Dungeon Crawlers
They kept descending, deeper and deeper down the stairs, through the air filled with silent distant cries, until they found themselves in front of a big sinister door. The lantern cast the shadow upon it, making the cuts in wood look like scars on a creature, slowly moving with the light. They looked each other, gave a quick nod of encouragement and pushed through the door...
Dungeon crawler games stand somewhere in between RPGs and regular board games. They offer a mix of adventure, exploration, fighting and party building which are usually either cooperative or one vs all. Dungeon crawlers are mostly fantasy themed. Yes, of course, Star Wars is a fantasy too! - Star Wars: Imperial Assault
A lot of dungeon crawler games came out lately, including a bunch miniature games from Fantasy Flight and Cool Mini Or Not. We also saw a lot of dungeon crawlers on Kickstarter, like Gloomhaven, a monster of the game that is shipping to KS backers at the moment and also hitting retail. Reviews for Gloomhaven are pretty positive and it's climbing pretty fast up the BGG all time top list, being on a top of a hotness list for quite some time.
Some other notable dungeon crawler games are Descent: Journeys in the Dark 2nd edition, Claustrophobia, HeroQuest, Massive Darkness, Arcadia Quest and Gears of War: The Board Game.
If you are still not convinced about trying dungeon crawlers, check out Geek & Sundry's 3 Reasons You Need to Play A Dungeon Crawler Miniature Game.
News
Charterstone! New from Stonemaier Games!
ACD Distribution writes about Charterstone, a competitive legacy game, where players construct buildings and inhabit a shared village. Building stickers are removed from cards and permanently added to your charter on the board, becoming action spaces for any player to use.
New & Upcoming Board Games in February 2017
Board Game Prices share their rundown on new and upcoming games for February. Anansi and the Box of Stories, Dungeons & Dragons: Assault of the Giants and others.
PayPal Freezing All of Portal Games Accounts over First Martians Pre-Orders
Portal Games is having major trouble with their pre-orders for First Martians: Adventures On The Red Planet. With nearly 3,000 pre-orders coming in for First Martians via PayPal, Portal Games was informed that PayPal has frozen all of their accounts until they actually deliver the game to the buyers.
What's Next Feb 13th through Feb 26th 2017 - YouTube
What's Next on your game table? Man vs Meeple talk about the 5 new board game releases that are highlights of the weeks of Feb 13th through Feb 26th 2017.
Game Preview: LYNGK, or Bringing Everything Together for Success
W Eric Martin of BoardGameGeek brings us the overview of LYNGK, an upcoming game by Kris Burm and also does an interview with the author.
Sleuthing Gets Catty This June with 'Purrrlock Holmes: Furriarty’s Trail'
A cute looking deduction game is on the horizon, from IDW Games, as Purrrlock Holmes: Furriarty’s Trail is set for a June release. Players will take on the roles of newly minted inspectors at “Scotland Pound” tasked with tracking down members of the notorious Furriarty Gang.
Articles and Videos
Why You Should NEVER Play MONOPOLY Again
Actualol talks about why Monopoly is a terrible family board game, that no-one should still be playing. Funny and educational for non-gamers.
Feature: A Day in the Life of Matt’s Game Collection!
Matt Less of Shut Up & Sit Down writes about his board game collection. Cosmic Encounter, Arkham Horror, Star Wars: Imperial Assault, Burgle Bros, Sheriff of Nottingham, Mechs vs. Minions...
Building a Creative Career on Kickstarter: A Visit to Kingdom Death – Kickstarter – Medium
Kickstarter interview with Adam Poots. Long before game designer Adam Poots raised a record-breaking $12.4 million on Kickstarter, he raised… much less than that.
How to Justify the Cost of Boardgames
Another good article from Art of Boardgaming. I’ve heard it many times… from the friend who just had a blast learning a euro game for the first time: “Oh wow… That cost you $50!?” From a family member to my wife: “You must be so proud of him spending so much money on those.” And from the random person who I’m trying to explain the hobby to: “Monopoly is a whole lot cheaper.”
