Games on Location: Episode 3 - The Bloody Inn

Episode 3 of Games on Location is taking a morbid turn with Nicolas Robert's The Bloody Inn, published by Pearl Games. With Spooky Season fast approaching, where better to play a game of murder and robbery than one of Canterbury's oldest pubs with a dark local legend?

The Bishops Finger, dating back to the 16th Century, "stands out as one of Canterbury's most distinctive historical pubs." So states the website. "Whether you're looking for an exciting venue showing the football, or a cosy local to enjoy a romantic meal in, Bishops Finger is your pub."

What this introduction doesn't mention is the mysterious story of Ellen Blean, who local legend says haunts the pub and the nearby streets. It is said that Ellen Blean, wife to a local canon (some versions of the legend have her as his housekeeper but the blurring of lines between housekeeper and wife is a subject for another blog post), discovered that her husband was having an affair. To take her revenge she poisoned the canon and his lover with a meat pie. This is far from the most haunting part of the tale. Legend has it that Ellen disappeared after the murder only to be discovered shortly afterwards, walled up at a house nearby called Dark Entry, where she had evidently been buried alive. Locals state that every Friday night her ghost wanders the street and then manifests in the bar of The Bishops Finger, appearing as a plain faced, large woman in a long, wide skirt and mobcap.

So with this story fresh in our minds, we headed out to the pub to play a game of The Bloody Inn, in which players play as 18th Century tavern owners looking to make their fortune by murdering and robbing their unfortunate guests. 

"Whether or not their plan will work out, one thing is certain: Not every guest will leave this inn alive..."

The game, for 1-4 players, is stunningly simple with a high bar for strategy. Each round, players will get two turns to complete actions. These include, murder, bribery, burying a corpse, or laundering money. All fittingly dark actions for a morbid game such as this. Over the course of two seasons, any guests left alive during the first season will foolishly return during the next, giving players the opportunity to get that large paycheck they missed the first time around. Honestly, the game brings out the darkness in all of us.

The first player fills the inn, allocating guests to rooms, each of which is owned by a particular player. If a guest in a player's room survives the night they pay a small fee, so there is incentive to keep certain guests alive. Players then take it in turns to decide what they are going to do and weigh up how they're going to get away with it.

All actions are paid for with guest cards, that when in a player's hand are known as accomplices. Accomplices are obtain through bribery, which itself is paid for with guest cards. There is a constant balancing act of keeping enough accomplices in hand to be able to pay for each murder and body disposal, while not having too many that they cost too much money at the end of each round.

Murders must also be well timed, as if a law-enforcement card comes a-calling, and is still alive in the morning, they will be alerted to any dead bodies cluttering up the inn and the cost for disposal becomes crippling.

Bodies can only be looted and disposed off by building annexes to your inn and burying them beneath the buildings. This is costly in itself and it is easy to become stuck in a loop of murder without being able to dispose of the bodies. Another law enforcer turns up? Sometimes you just have to kill him to avoid him discovering the bodies. But then you have another body on your hands and nowhere to store it. In a grim way, it's very funny.

In many ways this is a tableau builder, as you construct buildings in front of you and gradually slide corpses beneath the cards. In other ways the game plays like a card drafter as you aim to get the guests who are most useful to you (each guest has a speciality that means they can be used multiple times for certain actions) and maximise their potential in your grim work. The game achieves both very well and it feels like a neat and concise experience. There's not an inch of fat on it, which translates to a smooth and intuitive game.

You've got to love a game where a player can say quite casually, "He's worth more money to you dead." It's quite thrilling to play as the bad guys for once.

At set up there is the option to play a shorter game, but in all honesty, it's worth opting for the longer version. The longer play time allows you to rack up more victims and it's fun at the end of the game to look back on your legacy of blood and murder. 

This game is perfect for a spooky games night with friends but also offers a solo experience, where you're looking to accumulate enough money to rank from Troubling Innkeeper to Demonic Innkeeper, without having any bodies remaining at the end of the game.

It would be remiss of us to not include some praise for the artwork by Weberson Santiago. The stricking graphical style really captures the dark and bloody nature of the game. I can't quite put my finger on what the box art puts me in mind of but it's something from my childhood, something that used to give me the creeps.

We hugely enjoyed this and agreed that it has the potential to become one of our regular games, especially as nights draw in and shadows grow large in the dark months of the year. 

Sadly we didn't experience any hauntings while we played at The Bishops Finger but it provided the perfect backdrop to a game as dark as this.

Review: Daybreak - Avert Climate Catastrophe

 

"Daybreak is set in a fictional world in which all the world's major powers agree that climate change is fact."

This is how Daybreak was first introduced to me when I got to play it at a recent Gaming The System evening. It's easy to then think that's the hard part over and done with, but oh boy does Daybreak still manage to throw up a juicy challenge.

Designed by table top heavy weight Matt Leacock (Pandemic, Forbidden Island, and many others) and Matteo Menapace, in Daybreak 1-4 players take the roles of dominant world powers such as the USA, China, Europe, and somewhat confusingly, the rest of the world, in an attempt to reverse the course of climate change to avert catastrophe.

This is achieved by drawing cards to create a tableau in front of you that acts as an engine to reduce the carbon footprint of your nation, while keeping up with the energy demands by switching to green energy. This is only half of the challenge, however, as you will also need to invest in carbon capture strategies to ensure that any carbon that is released is captured before it can build up and create serious problems down the line.

Aside from working on your own tableau/engine, known as local projects, you can also work together to attempt to achieve global projects at the cost of cards. These global projects are powerful buffs that can help your local projects achieve their aims. For example, in the game we played, one of the global projects we invested in allowed us to double the clean energy output from any nuclear power plants in our tableau. Each round, the energy demands on your nation increases by a set amount so having a reliable source of green energy is very important.

