Opening

SPEAKER_00 0:00

In a world where there's over 100,000 board games, it only takes a special few to make a difference. Let's dive into my top 10 games that made me fall in love with a hobby.

PHASE A: PULL UP A CHAIR

SPEAKER_00 0:21

Welcome everybody to the Just Play podcast with me, your host JP, and welcome to the channel and podcast if you're here. If you're new to the show, thank you very much. Uh can't wait to kind of have you here on this journey. Uh this is episode one, so very, very much at the start of it all. And if you're returning from the Who's Turn Is Anyway podcast, thank you so much for jumping over and uh keeping me company while I talk about the usual things that who you're used to to me to talk about, to be honest. But um, but no, really, really great uh to kind of have you um join in the just play fun as well. So so this is the first segment called Pull Up a Chair, and generally um I want to to kind of enhance this segment and uh basically this is where I need your help, uh listeners and and viewers. Um I basically need your engagement. I need you to kind of help me uh basically give give me questions to answer, um, get engaged and start asking, you know, what your favourite games are or or what you like about the hobby. And and I think in particular against this episode, um, you know, I I've kind of said I'm gonna go through the top ten games that made me fall in love with a hobby. So I want to hear about your games. I want to hear about what you enjoyed and and and what kind of help you get to the place in the hobby space that you're in today. So please, you know, in the comments below, um please get in touch, or if you're on our socials and Facebook and Instagram, then do the same stuff. We love it. I just I just want to get engaged with stuff like that. Um

PHASE B: JUST PLAYED

SPEAKER_00 1:46

so yeah, so let's move on to the uh the next segment then. So the next segment is called Just Played. So this is where I'm gonna basically talk about games. One of my favourite segments, because I can talk about games till the cows come home. Um but yeah, I'm gonna talk about a couple of games um in this this segment and and I'm gonna start by sharing the screen, which is kind of weird for me. If anyone who's kind of caught the uh episode zero primer uh episode will know that I mainly have been doing audio only podcasts and it'll probably shows, so bear with me as I kind of transition to this kind of visual media, which I'm not completely used to uh at all. So hopefully after a few episodes it'll kind of get normal.