Top 10 Games Not to Play with Noobs!
Tom, Sam, and Zee of The Dice Tower discuss the games they'd rather not play with (or teach to) new, inexperienced gamers!
Asking 14 Kickstarter superbackers one really important question
A Kickstarter superbacker is a person that backed at least 25 projects in the last year, with pledges of $10 or more. In other words, they back a lot of projects. Tompet Games did an interview with 14 superbackers and shared their first answer. Includes an answer from yours truly :)
Crowdfunding
Dungeon Alliance by Quixotic Games
Dungeon Alliance is a competitive, deck-building, dungeon-crawling miniatures adventure game.
Champions of Midgard: The Expansions by Grey Fox Games
Add a fifth player, new monsters, new leaders, new warrior dice and more! The long awaited expansion(s) to Champions of Midgard.
The Grid Game / The reinvention of the Dominoes! by Ismael Porras L.
A creative and colorful board game turns into a mesmerizing piece of art on your table every time you play it.
Campy Creatures by Keymaster Games
Choose your creature, outwit your opponents, capture the Mortals. It's a ghoulish game of bluffing and deduction for 2–5 players.
Arkham Ritual by Ninja Star Games
Deception, deduction, and push your luck card game for 3 to 7 players. Keep your sanity and escape from the horrific ritual alive!
Jackal Archipelago — islands, pirates, gold and more! by Mosigra
Jackal Archipelago is a strategic board game for 2-4 players aged 6 years and up.
Reviews and Playthroughs
Wil Wheaton Plays TINY EPIC GALAXIES w/ Mayim Bialek on TABLETOP!
TableTop Season 4 continues as Wil Wheaton invites Mayim Bialik, Tim Schafer, and Andy Weir to colonize planets in Tiny Epic Galaxies!
Twilight Struggle (2005)
Michael Heron of Meeple Like Us reviews Twilight Struggle. It feels like it deserved to be the number one game on Boardgame Geek for over five years. I would be hard pressed to say Twilight Struggle is a fun game but it’s certainly one that that is deeply hypnotically absorbing.
Arkham Horror: The Card Game - Shut Up & Sit Down Review
As always, an excellently produced review from SU&SD. This time for very popular Arkham Horror: The Card Game.
Covert Review
Tahsin Shamma reviews Covert, a game of tactical dice placement, set collection, and timing set in Cold War Europe.
Clank - How To Play
Watch It Played is a series designed to teach and play games. In this episode, we're going to learn how to play Clank. Also, check out a review for expansion Clank!: Sunken Treasures by Game Boy Geek.
#90 – Dale of Merchants 2 + Systematic Eurasian Beavers
Eric reviews the second Dale of Merchants game, again from Snowdale Design! This time, the city of Yengzuh is looking for a new Trade Master, and maybe… it could be you?
Week in Review - February 13, 2017
The Dice Tower crew and friends are going through all of the reviews they did the last week.
Influencers
Corey Konieczka
Corey is a lead designer and driving force behind Fantasy Flight Games. He joined FFG in 2005 and designed or co-designed a number of hits. Some people even call him The Best Designer of the Last Ten Years.
All of his games are highly thematic and a good percent of them is high on BGG's all-time list. Last year's Star Wars: Rebellion is currently #5 on BGG, the newest game in top 10. Some of his most popular games are: Eldritch Horror, Star Wars: Destiny, Forbidden Stars, Star Wars: Imperial Assault, Battlestar Galactica, Descent: Journeys in the Dark Second Edition, Runewars and Mansions of Madness.
Check out his BGG page or an interview with him by Shannon Appelcline of Mechanics & Meeples. You can also follow him on Twitter - @Psycorey.
That's it for this week. I hope you have enjoyed reading this issue. Please share with your friends, subscribe if you have not already and follow BGW on Twitter and Facebook.
Thanks for reading and until next week,
Miroslav
Title image: painted Gloomhaven miniatures by Jason Frowde.