Often cited as the kickoff of modern boardgaming, CATAN remains one of the enduring brands ripe for expansions and spin-offs. The CATAN booth was showing off the new Starfarers expansion: CATAN: Starfarers – New Encounters as well as the CATAN: Hawai’i Scenario. However, in the running for the most unexpected combo of the convention, CATAN: Soccer Fever Scenario.
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In Castles By The Sea, each player tries to lead their tribe of Shorelings to build the best kingdom of castles. To start, the board is created for the appropriate number of players, with sandy tiles placed around a central tide pool. Stone blocks and seaweed tokens are placed on the board on the grid spaces where their matching icon is found.
What do you do if you have a line of spaceships with interchangeable parts and a large fan base? Turn it into a boardgame via Kickstarter, and that’s just what Snap Ships LLC has done. Snap Ships Tactics takes the spaceships (and their parts) from their toy line and creates a tactical level space combat game.
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I’m a huge fan of the Australian Metro simply because of their excellent safety campaign based around a video showing a list of Dumb Ways to Die. The cartoon gained a cult following which resulted in (two I think) mobile games and more. Spin Master Games has somehow acquired the rights and created a quick and silly take-that card game simply entitled Dumb Ways to Die, playable by 2 to 5 players.
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Little wooden kitten meeples hopping up and down on an actually quilted-top bed? It was an immediate stop for my sons on Sunday afternoon and they went on to play a full game. Published by Smirk & Dagger Games, BOOoop. has players maneuvering their little kittens on a quilted bed grid to form three full-grown cats in a row.
Players take turns placing kittens onto the cute little bed. When placed, any kitten adjacent (orthogonal or diagonal) to the newly placed kitten will get “booped” and bumped one space away. If they are on the edge of the bed, they will be knocked off. However, if they would be bumped into another figure, they don’t move.
The goal, at first, is to get three of your own kittens in a row (after any booooping…) Those three kittens are removed from the game and you are awarded adult cat meeples. Sets of three mixed adult and kitten tokens are also removed, with only the kitten tokens removed from the game and replaced with cats. Cat meeples cannot be booooped by kitten meeples but can boohoo each other. The goal is to be the first player to get three full-grown cats in a row.
New to this game (Fans of Smirk & Dagger may recall boop.) is the inclusion of a ghost cat meeple. Each player has a ghost cat that can be placed at the end of any turn. It must be placed on a seam (not the center of a square, like the cats) and then it will move one space along that seam at the end of that player’s turn. If it moves next to a cat or kitten (orthogonally) it will boooop that cat. Note, this will happen even if the cat/kitten is blocked. It simply hops over the blocking meeples until it reaches an empty space or falls off the board. Both players have their own ghost cats moving at the end of each of their turns. They don’t interact, of course, because they’re always running on the seams. When a ghost cat reaches the far side of the bed, it is removed and can be placed again on any subsequent turn. My boys were instant fans and I’m hoping to take a look at the game further in the coming months.
I have to admit that the Smirk & Dagger booth held one of my favorite Con moments (in addition to the boys’ game.) I was walking by and a large stack of BOOoop. fell over. I yelled out “BOOOP!” and was pleased to hear an answering chorus of “BOOOP!”
I didn’t meet Horrible Guild in the main exhibit hall but I braved the wilds of one of the hotel lobbies and came away with intel on the upcoming redo of Rondo entitled Sunrise Lane by the venerable Knizia and the realtime co-op game Quicksand.
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