Product– Dead of Winter

Producer-Plaid Hat Games

Price– $75 here http://www.amazon.com/Dead-of-Winter-Crossroads-Game/dp/B00HFKITJC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1432091044&sr=8-1&keywords=dead+of+winter

Set-up/Play/Clean-up– 45-120 minutes (2-6 players)

Type-American

Depth-Medium

TL; DR– Battlestar Galactica meets Zombicide.  89%

Basics-Can you survive the winter with the dead outside?  Dead of Winter is a simple American style game where player take the role of a group of survivors of the zombie apocalypse.  At the start players choose a scenario with a victory condition as well as each player receiving a secret goal that can range from getting enough of one item to a traitor card who has to undermine each other player!  Next, players receive starting items and choose two characters out of four possible options.

Each round the players uncovers a new problem that they must face.  These problems require players to spend a number of cards to solve or more enemies will be added and the players will lose moral, a general survivability of the colony that when it reaches zero the players lose.  Then, all players roll dice equal to the number of characters they control.  These dice can be spent to do actions with no limit to the number of actions each individual character you control can do.  Next, each player takes their individual turns, but here’s the catch- before a player starts his/her turn, another player draws a crossroad card.  A crossroad card is a random event that may happen that turn depending on what characters are in play, actions the player does, and even the number of cards in the discard/garbage pile!  The current player spends dice to take actions that range from attacking zombies, searching, building barricades, and some character specific abilities.  The number rolled on the die really only count for combat and searching.  Each character has a search value and a combat value.  If you spend a dice for either of those actions with a value equal to or higher than the characters search or combat result for search or combat, you succeed on your search or combat and get to draw a searched card or kill a zombie.  Thus, you know you will be successful before you even attempt your turn.

What makes this more interesting is the exposure die for combat and moving.  The exposure die is a 12-sided die with over half he faces being no result, a few are damage, less are frostbite, and one is a tooth.  The damage icons do one damage.  All characters have three hit points.  Frostbite does damage each turn which can quickly kill a character, and the tooth means a character is bitten.  Bitten characters instantly die, and then another character could become bitten.  Each character also has an influence value, and after a character is bitten, the lowest influence value in the bitten characters location becomes the target of the bite giving that character’s controller two options: kill the character and end the bite OR roll the exposure die.  Roll anything besides no result, and the new bitten character dies and the process repeats.  Also, when players move between locations, players roll the exposure die to see if the traveling goes smoothly.  Traveling between the different locations doesn’t cost an action, BUT does risk damage from the exposure die.  Barricades provide a temporary buffer against zombies.  If a zombie would be placed on a barrier, you remove the barrier and that zombie.  Players can also spend cards to do the action on the card or spend them face down to try to solve the problem for this round.  Each chard has a symbol, and enough cards must be spent or the negative effect of the rounds card event occurs.  Traitors can also spend cards with different symbols that count AGAINST the other player’s cards.  After the player has spent all his/her dice, play progresses around the table until its back to the first player.  Then the round’s problem card is resolved, for good or ill!  Next, zombies are placed at all the different locations; one per character at outer locations and one for every two characters at the central location.  If a zombie would be placed and there is not a zombie space available, then the character with the lowest influence at that spot is instantly killed!  A new problem for the round is revealed, the first player marker passes, and the turn starts anew.

What makes this game novel is the hidden goals each player has.  Not only do you have to meet the major goal for each game, but you have to complete your own goal.  In this co-operative game, you can lose while everyone else wins!  Players win by completing their goal, and can lose if the game goes too many rounds or if moral drops to zero.  Moral decreases whenever a character dies, through the crossroads cards, or a failing a round problem card.  While all of this is going on a traitor could be in your midst spending the wrong cards to cause events to fail and has his/her own goal where they succeed if everybody else fails AND they have the proper items or characters to win.  Even the traitor can lose if they don’t have their gear ready when everybody else loses!