The game is played over 6 rounds in which crisis cards are added to the map, global projects are started, then players complete local projects by drawing and placing cards, emissions are then added to the map board based on each players current carbon footprint, which are then either absorbed through the carbon capture initiatives or go into the thermometer track, gradually raising the temperature of the planet and increasing the number of crisis cards drawn each turn. Following all this any unresolved crisis cards are resolved. These crisis cards have devastating effects on the players' nations and can cause community crises, which if left to build up can cost the game.  Much like the global initiatives, players can sacrifice cards to combat the crisis cards in an attempt to mitigate the impending disasters.

As cooperative games go, this game is highly cooperative. While each player has their own nation to worry about and their own engine to build, without sufficient communication and teamwork, the state of the global map can quickly go from bad to worse, which, incidentally is what happened to us. Those crisis cards are no joke and it's easy to forget about them while trying to shift your nation from dirty to clean energy while keeping up with the ever increasing demand.

Aside from the general structure of each round, there is no turn order when it comes to the main part of the game, in which players draw cards and decide whether to invest them in local initiatives, global initiatives, or use them to counter the disasters on the horizon. This creates a perfect forum for discussion, debate, and collaboration in which players really feel like world leaders sat around a table trying to work together to solve a problem. Each card is played with consideration as to how it can not only help you home nation but also the goals of the wider world (at least that's how it's supposed to work, I must confess I spent most of my cards rather selfishly on my local projects to the detriment of the global issues. But, hey, I know for next time).

Despite it's difficulty, this is a tremendously optimistic game that allows us to imagine a future in which world leaders can work together for the good of the planet. While challenging, the solution is always within sight. The game exudes the belief that with a few smart decisions and enough cooperation, we can find out way out of the present climate crises we find ourselves in. This optimism is evident in the colourful, uplifting art style that speaks of a bright future rather than the dingy, polluted present. Each card is carefully illustrated with bold colours and clear lines. On the whole the game is a joy to look at. Even the name, Daybreak, inspires visions of a utopian future.

As an excellent touch, each card contains a QR code (kids love QR codes) which can be scanned to learn more about the local projects they represent, such as Dirty Electricity Phase Out or Climate Debt Reparations. Everything about this game feels like it is trying to educate about the environment with the hope of instigating change, rather than succumbing to the bleak misery that is all too easy to fall into when viewing the world today.

Despite all this optimism, though, we cannot ignore the point I made at the beginning of this review. In Daybreak it feels as though the hard part has already been done. This is a present in which we've already achieved the fantastical in getting world leaders to cooperate and communicate. The game makes the statement that if we can just manage this, then a solution is in sight, but this is a a tremendously big If.

Overall, Daybreak is a joy to play and I look forward to getting to play it again. It strikes a good balance of being almost overwhelming while also dangling the carrot of success in front of you each round. I often find games that have no specific turn order can feel somewhat disorganised and chaotic but it avoids this and really does allow space for effective cooperative play. The game marries the mechanics and theme very well to create an intuitive and enjoyable experience that offers a satisfying challenge. 

While I wouldn't recommend this game to those very new to the hobby, it is definitely one of the more accessible games to tackle a Big Issue like climate change, so if you want something to really get your teeth into with a terrific message, look no further than Daybreak.

If you are interested in joining in with Gaming the System, they meet twice a month at The Long Rest in Canterbury from 18:30 to 21:30 every 2nd and 4th Wednesday of the month. Gaming the System are a group interested in how board games can improve our understanding of the inequalities in the world and what we might do about them. They play games that challenge our understanding, help us to cooperate, and point towards new ways of dealing with the world. All the games available at their events are considered political (with a lower case p) in that they demonstrate certain morals and values and can open up wider political discussion.

Review: Dungeons & Dragons Horrified

I've been a fan of the Horrified series since the first edition, which comprised of the classic Universal Studios monsters. From that first game, the colour palette, theme, and pick-up-and-deliver mechanics held me enraptured. There was a simple beauty to the game play and everything about it was a love letter to those classic horror movies that inspired it.

Since that first edition we've seen a tremendous outing with Horrified: American Monsters, focusing on North American cryptids such as mothman, big foot, and the jersey devil. We've also had the legendary Greek Monsters, which featured monsters from classic Greek mythology. Both of these titles expanded on the original theme with larger maps and mechanics that kept the game fresh and interesting, more than just a re-skin of the original.

Following this, Ravensburger, released Horrified: World of Monsters, which if I'm totally honest didn't hit the same mark as it's predecessors. The steam punk aesthetic was interesting but less refined that the previous three titles, and the assets included felt cheaper (the cards felt much thinner and flimsier than the original). Furthermore, the monsters that were chosen for inclusion felt disjointed. Fascinating monsters from real world folklore were lumped with Cthulhu (the Cthulhu mythos could easily have supported it's own game, not to mention the monsters from folklore from around the world). There was no cohesion here, and it was explained away with some half-hearted text about rifts between worlds. Generally, World of Monsters felt like a misstep in the series.

Those negatives aside, we at Hand Limit still get World of Monsters to the table and it still offers a rewarding challenge. There was, however, some trepidation that there were signs of the franchise going stale. Could the Horrified formula continue to provide enough material to keep it relevant?

It was with great excitement that we learned the next title in the series would be Dungeons & Dragons. There is already so much material in existence from the world of D&D that it seemed like the perfect way for Horrified to bring in some fresh blood.

The game arrived at Hand Limit HQ at the beginning of August and it has taken us a couple of weeks to get it to the table but when we finally did we were so happy to see the results of this match-up.

At it's core D&D Horrified is a return to the classic formula. The gameplay is smooth and well executed, and the rules are easy to learn for those less experienced in board gaming. 1 to 5 players take the roles of heroes looking to rid the land of troublesome monsters by completing various mini-games and challenges. On a turn a player gets a set number of actions to advance their objectives then they flip a card from the monster deck and complete the monster actions as described. When players or the sporadic civilians who turn up on the board are knocked out during monster attacks the terror marker moves along the terror track. Should this ever reach the final point on the track, the heroes have failed and the monsters overrun the town. Likewise, if the monster deck is ever depleted, the heroes have run out of time and fail.

