Obligatory 2015 Origins Game Fair Post: Top 5 List

Hello everyone!  Sorry it’s been so long since my last post.  I’d give a good reason but I think laziness is the only excuse I have!  However, I have a bunch of posts planned and this will be the start.  Origins GameFair is one of the major boardgame conventions in the United States.  It is currently being held in Columbus, Ohio and is already underway for this year.  This has become a larger convention over the years but still doesn’t hold a candle to Essen Spiel or Gen Con.   

However, some companies are starting to release games at Origins and this post will be my top five interests from the games that are specifically debuting at Origins.  What I mean by this is that they are the games that are being debuted for the first time and are actually being sold at the convention.  Most of my “top so-and-so” lists are in three parts.  The first part is my honorable mentions while the second and third parts are my games 6-10 and then games 1-5 respectively.  However, in looking through Eric M. Martin’s excellent list on BoardGameGeek there aren’t that many debuts that I’m interested in.  What that means, for me, is that I’m only going to do this one post on Origins and give my top five interests of the convention.  Enjoy!

#5 – Bring Out Yer Dead (Upper Deck Entertainment)

Bring Out Yer Dead gameplay

Bring Out Yer Dead is a game by designer Arron Watts and published by Upper Deck Entertainment.  This is Upper Deck’s first foray into a Euro-style game and I think it is an interesting choice.  I saw this game back when it was on Kickstarter and toyed with backing it a couple of times but in the end decided not to.  Now it has been picked up by a major publisher and they seem to be doing a really good job in marketing it and pushing it out to the game-buying public.  This is a fairly macabre game where you are the head of a family who is trying to get their deceased family members into the best burial plots.  You are using set collection, area control, and card drafting mechanics to attempt to get influence points in order to be the top family in the city.  Put your family members in the best plots, rob graves, and bribe the grave keeper so he doesn’t throw your family into the river to be washed away.  It may be a little morbid, but it looks like a ton of fun, Tim Burton in a boardgame!  I’m glad that Upper Deck took a chance to bring this interestingly-themed game to the market.

#4 – Extra! Extra! (Mayfair Games)

Extra! Extra! gameplay

Extra! Extra! is a game by designer Andrew Bond and is published by Mayfair Games.  Extra! Extra! is a newspaper-themed game (much like Tabletop Deathmatch winner, Penny Press) where you are attempting to gain circulation points in order to win.  This game uses auction, set collection, tile placement, and worker placement mechanics in order to score the player points.  Your goal is to get the biggest and best stories on the front and back pages of a newspaper.  You get more points for the larger stories and even more for extras and those stories that are in you expertise.  This looks like a fun worker placement game with interesting tile placement in order to create your newspaper columns.  I’m looking forward to seeing even more about this game!

#3 – Parfum (Queen Games)

Parfum gameplay

Parfum is a game by designers Marco Ruskowski and Marcel Subelbeck and published by Queen Games.  This is another successful game funded and created by Kickstarter mainstays: Queen Games.  This is a beautiful looking games with gorgeous components that was very hard not to help fund while it made its Kickstarter rounds.  However, I was able to keep my finger off the mouse button and withhold my money for another time.  Now, it is great to see that it has come out and is being release at this year’s Origins.  Parfum is basically a set collection and dice rolling game where you are collecting “ingredients” in order to create perfumes.  You use different die in which stand for different ingredients and roll these and hope to get enough to be able to create the specific perfume.  Then, you turn around and sell these perfumes to customers who have very specific likes and dislikes.  This game just looks beautiful and fun and I’m hoping I get a chance to try it out!

#2 – The Voyages of Marco Polo (Z-Man Games)

The Voyages of Marco Polo gameplay

The Voyages of Marco Polo is a game designed by Simone Luciani and Daniele Tascini and published by Z-Man Games.  This is a game with quite a pedigree as Luciani and Tascini were the co-creators of the popular Tzolk’in: The Mayan Calendar.  This game is absolutely beautiful!  The colors are bright, it has a ton of colorful dice, and the board is just a stunning work of art.  In this game you have a small pool of five die which you will roll in order to take actions.  I love this idea as it takes the dice rolling aspect and puts it into a more classic Euro-style pick-up and deliver game.  I love how games are beginning to marry both ideas of “Euro-games” and “Ameritrash-games” to create clever and beautifully designed work of art!  I am very much looking forward to trying this game out.

#1 – La Granja (Stronghold Games)

La Granja gameplay

La Granja is a game designed by Michael Keller and Andreas Odendahl and published by Stronghold Games.  This game was originally released in Europe under the Spielworxx banner.  Spielworxx are known for their fairly heavy Euro-style games such as the brain-burner, Arkwright.  La Granja finds the player taking control of a farm and using cards and dice rolling in order to get goods which you will then sell or use for other things.  This game has been called the love-child of an Uwe Rosenberg game and a Stefan Feld game.  From what I’ve seen of it so far it seems pretty close to the truth.  There are many ways of getting points and the action selections allow you to do that.  This game also uses one of my very favorite mechanisms, multi-use cards.  I love when a game takes the cards and gives you multiple ways of using them.  This gives you so many different actions and decisions and just gives the game a deeper and richer experience.  This game looks awesome and I can’t wait to get it in my hands!

These are just some of the great looking games that are out now at Origins Game Fair and I wish I was there to pick them up!  I would like to give a quick shout out to DarkMoon, designed by Evan Derrick and published by Stronghold Games.  This game would have been #6 on my list as it just missed!  It is a deduction style game where everyone has variable powers and it plays up to seven people.  This looks quite interesting and would really add to a style of game that we don’t really have in our collection currently.