Mechanics– I was serious before, this game feels like a mix of two great tastes making something better.  You have the card use of Battlestar Galactica for hidden card resolution and turn events with the simplistic combat of Zombicide.  Those two things work amazingly well together.  This game is MUCH more swingy then Zombicide as dice dictate actions and combat results, but once you know your dice for a turn, you pretty can plan out your turn.  It’s quick, easy to play, and not any more complicated than it needs to be.  The crossroads cards are fun, but they might have been a bit over sold.  You do have random events happen, but I expected something a bit more intricate.  What does happen is about one out of every four turns, something unexpected will happen.  It does add something interested, but don’t expect the moon.  4.5/5

 

Theme– Here is where things are a bit off.  The majority of the theme is great.  Players fight zombies, struggle for items, and in general are the proper amount of miserable as the fun from this game comes from a hard co-op experience.  But, some things don’t quite fit.  Players lose moral for the number of cards in the discard pile.  You can spend a die to clean some, but honestly that’s kind of such a weird concept.  “Yep, zombies are killing my friends, but I’m sad that Steve didn’t take out the garbage!”  One game I chose the school janitor as one of my characters so I could clean garbage.  That’s not as much fun (or exactly as much fun) as you’d think it would be in the zombie apocalypse.  The game uses a few abstractions to bring things in like how combat is instantly resolved as its part of survival, but not the whole part.  Overall, its fun, feels like zombies in winter, but isn’t perfect as a few minor things keep it from being a slam dunk.  4.25/5

Instructions– Here is the worst part of the game.  It’s pretty simple rules that read relatively quick, but they bury a lot of the leads.  There are very intricate rules that should be followed that are not expressed as importantly as they should be.  Sure, you can play in about five minutes, but you WILL miss something important.  The game comes with some nice player boards, but they leave out important information that would really help a new player like when and how many zombies to add to each location.  The rules are not bad, but they are not as well layout out or emphasized as I’d like.  4/5

Execution– I really like how Plaid Hat puts their games together.  It’s a well done game with lots of parts, tons of standees with great detail, and lots of small things like intro paragraphs to each game, and epilogues for each victory and traitor win.  This is a theme game (don’t play this if you want a Euro experience!), and Plaid Hat delivers on that.  Even the first player marker is a big knife cardboard token!  Well done.  Also if you want to see my unboxing of the game check this like out: https://youtu.be/nOgN3v8OiqY 5/5

Summary-If you want a great game that has absolute kick in the teeth difficulty, then this is your game.  If you want a co-op with lots of story built in, this is your game.  If you want deep mechanics that are completely new and different, then this is NOT your game.  This is a quicker version of both Zombicide and Battlestar Galactica.  It’s got the high points of both, but does lose a few elements of both as well.  That’s not bad is what comes out of the Plaid Hat kitchen is its own tasty entree, but it is a new, simpler, quicker thing.  Instead of the weekend killer that is Battlestar, this is less than two hours to get a game in-great for a weekday game night.  I think the crossroads mechanic was a bit oversold as the end all/be all new interaction mechanic, but that doesn’t ruin this game.  The instructions are a bit rough, but the videos online will teach you to play quicker then reading them.  Overall, this is a solid game that that’s fun if you want an amazing American-style gaming night with zombies, possible traitors, and some team work picking up some garbage around the barricaded house.  89%

Product– Harbour

Producer-Tasty Minstrel Games

Price– $20 here http://www.amazon.com/Tasty-Minstrel-Games-TTT3002-Harbour/dp/1938146786

Set-up/Play/Clean-up– 30 minutes (2-4 players)