As with most cooperative games there are multiple ways of losing but only one way to win, defeat all the monsters before your time runs out. D&D Horrified introduces 4 new monsters to the series; mimic, displacer beast, beholder, and the fearsome red dragon. All classic and recognisable monsters of the IP.

Dungeons & Dragons Horrified introduces some interesting new mechanics that helps keep things interesting. Most notably is the inclusion of a D20 in the set. In other titles of the series, characters have special actions unique to them, in this latest title each character has a number of special actions that are determined using a D20 roll. While this makes it harder to plan for these special abilities, it does add an element of the luck of the roll, which feels very in keeping with the D&D theme. On top of this, many of the monster mini-games involve rolling a D20. In the game we played (displacer beast and beholder) we found battling the beholder a lot of fun as it involves rolling the D20 and disabling it's eye-stalks depending on what you roll. This effectively captured the classic feel of D&D while staying in the realm of Horrified.

The map itself is the most adventurous yet with the inclusion of teleportation portals that link sections of the map in ways that made strategising feeling more akin to 4-dimensional chess. Not to mention the artwork on the board, which has definitely found its footing since the slightly ill-defined aesthetic of World of Monsters. The high quality artwork associated with Wizards of the Coast is evident throughout the game, with perk cards made to look like tarot, monster cards featuring some impressive monster artwork (the green and purple beholder is a particular favourite of mine), and some lovely character art on the character boards.

The characters for the game once again feature staples of the genre. The Cleric, The Wizard, The Rogue, The Fighter, and The Bard, are all playable characters with their own selection of unique abilities. My main criticism of this version of the game is that there are only those 5 characters to choose from. In earlier editions of Horrified, some of the joy was finding synergies between different characters and assembling a new team for each session in an attempt to find the match ups that worked. As the game accommodates up to 5 players it feels as though Ravensburger have tried to get away with giving us the minimum it can possibly give. Only 5 characters, and only 4 monsters, feels stingy and will certainly impact the replayability of the edition. 

That being said, we found nothing has been lost in terms of the challenge. When it comes to cooperative games, we always say that we don't feel we've got our money's worth unless we've lost more times than we've won, and in this respect D&D Horrified didn't disappoint. The displacer beast and beholder comfortably wiped the floor with us.

Overall, this is a strong contender for a place in the top 2 Horrified titles (Universal and American Monsters - the exact placement of these is still to be determined). Does it quite outpace American Monsters? It's possibly too early to tell, but it is a solid contender. The theme is incorporated well, the monsters feel original to the series, and there is enough here to keep the series feeling fresh and original. This is a fun title for those experienced and in-experienced in D&D and is definitely worth a play if you enjoy cooperative games and the Horrified series.

Review: Tribes of the Wind - Does anyone else smell Ghibli?

 

We recently got a chance to play Tribes of the Wind by Joachim Thome, published by La Boite De Jeu, at Canterbury Gaming Festival, and if you read our roundup of day 1 you'll know that we didn't get past the first turn before throwing in the towel.

Well, I got home and I found that I couldn't stop thinking about the game. The artwork, the pieces, the promise of a satisfying tile-laying, worker placement, strategy game with all the colour, charm, and theme of post-apocalyptic environmentalism, reminiscent of studio Ghibli's Nausicaa: Valley of the Wind (I mean, seriously, someone on the production of this game must have been a fan of that phenomenal film). Plus I was left with the feeling of disappointment at not having understood a game that had such a small instruction booklet for the amount of game that was in the box. 

All of these things left me wanted to take another run at the game. I said to a fellow Hand Limit Collective member that I really felt that given half an hour in a quiet, temperature controlled space, I would make sense of the rules (which didn't seem that complicated, it was definitely a skill issue on my part). Therefore, it was with great delight on Day 2 that I found a copy for sale at Board At Home's "pay what you roll" stand at the event. I rolled a D20 and came away with a copy for £16. I was so sure that I would like Tribes of the Wind if given another opportunity, I was happy to spend the money.

Sure enough, once I got it home and could sit and properly digest the rule book I almost felt foolish that it had bested me a couple of days before. The premise is simple, clear away pollution in order to lay forest tiles on your player map, rewilding the barren landscape, and then populate those tiles with people (known as Wind Riders) to construct villages. As soon as one player constructs their fifth village an additional round is played and the game ends.

Combining a bit of card drafting, a bit of worker placement, and a bit of set collecting, the game (for 2-5 players) plays very smoothly with straight forward actions available on each turn. Players must choose between playing an action card from their hand, placing a temple at the cost of three action cards, or building a village on a populated forest tile. The challenge is collecting sets of cards that allow you to play these action cards. Each card has a specific element associated with it and the requirements to play need certain sets of these elements to work. For example, in order to play a card that would allow you to clear pollution or place a forest tile, you may need one of every element in your hand, or for you to have more water element cards than both of your neighbours.

Victory points are earned in a variety of different ways. The most prominent is through completing objectives on village cards, which are earned whenever you construct a village. These will have specifications such as tiles in certain configurations or temples built in certain locations. Points are also scored for removing as much pollution as you can, and placing all your temples (you are limited to 4).

Working out the best order to play your cards adds a real puzzle element to an otherwise simple game, but it carries it off very well. There's very little downtime between turns and during that time you will find that you are focused on deciding what card to play next to maximise efficiency. While the game is primarily built around constructing villages on your own individual maps, there's a bit of player interaction when it comes to using your neighbour's cards to complete card requirements, and drawing new cards from the same marketplace. This gives scope for working together, or working against each other, depending on who you're playing with.

Despite the straightforward nature of the actions, there's a lot going on in this game that gives it a moderately crunchy feeling but it feels great when you manage to pull off the strategy you had planned. There are a lot of pieces to this game and it's satisfying to get to place them around your board. Generally the game has a very nice feel to it and the quality of the assets is clear.

The only downside we encountered was especially notable at the start of the game. It's very easy to be dealt a starting hand that cannot be used because you've not had a chance to build any sets yet. In this instance it's possible to spend three of the cards to build a temple. However, it does feel like it would be possible to be backed into a corner as only one temple can be placed per tile, and you only start with a single tile. This is frustrating early game, when it feels like your agency is taken away from you, but as the game progresses and sets of cards are accumulated, it becomes easier to fulfill the action card requirements.