Eternal Decks

SPEAKER_00 2:27

But hey, look, as if my magic screen sharing is a thing. So the first game I want to talk about and just played is Eternal Dex. And I mentioned this in episode zero that I've been playing it uh fairly recently, and um Eternal Dex is a game um from Publisher Trick Taker Games, and it's a Japanese game, and basically it's uh uh it's really rare. It's so hard to get hold of Eternal Dex uh in the UK, and every now and then um you know a rare opportunity comes where a UK uh stockist happens to have it and you pick it up and it's just the right place, right time, and finally it's in your hands. Now, Eternal Decks, I first heard of this game when I went to full board gaming um down in Torquay. And uh if you haven't been to that convention, fully recommend it, it's brilliant. Um, and we'll probably talk about that on another uh episode or one that's coming up. But yeah, I managed to see uh a couple of people um or group of people playing this game, and you'll you'll see if you haven't seen what this game looks like, you can't help but look at um you know the ball and go, what is going on? Uh what is it all about? Because it just looks like nothing else. Um, and I'm quite pleased to say it plays like nothing else as well, in my play experience, anyway. So, what is Eternal Dex? What is it about? Well, thematically, it's you know, I'm gonna try and and string this together. Like some games will kind of put some themes together, you you know the ones I'm talking about. Um, but generally you're kind of like adventurers, um, all grouped together um to explore this this world, and uh basically you're trying to work uh wake up the eternals and to kind of help you progress through these various different stages. And and in the rule book, it does a great job of of looking like uh kind of a cone that kind of goes down, um a bit like Dante's Inferno, you know, layers of hell, and it kind of goes all these kind of layers all the way down to this big dragon egg, um, with which you want to kind of wake the dragon up um for for reasons I actually don't know, I'll be honest with you. Um, and each kind of layer is a stage in the game. So you start with stage A and you go to B, then C, then D, etc. etc. And um caveat, I've not played all the stages, I've only done A and I've got plenty more of the game to do. So I'm not doing a full review here, just kind of giving you my play experience and what what I kind of think of the game so far. Um, so yeah, I'm gonna jump into uh some of the pictures because let's show this game off. Um, and let's jump into this one first. And here we go. So basically, you'll play in a cooperative game. It's a game where you'll have uh a deck of cards each, and that's kind of what these cards here you've got red, blue, green, and yellow, and each deck will have the numbers one to five in them, so that's pretty much it, and you'll shuffle them and draw three. And now, as it's a co-op game, um, it's also a limited communication uh kind of game, so you cannot tell people what you have in your hand. So you can't say, Hey, I've got a red three, or I've got uh a four. So do you have a five? No, you can't answer those kind of questions, but you do have these kind of discs, and I think they're kind of shown here actually. You have these communication disks that you can put down onto the board, which basically are telling people, hey, I want to go here, or I want to do this particular thing. Um, so yes, that's kind of how you you communicate indirectly. Um, but jumping back out, um, and basically let's jump jump to another picture and let's go here. I'll show you the board. The board kind of looks like this, uh, anything that uh kind of within that squiggly line is is the board. And the board actually isn't a board, the board is a uh a really nice kind of silky material, and and you basically when you pop the box, you'll unravel this this this cloth and you'll lay that out onto uh your table and and it looks and feels amazing. I mean I have to say the production value in this game is is is brilliant. Um and and when you first look at it, you go, What the hell is going on? What is this all about? How does this work? Um but generally the game is uh you win the game by collecting stars, and you get enough stars to trigger the the stage achievement. Um and that can differ in different stages, will add different puzzles and different layers and complexity uh kind of thing as you go. Um but that's how you win. So you you basically get to that point. But you lose in a few different ways. You'll lose when any one of your team runs out of cards. So if you have to draw a card and you can't because you ran out, you all lose. Your life force is your cards. So you've got to have to work together to keep yourselves getting more cards and more decks of cards, and I'll explain how that happens in a minute. Um, so that's one way that you lose. Another way that you lose is down here in the river. Um, you've got