Type-Euro

Depth-Light

TL; DR– This game feels like a pocket Lords of Waterdeep.  90%

Basics-Let’s do worker placement with only one worker!  Harbor is a worker placement game where you only have one worker while you manipulate the market for fish, meat, stone, and wood to buy property and build your economic empire.  Each player gets a different role from a penny pincher to a pirate.  These cards give each of you a power, a start location, as well as a marker to keep track of your different good.  Between all the players sits the market board as well as a number of location cards.  These building each have a cost, a victory point value, possibly extra ability markers, and a power.  Each turn, players move their one meeple to a new building and do the action on the card.  These actions range from buy a building, gain some of one resource, or lose X of one resource and gain Y of another.  And that’s the entire game!  I’m not being condescending here; I’m impressed by the elegance.  What really cranks this game up to 11 is the market.  On a separate board is a market of good with the current value of meat, fish, wood, and stone.  You must have at minimum the same number of a good as the dollar value of the good.  When you move to a building that allows you to buy a property, you move the good to the sold location on the card, which is below the normal location.  You will most likely sell multiple goods at once, so multiple goods will be on the sold locations at the end of your turn if you buy.  But, the market shifts now.  Goods you didn’t sell move higher in the market, increasing their price.  The sold goods have saturated the market.  They move on the sold track to the last spots.  Since goods you sold a lot of have moved into the last spot in the sold row, good you sold more of enter the market on the lowest value as the market is now flooded.  Play continues until someone has bought their fifth building, then all players get one more turn, and the player with the most points in the harbor master!

Mechanics– I wasn’t being glib above.  The rules are that simple, and that’s fantastic.  Also, this game has a semi-realistic economy.  If you sell a ton of something, then the market has a lot of those goods and won’t pay much for it.  I love any game with slick rules and easy grasp concept that plays quickly.  This feels like a pocket Lords of Waterdeep! 5/5

Theme– The theme isn’t bad, but it does need a bit of work.  I like the world this game is in.  It’s in the same world as Belford, and I like the way that place looks and feels.  It’s almost like the Discworld.  Also, the unique player cards do bring some story the game with all the cards have flavor text on them. That’s a good addition to a card game that adds a bit more theme to a semi dry concept of buying property and market manipulation.  Overall, it does feel like I’m a real-estate mogul in a fantasy world, but some of the simplifications does take away a bit from the theme.  This game is good, but it’s not Arkham Horror levels of immersion. 4.25/5

Instructions– The rules are simple, and they read quickly.  However they are a bit cramped and a few of the leads get buried.  On my first game, we made two fatal flaws: we multiplied the goods sold by the price and we didn’t use the center, uncontrolled buildings.  If you dig deeper into the rules, those are central to the game.  I’d like the rules to be a bit expanded and to provide a few more examples.  As it stands the rules are ok if you take the time to really read them, but you can’t just bust this game out and play in four minutes. 4.25/5

Execution– I like what comes in this box.  However, I have to whine about two things.  1-Stickers!  Tasty Minstrel Games loves to add stickers to wood.  It’s not as bad as say Village or Belford, but I hate having to put that on my stuff.  2-The card sleeves are nice, but I can’t fit my game into the game box now.  I’d like the box to be a bit bigger to accommodate the sleeved cards.  Normally, card sleeves wouldn’t be a problem as there something extra I’m adding to the game, but Tasty Minstrel Games gave out card sleeves as part of the kickstarter.  So, these are company provided.  Those things said, I do like how this game is done overall.  I like the art, the iconography, and even the wooden components.  Just give me some premade components as well as a bigger box, and I’d be thrilled! 4.5/5

Summary– This is a great game if you need something between heaver games.  It’s good in its own right, but you won’t get the two hour experience of a deep fantasy world.  That doesn’t make this game bad in any way, but it’s something to consider.  However, if you want to play a game that has about 1 minute of set-up and you’re then you’re in the middle of things, this is an awesome game.  The “realist” economy makes this game a fun puzzle, and the different races and fluff on the cards does bring you into the world of the game.  Even with having to put some stickers on wood, this is a great, quick game. 90%

Product– King of New York

Producer-Iello

Price– $50 here http://www.amazon.com/King-New-York-Board-Game/dp/B00KU9LQUO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1429421137&sr=8-1&keywords=kings+of+new+york

Set-up/Play/Clean-up– 45 minutes (2-6 players)

