MAN IN BLACK: All right: where is the poison? The battle of wits has begun. It ends when you decide and we both drink, and find out who is right and who is dead.

The shortest and easiest way to describe the newest game from publisher La Boite de Jeu and designer Frédéric Guérard is “It’s like their previous hit, It’s a Wonderful World, only with a ‘you cut / I choose’ mechanic in place of drafting.” That’s fair – as far as it goes – but it misses the full flavor and breadth of this two-player game design.

Yes, I know there is a solo mode as well – I promise I’ll get to that in a minute.

Berried Treasure

• Designer: Sid Sackson
• Restorers: Rob Daviau, Brian Neff, Noah Cohen, Justin D. Jacobsen
• Publisher: Restoration Games / Eagle-Gryphon Games
• Players: 2-5
• Age: 7+
• Time: 10-20 minutes

Sid Sackson is one of the greatest designers of all time – His first game was called High Spirits with Calvin and the Colonel; based on an animated TV show in 1962 – published by Milton Bradley.  While the TV show ended, the game lived on, being reprinted in 1992 as Das Super-Blatt, now using tabloid journalism as the theme (Who has the biggest hits?).  Seven years later, the game was given a pirate theme and called Buried Treasure (It’s time to deal the cards and divvy up the loot).  Nearly 25 years after that, the game gets another makeover, now punnily called Berried Treasure (Swipe the sweets or get stuck with the crumbs), and you guessed it, the theme is about berries.

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P’achakuna

• Designer: Moreno Vogel and Stefan Kraft
• Publisher: Treeceratops
• Players: 2
• Age: 8+
• Time: 30-40 minutes
• Played with review copy provided by publisher

Treeceratops is a newer company, and we have played their previous release, Darwin’s Choice, a few years back.  Their most recent game is called P’achakuna – set in the Andes Mountains.  You and your opponent are traders, and you are trying to deliver wool and dyes to the far flung villages in the mountains.  The goal is to the first to deliver to all seven villages, collecting yarn of a different color at each, and thus be able to create your own colorful costume!

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