these three wild cards. Whenever they're uh basically they're taken and you fill up the river uh again, it's game over, it's done. So you've kind of uh basically wasted too much uh as you've been going around. Um so how do you do it? Well, what's the point of the game? What are we trying to do? So the middle of the board here is the main section uh that you'll be interacting with, and each row kind of has a uh kind of a condition card here uh which will basically kind of highlight what the restrictions are and how you will play cards into that row. Um so this one example here says you need to do it in ascending order, so you've got a one to nine, and and that this one might be descending, this one might be something else altogether. And this is kind of where the puzzle is, but you cannot put the same number or the same colour down next to each other either. That's the kind of a generic rule uh across the map. And these nine cards here are the eternals. So the eternals are these mythical creatures like the Medusa or Vampire or or the Phoenix or whatever. And the rub here is that each of these eternals has a deck of cards sat underneath it and um basically mixed up of different colours and numbers, and that's very important because you might be hunting lower numbers or specific colours, and you start with let's say red cards, but you'll end up having but yellows and and some purples, and some cards that are multicoloured as well, which is uh very, very useful. Um now you'll get the the deck of cards, whoever places the last card next to the eternal, you can pick from that row. So you get the deck of cards, which is great. I can keep going, but the eternal goes into this top row here and it goes kind of active, it wakes up. Now, this this eternal gives you a um basically it gives you uh a curse. And the curse might be you can't play ones in this area, or you can't to the field, and you can't play uh sixes or fives or this, that, and the other. So the more eternals that you wake up and you wake them up too quickly, you end up with a hell of a lot of restrictions that you've got to deal with, which then might mean you'll have to burn cards into the river, which is pushing the one of the end game conditions. Um, so what do you do about that? Well, this is where the gems come in, which is this little section here. So you will use cards to craft gems and basically put gems uh as an offering to the Eternal to basically say, Hey, go away, I don't want your curse anymore. And and that's kind of one of the core actions in the game. Um, when you craft gems, all of the cards crafted go into the river. So that's also something to kind of watch out because you do too much of it, it's all going to flood the river and again push the end game condition. Um, but one of the things is when your river fills up uh with at least five cards, you'll get to pick up one of these wild cards, which can be any colour and any number, and as you can imagine, already getting you out of some binds uh as you go. Um, one of the things I didn't mention is that the Eternals um will basically uh offer a power uh as well and will help you uh basically do different things in the game. Uh so sometimes you might want to do uh certain powers before others just depend on what's happening. Um one of the actions that you can also do is you can gift someone a card. So if they're really struggling, and they'll they'll they'll let you know. It's usually the case. Um you spend a life, you've got three here, and you give a card from your hand. So if you've got plenty and the other player doesn't have one, you can do that, and it helps to keep them in the game longer, um, even if they need two more turns, for example, to get their own deck from an eternal. Um, so yeah, so that's that's pretty much the the game. I mean, I'm I'm probably describing stage A. Uh, in stage B, which is called Ghost Town, it does a lot more and it replaces a lot of this stuff up here, and then you have to get keys as well. Um, I'm not gonna spend all day explaining eternal decks, but I it adored this game. My first play of this game was this is just something so unique and so different. I had to talk about it, and you know, I got my family playing this as well, and this is one of the advantages of this game. It's not it's not super complex. I think it takes the rule book takes a few reads to get it kind of in your head, what you're trying to do. Um, but once you get it down and you get that first play done, like I've got my my 11-year-old um son and my my 15-year-old daughter and my wife playing this, and and we had actually had a blast. We had a great time, and I can't wait for us to kind of go through the stages and and see how far we can get. But yeah, I mean that that's Eternal Decks, guys. I think um I recommend this. I think it's uh a cracking little game, weights just under mid-weight as well, and it's quite kind of chill, but yeah, puzzly, very puzzly, and uh yeah, definitely recommend it.

