Galaxy Defenders is a cooperative game in a fantasy setting about tactical battles on a modular hexagonal field with miniatures, like Gears of War: The Board Game . The key difference from the latter is the presence of a campaign during which the heroes (called agents - members of a secret organization like the "Men in Black" dedicated to stopping an alien invasion) upgrade skills and acquire new types of weapons. The outcome of each mission determines which missions will be available next and which special events may occur in the future. There are a total of 12 missions in the retail base, although you won't see everything in one campaign. Since the game comes from Kickstarter, it includes Kickstarter exclusives. These are agents and aliens who look like popular characters from various franchises: Arnold Schwarzenegger from "Predator", Ripley from "Alien", villains from both films, as well as game authors stylized as "Robocop" and "Men in Black". In general, you shouldn't take the setting too seriously; it's a collection of fantasy clichés. If you were expecting serious sci-fi... these aren't the droids you're looking for. COMPONENTS Kickstarter-exclusive miniatures. If you haven't invested in the Kickstarter, then there is good news and bad news for you. Bad news: there were a lot of kickstarter agents, they are very interesting, and their miniatures look great. Good news: even in the retail base there is a lot of everything. It may not be able to replicate Alien vs. Predator, but you'll still get decent variety for a reasonable price. The components are very high quality: thick cardboard, luxurious custom cubes, not a single broken piece. I especially want to note the two-sided health and shield tokens covering values from 1 to 4, which minimizes token clutter. FEATURES OF THE GAME Being an amerithrash, Galaxy Defenders tries to emphasize atmosphere. The 12 campaign missions tell a connected, not too serious story about the struggle between alien invaders and secret agents. There is some humor, there are some unexpected twists. Fans of science fiction will notice many references in the names of the missions: "Close Encounters", "New Hopes", "Old Tech", "Doomsday". Briefings, debriefings and special events are also thematic; although I think the fluff could have been given more attention than a few lines. Fortunately, this is more than compensated by the game mechanics. Each of the 5 agents of the base starts with only one special ability, primary and secondary weapons plus a defensive ability, but this is enough to make them feel different and fulfill different roles in the team. For example, Hulk (similar to Mr. T) can take a lot of damage and attack well both at short and long range. Sniper - Don't move to get an attack die roll, which helps maximize damage done. The Infiltrator is invisible until standing next to enemies, and is therefore invaluable as an agent who runs to mission objectives while others distract the aliens and try to survive. The Marine is the most versatile character in combat, while the Biotech is a healer and (with the right gadgets) a designer of sentry drones. Kickstarter agents have a more pronounced specialization: yes, the Xeno-Hunter agent (essentially a friendly Predator) disguises itself even better than the Infiltrator and is armed with the most powerful barrels available at the start, but it has to be reloaded after each shot, and reloading takes most of the turn. One of the Men in Black has the Jackal ability, which allows him to steal weapons from slain aliens (for one use), and the other has the ability to shoot twice if he kills the alien with the first shot. In addition to special abilities, most agents, as well as aliens, have a defensive ability and several attacking abilities: one for each weapon. They are triggered if a lightning symbol lands on the custom die. Effects are diverse: additional hits, reduction of enemy defense, prevention of weapon failure; additional defensive bonus, damage regeneration... As agents level up, they get new skills and tactics. As a rule, they can be used once per turn or once per game. They provide additional variety, so the agent can be equipped as needed for the situation.  Another interesting feature is the signal mechanics. Distant threats are represented by a signal token, which appears to appear on your radar... until the signal comes into your line of sight, at which point it's some kind of minion (and sometimes maybe a human - or an important specialist , or a civilian who will immediately disappear). In this way, the game builds pressure, while not overwhelming the player with the need to activate aliens that are far from the plot. It seems to me that players should try to see as few signals as possible (since signals, unlike aliens, are harmless), which hurts the atmosphere of what is happening.  Each type of alien has its own card, which shows its behavior, available attacks and special abilities. The behavior of aliens varies depending on their species and the situation on the field. In addition, each pimple has several subspecies, differing in complexity (increased parameters) and color, which contributes to diversity. The behavior depends on the distance to the nearest agent. For example, it's a good idea to stay close to the wary Xeno-Bethe, who will double-shoot you if you're mid-range, but spend a turn running away or closing in if you're too close or too far away. And Creatures that prefer close combat are innocent, provided you are able to run away to a sufficient distance. One of the keys to success is skillful maneuvering and the use of cover so that the aliens activate according to the least dangerous algorithm. COMPLEXITY If you think line-of-sight tracking and behavioral algorithms are overkill, don't worry. On a scale of 1 (game for true hardcore players) to 10 (gateway), I would rate Galaxy Defenders a 5. This game is hardly worth getting to know the mobs to start with, but if you already know how to push and want to get to know this genre, then Galaxy Defenders is a good, fairly beginner-friendly option. Compared to Gears of War, this game is clearly smoother because you don't have to bother with the card system. Strategy and tactics are still present (yes, it is very important to understand when it is time to defend, when to attack and demolish a dangerous alien, when to advance to the mission goal), but you cannot call the game overloaded. Controlling the aliens is moderately complex, but not so much that it interferes with focusing on how to be like the players. You'll spend about 75% of the game in combat, rolling dice and comparing results, which can be a plus or minus depending