Boardgames

Another Boardgame Round Up – China, Red November, more…

Posted by leespeakin on February 2, 2012
Posted in: Boardgames. Tagged: , , . Leave a Comment

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Links: China in Venice, Fresh Blood for Red November, Adam Sandler in Candy Land & a Top Prize for Poop

from BoardGameGeek News | BoardGameGeek by W Eric Martin

by W. Eric Martin

• Designer Michael Schacht continues his “12 months of China” project on his online gaming website with implementations of the China gaming system in the Soviet Union (which debuted in January 2012) and in Venice (which goes live in February 2012). What’s more, Schacht has now made these new China game boards available for download via the China page of his website. (Click “expansions” under the Downloads header, then arrow right to the second page. A ton of stuff awaits the curious!)

• Schacht has also posted downloadable versions of the Ferris Wheel for Coney Island (here), the promotional scoring card for Gold! (here) and board #20 for Valdora (here).

• Designer Fredric Moyersoen has published new cumulative sales totals for Saboteur, noting that 130,000 copies of the game sold in 2011 – twice as much as in 2010 – bringing the cumulative sales tally up to 480,000. (Moyersoen includes sales of Saboteur 2 in this total, which is somewhat justified given that some versions of that title include the entire game, despite others having only expansion cards.) The game is available in 21 languages, and the top-selling countries/regions are France, Germany, Benelux(!), the U.S. and the Baltic States(!!). Lots of love for the game in those smaller countries…

• Designer Bruno Faidutti has posted approvingly of twenty special characters for Red November, each with a unique special ability, that blogger Dylan Brooks created and posted (PDF) on his personal blog. Says Faidutti, “They are really well designed.”

• WizKids is looking for game designers and developers who, if selected, would be willing to pitch a game concept for a licensed property or work to develop and balance someone else’s game. Details at the link above.

Reblogged by Lee Speakin

New Boardgames Announcements- Aeroplanes etc…

Posted by leespeakin on February 1, 2012
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New Game Round-up: Wallace Takes to the Sky, Germany Gets New Tickets & Crazy Creatures from Dr. Schacht

from BoardGameGeek News | BoardGameGeek by W Eric Martin
• Mayfair Games long ago announced that Martin Wallace’s Steam and Automobile would be part of a transportation-themed trilogy and now the U.S. publisher has revealed the third title in that series, which is due out May 2012. Here’s the description of Aeroplanes: Aviation Ascendant

Aeroplanes: Aviation Ascendant explores the dawn of commercial aviation, an exciting era between 1919 and 1939. Experience the difficulties and triumphs of commercial airlines in Europe, pioneering airports and service in continental Europe and around the world!

Aviation spurred the growth of intercontinental travel, and airlines struggled to dominate the regions of the globe that they served.

Rapid technological advances in planes play a vital role in this development as you compete to purchase newer more efficient aeroplanes, build airports, and move passengers around the globe. Earn bonuses and prestige for being the first to fly to North or South America, and win by maintaining the most airports around the world and by running your airline profitably.

Can you balance your investment in aeroplanes, customer service, and routes well enough to become the premier airline of the era? The fate and future of air travel lies within your hands!


• Days of Wonder has now dropped details on Zug um Zug: Deutschland, which I had brought up seven days ago in another new games post. At the time, one wag responded, “I thought Ticket to Ride: Märklin Edition was TtR: Germany.” To which I rebutted, “Well, we’ll see about that, won’t we? Personally I can imagine the desire – from both the public and the publisher – to have a less fiddly version of the game set in the German landscape.”

New Boardgames for 2012 Previews

Posted by leespeakin on January 20, 2012
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New Game Round-up: Queen & Rio Grande Unveil Packed 2012 Schedules, Ora et Labora No Mora & Nürnberg 2012 Shapes Up

from BoardGameGeek News | BoardGameGeek by W Eric Martin

by W. Eric Martin

• German publisher Queen Games has passed along details of nine titles on its 2012 schedule, and while info is scarce for a number of them, here’s what I know so far. As I receive more updates from Queen or as info comes in from the Nürnberg trade fair in early February 2012, I’ll update the various game pages to provide more details about game play.

January 2012
—–• 3 in 1: Mückenstich, Danger, Zwickern, which is – as the title suggests – a three-pack of older card games from Queen in a new package for those who weren’t around ten years ago when these games were originally released.

February 2012
—–• Kingdom Builder: Nomads, which I posted about earlier in January 2012. This expansion includes bits for a fifth player, four new game boards (and consequently four new powers), three new scoring cards, and a bunch of nomad and location tiles of which I don’t yet know the use. Soon!

March 2012
—–• Maharani, a tile-laying game from Wolfgang Panning in which players take mosaic tiles from a rondel in order to build a palace. Seems like an incredibly inefficient way to build a palace, but I have no experience doing such things, so what do I know?

April 2012
—–• Edo, which I previewed in a November 2011 post following a demo at BGG.CON.
—–• Kairo, in which you try to maneuver customers to different-colored stalls by competitors keep popping up in their way and the customers themselves keep disappearing.

May 2012
—–• Urbanization from newcomer Johnny Ebsen in which “the players follow the development of a rural area, from the beginning of the industrial revolution to modern times. They guide their villages through hard times and try to attract citizens by building houses. Later, factories are erected and the villages grow into prospering cities.”

June 2012
—–• Thebes: The Tomb Raiders, a card game version of Peter Prinz’ Thebes, with players once again spending time to dig for glory.

July 2012
—–• Escape, which I also previewed following a BGG.CON demo.

August 2012
—–

• Locomotive Werks, a fancy edition of the Winsome Games release from 2002 in which players “purchase the ability to produce engines, pay workers to produce them, and sell to the volatile, dice-driven market”.

• Jay Tummelson at Rio Grande Games has posted a general news update, mentioning that the English edition of the Puerto Rico: Anniversary Edition is sold out at the publisher level and not coming back, so what’s on the market is all there will be – at least for the English version.

• In news of upcoming games from Rio Grande, Tummelson says that Upon a Salty Ocean, Lamborghini, Leader 1: Hell of the North, Hawaii, Last Will, Stone Age: Style Is the Goal and Roll to the South Pole – a dice game from Kristian A. Østby and Eilif Svennson – will be available “in a few weeks”, which puts them as February releases on Gone Cardboard, BGG’s game release calendar. Tummelson didn’t mention that RGG is importing the Giochix release The Forgotten Planet, but the game is listed on the RGG website with a February 2012 release date, so throw that on the list, too.