In a recent review of Trickerion as part of our Canterbury Gaming Convention Day 2 roundup, I bemoaned the game's chaining of requirements, which made meeting a simple objective feel like a cumbersome task. To an extent this game operates in the same way. Players need to decide what they want to achieve and then slowly work backwards to plan out how they will get there. However, Tribes of the Wind manages to make it feel less clunky and there is more often than not a clear path from point A to B. I do feel that the estimated play time of 20 minutes per player to be a bit unrealistic. For a 3 player game we easily made it last 2 hours, though some allowance must be made for it being our first game.

Overall, Tribes of the Wind is a lovely game that offers an engrossing experience, boosted by some truly lovely artwork and a cohesive theme that works well with the mechanics at play. If you're a fan of worker placement games, then this is a must try.

Finally Played: Uno

Continuing our current series of big name games that remarkably I've never played, we return with the classic card game and cause of family arguments everywhere, Uno!

It seems everyone I talk to has played Uno at least once so it's strange that I've gone this long and have never picked up a deck. If I'm totally honest from what I picked up about the game second-hand, there wasn't much of a draw to play it. It seemed like a very basic game without much going for it.

When I told my eleven year old daughter that I had never played it, however, she wanted to put that right straight away. As luck would have it I was gifted a set of Pokemon Uno cards last Christmas so I got the deck out and asked her to teach me how to play.

I went into the game with an open mind but there was a part of me that was expecting to dislike it. Try as I might though, I couldn't bring myself to form a negative opinion about the game. This wasn't due to the game itself, which on the face of it was on the boring side, but instead was thanks to the way in which I was taught.

It was clear from the start that Uno is a very special game for my daughter and it was a privilege to be taught by someone who cared so deeply for the game. It is the first time that my daughter has taught me the rules to anything so it made me quite emotional as she carefully lead me through the different rules and what actions the different cards did. It is a game that she was clearly passionate about and this was infectious, I found myself really enjoying our game despite it being far more basic than what I usually like.

As she was teaching me, she spoke at length about how this game was important to her as during the Covid-19 pandemic, when she was being home-schooled, she would play it most evenings with her mother. This was a difficult time for her, as it was for everyone, being separated from her friends and the routine of the school day, so it was really touching to hear her talk about Uno as something that gave her joy. It was a little bit of routine to her day that kept some feeling of normality during a deeply troubling time.

We played board games as a family during the lockdown but Uno was something my daughter had with just her mother and it was clear to me as she taught me how to play what a special place the game held for her. She talked at length about the rules that she and her mother used, and how these differed from the rules that each of her step siblings played, and that her step father had a different set of rules still. We laughed that these home-brewed rules didn't help them win at all and talked about how she felt the rules she played with her mum are the correct ones.

Regardless of how I feel about the core game of Uno, it occurred to me that this was the perfect example of how games can bring us closer together and how they are sometimes worth more than the sum of their parts. I don't often like giving bad reviews. I prefer to give recommendations for games than go into the negatives. However, this experience gave me a better appreciation that all games, no matter the objective quality, have the power to improve our bonds with each other and strengthen our community. Uno is a popular game, and it must be so for a reason.

Is it a game I would play with just anyone? No, probably not. Will I play it with my daughter again? Almost certainly.

Finally Played: Spirit Island

 Despite having been into table top gaming for a while now, there are a few games that always surprise people when say that I've never played them. These games are modern classics, staples of the table top scene, that almost any board game fan would usually have played early on in their gaming journey. 

In this new series, I am aiming to put that right and get as many of these games to the table as possible. Many are considered entry-level games for those new to the hobby, so will they stand up to someone coming at them from the other end of the spectrum?

Kicking off this series I sought out Spirit Island by R. Eric Reuss. While this isn't often considered a starter-game, it is widely regarded as a modern classic so it surprises me that I'd never had the opportunity to play it. 

Spirit Island, R. Eric Reuss - Greater Than Games

Spirit Island is a cooperative, anti-colonialist game. Players take the roles of the eponymous Spirits to defend the island from destructive colonisers and protect the indigenous population using their mystical powers. The spirits powers range from outright destruction to moving the enemy colonisers around the board, making them easier targets for other players. 

Each round consists of players levelling up their spirits, choosing actions, and then playing them out either before of after the colonists depending on the speed of the action. On the colonisers' turn they explore, build, and ravage different sections of the island, expanding their presence or spreading blight. The amount of blight dictates the overall health of the island and is difficult to remove. If too much blight is placed, the island becomes irreparably damaged, implying that even if you are successful in repelling the invaders, it comes at a cost.

Building on the narrative of the cost of removing the colonists, is the progression of the spirits themselves. As they level up they gain access to more and more powerful actions, which soon start to include negative effects as well. Yes, you can remove all the towns and cities from a space on the board, but you also must place a blight, or you destroy all the natives while you're at it. This helps establish a nuanced story in the course of play that really highlights the short and long term impacts of colonialism on native populations. Even if they are successful and manage to defend their island, it comes at a cost that they will be dealing with for years to come.

The game tells the story of invasion in a way that doesn't hold any punches. Players will start out feeling like the underdog defenders and it's easy to become overwhelmed by the sheer amount that is going on on the board. At the start of the game, the spirits are weak and ill-equipped to deal with the growing problem, but as they grow, more interesting and useful powers are unlocked. Through this progression players find their feet little by little and learn how they can work together to make the most out of their actions. The game is undeniably hard, but in an historical sense, it needs to be. It would be unfair on real-world indigenous populations if repelling colonisers was portrayed as something straight forward or easy. That being said, it did at times feel like the indigenous people, the Dahan, lacked agency and were a passive entity on the board, waiting for the spirits to deal with their problems. 

The game itself is a mixture of strategy, area control, and deck building, all of which are fairly well executed. There was also a satisfying crunchiness to the amount that was going on on the board. There's a lot of game here to sink your teeth into.

