Everdell Spirecrest (Expansion Review by Chris Wray)

Posted on September 23, 2020 by Chris Wray

Author’s Note: I’m breaking with our traditional review format today, so this will be a review that integrates the gameplay description with my thoughts on the expansion.  Also, for the uninitiated, today is the third day of Everdell Week, a project I’m doing to commemorate the changing seasons.  This review is based on a review copy from the publisher.  

Spirecrest is the second expansion for Everdell.  It was on Kickstarter along with the third expansion, Bellfaire, and together they earned 11,900 backers and more than $989,000.  Today, Spirecrest is the highest rated of the three expansions on BGG (earning an average rating of 8.46 out of 10.00), likely because it adds the most to the base game.  Of the three expansions, Spirecrest is probably the most thematic, and adds the most mechanically to the base game.  

Spirecrest is about a journey, and every player begins with the rabbit meeple of their color on the Mountain Board, which is placed below the main board of Everdell.  The Mountain Board controls the main actions of the expansion, and it is activated — with players travelling along it — at each new season.  

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Everdell Pearlbook (Expansion Review by Chris Wray)

Posted on September 22, 2020 by Chris Wray

Author’s Note: I’m breaking with our traditional review format today, so this will be a review that integrates the gameplay description with my thoughts on the expansion.  Also, for the uninitiated, today is the second day of Everdell Week, a project I’m doing to commemorate the changing seasons.  This review is based on a review copy from the publisher.  

When Everdell’s first expansion, Pearlbook, went on Kickstarter in September 2018, it was an instant success, earning 8,012 backers and more than $609,000.  Though today it is the lowest-rated of the expansions on BGG (with what is still a sky-high rating of 7.79 out of 10.00), I don’t understand why, because it is my favorite of the three Everdell expansions. To me, Pearlbrook best accentuates the gameplay I love in the base game, and it feels like a seamless addition to base Everdell.   

Pearlbrook is about a “mysterious civilization of waterfolk,” and you send your amphibious ambassador — a frog meeple — to interact with them.  This expansion may not change the base game much, but it does add a few different in-game mechanics and some cool new components.  

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SPOILER CITY – The Opinionated Gamers play through My City… Part 1 of 2

Posted on September 21, 2020 by Dale Yu

Editor’s note – Normally we don’t write reviews here that include spoilers.  This is going to be an exception.

 THERE WILL BE SPOILERS HERE ABOUT SOME OF THE LEGACY PARTS OF MY CITY! PLEASE CONTINUE READING ONLY IF YOU ARE OK WITH SPOILERS!

But, the spoilers will be hidden (hopefully).   If you’re planning to play this game on your own, I’d suggest either skipping the spoiler text or maybe skipping this whole review!  A lot of the enjoyment of legacy games comes from the surprise of dealing with whatever comes in those sealed envelopes, and we’ll be discussing some of those things below.

Here is a test of the spoiler block that we will use.  Click on the arrow here to un-hide the spoiler text. (If you can read this without clicking on anything, the spoiler text does not work on your browser, and you should only proceed further at your own risk).

This game seems like it is perfect for remote play, and part of the reason that I wanted to write this up was to help people realize that this is possible, and how it would be best to organize the game.  If you want to skip all the possible spoilers and simply figure out how/when to send things, scroll all the way to the bottom of this post and I’ll have a summary at the end.

I will do my best to hide all the spoilers behind a spoiler tag, and if there are any incriminating photos, those will hopefully also be hidden behind them.  In this new era, I think trying to figure out how to play games remotely is the next frontier, and while this game wasn’t specifically designed for it, it seems to be fairly suitable.

OK?  Last chance for me to warn you that spoilers are found below the jump! Time to tell you about our game!

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Everdell (Game Review by Chris Wray)

Posted on September 20, 2020 by Chris Wray
  • Designer:  James A. Wilson
  • Publisher:  Starling Games
  • Artists:  Andrew Bosley, Cody Jones, Dann May
  • Players:  1 – 4
  • Ages:  13 and Up
  • Time:  40 – 80 Minutes
  • Times Played: > 10 

To call Everdell a success would be an understatement.  It is currently the 38th highest ranked on BoardGameGeek, an impressive accomplishment for any game, but a remarkable feat for a game that was just released in late 2018.  Everdell has won or been nominated for numerous gaming awards.  More than 22,000 BGG users own Everdell, but given that many BGG users don’t log their collections, and given that many gamers don’t use BGG at all, the true total is far higher.

The franchise has earned millions of dollars.  The original Kickstarter had 6,775 backers and earned more than $473,000.  The first expansion, Pearlbrook, had 8,012 backers and earned more than $609,000.  The second and third expansions, Spirecrest and Bellfaire, had 11,900 backers and earned more than $989,000.

But we here at The Opinionated Gamers had never covered Everdell.  And, in fact, I had never played it until I traded for it earlier this year.

But this week, as summer officially turns to fall, I wanted to cover this game about changing seasons in detail.  Welcome to Everdell week.  Today I review the base game, and over the next three days, I’m reviewing the expansions.  But the coolest day will be Friday, where I make the case that Everdell can tell us a considerable amount about gaming in 2020.  

This is the story of a great game that I overlooked, even if the rest of the hobby didn’t.

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Dale Yu: Review of Divvy Dice

Posted on September 19, 2020 by Dale Yu

Divvy Dice

  • Designers: Ulrich Blum & Jens Merkl
  • Publisher: Stronghold Games, Schmidt Spiele
  • Players: 1-4
  • Time: 30 minutes
  • Times Played: >20 combined between German version received as a gift as well as English version provided by Stronghold Games

Divvy Dice was one of the games that I learned about from some of my friends over in Germany – namely when they sent me a copy in the mail as a present.  The original title “Man Muss Auch Gönnen Können” seems to have a bunch of varying translations when run through the different online translators, so I was hoping that the new US version would clarify the situation.  The short answer – nope.  But, the new title Divvy Dice does seem to be a nice riff on the alliterative German title.

So how do you play?  From an earlier review by Brandon Kempf here…

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Fort (Game Review by Brandon Kempf)

Posted on September 18, 2020 by Brandon Kempf

Designer: Grant Rodiek

Artist: Kyle Ferrin

Publisher: Leder Games

Players: 2-4 players

Time: 20-40 Minutes

Times Played: 6

Deck-building games have come a long way since the days where the only choice was Dominion. Most of the time though, even today among those myriad of choices, I’ll still take Dominion over any other deck-building game. Nowadays it seems that you need to integrate your deck-building into games with other mechanisms. I honestly don’t think that a pure deck-building game will ever come along again like Dominion and even if it did, it wouldn’t be nearly as successful. So many challengers try to step up and knock the king from its throne, and one by one, they all fail to get that top spot. Enter a new challenger, Fort, from Leder Games, who are better known for their asymmetric lineup of games with cute and cuddly art from Kyle Ferrin, and designer Grant Rodiek, better known for his corgi, Peaches and his ability to just keep talking, along with game designs like Cry Havoc and Hocus. 

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