ABOUT THE GAME In the game The Isle of Cats, you sail your ship to an amazing island. There have been rumors of an island full of beautiful cats for some time now. The rumors are true! Unfortunately, the island is in danger. Vesh Darkhand's army is on its way to destroy the island. Fortunately, you arrived on the island in time and can try to save as many cats as possible! The goal of The Isle of Cats is to rescue and collect as many cats as possible on your ship. In addition, you also collect as many valuable treasures as possible. At the end of the game, cats and treasures bring points in different ways. Cat Island needs some time to prepare. Each player gets their own field in the shape of a ship with a basket to carry cats. In the middle of the table you place an island. It has a circular track, and it allows you to track the order of the move. To the left and right of the island you place a supply of cats. They are randomly drawn from the bag. Each player places 2 cats on the left and right. So in a two player game there are 4 cats on both sides. The difference between the left and right side is the price. Cats on the left side are worth 3 fish, and cats on the right side are worth 5 fish. In addition, you place regular treasures, special Oshax cats, meeple cats, fish tokens, cards, and of course a big bag of cats on the table. Island of Cats is played for 5 rounds. These 5 rounds are divided into 5 phases. PHASE 1 FISHING In the first phase of the game, all players go fishing. After all, to lure a sufficient number of cats, you need a lot of fish! During this phase, all players receive 20 fish. PHASE 2 OF THE RESEARCH The research phase is divided into 2 parts: selecting research cards and paying for the cards you decide to keep. At this stage you have to draw cards from the deck. Each player receives 7 cards. From these 7 cards, each player chooses 2 to keep. Then each player passes the remaining 5 cards clockwise to the..

 There are games and there are games. Some games can be seen everywhere and are played by everyone, while others are shrouded in mystery and ritual. It's like comparing a mass-market soft drink to a vintage wine—some are readily available and give instant but quickly forgotten pleasure, while others are rare and unique experiences. Splotter Spellen games belong to the last category. I was first introduced to Splotter Spellen when a collector unceremoniously presented a copy of Roads & Boats and carefully peeled off its protective film to reveal what at first glance looked like a collection of uninspiring components. With the playing time and price triple what I was used to, I remained lukewarm to his enthusiasm. The lack of Splotter Spellen games at all my gaming gatherings further confirmed my skepticism. But the more I learned about games, the more Splotter Spellen's games stood out in discussions of great games. Could a game like this fill a gap in my already limited collection? Maybe there was one game that was highly rated by a few influential geek friends with a reasonable play time (90-150 min) and weight (3.7). When I was offered to buy a used copy from the aforementioned collector, it was time to discover the world of Splotter Spellen! ECONOMY OF THE GREAT ZIMBABWE  The Great Zimbabwe is a good representation of the type of mechanics that I've come to find characterize many of Splotter Spellen's games: build a shared infrastructure and use it to make more money than your competition. In The Great Zimbabwe, the shared infrastructure consists of artisans who transform resources into goods, which are then used to build monuments. The higher the monument, the higher your score. Let's take a closer look at the different links in this economy.  Assets Resources are provided during training (clay, wood, ivory and diamonds). The playing field consists of several 6x6 squares, some of which contain resources. Artisans (potters,..