Euphoria: Build a Better Dystopia

SPEAKER_00 12:11

Okay, so on to the next game, which is Euphoria Build a Better Dystopia. So uh Euphoria is uh a game from Jamie Stegmeyer uh and Alice Stone, as it says there, um, published by Stonemai Games and Stonemai were were great in basically giving us a copy uh to check out. Um so thank you, Jamie and team, for that. Um, the copy was um gifted to the Who's Tunis Anyway podcast, which is what I was uh originally from. And I wanted to to get this talked about um and basically just to kind of kind of explore it. And I I was keen to do it because I don't want to just talk about all the new new games. I don't want to talk about the new hotness all the time. I want to you know go back to some of the golden oldies, and as you can see here, 2013 just came out 13 years ago. Um, so yeah, so we had a kind of a quick game and uh we jumped straight into it. So the theme theme around euphoria, as it says there, build a better dystopia, is exactly what it is. You're you're kind of building um the dystopian future in this city. And the the premise is that you're trying to uh work with your workers to help you achieve your your kind of ambitions and goals, and your goals might be to enhance the dystopian hell for others for your own personal benefit, because you know, those in dystopia, the ones at the top tend to benefit the most, um, or you're trying to break free from from that. Um and the workers that are helping you are represented by dice. So I'm gonna jump to this particular picture. So you've got these dice here that have different pips. I mean, they're D6s, you know, one to six um um dice of different colours there for different player colours. And the dice are your workers, so they're placed out onto the board, they're there to do different actions. Um, but the the kind of key mechanic that I think is quite unique in in this game is is that you have like a collective intelligence. So once your workers get more and more intelligent, which can happen through various different mechanisms in the game, um, they get better, they'll give you more resources and they'll give you more things, but the more intelligent they get, the more they realise they're in a dystopian hell and they go, nah, I've had enough of this, I'm I'm out, and you'll lose them. And how the game handles that, which is quite simple and quite clever. Uh I forget the number specifically, I think it's 13. But if your collective pool of dice that haven't been allocated add up to 13 or more, then your highest level dice basically does one. He jogs, he jogs on. Um, so you you can get more workers in the game, but it's that whole thing: do I want more workers when I've got a whole load of dice that haven't allocated yet, and I could risk losing one, which then obviously makes the action inefficient. So, yeah, it's a real kind of puzzle. But the other thing you can do in the game is you can bump the other players' uh dice, and when you bump their dice, they have to roll it, and again, they're praying for kind of lowish numbers uh half the time. Um, so yeah, so let's take a look at the board, let's jump in um to uh the board. I think this is probably a prototype. Um, so yeah, so I think this is a good representation of the board and kind of what's going on. So the game's kind of broken into four different areas, and these are the four factions in the game. Um, and they they will all produce different uh resources that you're gonna need, whether it's food, whether it's this kind of cloud stuff material, um, you know, this, that, or the other gold, etc. And you're gonna need those resources to be able to do pretty much anything in the game, and those resources are there to kind of help build these tiles, um, which is one of your main ways of getting these authority uh tokens uh out onto the board. So the way you win this game is much like Scythe, if you've played Scythe before and you're trying to get your sixth achievement star out, this is very similar in that you're trying to get your authority tokens out, and when you've got all of them done, you win, and it basically ends the game. So, very much a classic Stonemeyer feel in how it triggers the endgame. Um, and yeah, so you're gonna need those resources to build those tiles to do that. So, yeah, so you've got these uh little meeples there which um uh kind of go uh down these tunnels so you can help push that that meeple to kind of excavate through and it connects the two factions together and allows you to get um more and more kind of uh a better resource exchange as they get access to different resources as well, so get you a bit more efficiency in what's going on. Um, the other thing that you could do as well is that you level up these uh factions so you get more allegiance um to the factions and it pushes these tokens up for everybody, and that can have benefits um uh along the way, which helps you play these uh uh cards down. So you'll start with specific cards that are of the actual people in this dystopian hell, and they will help you um to basically give you uh their abilities and powers. So the more that you can push the factions up, and the more you can get those cards down, the more that you can start bending and twisting the rules and create yourself a little engine there, which is uh always good fun uh to do. Um, as I mentioned at the beginning, you have uh kind of a a card that once per game you'll make a decision. Do you want to push the dystopian um regime or do you want to um break free and do something? So I think one of them says choose love or choose something or burn books or read books. I don't know. Um, but yeah, you you kind of do that. And yeah, I mean the premise of the game is pretty simple. The premise of the game is is it is what it is. You're trying to erase the efficiency puzzle to get those stars out and and away you go. And uh yeah, I think I I enjoy my play um of Euphoria. It is of its age, it does feel like it came out um in 2013. Um, and I think there are a lot you know are better games um out there for sure. I know this is going for uh an essential edition uh at the moment, which is actually cleaning the board up, and I think that's one of my main uh criticisms of the game is is basically how the board UI works and the UI UX um because it just feels like things are just kind of everywhere. And I've seen the the essential edition board, it's very neatly laid out, it's more methodical, and I think that will be uh an easier uh experience for players to to grasp. So do check out videos on that if you haven't seen that already. Yeah, here we go. So I've just jumped into the essential edition, and you can already see that you've got you know the these are the factions, Icarus and Euphoria, Wastelanders and Subterranes, and everything's kind of laid out into their rows, and it's just easier. And what it also gives you is player boards. So, where I mentioned around the um uh the intelligence, um, that's actually tracked on your own player board rather than this this kind of communal track, which is a bit awkward to get to if you're different size of the board. So, this is uh a much better um layout of the game for sure. Um, but how did I think? I I like I said I enjoyed it, I didn't love it, I didn't hate it. I thought I thought it was pretty good. Um, and I'd play it again. Um, I'd like to play it at higher player counts uh to see how it goes. But but yeah, I wanted to talk about it because again, it's it's a golden oldie, it's one that kind of passed me by. I I basically jumped into scythe. Uh, I think that's my first Stonemeyer experience, and I've completely missed Euphoria. And I'm glad to kind of go back and and rectify that. But yeah, that's Euphoria.