That being said, I found myself slightly underwhelmed with the game as a whole. The gameplay often felt a bit clunky and I found that as a new player I was getting frustrated at how difficult it was to take meaningful actions on my turn. There is definitely a high amount of strategy needed and there is very little luck involved. Personally, I like games to have a degree of chance to be truly engaging, and I think that Spirit Island is missing this. The only real element of the game that was left up to chance was which environments would be targeted by the colonisers, but as they were constantly all over the board anyway, it felt like everywhere was constantly under attack

The game generally has a nice art style, portrayed on the player's spirit boards and action cards, but I feel it is let down by the board itself, which looks fairly bland, even when covered with tokens and counters.

Overall, I can completely understand why this game is as popular as it is. There's plenty of scope for improving your skill and strategy on consecutive plays, learning how the game wants to be played. For me, however, the fantastic theme and mostly good artwork failed to stick the landing when it came to gameplay. I never felt like a mighty spirit of nature. More accurately, I felt a little lost and confused. Perhaps it was because we were all new players, but it didn't flow in a satisfying way and at times felt downright messy. I love the theme and would like to see more anti-colonial games, but I don't think Spirit Island is for me. It's possible that with more plays I would learn to love it, but I just don't know if there is enough there to draw me back in. Call it a skill issue, if you will, but the game failed to draw me in.

Regardless of my feelings, I am pleased to have finally managed to sit and play this game.

Review: Citadels - A scheming city builder

We don't tend to worry about release dates when we do our reviews but we may be pushing things a bit with Citadels by Bruno Faidutti, released 25 years ago next month. 

Despite it's age, Citadels stands up as a great experience. We played a game with 7 players (it can accommodate up to 8 with the Dark Cities expansion), and although it was a long game it was a lot of fun. There is plenty of opportunity to interact with other players but the option is also there to just focus on building your own city, without meddling in other people's.

In Citadels, players take turns to gather gold and use it to pay for the construction of new districts to their city from the cards in their hand. Which is an incredibly straightforward premise. There is, however, a small twist to this. Each round, players draft cards that dictate what role they will play during the round. Roles include characters such as the Assassin, the Bishop, the King, and the Warlord. Each role remains hidden but acts in a set order, starting with the Assassin and ending with the Warlord (in a 2-7 player game), and each has their own unique ability that can be used to the benefit of the player or the detriment of others.

 

For instance, the Assassin can assassinate one character each turn, removing their ability to take a turn in that round. The target is chosen by the role, not the player, so there is a bit of social deduction involved if there is a particular player on you want to remove from the round. The Bishop gains extra gold for each religious district in a player's city, the King always chooses their character first at the start of the next round, and the Warlord can pay to destroy districts in other player's cities.

 

These layers of card drafting, hidden role, and social deduction add a great depth to a game that otherwise might be overly simplistic and allow for a lot of underhanded tactics around the table. We played the game with a higher player number, which I feel helped the flow of the game as we had a player for every character, with the exception of one character card each round which is left face down in the middle of the table to complicate the social deduction element. There is the potential that with a smaller number of players, the game would feel less characterful (pardon the pun).

However, with the larger number of players the game did take some time to get through. The end of the game is brought about by the first player able to build 8 separate districts, which can take some time with characters like the Warlord and Assassin in play. Another criticism, though only a very light one, is that the assassin does have the potential to remove a lot of fun from the game if a player is unlucky enough to be targeted multiple times. This is somewhat mitigated by the targeting of the character, which is hidden, rather than the specific player.

All in all, Citadels offers a smooth gameplay experience with some good player interaction and relatively little downtime. It certainly isn't showing its age and will definitely be brought back to our table again soon. 

Review: Book - They Came to Slay: The Queer Culture of D&D

"Queer nerds have always played at D&D tables and also worked in a professional capacity on and around the game."

So begins Thom James Carter's dive into the Queer Culture of Dungeons and Dragons.

Thom takes the role of Dungeon Master (DM) to take us through this brief history of D&D and the impact the game and queer culture have had on each other. It is a short read at just over 100 pages, but it is concise and contains some fascinating insights from queer D&D players and content creators. 

The book starts with a much needed potted history of Dungeons and Dragons, from it's inception by Dave Arneson and Gary Gygax, and Gygax and Don Kaye's creation of Tactical Studies Rules (TSR) in order to get its first iteration published, to the purchase of D&D by Wizards of the Coast, who retain ownership of the IP to this day. 

Thom moves on to take a look at D&D 5th Edition, commonly referred to as D&D 5e, and explores how the renewed accessibility of the streamlined rules made for an inclusive and nurturing space for players to explore things such as gender identity and sexuality. Thom focuses on the development of the game away from outdated concepts such as the strength penalty players would face if they chose to play as female. In the early editions it didn't matter what species or class you played as, if you chose to play as a female character you would automatically have a lower strength than male counterparts. This is not to mention the complete absence of the ability to play as non-binary or a-gender characters.

In 5e, Thom highlights, "the Player's Handbook and Basic Rules prompts the reader to acknowledge" that their characters can be queer. "The text asks the reader to interrogate who exactly they want their character to be".

Thom also draws on the inclusion of queer NPCs in official D&D texts such as The Curse of Strahd in making the case that the game in its current state is an inclusive and safe space for queer players and characters. 

"From a gameplay perspective, having queer NPCs can also help queer players feel more comfortable leaning into their queerness at the table - if there are others like them, even if they're NPCs played by the DM, they're no longer 'the only one'."

The character sheet alone, Thom asserts, can be a powerful, yet low-risk, tool in helping players explore queerness before any commitments are made in real life. Experimenting in such a way in the real world can be "outright dangerous or unpredictable in many places and spaces". Furthermore, Thom states that roleplay can provide players with a safeguarded way to dig deeper into who they are. He talks frequently about how the player can become the character, and in a similar fashion, the character can become the player. Through roleplay the lines between two people are blurred and it can increase our understanding of how it feels to be someone else. Perhaps someone we truly are or want to be.