 When the mere mention of a franchise's name causes twelve to fifteen thousand people to open their wallets to support it, I think the world should take notice.  Canvas by Road to Infamy Games (R2i) is from designers Jeff Chin and Andrew Nerger. And while the game itself has its merits, Luan Huynh's creativity probably deserves more praise. Canvas is one of those games that is so visually stunning that the game itself often takes a back seat. But inside that beautiful box is a game. In fact, thanks to three wildly successful Kickstarter campaigns, there are now three games in three great box sets, completing this trilogy franchise. Today we're going to take a look at the basic box that started it all. VISUAL The hook that lures you into playing Canvas is the transparent cards that will eventually form a picture of the players. These five cards are opened in the market, which changes as the cards are received. The cards are stored in a box to avoid accidental glances. At the beginning, four cards are chosen as artistic goals for the game. The back of the rulebook has a number of suggested combinations to suit skill levels and thematic presentations, but randomness is always a possibility. Objectives control the selection of cards to collect combinations of symbols in their easels to score points.  Each player turn consists of visiting the market to get a card or presenting a finished painting. When visiting the market, the first card is free, but skipping cards requires one Imagination Token for each missed card. These collected Imagination Tokens remain on the cards until they are picked up in subsequent turns. Three cards are needed to represent the picture. If a player reaches five cards in his hand, he must reveal them on the next turn. The three cards are (hopefully) stacked in such a way as to maximize the scoring potential of the various symbols according to the objectives. Of course, since each painting will be stunning in..

 "Photograph," she said. "Just a fun little game." The next day I bought a copy of Photograph (also known as Wind the Film! , published by Saashi & Saashi ) and finally got it to my desk during the holidays. I must say that my friend was right. More importantly, I can see why she likes the game because it lends itself well as a thoughtful strategy game for gamers who want to kick off the night in front of heavier tables. A LITTLE ABOUT THE RULES  Photograph is a game where you need to control your hand blindly for 2-4 players. Depending on the number of players, a certain number of sets of 12 colored cards are added to the common deck, each of which depicts the story of a certain scene taking place somewhere in the city. The card market consists of two outer columns showing the cards face up, and an inner column to the left showing the cards face down. Players are dealt five cards, but must keep them in the order they were dealt. This is important because, similar to games like Luxor, the order of the cards is key to understanding the strategy of each move. During his turn, the player announces a number from one to three. Starting at the edge of one row, that player takes the number of cards announced and adds them one by one, and in the order in which they were removed from the market, to the right side of his hand. That player is then allowed to move one card forward in their hand, from left to right, one or more steps forward. Depending on the number of cards taken at the start of the turn, that player must play cards from the left hand onto the table. Each suit is a separate row in their personal area, and the cards must be played in ascending or descending order after the first card is placed, within three numbers of the previous card.  This means that if I play a yellow eight from my hand, my next yellow card can start with 9, 10, or 11, or 7, 6, or 5. Once that choice is made, future cards after the second must..

 Basically, Dungeon Heroes is a simple and fast dueling dungeon crawler with asymmetric objectives. The hero player tries to find 3 of 4 treasures hidden in the dungeon with the help of his thief, warrior, healer and wizard. Player - The Dungeon Master first lays out the dungeon during the first nine turns (passive phase), and then actively tries to prevent the heroes from getting the treasures (aggressive phase). It sounds pretty corny, but the mechanics make Dungeon Heroes a unique game. Each player can perform 4 actions. During the first nine turns, the dungeon master takes four tiles per turn and places them face down on the field. The tiles have 4 types of monsters, 4 types of traps, 3 treasures, 4 special items, 2 clouds of poison gas, 3 portals and 4 moving floor tiles. The owner of the dungeon decides where to place what, but cannot see where it lies after laying out the tile, so Dungeon Heroes has a place for memory training. Of course, the treasures should be hidden away from the players, and the passages to them blocked by monsters and traps, but isn't that too obvious? Yes, there is room for bluffing here too. After laying out all the tiles, the Dungeon Master uses his actions in a different way: he reveals tiles and moves monsters, hunting heroes.  Heroes spend on moving around the dungeon from the very start, but with some restrictions. Yes, the thief and wizards move like a chess king, and a warrior and a healer - like a rook, but only one square. Also, each character has their own special ability. A thief can step on traps and neutralize them without taking damage. A warrior can move to the same cell as a monster and kill it. The healer heals himself and others by spending an action point. Well, the wizard can open a tile anywhere on the field by spending action points. In my opinion, the wizard ability is the most useful because it allows you to explore dungeons without too much risk and guesswork, which reduces the role of..