PHASE C: CENTRE OF THE TABLE - Top 10 games that made me love tabletop

SPEAKER_00 19:24

So yeah, so I think it's time to move on to the the the next segment of of the podcast, which is uh centre of the table. So, centre of the table is where we're going to talk about our core uh topic of the show, and as I said right at the beginning, the sh the the topic is my top ten games that made me fall in love with a hobby. So let me first explain what I actually mean by that. Do I mean these are the top ten best games that I've ever played? No, no, I don't mean that. Um, these are the top ten games that kind of sit uh in a very special place that either got me into the hobby or helped me kind of evolve in the journey of the hobby. Um, and and you know, those are the kind of special games that made me go, wow, I didn't realise board games could do this. Um and I've kind of picked these ten uh to kind of represent maybe different stages of of my my board gaming experience. And and as this is uh you know episode one, I thought, what a great way to start the podcast, get you to know me a little bit better if you don't know me, if you're new to the to the channel and pod. Um, but those um you know from from who's done is anyway will no doubt probably know most of these and I've probably talked about them before. So apologies, guys, if you have picked that up. But hey, it's always good to go back. So I'm gonna run through my top 10 and and just I'm not gonna go into the the deep mechanics of the games, but I'm gonna talk about more why they sit where they sit, why they are quite special to me. So let's jump straight into number 10.

No. 10 - XCOM: The Board Game

SPEAKER_00 20:56

So let's jump into the the first game, which is uh number 10. So number 10 is XCOM the board game, and XCOM the board game was my first probably uh major game uh that got me into the the hobby back in you know 2015, 2016. So not long, you know, pretty much after it came out. And yeah, XCOM, I picked XCOM up on a whim. I I was basically looking to entertain uh friends that were coming down and visiting us for the weekend, and I just wanted to do something different. So I picked up XCOM um and it arrived because I played the video game quite a few times. I know the IP, I love the IP, and I thought, hey, why not? If I'm gonna go and play a ball game about something, it's it's an IP that I I care about, right? So I picked it up and and it and it landed. And in basically XCOM um was uh published by Fantasy Flight Games, I think it's out of print now. Um, and um yeah, I didn't even know who that publisher was, but this is my first foray into Fantasy Flight. So in there you get your booklet, your catalogue, and you go, ooh, what's all of this? And you start to learn about all these other games that that FF. G do and and there you go. But going back to XCOM, um, those that don't know it, it's a real-time um stress management simulator. I think it's the best way to kind of explain it. Very quickly, um, you've got the board which looks like uh the whole world map in the middle, and you all assume four different roles um from you know chief engineer, chief scientists, and the the basically the the army dude and the the commander that basically is is the chief accountant, and you're all working together in two stages of the game. You've got a real-time aspect and you've got a turn-based um aspect. And the real time is where the stress is. So it's like you've got an app, so it's an app-driven game, and you'll you've got a timer of two, maybe, you know, not even probably two minutes. I can't remember, it's really quick. And it's asking you, saying, right, draw a crisis card, right? Next, allocate budget for this, next, do this, next, do that, pick your research, do that. And it's very much the longer you leave it, the app knows that you haven't moved things along, and it's kind of tracking the bad stuff if that happens. But you're making decisions fast, furious, and quick, and it is stressful. And then once you've done that, you go to like this resolution phase, and then you resolve all of the crap mistakes that you've made and hope that you're gonna get through it. But yeah, you know, UFOs are are appearing in the world, you need to launch interceptors in there to take them out, much like the video game, and you'll have uh little army dudes that you'll send out on missions, and hopefully you'll you'll kind of get there. But yeah, I'm not gonna go into the main game. It's um yeah, it's it's a definitely definitely unique experience, and not one I would ever recommend introducing new players to, but I did, but I didn't know any better, so bad me. Um but yeah, I mean we had fun with this. I I I remember my first play of this, I was blown away, absolutely blown away that that board games could could do this, and yeah, this facilitated this experience for me. And and honestly, I think I spent the whole weekend just smiling, going wow, and I was looking through that fantasy flight uh catalogue, and that's where it took me to

