it directly. A player can “pass” the egg by shooting it at another disc of their color. In that way, the disc can move down the field but remain “in control” of the active player. A player trying to steal control of the disc has to hit the egg without making contact with the opponent’s disc.

There are 25 discs in the game box and players build a 5 disc team using the mentioned 1/3/1 disc size distribution. Each size has their own moves and limitations. The large discs can “dunk” by taking the disc will them and landing on the hole, but they can’t “shoot” – let the player flick the egg directly. Small discs can pass to other discs on their team (hit them) and can move (just flick down the field) but they are not allowed to score. The medium discs are the primary movers and can move, pass, and shoot. Finally, each individual token may have a special ability that they can trigger under specific situations.

Animals in Espionage

Animals in Espionage is a short 2 player game where players are trying to recruit animal agents while sending a spy over to their opponent. Players alternate splitting groups of agents into two and then letting their opponent select which stack to take. At the end of the game, each player tries to guess their opponent’s “secret” agent they were trying to recruit. Points are scored for recruiting their assigned “secret” agent, guessing their opponent’s, and for managing to send their spy over to the opponent’s side.

Asmadi Games

Mystic Curling Club

Asmadi Games was showing an upcoming flicking game based around a curling (the ice bowling Olympic event) theme. It will be coming to Kickstarter in October. The game consists of several sets of 12 sided dice, character cards, and a long board with concentric circles on the ends. Players take turns flicking their 12-sided dice from one end to the other, trying to get as close as possible to the center of the circles in the other end. As with curling, the player who gets closest to the center wins a point. They also score for any other dice that are closer to the center than their opponent’s closest die.

Scoring is a bit simplified here (as opposed to actual curling) as you don’t have to measure anything, you just look to see what ring a die is touching, and then it is included as being fully in that ring. That would make a lot of ties, but ties are then broken by the number on the die – lowest number wins.

Players line up their dice on their player card and flick them one at a time (alternating players) starting with dice showing lower numbers and then moving up. This means you may, at first, want to flick your die so that it doesn’t roll but as the starting number goes up, you may want to get a roll instead to try to get the final number lower.

Player cards are more than just placed to keep your dice. Every player has a special power that can be triggered when flicking the dice numbered 4, 5, and 6. If a player manages to meet the requirements on the top of their board (like knock an opponent’s die) the active player may then also use the special power at the bottom of their board.

Innovation (Ultimate & 4th edition)

There’s now a fourth edition of the civilization-building game card game that is Innovation. One of the all time greatest games (so I’ve heard it said) it has players placing cards with powers that trigger off the number or majority of total card icons in one’s area. Cards can stack up behind others, granting a player more ways to display more icons. The cards enter the game in roughly civilization order, with later cards becoming more powerful and possibly replacing some of the older cards. It’s a very cool bit of engine-building that is accomplished entirely through cards. The new “big box” Innovation Ultimate has all released expansions so far plus one more new one. The base game and all the expansions have had a bit of an overhaul to help make things go smoother and to adjust any small balance tweaks needed.

For those not interested in embracing such a big box, one of the appeals to me was always how small the base “civ-like” card game was, there is a new printing of the core Innovation game using the spruced-up 4th edition changes.

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Jelly Jelly Games

Yubibo

I did not get a chance to experience it when it first made its way out into the wild last year, so I was excited to get to see it in person. This slightly-odd looking game can be thought of as a sort of cooperative Twister, played with one hand.

The idea is that players combine to suspend wooden sticks in the air between their fingers. Each turn, a card is flipped displaying a color and a specific finger (like ring finger.) If it is not the active player’s color, the player of the matching color must put a stick on the finger indicated on the card. The active player uses any finger of their choice to connect to this stick. If the color of the card matches the active player, the active player gets to pick any other player. The active player connects the new stick to the finger shown on the card and it connects to any finger of the chosen (other) player. Keep going until someone drops a stick – win if you get all of them suspended!

The game can be made more difficult by adding foam balls to the mix. These must be placed (anywhere) on top of the held sticks. However, only one ball for any specific pair of sticks, and balls must never touch. A great game to loosen up, or perhaps cramp up, your hands before or after a game night.

Fixer

Fixer is an area control trick taking game for 2 to 4 players. Players take turns playing cards to various locations, and like most trick takers, must follow suit. When any location is filled by cards, they are compared. The winner slides the area-control token their way. However, the loser gets to keep the stronger card and put it into their own hand. Point values vary by location and some locations have slots for more than just two cards. The game is played over a number of rounds equal to the players. The rules also have a few adjustments that can be added to or subtracted from the game to increase or decrease the game’s overall level of complexity. Fixer is out on their web site, but may not be in stores yet.