Dale Yu: Review of Dream Home

Posted on November 29, 2016 by Dale Yu

 

Dream Home

  • Designer: Klemens Kalicki
  • Publisher: Rebel.PL / Asmodee
  • Players: 2-4
  • Ages: 7+
  • Time: 30 minutes
  • Times played: 4, with review copy provided by publisher

dream-home-box

Dream Home is game about building your dream house, or at least building a dreamier house than all of your competitors.  In this game, each player gets a home board which has twelve room spaces in it – 2 upper floors of 5 rooms each and a two room basement.  There are two decks of cards in the game, one for rooms and one for resources.  In most rounds, players will get a pair of cards (one room and one resource) to use in building the home of their dreams. Continue reading →

Posted in Essen 2016, Reviews | Leave a comment

A Feast for Odin (Game Review by Chris Wray)

Posted on November 28, 2016 by Chris Wray
  • Designer:  Uwe Rosenberg
  • Publisher:  Feuerland Spiele, Z-Man Games
  • Artist: Dennis Lohausen
  • Players:  1 – 4
  • Ages:  14 and Up
  • Time:  30 Minutes Per Player
  • Times Played: 5 (With 1, 2, and 3 Players)

AFeastforOdin.png

Uwe Rosenberg’s latest design, A Feast for Odin, was a big hit in Essen.  The publisher describes it as “a saga in the form of a board game,” one in which players “raid and explore new territories” and experience the “day-to-day activities” of the Vikings.

Like many of Rosenberg’s bigger releases — Agricola, Caverna, Fields of Arle — his latest title is, at its core, a worker placement game.  But A Feast for Odin also has some of the resource conversion of Le Havre and the polyominoes of Patchwork or Cottage Garden.  In short, this feels like a mashup of several of Rosenberg’s popular designs, and if you’re a fan of his, I suspect you’ll enjoy A Feast for Odin.   Continue reading →

Posted in Essen 2016, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

Dale Yu: Review of Honshu

Posted on November 25, 2016 by Dale Yu

 

Honshu

  • Designer: Kalle Malmioja
  • Publisher: Lautapelit.fi
  • Players: 2-5
  • Ages: 8+
  • Time: ~30 minutes
  • Times played: 3, with review copy provided by Lautapelit.fi

honshu

I was immediately interested in Honshu after reading a short paragraph long description from the publisher – after all, I don’t think that I’ve ever played a trick-taking/tile laying game before…  I was already scheduled for a meeting with the nice folks at Lautapelit during Essen, and after getting the full demo, this was on my really-have-to-play-at-the-first-opportunity list.

The game itself is composed mainly of a deck of 60 cards and a handful of wooden tokens.  The game is split up into 12 rounds – each with a trick taking phase and then followed by a “tile laying” (or more specifically, a card laying) phase. Continue reading →

Posted in Essen 2016, Reviews | 1 Comment

Dale Yu: First Impressions of Bohemian Villages

Posted on November 23, 2016 by Dale Yu

Bohemian Villages

  • Designer: Reiner Stockhausen
  • Publisher: dlp games
  • Players: 2-5
  • Ages: 8+
  • Time: ~30 minutes
  • Times played: 2, with review copy provided by dlp games

bohemian

Bohemian Villages wasn’t really on my list of games for Essen until about three days prior to the show.  This was mostly due to the fact that I hadn’t had much information to go on until that time.  I knew that it was from dlp games, and that is a publisher which usually makes games that interest me – but a publisher which also historically has been hit-or-miss for me.  However, since Orleans, I have definitely made it a point to always see what sort of game Herr Stockhausen has to offer!  Furthermore, I’m a big fan of the game’s artists, Klemens Franz and Andrea Kattnig.

Continue reading →

Posted in Essen 2016, First Impressions | Leave a comment

Dale Yu: First Impressions of Kingdomino

Posted on November 22, 2016 by Dale Yu

 

Kingdomino

  • Designer: Bruno Cathala
  • Publisher: blue orange
  • Players: 2-4
  • Ages: 8+
  • Time: 15 minutes
  • Times played: 2, with review copy provided by blue orange

kingdomino

In Kingdomino, players vie to build the best 5×5 grid of dominoes (each starts with a single square piece and then has the chance to add 12 dominoes to the grid).  There are 48 numbered dominoes that are shuffled and then placed in a draw pile – you can use the box for this purpose.  To start the game, the first four tiles are drawn, and then they are placed in numerical order on the table (with the lowest number tile being at the top of the column) and then flipped over.  In the first round, the player pawns are drawn out in random order, and as each pawn comes out, the owner chooses which domino to place his pawn on. Continue reading →

Posted in Essen 2016, First Impressions | 2 Comments

BOOTY

Posted on November 21, 2016 by gschloesser

Design by Alexander Cobian
Published by Mayfair Games
3 – 6 Players, 1 hour
Review by Greg J. Schloesser

booty-cover

Yes, another pirate game.  I guess the theme is just so darn enticing and somehow romantic that designers and publishers just cannot resist using it.  I would assume that at some point the game-buying public would become satiated with the theme and say “enough!”  But I also assume that publishers would recognize if the situation reached this point and cease releasing games using the theme.  I guess that has not yet occurred…or my assumptions are way off-base!

Booty is a recent offering in the crowded seas of pirate-themed games.  Designed by Alexander Cobian, players are nasty pirates attempting to grab the most lucrative booty (commodities, weapons, liquor, gold, silver, etc.), control ports in the Caribbean and Atlantic, and influence the market price of their illicitly-gained loot.

The game is primarily one of card acquisition and controlling ports.  Five island tiles, each depicting 3-7 ports, are arranged in a circle, along with the Commodities market tile and the turn order “Rank” board.  A number of cards (3 x the number of players) are revealed, sorted by color and placed in the center of the ring of islands, with the first card being kept face-down.  Each player receives a supply of “might” markers, two secret “legacy” tiles and a handful of coins.  Let the looting begin!

Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged , | Leave a comment