on your preference. GAME PROCESS The game lasts a certain number of rounds, each round is divided into phases. During the start and end of the round, players can recharge used abilities, try to level up or call in reinforcements, and apply event card effects that usually teleport new arrivals to the card. The most interesting thing happens in between, when all the players take turns and after each player's turn comes the aliens' turn. During an agent's turn, he can move, attack and make an extra in any order. action. At the end of the turn, he draws a card of close contacts, which activates some part of the aliens in the game. For example, all aliens of a certain type, or a certain rank, or all wounded, or all in melee. Then repeat with the next player. So Galaxy Defenders scales. However, it seems to me that the more agents, the easier it becomes for players: more opportunities to quickly destroy aliens and maneuver. I have no particular complaints about the basic gameplay, although the alien AI often leads to the fact that they are concentrated on one agent, and it was rare that the mission was completed without any losses in the state of the agents. The latter can be problematic if the player dies early in the game: there is absolutely nothing to do with him. The difficulty is average by the standards of cooperatives, and there are optional rules that increase the difficulty. In addition, missions can be completed with full success, with partial success or failure - the consequences depend on this. In my opinion, average players will more often than not complete a mission with partial success and regularly suffer small losses. But completing the mission successfully and without casualties is a real challenge, especially in the campaign mode.  Many may be put off by the fact that nothing particularly remarkable happens within a particular move. This is because as many dice are rolled in combat as the attacker has hit, so even the most powerful attack can be completely blocked. For example, an Infiltrator attacks a blue Xeno-Beth: 4 attack dice, 5 hits. The first hit absorbs the energy shield, Beta rolls 4 defense dice. 2 shields, 1 hit and 1 lightning - 2 damage goes together. However, lightning activates the ability to regenerate - and 1 damage is healed. During the aliens' turn, the Face attacks the Infiltrator with 3 hits and 1 lightning for +1 hit. The infiltrator rolls 4 defense dice, gets 3 shields and lightning, which the defense ability transforms into another shield. The attack is completely blocked. Together, for the entire turn of the player, after throwing 10+ cubes, the situation on the field has changed by as much as one damage. Thanks to such leisure, there is no risk of sudden unexpected death, but there is also no feeling that you have achieved something serious. The long preparation for each mission can also repel. Lay out the map and tiles, shuffle a certain number of alien and human signals, assemble mission-specific decks of aliens, close contacts, and events. The last is a particularly dark moment: in order to create a certain sequence of the plot, missions usually form decks of 3-4 event cards, which are shuffled individually and..

 At film school, they told me: "Don't work with animals." Where am I? Filming in the wild nature of the Serengeti. Your goal is to earn the most stars and make the biggest wildlife documentary. It will be much easier for you if the animals do not move. Some hide in trees, others crawl on rocks. Pastures stretch across the entire territory, and the river serves as a coolness support. The varied terrain of the Wild: Serengeti can provide amazing scenes if the animals are in the right place at the right time. This is the second Kickstarter game from South Korean company Bad Comet. The first was Shaolia - a duel game with placing cubes, managing resources and building an engine. WHAT CAN YOU FIND IN WILD NATURE? The beautiful leopard print on the lid of the box perfectly reflects what is inside. The animals (animiples) are gorgeous and you will spend an eternity just looking at them. You can place them on the playing field to see how they look. The area is well drawn on the map. Terrain icons are clearly displayed on each square. This is the central part, and above it is the action tablet. The tablet is double-sided, which allows you to use an alternative terrain of the Serengeti for filming. There are 4 types of animals on the action board. There are 8 action areas in total, from placing animals on the field to moving/replacing them and accessing scene maps. The action costs less if you choose it first. Place all castle tokens on action cells that have a value greater than the number of players. HOW TO SHOT A SCENE? There are 168 scene cards that depict the objective and your reward (if any). The icons on the right side of the map are easy to read. Each card has a fact about the animal, which is a nice touch. The artwork on the back of the card is simply stunning. Create a scene pool of 6 cards, each player draws 8 scene cards and chooses 4. The others are placed in the discard pile next to the deck of scene cards. WHAT RESOURCES ARE NEEDED FOR Coin, food tokens are designed to clearly show what they mean. In terms of quality, these are standard cardboard tokens that you get in most games. They are placed as resources around the field map. Coins are spent performing an action. Food helps the animal to move 1 cell to the desired area. vfx tokens allow you to change the terrain to create the perfect scene. WHY IS THE CENTURY STONE NEEDED? The Stone of Ages (a cardboard 3D structure like the tree in Everdell) is a great way to keep track of your round count. A rhinoceros bird is placed on the cage at number 1, showing the coin reward, limits and events. Place the prize tile on the spaces below rounds 4 and 6. The prize tiles are solid and the icons represent the 1st and 2nd place prizes. The number of coins listed for each day is taken from the supply. The Great Migration takes place three days in a row. The migration maps have the same quality art as the scene maps and are placed next to the stone of centuries. Each migration card has a picture on it, and if there are animals on that field square, they migrate (remove from the map). ALL YOU NEED IS A CAMERA Each player chooses a color and takes 2 cameras (player markers) and a video bar. The cameras are beautifully designed, one of them is used as a star counter (PO) located on the edge of the field. The video bar is used for executed scene maps. Everyone receives a two-sided souvenir for the player. Specialist cards are optional and have a difficulty rating. Each player gets only 