Obligatory 2015 Kickstarter Post Part II: Top 10 List (Part I)

Now we get to move to my top 10 interests on Kickstarter.  If you haven’t had a chance to check out the first post in this series please take a second and take a look.  The first post has 5 games that are my honorable mentions (as well as 12 games that I didn’t quite make the list) and it sets up for this post.  The biggest rule I’ve set for myself on these posts is that these are all Kickstarter campaigns that haven’t yet been shipped to their backers.  Other than that there are no rules on the dates or anything along those lines.  Again, before you read this you can check out my honorable mentions list at the below link.

Kickstarter 2015 Honorable Mentions

With the preliminaries out of the way we can now move on to games 6-10 of my top 10 Kickstarter 2015 list.  Keep an eye out in the next day or two as I’ll be releasing my games 1-5 of the top 10 list.  Alright, here we go!

#10 – ExoPlanets (Board&Dice)

ExoPlanets is a tile drafting, tile placement, set collection, and area control game designed by Przemyslaw Swierczynski and will be released by Polish publisher Board&Dice.  This game was funded by 904 backers and made $44,021 during its run on Kickstarter.  It is being released by Board&Dice during Essen Spiel 2015 and looks like a really cool game.  I was very interested in this game when I saw the run through by Richard Ham.  It is a beautiful looking tile drafting and placement game that has just enough “take-that” attitude in it with its player interactions.  You are basically attempting to control planets in order to get different resources which will let you control other planets.  There is some hidden information that each player has in some of their tiles where they are able to gain points with different sets and things of the like.  It just looks like a fun game and we love Dice Brewing which is also released by this company.  The shipping was really what held me back on this game.  I hope that they will partner with a company over here to release it in the United States.  If/what they do that this will probably be an insta-buy.

#9 – Mistfall (NSKN Games/Passport Game Studios)

Mistfall is a co-operative, deck-building, adventure game designed by Blazej Kubacki and will be released by NSKN Games and Passport Game Studios.  This game was funded by 2,489 backers and made $134,348 during its run on Kickstarter.  To be honest this game wasn’t really on my radar during its campaign (much to my chagrin).  This game is an insta-buy for me for a few reasons.  The first is that many reviewers have stated that it has some similarities to the Lord of the Rings LCG by Fantasy Flight, Sentinels of the Multiverse by Greater Than Games, and Legends of Andor by KOSMOS.  These are some great games and the mixture of the three of them just sounds like it would be an amazing game.  I saw Ricky Royal’s play through of the game and it got me even more interested in the mechanics and gameplay.  The game also looks absolutely beautiful on the table and that certainly doesn’t hurt!  Another reason I want this game is because it looks like it would play great solo.  I think this may be a Christmas purchase and I can’t wait.

#8 – Wizards of the Wild (CrossCut Games)

Wizards of the Wild is a card drafting, dice rolling, set collection, engine building game designed by Adam West and Dan Schnake and will be released by CrossCut Games.  This game was funded by 1,307 backers and made $46,291 during its run on Kickstarter.  This game is actually the first on the list that I am a proud backer of!  This was an easy purchase as the base game was only $16 for what appears to be a light, fun, card and dice game that will play fast and easy.  The artwork and theme are great and the mechanics look solid in this Yahtzee-style dice rolling game.  Engine building (along with card play) is one of my favorite mechanics in a game and this one really seems to use it well.  As a bonus this was one of the best run Kickstarters I’ve been a part of and the game should be in backer’s hands by November or December at the latest making it to us on time.  Can’t wait for this one!

#7 – Bottom of the 9^th (Dice Hate Me Games/Greater Than Games)

Bottom of the 9^th is a dice rolling, press your luck game with splashes of bluffing and deduction.  This game is designed by Darrell Louder and Mike Mullins and will be released by the Dice Hate Me Games imprint of Greater Than Games.  Bottom of the 9^th was funded by 2,183 backers and made $67,251 during its run on Kickstarter.  I saw this game’s campaign go up and I was instantly enamored by the mechanics and old-school art that was on display.  The cards that make up your players are actually made to look like old Topps-style baseball cards and really lend to the theme of this game.  This game was an insta-back for me with its great style, fun gameplay, and low price point.  Again, just like the Wizards of the Wild campaign, this was one of the best-run Kickstarters I’ve been a part of.  I’ve never heard anything bad about the way that Dice Hate Me Games runs their campaigns and this is no different.  Spoiler alert, there may be another Dice Hate Me Games campaign higher on my list!  This game is currently running on time and should hit backer’s doors before the World Series which is really what they were shooting for.  Can’t wait!