No. 9 - Mansions of Madness 1st Edition

SPEAKER_00 24:11

number nine. So, number nine is Mansions of Madness, but not second edition, first edition, and and the reason why I got Mansions of Madness is because from that fantasy flight catalogue, guess what? This is one of the uh the options, and I was like, oh god, it's like a haunted house game, and I I feel like I really want to explore this. And it had, you know, exploration, it had like Cthulhu-esque um, you know, cultists and monsters and beasts and worms and all that kind of stuff, miniatures, um, and it also had um kind of puzzles that you could do to unlock doors or and do all sorts of stuff. And I thought this looks extremely thematic and and really kind of helped, I think, be my I think it was probably my second board game purchase um after XCOM. And and it came in this big chunky box, and I was thinking, wow, this thing is so huge. Like, how how am I gonna play this? Who am I gonna play this with? And and I think this is the point where I started to get games that I couldn't basically play with my family, um, because they weren't really interested in in games in the same way, and I was just like at the entry point of just exploring it. But the reason why I like first edition, and actually I'll I'll I'll die on the hill, and this is uh probably a um unpopular opinion, is I think I preferred the first edition to the second edition Mansions of Madness, and I know second edition is better. Like I think if you're getting this game new, don't get first edition, get a second edition. The second edition has an app, it helps control um the story, the bad guys, the narrative, and all of that kind of stuff, and it does a lot of the heavy lifting, so you and your friends can just play as the investigators and and do the the scenarios, right? Um but I kind of miss the the first edition because it allows one of the players to be the git, right? And and that was usually me, and it's the one that knew the rules that the most. So when I founded um our gaming group, um, you know, around 10 years ago, I uh I basically managed to get a few people around to play this and and uh we had a blast. And you know, I love just playing the bad guy. I just think it's fun. You know, you play as the house, or you play as the the you know, one of the ancient ones, or whatever, and you're spawning bad guys, or you're laying traps if they go into certain rooms, and yeah, you just you're kind of there with your screen and and yeah, you're doing all the the cool stuff. And I think that kind of one versus many aspect was the yeah, this is my very much my first experience. But I'd be interested to see what you think, whether you think um the first edition is better than second, you know. Uh call me wrong, I don't mind. Um, but this just my opinion. I just there's something about the first uh edition, I think it's nostalgia, right? I think it's just something that I I really really

No. 8 - Star Wars Rebellion

SPEAKER_00 26:59

enjoy. So next one, we're going to Star Wars Rebellion, and you can see what's going on. There's another fantasy flight games. Uh, there's a pattern emerging here. It's uh pretty much the theme. I do deviate from it though, I promise. Um, Star Wars Rebellion is a 1v1 uh kind of asymmetric skirmish game where one of you plays as the rebels and one of you plays as the Empire. And this is the most Star Wars y Star Wars game, board game that ever exists, and it kind of encapsulates the the original trilogy uh into a board game and allows you to play it out in the way that you want to do it. And now that doesn't mean you're on rails, um, it does reference certain aspects of the films, but you can actually play it your way. So if you're empire, you can actually build two Death Stars. I mean, how cool is that? You just build two, and I'm telling you, when you're the Rebel player and you see two Death Stars on the map, you're worried, you're you're concerned because planets are blowing up left, right, and centre, which is it's generally not good. Um, so the game kind of pictures you as the Empire, as this, you know, you've got the resources, you've got so many units, you've got Star Destroyers, you've got Death Stars, you've got all this stuff, and it's spread out on this big, massive map. So maybe I'll show you a little picture of this. Um, yeah, the map is actually two boards you stick together, and all of the planets are there, etc. And yeah, the empire just has stuff everywhere, and in your rebel side, you have little little teeny bit of bitty uh units that are just scattered in a rebel base and somewhere else. And here's the key, right? The win condition for the uh the empire is to find the rebel base and blow it up, right? And the win condition for the rebel player is to make meet the uh turn marker and the the reputation track at the same time. So either biding your time or you're doing objectives to kind of speed that up as as you go. And it's a cat and mouse game. Like as rebels, you're secretly picking the base that the Empire don't know, and it's on one of these planets, and you're just hoping, misdirecting, and doing all these kind of things to basically say, Don't go there, don't look there, and it's tense and it's epic, and it's just such a good experience. And and the reason why I wanted to pick this is a good close friend of mine who you know is sad he passed away, bless him, um, many years ago. This is one of his favourite games, and we used to play that together, and and I still play this today. I I literally last night I was on uh Gaming Rules, um Paul Grogan's uh channel playing Star Wars uh Rebellion on May the 4th, because why not? What else is there to play on on Star Wars Day? Um, so yeah, so I I I really enjoy this game. I think it's probably my favourite 1v1 game. I think it beats War of the Ring for me, but that's because Lord of the Rings isn't an IP that I mean I like I like Lord of the Rings, don't get me wrong, and please don't don't hate on me. Um, but Star Wars just edges it for me. But I am wanting to play Dune Um War for Arrakis, which is another 1v1 game because I love the Dune universe and I want to see how that does uh in comparison. So so yeah, so that's uh Star Wars Rebellion. So let's jump to the next one, which is at number seven.

