New to Me – March 2018

I’m tired.

It’s been a busy month of playing new games! So I’ve definitely enjoyed it.

But I’m tired.

If I hadn’t been writing this post as I played the games, I’m not sure if it would have come out. This is a long one.

It totals 12 new games. My month of March itself consisted of 21 games played a total of 24 times.

Woo!

So, without further adieu (I lost all of my adieu in a card game that I was too embarrassed to put on my play list), let’s begin.

Raiders of the North Sea (2015 – Renegade Games Studio, Garphil Games) – 2 plays

Designer: Shem Phillips

Artist: Mihajlo Dimitrievski

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Review – The Fox in the Forest

I’m a big fan of trick-taking games, most especially the wonderful game Diamonds.

But what happens when you’re sitting there with only one person, trying to figure out what game to play? You’re both fans of trick-taking games, but there are only two of you. No trick-taking games work with two.

What can you do?

Suddenly, an annoying-looking man appears with a Shamwow. And with a game that will suit your needs!

That’s a sly-looking fox

That game would be The Fox in the Forest, designed by Joshua Buergel, with art by Jennifer L. Meyer and Keith Pishnery, and published by Foxtrot Games and Renegade Game Studios. It was published in 2017.

This is a two-player trick-taking game that overcomes all of the limitations in regards to why trick-taking games are terrible with two players.

Let’s see how it works.

Renegade & Garphill Move on From Vikings

As a huge fan of the Renegade Games and Garphill Games production of Raiders of the North Sea (I haven’t played the other two in the series, Shipwrights of the North Sea and Explorers of the North Sea), I was really excited to see today’s press release of a new game.

Designer Shem Phillips, along with first-time designer S J McDonald, has moved on from the Vikings. I guess maybe he felt like he’d done enough with them?

Apparently he’s moving on to Carolingian history instead of North Sea. Today’s announcement was for a really interesting-looking game, Architects of the West Kingdom.

Another series of games?

Maybe. Which has this History buff going nuts.

I’ll try and calm down.

(Looking at the Architects page, it does look like this is a new trilogy)

App Review – Lotus

Sometimes you just need a little tranquility in your life. Your day at work was terrible. The kids are getting on your nerves.

Zombies are rampaging down the street.

You know, a typical Monday.

On days like that, you need a game that’s peaceful, that will contribute to your inner Zen.

On those days, you’ll pick up your mobile device and open the Lotus app.

(Hopefully you downloaded it before the Zombie Apocalypse cut all the power)

It’s peaceful right from the beginning!

Lotus is a beautiful 2-4 player card game published by Renegade Games. The app is published by Renegade and Dire Wolf Studios.

Top Games Played in 2017 – Honourable Mentions

I managed to play 100 games in 2017. That’s a record for me, I think. Some were new to me (58 of them) while others were old favourites.

Seven of my Top 10 games played were actually new to me, so they couldn’t have appeared on my list last year.

When I was going through the 100 games, I marked off the games that I felt might make my Top 10 and then checked to see how many I had chosen. Turns out that I had chosen 16. From that, I formed my Top 10, but that leaves 6 really cool games that could conceivably have made the Top 10 but didn’t quite do so.

So why not tell you what those are?

Hell, I need content, so why not?

Here they are, the Top 11-16 games I played last year, in no particular order.

Great Western Trail (2016) – Stronghold Games

Designer: Alexander Pfister

Artist: Andreas Resch

Top 10 Games Played in 2017 (5-1)

Thankfully this post isn’t coming to you really late, like in mid-February. That would be a bit stale, wouldn’t it?

I wanted to get this posted last week, but a bad cold did me in.

Yes, Gollum, I agree.

I know you’ve been waiting with bated breath. I’m sorry for those of you who may have keeled over waiting.

Hopefully it will be worth it.

What were the Top 5 games I played in 2017? These are games not necessarily published in 2017 (though the oldest is 2015, actually), but just the top 10 games I played.

The top #10 – #6 can be found here.

Let’s find out, without further adieu (I think I generate a lot of adieu when I have a cold)

New to Me – December 2017

Posting this in between the two posts for top games played in 2017 because, well, reasons that will become apparent when the 2nd post comes out later this week.

It was a lean month for “new to me” games in December, but it was fuller than I expected it to be. I missed two Sunday game days, but had a couple of unexpected week day game nights to make up for it.

In a delightful coincidence, every new game I played in December was actually published in 2017, which gives me a tinge of “Cult of the New” as well!

Just don’t tell anybody, please. I don’t want to besmirch my reputation.

Here we go!

Clank! In! Space! (2017 – Renegade Games) – 1 Play

Designer: Paul Dennan

Artist: N/A