#6 – Trickerion: Legends of Illusion (APE Games)

Trickerion: Legends of Illusion is a Euro-style, worker placement, and action selection game designed by Richard Amann and Viktor Peter and will be released by APE Games.  This game was funded by 4,330 backers and made $285,309 during its run on Kickstarter.  This game was a sneaky little surprise when it came on the scene.  I was able to catch a Richard Ham run through and this game immediately shot up to one of my major Kickstarter interests.  It is a pretty classic worker placement game but it has some interesting ways of going about these mechanics that I think will make it stand out from other games of its genre.  The theme goes a long, long way in really taking this game to the next level.  I love that you take a magician who specializes in a certain type of magic and you create their entire show.  Of course, the most reputation points (a.k.a. victory points) will win the game.  The art and mechanics really make this one a high candidate for a possible Christmas purchase when it is released.  I hope it does really well at its debut at Essen Spiel 2015.

Well folks, there you have it, games 6-10 of my top 10 Kickstarter 2015 list.  As stated earlier, keep your eyes open on my site and BoardGameGeek as I will have the final installment of the series up in the next couple of days.  As usual, if you have any questions or comments feel free to post them below.  Until next time, game on!

Obligatory 2015 Kickstarter Post Part I: Honorable Mentions

Okay, I have finally broken down and created my 2015 Kickstarter list!  This will be the first in a series of posts that will feature the Kickstarters that I am interested in.  These games are ones that haven’t been shipped out to their backers as of the writing of this post.  This means that their campaigns may be still going on, completed, or even haven’t started yet.  Also, for this list I didn’t look at any date for the campaigns as all I’m really looking for are games that haven’t been shipped.  One of the games on the honorable mentions has been rumored for a couple years and still hasn’t even had its Kickstarter!  This first post will focus on 5 honorable mentions (as well as some other cool looking ones that didn’t quite make the cut) that just missed out of my top 10 list.  Without further ado, here are my Kickstarter honorable mentions.

The first honorable mention to make it onto my Kickstarter list is Consequential.  This game is designed by Chris Cieslik and will be distributed by Asmadi Games after the (supposed?) Kickstarter.  This is a co-operative game with an app portion that will be used heavily for the story portions of the game.  Cieslik has been working on this game for quite some time as it was first mentioned around Gen Con 2012.  Here we are 3 years later and there are just some tenuous mentions of a Kickstarter coming up soon.  I hope that this game will be up soon and will do well because it looks quite interesting and could be another game that integrates applications with success.  The only reason it is so low is because my interest seems to be waning further as this game continues to taunt without any real substance behind it.

The next game that is interesting on the Kickstarter front and gets an honorable mention is 7^th Continent.  This game is by Ludovic Roudy and Bruno Sautter and will be distributed by Serious Poulp after its Kickstarter.  This game has really been going around BoardGameGeek with its very interesting looking mechanics and theme.  This game is inspired by the Fighting Fantasy series of gamebooks which really creates a game that will be much like a choose-your-own-adventure experience.  I find this idea to be very fascinating and am looking forward to see how it works.  I will hold off on this game until it hits retail because I really want to see how it plays and what others are saying about it before I take the leap.  So far the buzz is great and I love different themes/mechanics in games so I think this could be a winner.  They are obviously looking to have a successful Kickstarter (which starts 9/29/15) as they already have at least two slated expansions entitled The Forbidden Sanctuary and The Icy Maze.

The next Kickstarter game to receive an honorable mention is Above & Below.  This is a game designed by Ryan Laukat and distributed by his company, Red Raven Games.  This is a game that uses set collection, card drafting, and storytelling as its primary mechanics.  Ryan is truly a triple threat as he has designed this game, done all of the art for it, and is releasing it himself.  This game looks absolutely beautiful and it seems to really do a great job in marrying storytelling with an actual game!  I’ve seen other games that use storytelling as a primary mechanic but don’t seem to have any actually game along with it.  Above & Below will hopefully be one of those rare games that uses storytelling and is a fun game as well!