Type-American

Depth-Light

TL; DR– A much improved second version. 95%

Basics-Time for a rumble in the Bronx!  King of New York is a standalone game that builds on the popular King of Tokyo line.  This game follows a very similar turn order with some significant differences.  At the start of the game, all players choose which of the five New York boroughs they wish to start in, with the exception of Manhattan.  Like in King of Tokyo, a player rolls six dice, and can reroll some, all, or none of the dice.  Each die has six faces with players gaining different effects based on how many of each die each player rolled.  Lightning gives the player energy cubes for each die result that can be spent on upgrades.  Hearts heal the player one point for each heart result while not in Manhattan. Attack damages the player in Manhattan if the active player isn’t in Manhattan, or damages each other player not in Manhattan if the player is in Manhattan.  If the player in Manhattan takes damage, that player can leave, and you have to enter Manhattan instead!  If you start your turn in Manhattan, you gain energy as well as victory points.  The major differences between this and Kings of Tokyo come from the final three dice faces.  A new result is destruction.  Destruction results are spent to turn over tokens in each borough.  These tokens have two sides: red and blue.  Blue sides are buildings that usually provide points or healing.  Red sides are active military units that provide points or power cubes.  Both sides have a number that must be spent to either flip the token or to remove the unit from the board.  This brings us to the next result of Ouch!  Ouch! causes the units to attack players depending on the number rolled.  A one result causes the active player damage equal to the number of red tokens in the borough; two causes all players in the borough damage, and three causes all red tokens to attack all players!  Rolling three Ouch! results will also earn the player the Statue of Liberty Card worth three points.  This card can be stolen, however, when another player rolls three Ouch! results.  The final result is celebrity.  If you get three celebrity results, you gain the Superstar card, one point, and at the start of each round you gain an extra point.  This can also be stolen.  After all the dice are resolved, if no player is in Manhattan, you must move there.  If there is one monster there, you can move there depending on the number of players, or you can move to another borough.  Manhattan also has three areas that can be moved into over time, with the deepest area of Manhattan giving tons of points and energy at the start of each turn.  Finally, you can buy any cards available before ending your turn.  Play continues until there is only one monster standing or one player has 20 victory points.

Mechanics– Just like King of Tokyo, King of New York is about pushing your luck.  But this game feels a lot less like Yahtzee! and more like rolling for specific results.  The changes to attacking units, gaining celebrity, and damaging non-player characters massively change the results of this game.  Honestly, it’s a much deeper experience and one that I enjoy better than King of Tokyo.  Currently though, the monsters in each game don’t have any differences between each other.  It’s important, but not world ending.  This is just like the original King of Tokyo game, so I expect that an expansion is coming up very soon to fix that.  Overall, this quick, easy to learn, fun game that plays well. 4.75/5

Theme– I feel much more like Godzilla in this game than I did in King of Tokyo.  I don’t feel like I’m playing combat Yahtzee!, but instead I’m a 40 story mantis that is destroying New York.   The addition of buildings to destroy and units to fight really drive this home as well as deciding when to just put a ton of enemy units on a friend’s space and then get out of that part of town!  It’s not perfect though.  I don’t have difference powers between creatures, and the basic mechanic still somewhat takes away from the basic monster feeling that I’m supposed to have.  But, I don’t think that can be helped without a massive overall of the mechanics.  4.75/5

Instructions– Overall, the instructions are done reasonably well.  My main complaint is how packed they are.  I’d like more pages with more examples then the cramped four pages I get. It’s not unreadable by any means, and this game isn’t exactly the deepest game I’ve ever player, so overall the rules do a good job.  I’d just like them to be easier to read. 4.5/5

Execution-This is a great game for how it’s handled.  I love the art and the components.  I love large chunky tokens as well as heavy dice.  The box fits all the components well, and just like King of Tokyo; I think it will hold the expansions pretty well too.  The cards are well done, and the tokens all feel nice.  Overall, it’s a great box and presentation of what it contains. 5/5

Summary– I don’t think I’m going back to King of Tokyo.  I like that game, but I really LOVE this game.  I feel like a monster not a person playing Yahtzee!  Yahtzee! isn’t bad, but this is much better.  It’s got a few minor faults, but overall it’s a top notch game that represents the monster genre well. 95%