1 card. Benefits can be both permanent and one-time. The quality of the cards is the same as the others. The rulebook clearly shows each step with lots of illustrations. The rules are simple and straightforward. HOW TO BECOME THE MOST FAMOUS After 6 days, if you have the most stars, you will become the most famous photographer. The stone of centuries will help you understand the events of each day and spend your coins wisely. Place the camera on one of the 4 spots next to a group of animals and place 1 animal from that group on the map. The cost is 1 coin, unless the seat is already occupied, then the cost will be 2 coins. Buying scene card(s) from a pool costs 1 coin each or upgrading the pool and hoping for the best pick. You can swap or move animals for the same cost as placing the animal, but you cannot do this in the 1st round. As soon as these animals create the desired scene, the card is placed above the video bar. Earning a reward (if any) includes both stars and food/vfx tokens. Other free actions are spending food tokens and vfx. Also, selling 2 incomplete scene cards gives you a coin. A player can save at any time during a round only if they have less than 3 coins. The day ends when all players save. WHY ARE THERE ICONS ON THE MAPS When the scene map is in your video bar, the icons become active. Food and vfx tokens are activated daily. The flower, leaf, banana, and diamond icons are used to count the stars you receive as rewards on some scene maps. Animal paws are classified as wildcards when counting the number of animals at the awards ceremony. Hearts are the number of likes for your scene. Get enough likes before the end of the game and they will be converted into stars that will increase your final score. CAN I HIRE SPECIALISTS TO SUPPORT? Yes, and you can choose one of the two, but all players must end up with one. Specialist cards provide unique opportunities for which you can get additional stars or bonuses. Each specialist is rated from 1 to 5, from the easiest to the most difficult. ARE THE CO-OP/SOLO MODES HARD? The goal is to collect the minimum number of stars after 6 rounds. There are 6 scenarios and most of them add objectives based on stars, food tokens and vfx as well as scene maps after each round. A specialist can also play a role. The gameplay is the same as in the competitive game, with some variations for single player. Completing the objectives at the end of the round can be a challenge. In co-op, the interaction is great and makes a big difference in how you plan your actions. CONCLUSIONS  Wild: Serengeti is a fantastic family game. The puzzle element is very enjoyable and the planning is not overwhelming the brain and at the right level. The quality of the game is excellent and the animals are beautifully designed. Unfortunately, the quality of the cards could be better, and they need protectors. Scene maps are easy to make with careful planning. You might make a move and then gasp: someone just moved an animal to the wrong place. Other times, you're happy because someone just moved an animal that completes the scene for you. Some rewards are based on the icons of completed scenes and require additional thought. Specialist cards range from adding great bonuses and objectives to unlikely actions and challenging late-game objectives. You may feel at a disadvantage. Difficulty rating is a very good idea, and depending on the composition of the participants, you can use cards with the appropriate rating. Why are there only 3 maps with a difficulty rating of 1 and 4? It would be logical to have at least 4 cards for each rating. I understand that they can be dealt randomly, but some players will get harder cards than others.  Wild: Serengeti immediately reminds you of The Lion King. And the stone of centuries and places of action will evoke associations with "Everdell". USEFUL LINKS Wild: Serengeti on the BGG portal https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/335427/wild-serengeti VIDEO REVIEWS ..

BATTLE SHEEP GAME REVIEW  Battle Sheep is an abstract strategy game for 2-4 players that takes 10-15 minutes. It was developed by Francesco Rotta and released in 2014. In Battle Sheep, players start by building a "pasture" by laying out tokens, each consisting of 4 hexes. When the pasture is finished, players place their sheep in a single stack of 16 tokens, then compete for more pieces of the play area by moving stacks of pieces (their sheep) from space to space. The winner of the game is the player who has the most occupied seats. Players make moves clockwise, starting with the first player. The trick is for the player to choose one of their stacks of sheep and move from 1 to all the sheep in that stack (always leaving one sheep on your current cell). To move, you take a selected number of sheep and move them in a straight line until you can move no further. WHAT I LIKE ABOUT BATTLE SHEEP The components are of the highest quality, from the thick, heavy discs (seriously, these tokens are just gorgeous) to the hilariously gorgeous artwork of sheep belching), showing their behinds, or winking obscenely. Each tile has the same shape, but consists of differently depicted hexagons and is made of thick, durable cardboard. The organizer holds all the pieces together very well without much shifting. WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE The only negative thing I can say about this game is that the parts of the piles that you move do not connect together. The tokens are made of high density plastic which means they are very smooth. This means that when you try to move or pick up a bunch of them, there's always a chance they'll fall. If only the designers had tried some means of connecting the pieces, perhaps a thin ridge around the top and a recess at the bottom. But this is a minor gripe and shouldn't stop you from picking up this great game. IMPRESSION  Battle Sheep occupies an interesting place in gaming. This is a short strategy game with an amazing theme. Sheep are peaceful, beautiful, calm creatures whose sole purpose is to eat as much grass as possible. Not sheep in THIS game. They are mean, mean and will block you as soon as they can, making sure they keep the tastiest grass for themselves. Ignore or accept the theme of this game and go straight to the great gameplay. Laugh at your opponent's screams as you block an entire stack of his sheep. Enjoy the funny illustrations of sheep dominating the pasture. USEFUL LINKS Battle Sheep on the BGG portal https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/54137/battle-sheep Battle Sheep on the Game Theory portal https://www.tg.in.ua/boardgames/1369/battle-sheep VIDEO REVIEWS ..