The fourth game to make its way onto my Kickstarter honorable mention list is Shadows over Normandie.  This game is designed by Yan & Clem (they also designed Heroes of Normandie) and distributed by Devil Pig Games and Iello.  This game is a war style game that uses grid movement, dice rolling, and hex-and-counter mechanics.  I am not normally interested in these types of games but this one really grabbed me.  The mechanics are interesting and the theme is awesome!  This game finds a group of soldiers who got split from the main army and find themselves fighting a cult of Nazis who are bringing up Cthulhu horrors.  I like the mashing of the World War II theme with the Cthulhu theme.  It appears to be a great game with a sweet theme and that is enough to make this list.

The final game to make it onto my Kickstarter honorable mention list, and thus just miss the top 10, is Millennium Blades.  This game is designed by D. Brad Talton, Jr. and distributed by his company, Level 99 Games.  This game wasn’t one I knew much about when it first popped up on Kickstarter but it quickly became incredibly interesting to me.  This game takes the idea of collectible card games and turns it on its head.  In this game you’ll draft cards, use hand management and set collection in an effort to gain victory points during card battles.  This makes the game essentially a commodity trading game that strives to be a CCG-simulator.  This idea is very interesting and I can’t wait to see the final product to see if Talton was successful in his ambitious Kickstarter.

These are the 5 games that just missed my top 10 but I felt deserved honorable mentions.  Below I have the names of 12 other games that just missed the honorable mentions but still look very cool.  Check them out if they sound cool to you!

- Apocrypha Adventure Card Game

- Blood Rage

- Foe Hunters

- The Guardians: Explore

- The Others: 7 Sins

- Posthuman

- Prime Time

- Raiders of the North Sea

- Rome: Rise to Power

- Salvation Road

- Super Dungeon Explore: Legends

- Zombicide: Black Plague

Thanks so much for taking a look at my blog!  This is just the first in this series and the next one will feature games 6-10 of my top 10 Kickstarter interests.  Stay tuned to find out what they are.  As usual, if you have any questions or comments feel free to leave them.  Until next time, game on!

Obligatory “What I Played In…” Post Part II: August 2015

And we’re back for the second month of my new blog series.  This is my series of posts where I list the games I played the previous month and my statistics for said month.  This one will take on August 2015, the first month of post-Gen Con gaming!  There are a few new games to me and my wife from Portal Games in this post.  Enough of the ramble, onto my games played in August of 2015!

Statistics:

Total plays in August 2015 – 58

Total Unique games played in August 2015 – 21

New games played in August 2015 – 4

Most plays of a single game – 12

Coup

Designer – Rikki Tahta

Publisher – Indie Boards & Cards

New to me

First play – 8/9/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 12

I picked up Coup on a whim on 8/9/15 for a game night we were having that evening.  It is a simple to learn bluffing/deduction game that has gone over great with our friends!  This will be a mainstay in our collection and has definitely become our deduction game of choice (at least until Mysterium is released!) for the time being.  It was so popular with one of our friends that he went out and bought it the very night that we played it with him for the first time!

Shadowrun: Crossfire

Designer(s) – Mike Elliott/Rob Heinsoo/Jim Lin/Gregory Marques/Sean McCarthy/Rob Watkins

Publisher – Catalyst Game Labs

Last play before August 2015 – 10/28/14

Total plays in August 2015 – 10

Shadowrun: Crossfire is a co-operative, deck-building game that we hadn’t played for almost a year.  My wife suggested we pull it out and I haven’t looked back since!  This has to be my “re-find” of the month.  I think that we just didn’t quite get the game when we first bought and played it last year and so it got shelved.  Now as we’ve been playing we’ve be incredibly successful and it’s been fun leveling up our characters as we play.  I’m now looking forward to the High Caliber Ops expansion that was seen at this year’s Pax Prime.

Ashes: Rise of the Phoenixborn

Designer – Isaac Vega

Publisher – Plaid Hat Games

Last play before August 2015 – 7/31/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 6 

This is basically still a “new play” as we only played our first two games on 7/31/15.  We are loving this game so far and I’m quite enjoying playing all the different decks while my wife really likes getting to know one or two decks really well.  Super fun game with the incredible Fernanda Suarez art!