Product– Machi Koro Harbor Expansion

Producer-IDW Games

Price– $20 here http://www.amazon.com/IDW-Games-AUG142812-Machi-Koro/dp/1631401688/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1429068035&sr=8-1&keywords=machi+koro+harbor   OR WIN IT HERE! https://throatpunchgames.com/2015/04/10/machi-koro-give-away/

Set-up/Play/Clean-up– 45 minutes (2-5 players)

Type-Euro

Depth-Light

TL; DR– This is how you improve an original with an expansion. 94%

Basics-TO THE SEA!  The Harbor expansion of Machi Koro adds several new things to the base game.  I’ve previously reviewed the base game here (https://throatpunchgames.com/2015/01/29/ring-side-report-board-game-review-machi-koro/ ).  First and foremost, the harbor expansion now adds a fifth player.  Next, the game completely changes the card availability mechanics.  In the base game, you roll a six-sided die, cards you or other players owned would trigger, and finally you could purchase any available building card or major landmark for your town, with the winner being the person who built all four major buildings.  This addition now mixes all the building cards together in a pile.  Cards are drawn and each different building is placed in a separate pile until 10 different piles are generated instead of having all the buildings face up and available at the start of the game.  Otherwise the game plays the same as before with the first person to build all their landmarks being the winner!

Mechanics– This expansion adds a new player and new cards.  That doesn’t sound like much, but adding the ability to play five people really makes this game that much more fun.  I can get this to the table that much more often.  Honestly, that’s awesome.  Next, the change in card availability is small thing with a huge impact!  Not being able to buy the same thing all the time massively changes the types of decisions made keeping you on your toes creating an atmosphere of positive stress.  This game moved from a simple game to an exercise in smart choices with limited resources.  Honestly, I WON’T play the basic rules again as this rockets the game from a simple Catan-ish game to its own stand alone masterpiece.  It’s still a game where randomness can really destroy a player’s chance.  That said, this game is even more fun now with the small changes added in the expansion.  4.25/5

Theme– The base game isn’t a theme powerhouse, but this game does build nicely on what was there.  This game is called the Harbor expansion, and one of the new landmarks is, obviously, the harbor.  What really improves the theme of this game is now some cards need other landmarks to function.  You CAN’T fish with a tuna boat if you don’t have a harbor to fish from!  It’s a simple addition, but now the cards make a bit more sense.  Also, the random nature of what pops up does make this game feel a bit more like developing a town as different towns try to attract new businesses.  It’s not perfect, but it’s much better!  4.5/5

Instructions– The rules are short, concise, and easy to read.  If you can manage the base game’s pages, then this games short addition is no problem.  It even clarifies some points from the original game that were somewhat fuzzy.  Well done! 5/5

Execution– It’s time for another video!  Watch my unboxing here: http://youtu.be/Dm8ZLiifjlA This expansion is more cards, some being new buildings, more landmarks, and an extra set of landmarks to add a fifth player.  The art is still the Machi Koro style you know and love.  Even, the box is well put together.  This is basically more of what I loved from the original Machi Koro game. 5/5

Summary– Machi Koro is a quick, fun game to begin with.  It might not be the eight hour Eurogame experience some players want, but thirty minutes for a four player game is pretty solid.  The Harbor expansion honestly ups the game to a new level.  It’s simple a better game by just changing the way buildings are reveled as well as the new thematic buildings.  Also, for less than $20, it’s a no brainer.  This is a great game with great additions that also allows for more players! 94%

We have some good news!  IDW Games has given me a copy of the base game to give away!  Want to win the game that started this all?  Click here and follow the instructions- https://throatpunchgames.com/2015/04/10/machi-koro-give-away/

Product– Splendor

Producer-Asmodee

Price– $40 here http://www.amazon.com/Asmodee-SCSPL01-Splendor-Board-Game/dp/B00IZEUFIA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1428287594&sr=8-1&keywords=splendor