REVIEW 7 heroes, 3 villains, simple rules, it's Marvel United  PLAYERS: 1-4  GAME TIME: 40 min  PUBLISHER: CMON Games,  PUBLISHER IN UKRAINE Geekach Games In Marvel United, players take on the role of one superhero from the Marvel Universe and work together to defeat a villain. GAIT STRUCTURE Each turn, the player plays one card on the "timeline", side by side, and plays the value on the card just played AND also uses the value on the previously played card. Each icon provides either a move, a hit, a heroic action, or a wildcard action (any of the above). It is important to understand which hero will play before you and which one after. Each hero comes with a different deck, each deck has a different number and distribution of icons, making them somewhat unique from each other. For example, Hulk has more punches and Cap has more heroics, understanding your deck composition and your friends will be helpful for proper cooperation. In addition, there are three cards in each deck that also grant unique abilities only to the hero playing them (they cannot be used by other heroes) and make the deck even more themed around that hero.  After the heroes have played three cards on the timeline, it's time for the villain to attack. One card from the Sinister Deck is revealed, and the Villain will move, attack, spawn tokens, and play powerful abilities that cripple heroes. Each villain has different victory conditions that are specific and themed to that villain.  Round by round, the Heroes will try to complete the tasks to defeat the villain. The Villain will win by destroying all the Heroes, or by completing his Nefarious Plan (if he has one), or by running out of the Sinister Plans deck. COMPONENTS The quality of the components is top notch, the miniatures are probably the best miniatures I've seen in the history of CMON. They have a lot of detail, and the reliefs under each one make them glow, giving them a..

MEDIEVAL ACADEMY GAME REVIEW In Medieval Academy , players take on the role of squires training to become knights of the realm. Players advance by mastering combat and fighting dragons, as well as furthering their education, serving the king and demonstrating their chivalry and bravery. Only one player will be selected as a knight, so start training!  Medieval Academy is a card drafting game for 2-5 players that consists of 6 rounds and lasts 30-45 minutes. The game consists of a deck of 52 cards, 7 double-sided playing fields and a large number of tokens. Players compete for first place in as many playing fields as possible, earning them points at the end of each round. The player with the most victory points is the winner. HOW TO PREPARE THE BATCH Preparation is simple. Lay out the 7 playing fields as shown below. Each playing field is double-sided, each side offering different scoring conditions for greater replayability. Top: Gallantry Middle: Jousting (black armor), Tournaments (white armor), Education Below: royal service, charity, quests  Lay out the scroll containing the circular marks and the turn order indicator. Place an hourglass figure in Round I. Shuffle the deck of study cards and place them within reach of all players. Make separate stacks from each group of assessment markers. Each scoring marker will have an icon that matches the game board, with the exception of the Gallantry board. Each player will take all the pieces of their color by placing 1 circular disc in the lower left corner of each of the 7 playing fields. Deal 5 study cards to each player. Pick a starting player and give them a totally useless but also totally awesome First Player Sword token. Now the game is ready to start. GAME PROCESS  Playing fields The game includes 7 different playing fields. There are 2 additional fields that can be obtained from the publisher, which allows you to mix and match them. Each field is double sided and contains..