 Undaunted: Normandy is an interesting hybrid. Part deck-building game and part traditional wargame, it's as accessible to wargamers as it is to those who've never placed a cardboard token on a hex on the battlefield. Undaunted: Normandy tells the story of the exploits of the US 30th Infantry Division in June 1944 as they move into France to fight Nazi Germany. The development of scenarios reflects real events, adding a sense of authenticity and seriousness to the game. To start the game, players take the side of the US 30th Infantry Division or a mixed platoon of the German Wehrmacht and choose one of 12 scenarios. The scenario booklet tells players how to build their decks, how to build stocks from which to draw new cards, how to place tiles to create a unique scenario environment, and the victory conditions for each side. FROM D-DAY TO THE BLOODY STREETS OF MORTAIN Scenarios vary by objective, but their progression acts as a tutorial, linearly adding more complex troops and effects as players play through them. The problem with this approach is that it hinders replayability, as players who are familiar with the mechanics are forced to play with reduced decks for most scenarios. The tragically unwarranted solution is that the final scenario works as a sort of "standard battle" with all card types in play and symmetrical starting situations for both players. It's a little weak compared to more robust card war games like Command and Colors . A campaign that combines each scenario into a long game with many battles helps solve this problem. Wins are the primary measure of campaign success, but minimizing losses is also important, as certain thresholds forfeit campaign victory points. In practice, this resulted in several games where my wife and I had to consider abandoning our objective and losing the scenario rather than holding on to the end. Is it worth prolonging almost certain defeat to get the result of our campaign? Brave: The Normandy campaign adds nuance that is sorely lacking in a standalone, scenario-based game, and adds weight to the game's themed world. This is important when your soldiers die. EXCITING COMBINATION OF MECHANICS. HOW INTERESTING IS THE UNDAUTED: NORMANDY Deck building mechanics are cleverly used to subtly nudge players closer to World War II small-unit combat tactics. Each card in a player's hand represents either an individual soldier belonging to a designated unit, a commander capable of influencing the deck, or a useless fog of war card. Soldiers can be played to activate their squad token on the game map and perform one action. All of these activities weave wonderfully into the mechanics of deckbuilding and the core element of war. Scouts can shoot, but they can also add a Fog of War card to their opponent's deck or remove it from their own deck. Machine gunners can shoot with two dice or lead suppressive fire by doubling their attack dice to knock up an enemy counter instead of damaging it. This forces the card player to flip that unit back before it can act normally. These examples highlight how skillfully David Thompson weaves the military theme into the mechanics of Undaunted: Normandy . TRY YOUR LUCK WITH THE INITIATIVE On a given turn, players draw four cards before laying one down to determine initiative. This card will be discarded after the initiative phase, thus players will lose the ability to use it on the field. Each card has an initiative value that corresponds to its overall utility and importance. This is a crucial move, as the initiative player will play his entire hand before his opponent. Refusing the commander to go first can cripple the player's turn, but he has to evaluate whether it's worth it to make sure he can move his squad to cover before being ripped apart by an enemy machine gun. After initiative, players play all their cards in turn, taking one action for each. There are some minimal deck-building synergies that players can employ, such as stacking cards of a particular troop into their deck and then trying to use commanders to draw additional ones. However, in most cases, deck construction works to enhance the combat gaming aspect of Undaunted: Normandy , simulating the degradation of command and control, the relative effectiveness of depleted squads, and abstracting away officer intuition. A VISUAL ASPECT THAT PAYS OFF Visually, the game is fantastic. The tiles that make up the battlefield are solid, their coverage values are clearly marked, and the terrain they model is nice and crisp. The cards on both sides consist of cartoon-style names of individuals, and I admit it took me a while to appreciate. Playing the game now, I can't imagine it looking any other way. The fact that individual soldiers are named helps players relate their actions. When a unit is hit and the player is forced to permanently discard a card from that squad, they say goodbye to that person for the rest of the game. It's a subtle but impressive part of the thematic aspect. The deck building mechanics are a revelation, even after all this time. My wife and I enjoyed Undaunted: Normandy as much as we did a year ago when we first played it. The campaign is definitely the way to play the game, and because of the nuances it adds, we may even be playing it again months later. Undaunted: Normandy is definitely worth a try for fans of war games, fans of deck building. USEFUL LINKSUndaunted: Normandy on the BGG portal https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/268864/undaunted-normandyUndaunted: Normandy on the Game Theory portal https://www.tg.in.ua/boardgames/414/undaunted-normandy VIDEO REVIEWS ..