I hope you enjoyed this look at my top five (or six) interests from this year’s Origins Game Fair.  I hope to actually do a week of unboxings (one per day or five total that week) in the next couple of weeks.  After that I will start to work on my Gen Con posts for this year as it is rapidly approaching and I am getting SUPER excited about this year’s releases!  Thanks again for reading.  Until next time, game on!

Obligatory End of 2014 Post Part IV: Top Interests of 2015: Honorable Mentions

Now we move on to my greatest interests of 2015. These are the games that I am so very interested in for some reason or another, whether it be theme, mechanic, or even designer. If you haven’t seen them yet, check out my previous three posts from my “Obligatory End of 2014” series. These handle my top interests from 2014 that I haven’t yet been able to play. Check out the links below if you’re interested, and if not just skip on ahead and check out my honorable mentions for my interests of 2015.

Honorable mentions of 2014: http://www.alittlelatetothetable.blogspot.com/2015/01/obligatory-end-of-2014-post-part-i-top.html
 
Games 6-10 of 2014: http://www.alittlelatetothetable.blogspot.com/2015/01/obligatory-end-of-2014-post-part-i-top_13.html

Games 1-5 of 2014: http://www.alittlelatetothetable.blogspot.com/2015/01/obligatory-end-of-2014-post-part-iii.html

Before I go through my honorable mentions I think it begs repeating how I chose to label games either from 2014 or from 2015. Even if a game had a 2014 release date I didn’t put it in that category if it wasn’t readily available in the United States. Most of these games technically have an official 2014 release date but haven’t been distributed in the United States as of yet. That being said, on to my honorable mentions list of 2015!

The first game to make its way onto the list is Scythe, designed by Jamey Stegmaier and Alan Stone and published by Stonemaier Games. Technically this game already has a 2016 release date because it is going to be a Kickstarter a little later this year. Even though it has a later release date, I’m still putting it on my list because it sounds that amazing! This game has been explained as a mixture of Agricola (i.e. farming elements) and Kemet (i.e. area control) by the way of asymmetrical factions. If this doesn’t hook you on a game idea I don’t know what does! Plus, it has a card driven mechanic that keeps the action moving along smoothly. I can’t wait to see how this game rolls along as Stonemaier Games arguably puts on the best Kickstarters of any publisher. If their previous games like Euphoria and Viticulture are any idea of the future of this game and it’s Kickstarter, then I think we’re in for a treat! This is why I’ve “broken” my own rules and put a 2016 game on my list. 
 

The next game on this list is Between Two Cites, designed by Matthew O’Malley and Ben Rosset and published by Stonemaier Games. Another Stonemaier Games release! This is another game that will soon be making its run on Kickstarter and knowing their pedigree, it will be perfectly managed. This game is a city-building game where you partner with other players to create two cities and manage them between both players. You have to work together in order to make the cities the most livable and in the end it is the player with the most points that wins overall. This game has elements of co-op, card drafting, and tile-laying, all of which I love! This game is looking more and more interesting as it gets closer to its February 25th Kickstarter. 

The next game on my list is one of the few games I have pledged to on Kickstarter. The game is Super Dungeon Explore: Forgotten King and it is designed and published by Soda Pop Miniatures. This is the follow up to the popular game Super Dungeon Explore. Now, this stand-alone expansion will add more mechanics to the base game and well as a ton more models! I jumped on this one because of the stretch goals that were reached. I’m not sure that I would have pledged had the Kickstarter not hit the levels that it did. That being said, I’m very pleased with the way the company has handled the project. While the original due date was in December, they have been keeping those who pledged updated with weekly posts on the Kickstarter site. As of now they have received their first full copy of the game and seem to be pleased with the way it looks! We are now looking at a March due date and I am excited for the Arcade mode (fully co-operative!) that has been created to go along with the release. Can’t wait for my copy to come in the mail…and expect a full unboxing when it happens!

The fourth game to make the list, and just miss the top honorable mention spot, is La Granja. This game was designed by the team of Andreas Odendahl and Michael Keller and published by Spielworxx. Thankfully, Stronghold Games has picked the game up for United States distribution as this game really looks like a winner! This game has often been described as the lovechild of an Uwe Rosenberg game and a Stefan Feld game. To be honest, I’ve never played either of those designer’s creations before (although you may see one on the top ten of2015 list!) but I understand the pedigree is impressive! This game looks awesome because you are able to take the cards you are dealt and use them in many different ways. I love games where the cards can be played more than just one way, it is just one of the reasons I love Imperial Settlers. La Granja lets you use these cards in order to gain points in order to beat your opponents. This is a very good looking, mechanically-sound game that will see its release in the United States in 2015.

The final (thus my most interesting) game to make the honorable mentions list of 2015 is Elysium, designed by Matthew Dunstan and Brett J. Gilbert and published by Space Cowboys. This game has been picked up for distribution in the United States by Asmodee and should see its stateside release in the next month or so. This game is set in mythic Greece and uses card-drafting (easily one of my favorite game mechanics) and set-collection as its main mechanics. I love how each of the gods has their own cards that act and react differently than each other. Your goal is to please the gods by transferring their cards into Elysium and thereby gaining enough points for victory. Card games are probably my favorite and thus this one has just enough to get me very excited about its release.

There you go, my honorable mentions of 2015. These are just five of the games that I am excited to play, but there are ten more to come. Check back here soon for games 6-10 of my top 10 list. As always, if you have any questions or comments feel free to leave them here or at the posting on BoardGameGeek at my handle name, LateToTheTable. Thanks for reading. Until next time, game on!