Another year, another Essen season is upon us! I just thought I’d make the most of my train ride to Essen by once again sharing what my approach for this year will be. A lot seems to be different this year, so should be fun! 😀 Pre-Fair Coverage, Pre-Orders & Demo-Only It’s quite noticeable how …
Aaah, Barcelona! It’s been many, many years since I’ve been in this beautiful city, but I still have fond memories of it: Sitting in the Parc Güell, visiting the brilliant Gaudi museum inside La Pedrera, or in general strolling through the city and being amazed by its architecture. All those beautiful moorish-inspired private gardens on …
Read more “First Impressions of Barcelona: Passeig de Gràcia – As Before, Good Timing Is Everything”
Tell me if this sounds familiar: you’re browsing through Kickstarter projects, skip over a whole bunch of projects that look just plain boring or like another fulfilment disaster waiting to happen, and suddenly you stop. You’ve found a game that looks amazing! The visuals speak to you, the production is lavish, and the few sentences …
Read more “First Impressions of Rise & Fall – There Might Still Be Hope for Crowd Funding”
Essen-time is soon upon us! This year, the kind folks of SPIEL have provided me with a press pass, which is a huge milestone for an independent reviewer like me. For all the years – or shall I say decades – I’ve been going to Essen, I’ve always wondered what it would be like to …
This issue of Origin stories is special for a number of reasons. I’m talking to Stephen Hurn, a designer who’s name you might not recognise but who’s contributions to the hobby you will have experienced when playing Martin Wallace’s Anno 1800: The Board Game and it’s recently released expansion. He has been deeply involved in …
Read more “Origin Stories: The Anno 1800 Solo Campaigns – An Interview With Designer Stephen Hurn”
I ran into a number of situations where the automa behaved oddly. So here is an attempt to patch them a bit with minimal rules tweaks or clarifications. I’ll update this post as I evolve the automa changes. Hope you like them! Last updated: Sep 1, 2024 General Barbarian (Yellow) Climber (green) Pirate (blue) No …
I’ve published my Recommendations For Solo Board Games in 2023 over a year ago and it has been surprisingly popular. So I guess it’s time to do an update and throw out some new recommendations based on games I reviewed, new additions to the collection, and classics I got back to the table in the …
The Kickstarter project Rise & Fall is currently in fulfilment and it comes with a ton of components. There is also additional packing material in the box to protect all the wooden pieces during shipping, which can make it confusing to get everything back in the box. This small guide hopefully will help you find …
Sometimes, surprisingly, the BGG games market can be a source of inspiration for me what newly released games to try. With every pre-order or crowd funding project that is being fulfilled, someone inevitably will have had their life situation changed between backing and receiving a project … or they found that they didn’t get what …
Read more “First Impressions of I, Napoleon: Swipe Left for Conflict”
Ah, Kickstarter, you gotta love it. Sure, we all had our fair share of duds over the years but overall it’s always been an enjoyable spectacle for me. From the videos listing upcoming games to the hype-inducing previews that more often than not made me wonder “what were they thinking?” when I held the final …
Read more “First Impressions of Pampero – How Many Plays Do You Owe A Game?”