 Illusion is a card game for 2-5 players that tests your spatial thinking. The game was developed by Wolfgang Warsch, known for such hits as The Mind , Ganz Schön Clever and The Quacks of Quedlinburg . GAME PROCESS To start the game, a deck of 92 colored cards is placed face up on the table, one of the 12 arrow cards is turned over, and the top colored card from the deck is placed next to the arrow card on the table. The gameplay is very simple, you try to correctly place the new colored cards depending on how many colors of the arrow card it has. On your turn, you either take the top card from the stack of colored cards and place it in the row of cards where you think it should be, or you challenge the validity of the entire row. It's important to note that the top color card is already visible, so you know if it's easy to place before you make your choice.  When a player checks a row, all cards in the current row are flipped over so everyone can see their suit percentage. If the cards are not in ascending color percentage order for the current Arrow Card, the player who made the check wins the current Arrow Card (which gives 1 point). However, if all the cards were in the correct order, the card with the arrow goes to the player whose turn was immediately before the player who made the check. After the task is completed, all remaining color cards are removed and a new round begins with a new arrow and color card.  The game continues until one player receives three arrow cards. Once this happens, the game is over and that player is declared the winner. IMPRESSION  With such a simple game, players feel confident even before they start. After all, you just need to look at a few cards, how hard can it be? Well, it's more complicated than you might think. While some cases are obvious, there are others where the percentage difference is so small that it is very hard to tell. And when a line check could result in the other player getting one of the three arrow cards needed to win, you want to be sure of your decision. Considering the current state of the world, it's worth noting that this game can be played very easily in video chat. All players have the same information, so you only need one camera aimed at the playing area. With Illusion, Wolfgang Warsch has created a fast and simple game that almost anyone can play. I say almost anyone because there is one fatal flaw in the game's graphic design. For those with red-green color blindness, this game is almost unplayable. Just see how a row of colored cards will look to them.  But that's really my only gripe. While it certainly doesn't compare to The Mind or That's Pretty Clever, Illusion does exactly what it sets out to do. It's a quick and easy game that gives you the chance to tell your friends they're wrong. USEFUL LINKS Illusion on the BGG portal https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/244995/illusion Illusion on the Game Theory portal https://www.tg.in.ua/boardgames/1393/illusion VIDEO REVIEWS ..

 Set in the west of the Carolingian Empire, Architects of the West Kingdom players take on the role of royal architects competing for favor and glory. Your workers gather resources, hire apprentices, and construct buildings, including the king's magnificent new cathedral. Throughout the game, the actions you take will affect your integrity; Do you remain honest and unassuming, working for the cathedral, paying your taxes and managing your debts more easily, or do you take advantage of the temptations found on the black market, easily accumulating scarce resources while destroying your reputation? In architects, the choice is yours.  Architects of the West Kingdom is a worker placement game where players take turns sending one of their twenty identical workers to any of a dozen locations in the city. Not enough money? Send Aled—as I like to call them—to the Silversmith. Need a stone? Jacinth can run to the Quarry. You will use the collected materials to build landmarks and contribute to the construction of the Royal Cathedral, receiving any short- or long-term benefits associated with your work. Every time the player wants to build, he sends a worker to the Guild, where he will remain until the end of the game. If you build a landmark from your hand, you pay the appropriate resources and play the card in your play area, receiving any immediate bonus it might give. If you contribute to a cathedral, you pay the cost associated with the next tier of the cathedral track and move your token up the row. Each level is worth an increasing number of points and has a limited number of seats available. Players cannot work on a cathedral if the next tier is completely full and there is only room for one on the last tier. Competition for those 20 points can be fierce. CH-CH-CH-CH-CH-CHANGE. PART 1 This is all standard issue with worker placement games, but Architects differ in a few ways. Worker placement often limits each field to one meep and uses a circular structure where players remove their workers from the board every few turns. In Architects, you can't block other players in most locations, and workers stay in place until they're forcibly removed. This is to your advantage because more of your workers in one location means more benefits for you. If you send Morgan to join Jacinth in the Quarry, you get two stones this turn. Whether you need your own workers or someone else has more of a presence in one location than you'd like, you can use the Town Center to bring people together. Your own employees are returned to your stocks, ready to go back to work, while you hold your rivals' subordinates captive. The world of architects is unprincipled, and you can make all sorts of slanderous accusations about the business practices of your opponents. When you turn them in to the local garrison a few turns later, they'll be arrested on charges of impropriety, and you'll receive a reward of one coin per head. If your own employees are accused of wrongdoing, you can get them fired, no questions asked. FRIENDS, FRIENDS, FRIENDS, I DEFINITELY HAVE FRIENDS Disciples are the common thread that runs through all three Western Kingdom games. At the Workshop, you can hire one of the eight Apprentice Cards available, which grant you permanent abilities and allow you to build certain types of landmarks. These abilities can vary widely, covering everything from material bonuses to additional actions only available to you. Each student can offer their own path to victory, and the game shines in finding combinations that go well together. The apprentice deck that comes with the game is generous - not to mention if you get all the mini-expansions like I did - and helps add a lot of variety to later games.  