Tides of Time

Designer – Kristian Curla

Publisher – Portal Games

New to me

First play – 8/4/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 5

Wow, this is quite the 2-player, card-drafting game.  Card-drafting is one of my favorite game mechanics but it’s difficult to find a good 2-player game with this mechanic.  This does it correctly!  It comes with only 18 cards and in those 18 cards is a beautifully balanced game with infinite replayability within its own meta.  If you’re a fan of 2-player games I highly recommend this one.  And bonus, at a $12 price point it’s hard to go wrong!

Viceroy

Designer – Yuri Zhuravlev

Publisher – Mayday Games/Hobby World

Last play before August 2015 – 7/30/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 5

Viceroy continues to be a popular game with me and my wife.  We haven’t yet brought it out with other players but I can’t wait to try it with more people!

Imperial Settlers: Atlanteans

Designer – Ignacy Trzewiczek

Publisher – Portal Games

New to me

First play – 8/7/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 3

First of all, this isn’t my first play of Imperial Settlers, but rather my first play of the expansion to Imperial Settlers, the Atlanteans faction.  This new faction is absolutely amazing!  It feels so completely different from the original four factions with the different mechanics that it adds to the game.  This is an amazing way to play the game and gives even more variability to an already great game!  I highly recommend this to anyone who loves Imperial Settlers.  As a side note, we also played with the Why Can’t We Be Friends expansion.

Rattle, Battle, Grab the Loot

Designer – Ignacy Trzewiczek

Publisher – Portal Games

New to me

First play – 8/6/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 3

Rattle, Battle, Grab the Loot is a new game by one of my favorite designers, Ignacy Trzewiczek.  This game is an interesting one in lieu of his previous releases.  This is really Ignacy’s first family-style game and I personally think that he’s got a great one here.  Understand this game is one that is HEAVILY based on luck as it relies on the rolling/dropping of dice into a box.  You then take actions as your dice lie in the box to destroy NPC ships and get VP and loot as a reward.  After our first game, Em and I weren’t quite sure if we really liked it or not.  We’ve now played three times and it is really growing on us.  It is light, fun, and I absolutely love games where I get to build things.  In this case you get to grow your galleon from a fledgling ship to a large, fearsome behemoth.  We’re enjoying this one and I expect it will stay on our shelf!

7 Wonders

Designer – Antoine Bauza

Publisher – Repos Production/Asmodee

Last play before August 2015 – 4/26/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

We got in one play of 7 Wonders this month and that is never enough!  I love this game and we haven’t gotten it to the table recently.  I think I may make a concerted effort to get this one to the table again at our game nights.  This does bring up an interesting point though.  The 2-player game, 7 Wonders: Duel, is coming out at Essen and I expect that one will get even more play than the original.

Dungeon Petz

Designer – Vlaada Chvatil

Publisher – Czech Games Edition

Last play before August 2015 – 6/18/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

I did a solo play with a variant (by purple paladin) on BoardGameGeek.  This was for a Euro-style play during the Gen Can’t solo festivities.  It was an interesting variant but to be honest I don’t think I’d ever play it that way again.  It just made me want to play with Em.  Maybe we’ll get a play in of this next month!

Ghost Stories

Designer – Antoine Bauza

Publisher – Repos Production/Asmodee

Last play before August 2015 – 7/31/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

Em decided she wanted to play this as we hadn’t done with one together in a while.  We were starting to get whittled down by the ghosts but with some good rolls by Em and a lucky turn by me we were able to fend off Wu-Feng by the skin of our teeth!  It was a fun round.

Hanabi

Designer – Antoine Bauza

Publisher – R&R Games

Last play before August 2015 – 6/21/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

Em asked for a game of Hanabi, since I love this game I jumped at the opportunity!  She isn’t a huge fan (although she seems to be warming somewhat) of this one so her asking to play it was awesome!  Plus, as a bonus, we got our best ever score at 22!

Munchkin Loot Letter (Love Letter)

Designer – Seiji Kanai

Publisher – Alderac Entertainment Group

Last play before August 2015 – 7/19/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

We got in a quick play of this game with one of our main gaming buddies, Sean.  This is always fun but I definitely prefer it with more players as opposed to less.