No. 7 - Scythe

SPEAKER_00 30:14

So number seven is um Scythe uh from Stone My Games, not a fantasy flight game. Um so Scythe's probably on most people's lists, right? I think if they're doing this this kind of game, um Scythe will appear a lot, and and again, it's kind of of its age, it's 2016, it's 10 years old. Um, and it's a game where it's kind of set in an alternate 1920s um style universe where you know, after the first world war, uh things are kind of diverging in a different path, and you kind of play in this alternate history where um on the board you've got in the middle this it's called the factory, and it's producing all this technology, and you're representing one of the factions um which either uh represent real countries in the real world, but they're not obviously named those, um, and you're kind of going into a uh a resource management efficiency game. It looks like a dudes on a map war game, and Civ it is not, and I think that's what most people um realize when they play it, is like, oh, you've got these big mechs, like you can see in the the the cover here, uh, lots and lots of mechs doing different things. You know, if I just fire up this picture, you can kind of see some of the mechs here and some of the components. Um, but yeah, basically it's uh it's nice, it's an efficiency race, and you have six achievement stars, as I'm mentioning earlier when I was talking about uh euphoria, you've got six achievement stars, and the the when you place your sixth one down, the game ends. You might not win, but it ends, and there are many conditions there. But I think the thing that I really liked about it, the thing that made me go, wow, was um it's just the fact that it's so snappy and the overlapping turns, the fact that you can do a top action and a bottom action, and when you're doing the bottom action, the next player can do the top action, and suddenly you're zipping around the table, even on higher player count games. And I think there are many modern games that can learn a thing or two about how Sive implements that turn structure. Um, but yeah, some of it's dated, um, but it's just a fun game to play, and uh, I think we've had a blast with it. And one of the reasons why it also blew me away is because the Rise of Fenris campaign is um yeah, it's just brilliant. And guess what? We're gonna do it soon again, which I cannot wait to do. So I'll talk about that at another time. So that was number seven. So let's jump to number six,

No. 6 - Lorenzo Il Magnifico

SPEAKER_00 32:34

which is Lorenzo Il Magnifico. And the reason why this one hits the the list for me is it's probably my first mid-weight euro that really kind of blew me away. Um, and you know, it's it's one of the beige beige games uh out there, and you know, its theme is its theme is whatever, but mechanically this game was doing something so unique. You know, I'm gonna jump to um this this picture here, which I think gives you a good view of the board. Uh, you've got these towers here, which has these cards on, and essentially you're all you're doing each each kind of round of the game is you're you're rolling these dice, they represent the the different colour workers that you have with the stickers on the top. So everyone's got their colour cylinders, which are your workers, and then it'll have an orange uh dice or a white or a black dice on there, and that represents the power level of of um the workers for everybody. So if anyone rolls crap, everyone moans because you've all got crap um uh influence that you can kind of um use for the for the turn. Um and also you've kind of got this poor, poor cousin, um yeah, you kind of got the the poor uh cousin of the the family member that no one likes, which is uh level zero, it's always zero, so you have to kind of buff them up all the way. And you're basically getting cards from these towers, and there's lots of rules about if it's occupied or not, which I won't go into. Um, and then you're getting these cards, and it's basically building up this engine, and you're building buildings, you're claiming territories, you're uh enlisting characters, you're going on ventures, and you're doing all these kind of things, and you're building this cool engine. So by the end, you're just literally re-like resource conversion and doing some combos and all sorts of cool stuff. And for me, this is kind of like uh my first foray into the Euros, and like from here, I've been playing games like Two, um, playing um you know uh Glenmore 2, um, and probably getting into the UV Rosenberg stuff like Agricula and Feast for Odin and and all these other games that um just yeah, basically Beijing Cube, um, which is pretty much really good to kind of play. So yeah, Lorenzo still um sits in a nice spot for me, um, you know, up there on my list for sure. And with the expansion houses of Renaissance, it's just peak midway Euro game. And if you've not played Lorenzo, please give it a go. It is tight, it is uh a tough game to play in in that respect where you can't do everything that you want to do, but my god, is it uh a bloody good game? So Lorenzo was my first Euro. So let's move on to the next one, which is number