A quick note on this: The Age of Artisans expansion introduces a training step where players, in reverse turn order, obtain one of the available apprentices from the workshop before starting the game. Designer Shem Phillips said in an interview that he regrets not including this rule in the base game, and even though I don't have Artisans, I use this option. WANT TO BUY A SUNCLOCK? The Black Market, a collection of three spaces in the lower left square of the board, offers easy access to a selection of other expensive actions and rare goods. Instead of paying four coins to hire an apprentice and two of them going to taxes, why not pay two coins under the table and hire any apprentice you want? Why waste two turns sending workers down the mine to get one lousy piece of gold "the fair way", whatever that means, when you can pay three coins to rip out two bars now, and we'll throw in some wood and rocks while you're here ?  Black Market workers remain there until all three slots are filled, triggering a Black Market reset. All Black Market workers are rounded up and sent to the Garrison, and any player with three or more workers in prison loses power. Also, the player with the most workers in the prison takes a debt, which subtracts two points if not paid at the end of the game, but rewards one honesty if paid. The Black Market items have been replaced with new offerings and three locations are available again.  Keep in mind that the goods here are not just bargains. To the left of the field is the Virtue track, which tracks your reputation throughout the game. Working on the cathedral increases your honesty, while using items offered on the black market lowers it. There is a balance here. The black market is the easiest place to get the rare materials you need to work on the cathedral, but you can't shop there if your reputation is too high, which means it will take longer to progress through the cathedral than if you were a bit bad. On the other hand, if your reputation is too low, you cannot work on the cathedral, the best way to increase your reputation. Do too much of either and the other slips out of reach. The Track of Virtue encourages players to play a variety of strategies throughout the game, but more than that, it gives Architects of the Western Kingdom a great and immersive sense of narrative. CHANGES PART 2 The net effect of all this preparation is a staffing game where you have to pay a little more attention to what everyone else is doing. Not only are you trying to figure out when to build, when it's safe to go black market, or when you should do everything you can to break your workers out of prison, but you also have to keep track of what apprentices your opponents have recruited and the action spaces that will benefit them as a result. Repeatedly going out of your way to disrupt others won't win the architect game, but doing it enough to keep your opponents from running away will. MISCELLANEOUS The choice to make spaces both disposable and reusable is exciting. This eliminates two problems associated with the placement of workers. Player interaction in this genre usually boils down to blocking your opponents or having to think on your feet as a result of losing the space you need. The most unrelenting worker placement games—I'm referring to Russian Railways in particular—offer such a shortage of seats that every move is a knife to someone's heart. Handier titles like Viticulture give you a special worker that can't be blocked, or an action space that lets you copy anywhere else on the board. In these games, much of the tension comes from figuring out when to use that safety net. Architects find surface tension when you want to build, when you want to reset the Black Market, and when you have to stop one of your opponents from getting too many workers in a certain location. The main tension lies in the choreography of your movements on the paths of the Cathedral and Virtue. CONCLUSIONS Accessible yet with subtle challenges that will reward more experienced players, interactive without any penalties or over-confrontation, and richly reminiscent of the world through both its art and mechanics, Architects of the West Kingdom is a stunning game. That's a huge amount of content for such a small box, and it's a great choice for introducing people who are new to board games to the medium-difficulty process. I must note that Architects includes a very good solo mode that manages to convey a lot of the feeling of playing against a human opponent. The bot can also be used to add a third opponent to a two-player game, which I highly recommend. In the end, the Western Kingdom series is a great entry-level game if you want to transition people to more difficult games. The iconography in Architects carries over to Paladins of the Western Kingdom and Viscounts of the Western Kingdom, two much harder—and, I would argue, much better—games. Having familiar characters as a guide can make it a lot easier for more people who are used to light games to dig in. USEFUL LINKS Architects of the West Kingdom on the BGG portal https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/236457/architects-west-kingdom Architects of the West Kingdom on the Game Theory portal https://www.tg.in.ua/boardgames/74/architects-west-kingdom VIDEO REVIEWS ..