Throughout the book, Thom writes in celebration of the queer joy that D&D, its content creators, and its homebrewers can bring to the world. His passion for the subject matter shines through and with it so does this joy. His writing is accessible and friendly, and the book hits all the right beats with impeccable pacing. The world could do with more writing of this quality about such an important topic. As Thom himself points out, "homophobia and transphobia are on the rise in the real world".

They Came to Slay does more than just extol the virtues of Dungeons & Dragons, however. Thom takes time to delve into the problematic elements of the official source material, new and old.

"We cannot talk about Dungeons & Dragons' incredible potential and myriad positives without talking about it in its entirety, warts and all... In any consideration of the queer culture of D&D, it's important to look at... how certain aspects of the official materials have been problematic for LGBTQIA+ D&D lovers".

Thom draws on examples such as the 1e (First Edition) "cursed" item, the "Girdle of Femininity/Masculinity" and the 5e adaptation of the "Tomb of Horrors", which both contain problematic themes of unconsensual gender/sex changes to characters (compounding the issue, gender and sex are used interchangeable in the core material).

This book is a must read for any fan of D&D, regardless of whether they are themselves a part of the LGBTQIA+ community. It is written with insight and passion, and manages to get into surprising depth within a very small page count. The use of interviews with queer content creators shows a strong level of research into the subject matter. I have now read this book twice and would happily read a longer book on the same subject.

Review: Pandemic Fall of Rome - All roads lead somewhere

By now it's hard to find someone in the board game hobby that hasn't had some experience of the Pandemic series of games. Be it the original, Legacy, The Cure, or Contagion, it's likely board gamers will have come across the series in some capacity.

Pandemic: Fall of Rome by Z-Man Games, designed by Matt Leacock and Paolo Mori, uses this Pandemic system to create a game all about the sacking of Rome by the barbarian hordes. The marriage of theme and mechanics is a match made in heaven as it produces a smooth, tactics-based experience that will please beginner hobbyists and seasoned veterans alike.

As with Pandemic, Fall of Rome is a cooperative experience in which players take the roles of key positions from the Roman Empire, each with their own unique abilities, to stem the flow of Anglo-Saxons, Goths, Vandals, and Huns and find peace for the empire.

Each player's turn takes the format of 4 actions, chosen from a list of shared actions and their unique character's ability, such as march (move), sail, recruit legions to help defend and attack, and form alliances. Following this the active player draws two cards from the player deck. These cards consist of city cards (as with Pandemic), bonus actions, and the dreaded revolt. Revolt cards cause a revolution to break out in a specified city, air-dropping a battalion of barbarians often deep into Roman territory. After this, barbarian cards are drawn equal to the current invasion level and the hordes progress along preset lines, making their way to Rome. The revolt cards cause the barbarian discard pile to be reshuffled back on top of the deck, making it more likely that places recently attacked will be attacked again. Much like with Pandemic, when there are already three cubes representing a single barbarian nation on a city space, and another needs to be added, the barbarians sack the city and spread to all neighbouring areas. 

In order to win, players must either completely clear the map of barbarians, or make peace treaties with each of the attacking armies within the time it takes to reach the bottom of the player deck, or before any army manages to reach and sack Rome. This is no small feat and our first game ended in failure, though we came tantalizingly close. Close enough to make me want to play again!

The process of making peace treaties with the various hordes relies on assembling hands of city cards matching the colour of the army that you wish to make peace with. This sounds simple but the mechanic that controls the trading of cards so one player can assemble the correct hand is particularly difficult. As with Pandemic, cards can only be swapped between players when they are both in the city that matches the card being traded. On a substantial map, this takes a great deal of planning and cooperation and each of the barbarian hordes requires a different number of cards to appease them.

Naturally, forming a peace treaty does not stop the armies advancing on Rome. Only when you have made peace and/or defeated every single horde is the game won.

The application of the proven Pandemic system to a tactical warfare game feels incredibly natural and there is a nice balance of needing to react to events as they unfold, and making tactical plans. Even on the most basic difficulty there is a real sense of danger in the massing hordes of enemies that makes every turn feel like it counts. The board is always satisfyingly full of colourful cubes and small legion markers so you really feel like you are holding enemies off from all sides.

A particularly satisfying mechanic was that of recruiting legions and leading them to battle. In order to keep the enemy at bay it is essential to erect forts around the map and use these to recruit legions that will not only stand guard against the advancing armies, but can be lead to other locations to fight. The battle mechanic relies on rolling a number of dice depending on how many legions you have with you (up to three) and the results will either remove legions, barbarians, a mixture of both, or activate one of your character's special abilities (which aren't always good!). It's a basic system, but rolling dice and removing cubes remains a satisfying experience.

The only downside I can record is in the special ability of the Barbarian Queen character (I think this is the name of the character). This ability is tremendously useful but relies on peace treaties being made with the various hordes. This is a challenge to achieve so leaves the player with the Barbarian Queen unable to use their special ability for a significant portion of the game.

As with most cooperative games, the rules allow for a solo experience, where the player takes command of multiple roles in order to defend Rome.

Fall of Rome is a fun game that for me stands out among the other Pandemic titles as a fresh experience but with a familiar mechanic that reduces the learning curve and allows new players to get into the real meat of the game as quickly as possible. As cooperative games go, I rate this one very highly. There is plenty of space for joint tactics but also individual decision making. If you've played any other Pandemic game you will feel right at home with this one. Likewise, if you have never played Pandemic, maybe the theme isn't for you, this is a relatively easy game to learn.

Review: The Fox In The Forest Duet - A fox took a stroll through the deep, dark wood

The Fox In The Forest: Duet by Foxtrot Games is a cooperative trick taking card game that sees players immersed in a fairy tale world, finding their way through a fantasy forest, and collecting gems along the way. 

Fans of the original The Fox In The Forest will recognise the core gameplay of playing cards to win, or lose, a trick. However, in this cooperative version the winner of the trick will advance a token along a forest board in one of two directions, and collecting any available gems on the adjacent location. Players have three rounds to try and collect all the gems without the forest path shrinking beyond four spaces, which happens should players ever stray too far in any one direction and at the end of each round. 