Paperback

Designer – Tim Fowers

Publisher – (Self-published)

Last play before August 2015 – 7/19/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

Em and I played a round of Paperback in August and she was able to dominate me at this game once again.  This continues to be one of our deck-builders of choice.  This is a great indie game!

Province

Designer – Samuel Strick

Publisher – Laboratory Games

Last play before August 2015 – 10/10/14

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

This was another game that I tried a solo variant from BoardGameGeek for the solo Gen Can’t festivities.  This variant was by Santiago Eximeno and was pretty interesting.  Again, I doubt I’ll try this variant again, but it was an interesting way to play and fairly well done.

Quarriors!

Designer – Eric M. Lang/Mike Elliott

Publisher – WizKids Games

Last play before August 2015 – 2/22/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

Em and I decided to play this game when we looked up at our shelf and saw it sitting there all lonely-like.  We realized that it had been a while since we’d played it.  I always forget how much fun this game really is.  I would like to try out some of the expansions (mostly Quarmageddon and Quartifacts) and see how it opens up the game.

Roll for the Galaxy

Designer – Thomas Lehmann/Wei-Hwa Huang

Publisher – Rio Grande Games

Last play before August 2015 – 7/12/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

This game continues to be one of our very favorite games to break out when we have a small amount of time and want a game with some great decisions and a ton of dice-rolling.  This game is amazing and when the Ambition expansion comes out it will be an insta-buy!

Samurai Spirit

Designer – Antoine Bauza

Publisher – Funforge

Last play before August 2015 – 7/31/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

Em and I got in another play this month of Samurai Spirit.  This appears to be our go-to co-operative game as it is a great experience and super quick to set up, tear down, and play.  Long live Antoine Bauza games!

Seasons

Designer – Regis Bonnessee

Publisher – Libellud/Asmodee

Last play before August 2015 – 6/18/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

Ah, a wonderful play of our favorite game.  This game is always a fun experience when we break it out.  We played this game with the Enchanted Kingdom expansion.

Sentinels of the Multiverse

Designer – Christopher Badell/Paul Bender/Adam Rebottaro

Publisher – Greater Than Games

Last play before August 2015 – 7/18/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

Em and I broke this out for the first time as a couple in a while.  I’ve done some solo games but she hadn’t played it in a while and wanted to have a go at it.  I used Fanatic and Guise while she used The Wraith (her favorite) and Tempest.  We played against Kisment in The Block environment.  We won and it was a great time!

Star Wars: Imperial Assault

Designer – Justin Kemppainen/Corey Konieczka/Jonathan Ying

Publisher – Fantasy Flight Games

Last play before August 2015 – 7/7/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

Sean came over and we got in the story mission “Drawn In” during this play.  Em and Sean had a good round but I was able to eke out the victory before they could destroy the computer terminals and escape.  We have about four missions left in our campaign.

Tokaido

Designer – Antoine Bauza

Publisher – Funforge

Last play before August 2015 – 6/21/15

Total plays in August 2015 – 1

This was another game that Em wanted to play and I’m glad she did.  This is just a beautiful game that feels relaxing as you play it.  And as an interesting note, I just realized that we played five games by designer Antoine Bauza in August.  He is definitely one of our favorite designers.  This is also a great game to bring out with new players.

Whew, there you have it, my games played in August 2015.  This has been a great month for new stuff for us, including Coup, Imperial Settlers: Atlanteans, Tides of Time, and Rattle, Battle, Grab the Loot.  We enjoyed every one of these games and I would gladly recommend them to most people.  Also, we were pleasantly surprise when we pulled out Shadowrun: Crossfire for the first time in almost a year and enjoyed it so much!  This would have to be my surprise of the month as we definitely didn’t have this much fun with it the first time around.   

Anyway, stay tuned as I’m working on two upcoming blog series.  The first to come out will probably be my Kickstarter interests that are yet to come out to backers.  Some of these will be ones going on now and others are ones that just haven’t been shipped as of yet.  The second will be my Essen Spiel posts.  This one will be the doozy!  I have a huge list going for my interests of that convention so I may need to split it up in a different way.  We’ll see.  Thanks for reading and if you have any questions, comments or suggestions feel free to comment.  Until next time, game on!