Set-up/Play/Clean-up– 45 minutes (2-4 players)

Type-Euro

Depth-Light

TL; DR– Excellent game with no story. 79%

Basics-Time to head to the mines! In Splendor, you play a gem merchant trading gems to gather mines while trying to impress the nobility.  At the beginning of the game, a number of noble characters are drawn equal to the number of players plus one.  Then, three decks of cards are shuffled, and three cards from each deck are displayed.  These decks all have different gems in them with one decking having cheap gems worth little to no points, another with middle value gems it in, and the final deck having the most expensive and highest point gems in it.  Below the gem decks are placed poker chips with the five different kinds of gems on them.  Each turn, players take actions to gather gem tokens or spend gem tokens to buy gem cards.   Each gem card has a cost in other gems on it.  The cheapest gems normally require between three and five gems, while the most expensive gems requiring over 10 gems.  On a players turn, a player can take one of four actions: gather three different gem chips, gather two gem chips of the same type if four gems of the same type are available, reserve a card by placing it face down in front of the player and taking a gold (wild card) token, and finally spending gem tokens to buy a gem card from reserve or from the available cards.  When a gem car is purchased, another is drawn from the deck.  This game has an engine building component as each gem card purchased has a gem on it.  Any purchased gem cards can be used in place of a gem token when purchasing another gem card on a one-for-one basis without having to discard or return the card.  Thus, building up your gem cards makes it easier to buy gems in the future.  Some gem cards have points on them, which are added to your point total.  Also, each noble drawn at the start of the game has a number of different gem types and amounts on them.  When you have that same number of gems and types of gems as the noble, you get that noble and their points for free on your turn.  When one player gets 15 points, play continues until every player has an equal number of rounds.  Then the player with the most points is the best gem merchant and is the winner!

Mechanics– This is where Splendor absolutely excels.  Splendor’s easy to master mechanics make the game a breeze for players of any age.  The game’s four actions are quick while still giving you enough meat of the game to think about what you’re going to do next and the engine you’re going to build.  It’s fast, fun, and brilliant.  5/5

Theme– And here is where Splendor fails.  The game doesn’t really have a story to build on.  I didn’t feel like a gemologist trading gems as I moved up the international mineral ladder to conquer my opponents.  I feel like a guy sitting around a table trading poker chips as I build a card gathering engine.  The saving grace for the theme of this game is the art and execution.  The art is nice, adding a bit of environment to the game while the substantial poker chips do add a bit of tactile feeling to the game.  If you want a strong story in your games, you need to look elsewhere!  Honestly, simply adding some more story in the rules would have made the theme stand out even more.  1/5

Instructions– The rules to this game are amazingly well done.  The rules are less than two pages, front and back.  It’s clear and concise while still having pictures to help with game play.  These are rules you can read in less than three minutes and get playing in five.  Well done!  5/5

Execution– I know the execution of this game is controversial with the battle lines drawn over the poker chips.  I’m in the camp where I mostly like the poker chips. These are not the standard cheap-o plastic discs with some stickers.  These are heavy duty, clay poker chips.  I like game components with some heft, and this game delivers.  Also the cards are nice, but they are a bit flimsy.  I’d like them to be a bit harder card stock.  The art is well done with great drawings of historical figures as well as mines from all over the world.  Even the box has nice dividers that really help package the game.  Overall, this game is well executed with only a few things I’d like to see changed. 4.75/5

Summary– This is a game where the score is not the great predictor of enjoyment.  I really enjoy this game and have gotten a ton of plays in.  But, if you need a story in your game for the most enjoyment, then this is one you want to pass by.  I don’t always need a story, but that part of a game does draw me in more.  However, if you just want some excellent mechanics then this is your game.  It’s fast, fun, and thought provoking.  Building the perfect gem gathering engine in the shortest amount of time is always a blast!  I can’t recommend this game to everyone, but if you want a fast-paced, quick, easy to lean Eurogame, then this is the game to get.  79%