 I'll start with a disclaimer that I'm a big fan of PC Skyrim and have spent hundreds, if not thousands, of hours in it. I bought the tabletop simply because the box had the word "Skyrim" on it. Here are my impressions after playing the first campaign solo, including learning and replaying the first chapter (because I didn't understand all the rules right away). In total, it took about 12 hours. WHAT IS ENJOYABLE IN THE GAME  — The atmosphere of "Skyrim" is perfectly conveyed. The art, the field (although it is huge), the game mats, the equipment, the quest markers... everything is perfectly in line with the spirit of Skyrim. It plays very atmospherically if you turn on the soundtrack from the original. - The battles are very simple, but quite fan-like - in this they are similar to the original. You have several attacks to choose from, and enemies have several types of armor. You roll the dice, subtract the armor rating and deal damage. During the course of the game, the loss increases, different types of attacks, status effects, armor appear... but the calculations do not become excessively complicated. You can make a thief build and make a free attack with 2X damage at the beginning of the battle, you can chop with a two-handed ax. For me, the simplicity of the fighting game is a plus, although to some people. Those who expected deep battles that require a lot of thinking will be disappointed. — There are both scripted quests and those drawn from the deck. In my opinion, this is quite an interesting feature. Once a villager gave me a quest to find a fugitive, for which I had to go back and forth in different locations. I did it in parallel with the main quest and as a result had to decide what to focus on. Desktop "Skyrim" has a lot of freedom of action. You can spend the entire game clearing dungeons and doing side quests, or you can follow the main story. Most likely, it is optimal to combine both, but there are always a lot of options...

TIDES OF TIME REVIEW In Tides of Time , players will draft beautiful tarot-sized cards and compete to build the kingdom that will best stand the test of time. The goal of Tides of Time is to score the most points after 3 rounds of play. HOW TO PREPARE THE GAME  Tides of Time is a quick game that is easy to set up. Shuffle all 18 cards together, then deal 5 to each player. Each player will also receive two Relic Tokens (more on that later). GAME PROCESS  First Round Following the objectives and icons on the cards, each player will choose one card and place it face down on the table. When both players have chosen their card, reveal the cards. Each player then passes their hand to another player. Repeat until each player has 5 face up cards. Players will then score each card based on its purpose (more on scoring in a moment). Players will take into their hands all the cards lying face down. They will then choose one card for the next round, placing it face down in front of them and placing a relic token on top of it. Players will also choose one card to destroy, placing it back in the box where it will remain for the rest of the game. The remaining 3 cards remain in the hand for the next round.   Second round At the start of the second round, each player draws two cards from the deck to increase their hand to 5 cards. Both players then reveal the relic card chosen at the end of the previous round. The gameplay of the second round is identical to the first round. At the end of the second round, players assign their last relic token to another card and destroy the other card.  Third Round The gameplay of the third round is identical to the second: players reveal the relic card chosen in the previous round and replenish their hand to 5. TIDES OF TIME MAPS The maps in Tides of Time are divided into 4 main objective types with different combinations of palaces, temples, fortresses, libraries and gardens. COLLECTION..

YSPAHAN REVIEW In Yspahan, you try to build bazaars in the wealthiest areas to increase your wealth, use your influence with the Overseer Shah to control the market, and ship your goods and those of your opponents to distant lands in caravans destined for the desert. But don't delay, you only have three weeks before the markets close and the caravans begin their journey east. PREPARATION FOR THE GAME To start a game in Yspahan, place the City square in the middle of the table. In the upper left corner of the "City" field, place a white cube on the "1" field of the "Day" tracker (1-7), a white cube on the "I" field of the "Week" tracker (I - III) and the Overseer (white pawn) in the center crossroads. Place the Tower space on the side within reach of all players. Place 9 white dice and 3 gold dice next to the Tower board. Sort the camels and gold coins into separate piles and place them near the field with the tower. Shuffle the cards and place them near the tower board as well. Set the Caravan field aside. Each player gets 2 gold coins, a construction field of their color, and all the dice of their color. Players place one cube on space 0 on the scoring track on the City space, then set aside 1 cube to use on the building space. Finally, the first player's black marker is given to the starting player and the game can begin. GAME PROCESS In his turn, the player will take all the white dice and roll them. If the player wants more choices, the yellow die can also be rolled at a cost of 1 gold coin per die. After the die is rolled, group them by face value and place them on the tower field as follows: The group of dice with the lowest denomination, regardless of number, will be placed at the bottom of the field. The next highest value will be placed on the next division of the "Rook" field, and so on. Finally, the group of dice with the highest number will be placed at the top of the Tower field, regardless of value.  The current player..