 Golem is a complex euro like Grand Austria Hotel and Lorenzo il Magnifico (both in the 3.2-3.3 range, according to the BGG difficulty rating), and it shows when you're trying to get the game ready. So what is a Golem ? At its core, the game is a complex engine builder built around the legend of a rabbi who reanimates a clay statue into a golem to protect the people of Prague in the 16th century. While the backstory and weirdly dark box art didn't draw me in, the promise of building an interconnected engine between the various economies and tracks piqued my interest. There are different tracks. There are ultimate goals. There are multipliers that are used to increase the points, and while there is scoring during the game, more than half of the points are earned at the end of the game. There are figures of students that can be moved. There are Golem figurines that also move. There is a rabbi figurine that needs to be placed and activated! And that's before you even start adding artifact items to your personal gamepad along with your library tokens, orbs, a synagogue to store said orbs… there's just so much. (The rules contain EIGHTEEN separate steps to set up the game.) Now, if you're a fan of Vital Lacerda games like On Mars and Lisboa, you're probably thinking what I was thinking when I read the 20 page rulebook: Is this game as hard as the Lacerda games? The answer is definitely yes. This also means that if you like heavy combo-after-combo games, I think you'll be right on your plate playing Golem. 4 rounds and only 12 actions gave me the feeling that it would be hard and very strategic, but short; as it turned out, the three-man game took about 3 hours after the rules were explained, and included a good mix of strategic gameplay and forced change of tactics due to the distribution of marbles in each round. WHAT DID YOU LIKE ABOUT THE GOLEM? ALMOST ALL! The combos in this game, the big point where you chain together solid moves, it's awesome. I mean, fantastic. I had a turn where I performed an action to activate multiple of my Golems at once. I did this move by doing the Golem action to buy a 5 knowledge discount book (Knowledge is one of the resources in the game) which is placed in one of the columns on my player board along with the 3 other books I already have to give me a one time bonus that will be doubled because I've already activated another power… just describing all of this and rethinking how I did this move is mind boggling. All 3 players made at least a couple of such moves in the third and fourth rounds of the game; Golem is slow to develop, but opens up the potential for late moves that will get nods (or scowls) from other players at the table. Golem definitely has some magical moments that set it apart from other games, from building its engine to ending a little early… in other words, just in time! I also liked the turn order. As in most games, going first in Golem is good, especially if you want to take one black ball to move 2 students one division on any of the 3 lanes, or if you want to take a certain rabbi action. I also like staying last in Golem, especially since you can run into a situation where other players are doing both of their orb actions. Now, on your second of three actions in a round, you need to take a ball or a Rabbi action, and you can block the Rabbi action and wait for the ball action, since that zone is blocked for anyone who has already taken 2 balls. I liked that playing Grand Austria Hotel—and understanding how the "strength" of an action relates to the number of balls left in any row—helped me plan my move. The book market in Golem was fun, buying the right cards was just great. Then placing these cards in certain columns to activate everything in the column can give a lot of resources that can replace a good revenue engine if played correctly. The quality of the game is excellent, although I wish the design team had used wooden components or metal coins instead of cardboard ones. There are many ways to win in Golem and the game seems to direct players to specialize in one or two of the three main tracks in the game (Research, Artifacts, Golems). There's a lot to do, but even though it's a tough experience, the game doesn't get boring once you start playing game after game. WHAT DID NOT LIKE? For some reason, balls just don't work for me. Cubes? I love dice and I still don't know why they didn't use dice like in other games by these designers. The iconography in Golem is heavy. As with the Alma Mater, you'll need to keep a manual handy to explain the new round cards or what bonuses are on the finished Golem body parts. For my third or fourth game, the iconography did not raise any questions, but it is not as intuitive as in other similar games. Topic? I still really don't know why a themeless Euro used 16th century Prague with Golems - Golems that are possibly better killed thanks to the "Kill the Golem" mechanic!! And the idea that the orbs are eyeballs that go into slots on the players board… I don't know, that theme just didn't work for me. EXPERIENCE FROM THE GAME Despite some of the quibbles, Golem is a great game. If you're looking for a tougher version of some of the classic games these designers brought us, Golem, which, like Barrage, has a 4.0 out of 5.0 on BGG, will test every player. I look forward to future installments!..

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 Many board games attempt—often in the rule book—to tell a story. Some go that extra mile to create one or more deep worlds where the game takes creative form. Still others include a special digital program to tell that story along with a set of accents and sound effects along with an atmospheric musical score. Only one game I've seen has a cute microcomic about the random trouble of receiving a diplomatic gift in the form of a very hungry panda.  Takenoko , the creation of Antoine Bose ( 7 Wonders , Tokaido , Ghost Stories ), tells just such a story, immersing people in the magical scene of a Japanese imperial bamboo garden. The gardener, instead of calmly doing his work, has to fight with a magical large-sized eating machine.  In this game, localized in Ukraine by Geekach Games , players try to manage the location and development of a beautiful bamboo garden while satisfying the voracious appetite of a giant panda. The Chibis expansion even adds Mrs. Panda and a growing family for everyone's favorite black and white creature. The only thing missing is live streaming from the giant panda camera). The comic opening sets the stage for a carefree, magical experience that might even inspire a haiku. Did it interest you? I believe so. BAMBOO SPROUTS During training, players receive personal game tablets to store various components and mark selected actions. A tiled pond is placed in the center of the table to prepare a garden, and the figures of the Gardener and the Panda are placed in this pond, presumably to cool their feet. During the game, players look at three types of tasks. They are presented in the form of three separate stacks of objective cards. Players are dealt one card of each type at the start to start a fruitful garden of creativity and pave the way for victory points: Landscaping by placing hexagonal tiles next to an existing garden Irrigation of the land by laying water channels from the central pond Growing 3D bamboo shoots in irrigated areas for a cute panda to feast on  Each turn, players begin by rolling a weather die and applying its effects, which represent a kind of meteorological blessing: a solar bonus action, a rain-soaked bamboo growth, a windy duplicate