Dale Yu: Review of Gwent: The Legendary Card Game

Gwent: The Legendary Card Game

  • Designer: CD Projekt
  • Publisher: No Loading Games
  • Players: 1-5
  • Age: 14+
  • Time: 20 minutes
  • Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4g26XMD
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Experience The Witcher universe in an entirely new way with Gwent: The Legendary Card Game. Inspired by the iconic mini-game from The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, this official physical edition brings the strategic, faction-based card game to your tabletop.

In Gwent, two players build decks from factions such as the Northern Realms, Scoia’tael, Monsters, Skellige, and Nilfgaard, each with its own unique set of cards and abilities.

The goal of the game is to win two out of three rounds. The battlefield features multiple rows to which players will deploy their units and special ability cards to battle it out. Players must skillfully bluff, manage their resources, and read their opponent’s moves in order to wisely choose when to push aggressively to win a round — and when to hold back and play for the long game.

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Dale Yu: Review of Ink

Ink

  • Designer: Kasper Lapp 
  • Publisher: Final Score Games
  • Players: 1-4
  • Age: 8+
  • Time: 30-45 min
  • Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4fHLoAO
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Ink is an unforgiving medium. However, when mastered with care, its spontaneity and brilliance can create visual effects of astonishing richness.  INK invites you to deploy your talent by creating sumptuous paintings worthy of the greatest collections.

Combining tile placement, resource and hand management, and pattern recognition, Ink challenges players to complete high-value contracts by carefully placing ink tiles to form harmonious patterns. The trick lies in balancing spontaneity with planning, every move you make affects not only your current canvas, but the options you’ll have in future turns.

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Dale Yu: Review of Fairy

 

Fairy

  • Designer: ましう (Mashiu)
  • Publisher: Allplay
  • Players: 2-10
  • Age: 6+
  • Time: 10 minutes
  • Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4nf8PUR
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Every round, reveal a new card. Simultaneously, all players choose a hand gesture to guess how the card relates to the previous one ( for higher value, for lower value, for same suit, or   guess a fairy).

Guess the correct value relation and get two points. Guess same suit correctly and get four points. Call one of the three fairies in the deck? That’s seven points!  Any wrong guess loses you a point. 

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Dale Yu: Review of Piña Coladice

Piña Coladice

  • Designer: Yann Dupont
  • Publisher: Iello
  • Players: 2-4
  • Age: 8+
  • Time: 10 minutes
  • Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/45FYiMm
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Piña Coladice is a family party-game in which you roll the dice up to three times to claim one of the available combinations on coasters. Position yourself strategically with your cocktail tokens before your opponents. You will earn precious points that will bring you closer to victory… but the quickest way to win is to line up 4 of your cocktail tokens to make the famous Pina Coladice and win instantly!

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Alison Brennan: Game Snapshots – 2025 (Part 24)

 

These are the last of the games I played at the Gathering. It’s taken quite a while to get through them all but I hope you’ve found at least something of value along the way.

I upped my rating of the White Castle to a 9 recently, and played the Matcha expansion for the first time last week. It provides a fourth resource, a fourth avenue for actions, and a fourth action each round. While there are more options to consider, the feel remains unchanged – every action is still carefully weighed for its import. It’s one of those expansions which you’d probably always include if you owned it, but I’m not sure it’s needed because the purity of the original remains valued.

 

New-to-me games played recently include …

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Dale Yu: Review of Escape from the Starline Express (v2)

Escape from the Starline Express (v2)

  • Designer: Alessandro Deriu
  • Publisher: Professor Puzzle
  • Players: 2-8
  • Age: 8+
  • Time: 90 mins on box (~45 min for 4 adults in our game)
  • Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/487KRX1
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher (via Asmodee NA)

It’s time to gather your guests for an evening of intrigue with this quick-thinking, quick-solving escape room game!

News of the theft of the world famous Black Widow diamond necklace has reached the public. The only suspects? Members of the notorious “Rag-Tag Crew”, a gang of petty thugs who have taken the step into grand theft. Betty Willson, an ambitious young crime reporter, has unexpectedly become caught in the centre when she finds herself sharing a train carriage with six mysterious passengers, all members of the “Rag-Tag Crew”.

Armed with the task of collecting the evidence needed to put the gang behind bars, it’s a race against time for Betty to make her way through the train carriages. With the gang hot on her heels, will you be able to solve the puzzles and riddles along the way and find out what mysteries await her on this long, lonely stretch of track? All aboard!

Escape from the Starline Express is an escape room game designed for a group of 2–8 people.

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