For those unfamiliar with trick taking games, players take it in turns to play cards, the highest value in the lead suit played wins the "trick". Player one will play any card, which indicates the lead suit and the value to beat, while player two must play a card from that lead suit if they have one, or another suit if they don't. The lead suit always trumps another suit played unless that other suit matches a "decree" card that is visible to all players. As in The Fox In The Forest, some cards also grant additional actions such as choosing the direction of travel on the forest board, or choosing to ignore a certain amount of movement allowance.

The Fox In The Forest: Duet creates a satisfying and challenging cooperative experience. Players cannot discuss tactics or what cards they have, so the challenge comes from the ability to work wordlessly with your partner to traverse the forest, choosing when to win and when to lose, to ensure that you never stray too far from the path. The gameplay feels smooth and while there is a satisfying amount of tension involved, it creates a calming atmosphere thanks to the lovely illustrations and theme. 

A big problem that I often have when it comes to more abstract games is the question of "why". In more thematic games this is less of a problem, there's usually some story line that sets up the intentions of the characters that the players control, but in The Fox In The Forest: Duet the purpose of the game feels clear.

For a price tag of around £15, the game is well worth the expense and offers plenty of replayability. When we first got it out of the box we played two games back to back (one win, one lose) and it left me wanting more. The addition of the forest path board and movement counter was a nice touch and helps the game stand out from the basic The Fox In The Forest.

Review: Molly House - Party Hard or Hardly Party

I recently had the opportunity to play Molly House by Jo Kelly, Cole Wehrle, and Ricky Royal and had a thoroughly brilliant time.

"It's 1723. You walk through the streets of London, hiding your inner-most desires from the Society of the Reformation of Manners as you head to Mother Clap's. This may look like a coffee shoppe but inside are back rooms where loud festivities, intimate gatherings, and a thriving queer community is growing."

Over the course of 5 weeks, which act as rounds, players take the roles of gender-defying mollies and work together to grow the joy of the community, whilst also competing to be the most joyous individual. There is a risk-reward aspect to this, however, as while throwing excellent parties helps move counters along the joy track, they also have the potential to increase the gossip spreading about each of the four Molly Houses on the game board. Too much gossip will bring evidence against the Houses which can result in them being closed down. Even worse, players with too much reputation at these Houses risk getting indictments, the punishments for which can either be a reduction in joy or death by hanging. In classic Wehrle style, more mechanics is better, and there is also a system by which you can choose to betray your own community for your own selfish gains.

A key part of the game is the throwing of parties, which involve players taking it in turns to play cards in an attempt to create a poker-like communal hand that dictates how successful the party is. These range from dances, to christenings (in the historical Molly House sense), and if the communal hand played is a complete dud, a "quiet gathering". These quiet gatherings are likely to lose you reputation but can also be handy ways of throwing the Society of the Reformation of Manners off the scent.

I am fairly new to Cole Wehrle games, having only played Root once before and relatively recently, but the game definitely had his signature mark of very in-depth rules and numerous different play styles available. However, I have been informed that the real brains behind the game was Jo Kelly, an LGBTQ+ board game designer from Bristol. 

The art style is very satisfying and each of the cards that players use to build hands, which can be played at parties or to increase their reputation at the different Molly Houses, contain lovely imagery and quotes from actual historical indictments of the individuals mentioned in the game. Everything about the experience shows that the core theme was a true passion project and it has been handled with great care. It was a great experience to play a historical-political game that doesn't revolve around global conflict and instead provided an insight into a key moment in LGBTQ+ history.

While I am a fan of a good crunchy experience, I did find that the multitude of different mechanics in Molly House was slightly overwhelming at the beginning of the game, and by the time the game ended (which admittedly was early because we accidentally got one of the Molly Houses raided twice - a game ending condition) I still only had the barest of grasps on how the game worked, let alone be able to properly strategise. In comparison with Root, which also has a steep learning curve, I would say it comes off slightly more complex and probably requires a couple of games before you can understand it well enough to truly play the game as intended.

Overall, it was a very fun experience and there was a lot of laughter and joy around the table as we played in the most chaotic way possible. I would love the opportunity to play this game again with a better understanding of how it all works.

Review: Wandering Towers - Dude, Where's My Wizard?

We first played Wandering Towers, from Capstone Games, in December 2024 at our local tabletop convention, and I instantly fell in love with it. It perfectly balances strategy and luck, while being quick to learn and relatively quick to play to offer a very smooth and well designed experience for 1 to 6 players.

The board itself is unique in that it comprises a circular ring that the players will move their wizards and towers around. The towers are lovely, 3D folded card models that look intriguing and are great fun to play with.

The central premise of Wandering Towers is that players are attempting to get all of their wizards into a tower named Ravenskeep and fill all of their potion bottles while doing so. As soon as one player satisfies both of these win conditions the game comes to an end. The way in which players move their wizards around the board is by playing action cards that either move their wizard meeples, or the towers they stand upon. When towers land on the same space they stack on top of each other in a very satisfying way. This stacking of towers not only allows players to steal mana from wizards and therefore fill potion bottles, but it also provides an additional difficulty and is becomes increasingly difficult to keep track of where all of your wizards are, in the classic "ball under a cup" style. Whenever a wizard finds their way to Ravenskeep, it moves around the board, creating an almost constantly moving target. This element of chaos keeps all players on their toes and never lets anyone get too comfortable with their strategy.

The gameplay is smooth with very little downtime. Each turn, players will play two action cards, or discard their entire hand and move a tower of their choice, clockwise around the board. As they begin to fill their potion bottles there is a risk-reward mechanic where these can be spent to cast spells that unlock further opportunities to move wizards and towers clockwise or anti-clockwise around the board. These spells are chosen at random at the start of the game from those available in the box, and the instructions indicate that the more spells you make available, the more strategic the game becomes. However, I would suggest that rather than strategy, these spells inject a satisfying amount of chaos as it becomes harder to predict what each player is able to do on their turn.