action, a lightning-fast panda bamboo snack, cloud land enhancement tokens, or any action. Usually, players perform two different actions out of five possible: Take three plot tiles and place one in the garden Take one irrigation channel, use it immediately or save it for later Move the gardener to another area to grow bamboo Move the Panda to another area to eat a piece of bamboo Draw one target card from the deck of your choice There are a number of features that accompany these actions to both help and hinder would-be Zen gardeners. The Gardener and the Panda must move in straight lines, which in a six-tile garden means that not every tile is available at any given time. The gardener's work is effective not only on his current tile, but also on every adjacent tile of the corresponding color. Land improvements include enclosures that prevent the pandas from eating, fertilizer that doubles growth, and a well that provides irrigation without connecting to a pond. They can be placed at any time to change the look of the garden. If a player has completed any of their objective cards after completing their actions, they may place them as completed. The game continues in this way until a certain number of objectives are reached according to the number of players. The first to reach this number receives a small blessing of points from the Emperor when the scoring begins. The points then depend entirely on the value of the completed objective cards. If there is a tie, the winner is the player who fed the panda the best.BABYS The Chibis expansion adds Miss Panda to further frustrate and hinder the Gardener's efforts. As it turned out, the female is not so hungry for bamboo. When it is moved to a Panda space instead of eating bamboo, players receive a Panda token from the supply that matches the color of the tile. Each of the limited number of Pandenyat tokens carries victory points and gives an irrigation token, an enhancement token, or the ability to exchange an objective card.  On the other hand, Chibis also adds a number of unique garden tiles that lead to a season of abundance. The second pond makes watering easier. Kamis tile grows all three colors of bamboo, creating endless possibilities for any type of target. Sacred hills help each tile of a certain color in the garden grow, regardless of location. The Gardener's Hut provides more variety and control when selecting objective cards. With the addition of the Panda family, Chibis adds a whole new way to earn points. By improving the garden, the expansion puts the land on anabolic steroids, the sprouting bamboo is almost out of control; and because Panda is distracted, he doesn't eat as often. The poor gardener must have lost his roof! Is there no end to this unbearable madness?! Everyone knows that sometimes expansion is not a good idea. Chibis aren't mandatory by any means, but they do allow you to explore a wild "What if..." scenario by gently nudging some of the game's features. I found this to be a refreshing twist on a game we already love. VISUAL  Takenoko , from top to bottom, is visually captivating on the table. The grounds are a beautiful combination of green, pink and yellow with vertically cut wooden bamboo shoots. The garden grows wildly, starting with a small pond to engulf the table in a colorful landscape. The cards feature shades of blue, red and purple to add a spectrum of splashes. The Gardener and the Panda are painted miniatures of the comic book characters. Regardless of the outcome of the game, it's impossible to walk away from a session without admiring the aesthetics. In fact, you'll probably be inclined to take a picture of the garden at some point during the game.  I already mentioned the comic, but I have to revisit the concept because Takenoko boasts some of my favorite rules. This is the only book in our collection that the kids fight over when the game starts. The illustrations are cute and humorous and immediately draw players into the game's narrative. Throughout the book, the gardener's frustrations come to life as he learns the rules and struggles with his huge, pleasant friend. The subject matter really fascinates me and these characters have personality.  Takenoko 's base game is a gem. In a two-player game, the speed of the party is insane, often limiting decision-making on fast-track objective cards to nine cards. Three and four players lay out the entire garden and provide more strategy. On the more critical side, any game that contains non-reward contract cards is prone to being trashed. In practice, this means spending late-game turns desperately picking up random objective cards—instead of making fruitful moves, mind you—trying to get into conditions that already exist in order to rack up points quickly. Takenoko doesn't hurt to penalize cards in hand at the end of the game.  Over the years, there has been a lot of commentary floating around regarding the distribution of points on goal cards. The core game prioritizes panda feeding over everything else — especially the objective cards — which can be frustrating for those who like to seek balance, though I never thought the imbalance broke the game. Chibis presents two variants of the rules that brilliantly bridge the gap on the way to general happiness. One suggests banning pandas from feeding on the basal segments of bamboo shoots, which poses several obstacles to a strategy of targeted eating. The second grants a bonus for each full set of three objective cards, suddenly making these previously finicky objective cards very important. Although the expansion was a recent addition to our collection, this second rules mod has been in the game since we first heard about it, partly because I like to reward balanced play. The addition of tons of baby pandas certainly changes the physical landscape of the game, but the new scoring path only sees a fixed amount of points available on the table, which sometimes turns out to be the best actions without delaying garden beats. It only takes one try at the Babies, Babies and All Babies strategy to realize that victory does not await those who neglect the core game. If you're a frequent visitor to BoardGameGeek (BGG), you know that every game page has a list of game mechanics. Dice roll, tile placement, set collection, and other board terms help seasoned hobbyists describe the game experience. Takenoko has a whopping eleven mechanics. Eleven! There's a surprising amount going on in this lively garden, but not to the point of being overwhelming. The mechanics fit the theme perfectly and I find it has all the relaxation that The Gardener comic seems to want! The broad yet light collection of mechanics makes Takenoko a great game to introduce young and new gamers to the ins and outs of the hobby without blowing their minds. From opening the box to testing the finished product, Takenoko immerses the player in the stakes of what's possible in a more challenging version with modular maps, changing landscapes, resource management, and some nice low-consequence decisions. This is a game that shows that you can still do this in board games.  Despite ten years and thousands of competing games, I'd still say that Takenoko is the peach of a family game. The theme, aesthetics and gameplay are skillfully combined to create a playful and memorable experience. Like many of Bose's designs, Takenoko is relatively light-hearted fun whose greatest gift is the time spent together in another world without leaving the table. USEFUL LINKS Takenoko on the BGG portal https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/70919/takenoko Takenoko: Chibis on BGG..