While the theme of the game is charming, the core mechanic and purpose is abstract enough that the theme never gets in the way if magic and wizards are not your thing. You could easily strip the wizarding theme from the game entirely and it wouldn't lose anything from the enjoyment. That being said, the artwork is charming and definitely draws the eye.

Since first playing it at the tabletop convention, I have since picked up a copy of the game and it has made it to the table a number of times and never fails to entertain. Designers Michael Kiesling and Wolfgang Kramer have delivered to us a real tabletop staple that deserves as much space as other modern classics.

Review: Deep Regrets - No regrets backing this

Fans of the video game Dredge will absolutely love Deep Regrets by Judson Cowan and published by Tettix Games. The game blends a little bit of dice placement and a little bit of push-your-luck to deliver a satisfyingly creepy fishing experience that sees players competing for the highest value haul of creatures by the end of the game. Not everything beneath the waves is as it seems, however. Borrowing heavily from Lovecraftian horror and Edmond Halley's hollow earth theory, Deep Regrets contains many "foul" creatures that will force players to gain regret cards, which pushes player's madness to higher levels. Although the player with the most regret at the end of the game will suffer a penalty, there are advantages in the number of dice you can use and even discounts at shops in port that come with losing yourself to the madness that spreads beneath the sea.

The artwork, also by Cowan, makes this game really stand out as something special. The sheer number of different creatures is reminiscent of the Wing/Wyrn/Finspan games and allows for a lot of replayability before you truly know everything that lurks beneath the briny depths. The quality of the game is mirrored in the quality of the assets and extra care has gone in to reducing the amount of plastic in the packaging. This was thanks to the efforts of Cowan who, following a hugely successful Kickstarter campaign, wanted to ensure there was no hypocrisy in designing a game about the ocean while also introducing more plastics into circulation.

Deep Regrets also comes with a satisfying solo experience that allows a player to take the role of a scientist completing a survey of the oceans and recording the many fair and foul creatures they dredge up. This solo mode hits a more relaxing tone than the main, multiplayer game, with less focus on the madness and regret mechanics, and no down-time in port. However, it stands alone well as an enjoyable experience and will guarantee that owners of the game will get more of their money's worth should they struggle to get a group together to play.

Thanks to the huge success the game received on Kickstarter, Cowan has since developed Shallow Regrets, now taking late pledges on Kickstarter, with Button Shy Games. Shallow Regrets is advertised as a pocket-sized game of Deep Regrets made up of only 18 cards and packed in a vinyl wallet for maximum portability. The Kickstarter page also promises a solo mode in which players will go up against fan-favourite character Frod to make the biggest catch. The popularity of Deep Regrets saw Shallow Regrets make its pledge goal well within the time limit.

Cowen has also announced that this summer will see a Kickstarter launch of Even Deeper Regrets, an expansion on the main game, that promises even more disturbing fishing, deeper madness, and a wealth of new regrettable decisions. This campaign will also allow backers to grab a copy of Deep Regrets if they have any regrets of not backing the game the first time around.

Overall, Deep Regrets is a satisfyingly meaty game to play when played with the maximum number of players, yet simple to pick up, and the theme is well executed. A must have for any fans of eldritch horror as a genre, and a fascination with the horrors that lurk beneath the waves.

Games on Location: Episode 1 - Fungi in the Woods

@abitha_elizaart

There is a lot to be said for increasing the immersion when playing table top games, whether it be mood lighting or a themed play list, but have you ever wondered how far you could take the immersion? This was the thought behind this new series of posts where we will be playing Games On Location to answer the question: "Will it GOL?"

The Game

To kick off this series we set off into the woods to find some mushrooms and then play a game Fungi by Brent Povis, published by Pegasus Spiele.

Fungi is an enjoyable trick-taking card game in which players compete to harvest mushrooms and cook them in order to deliver the tastiest dishes by the end of the game. Mushrooms can be fried with extra ingredients such as butter or cider to increase the flavour points. (Though in real life we did draw the line at cooking anything with cider and butter that we found in the forest). The game is a favourite with us at Hand Limit and offers a perfect balance of luck and skill, while showcasing some very pretty artwork by Jarek Nocon, along with an information booklet on all the different mushrooms that can be harvested.

The Location

We decided that it would only be right to set up a game after finding some mushrooms and sure enough, 20 minutes into our walk we came across some stunning examples of Fly Agaric (Amanita Muscaria - according to the glossary), though I don't want to know what happened to whatever creature seemed to have taken a bite out of one of them!

Walking a bit further on we happened upon a clearing to lay out a picnic blanket and have a game. As luck would have it we situated ourselves just a few yards from a very cute example of Birch Bolete (Leccinum Scabrum).

The Play

We decided to lay the game out on the flattest part of the clearing with the help of a well worn picnic blanket and got down to setting it up. As mentioned above, Fungi is a card game, so we instantly ran into problems when the slightest breeze picked up and we had to spend the rest of the game diving for cards as the wind threatened to carry them away across the clearing. Plus there can be no denying the fact that playing a card game on a truly flat table top was far more convenient that the lumpy bumpy rug.

Despite this, we enjoyed an entire game without too much issue and there was something wonderful about experiencing the beautiful artwork surrounded by nature, with the sun and a flask of mocha warming us up.

The Verdict

@abitha_elizaart

Overall playing Fungi outside was a lovely experience. There were difficulties that made it less comfortable than sitting around a table, and the lack of a truly flat surface did make more of a chore when it came to moving the cards around, but these were countered easily by the peaceful location. It must also be noted that we were very lucky with the weather as only minutes before the rain had been coming down hard.

Overall, I would say that Fungi does play well on location and I would recommend giving it a try!

Have you ever played a game in a thematically appropriate location? Perhaps you've played Taverns of Tiefenthal in a tavern, or Carcasonne in, well, Carcasonne. Do you have any recommendations for further Games On Location? If so, please leave a comment below, and perhaps we'll take your suggestion and run with it!

@abitha_elizaart