No. 5 - On Mars

SPEAKER_00 35:17

five. So my number five is uh board games that made me love the hobby, is on Mars. And on Mars was my first Vital La Cerda um game, and probably one of the most heaviest games that I've experienced at that time. And I remember going in with kind of bit of a trepidation because at this time I've heard about La Cerda games, um, and they have a reputation about them as being really heavy, really complex games, and and I've always wanted to try one, but never really got around to trying it. You know, um Eagle Griffin games do a fantastic production, they're they're big board games, they are a sight to behold, the components are uh brilliant, the cardboard's chunky, and uh yeah, it's really good to kind of get your hands on that stuff. But it is expensive, they're not the cheapest games out there. Um they are what they are. Um, but a friend of mine uh basically bought a copy of On Mars and we played it, and I just played it for the first time and it blew me away. Just thought this game um was literally right up my street. The the the complexity of it, the way it made me think, the way that on Mars was very sandboxy in the fact that you had to do um, you know, a bunch of actions, but you had to be on the right side of the planet, either in orbit or on the surface to do certain things. And just what the game was trying to do, the way it was pushing and pulling me all over the place and and making this thing go white hot. Um, I absolutely just adored this game to the point where um a friend actually didn't really enjoy, he doesn't enjoy the La Cerda style games, he finds them too open and too sandboxy. He sold it to me and I gladly purchased it. And this was the first um kind of foray into the what I call the La Cerda verse, um, and and allowed me to buy um other games like Lisboa, which actually Lisboa is probably my favourite La Cerda game, if you're wondering. Um, and I think it beats on Mars, but I still love On Mars. And the reason why On Mars sits on this list is because it was the gateway into the heavy games. So yeah, that's uh that's number five. And then keeping on trend,

No. 4 - Anachrony

SPEAKER_00 37:22

so number four is Anachrony, and when I say on trend, I mean heavy games. So Anachrony is um a game from uh one of my favourite publishers, Mindclash Games, and uh designed by David Tursey, and this is actually my first experience of of David Tursey's design. Um, and I couldn't I've loved this game anymore. Um, I I'd kind of heard about it when it first came out, and I didn't really know much. I was still in my uh uh fantasy flight games bubble, and I didn't really want to venture out too much into different publishers. I just kind of kept you know where it was safe and and warm and cozy. Um and and yeah, and I I think I went to a UK and games expo, I ended up watching a uh a video, a playthrough video of an acronym, and I just went, wow, this game is cool, and it's got time travel in it, which for me I'm in. Like if you put time travel in anything, I'm I'm a massive Bats of the Future fan, you know. Hello, there's a DeLorean here for a reason. Um, I basically, yeah, I'm in. And the way that this worker placement game works, uh, I'm gonna have to show you. You've got um basically these exosuits, and you put your workers in the exosuits, then you slot them in. I you do have to get the exosuits uh um expansion, and and you should, it just makes the game uh really pop and make it better. And yeah, you put the the workers inside, and then if you go into the main board, you have to go in the exosuit because the world is is poisonous and and you can't go out there, and it's just that whole I'm putting workers on my player board and I'm putting workers in exosuits to go outside. It's like a two-tier worker placement game where you're building more buildings and creating this engine where you don't actually need to go to uh the the capital, as it were. You you can kind of stay on your player board and do many things, and the fact you can borrow from yourself and then pay yourself back um at a later time, which is very cool. Um, and Anachrony still to this this group, um our gaming group, we'll play Anachrony now, and with the fractures of time expansion, it is bloody fantastic. I can't recommend Anachrony enough.

No. 3 - Game of Thrones: 2nd Edition

SPEAKER_00 39:30

So then on to number three. So number three is Game of Thrones. We're back in Fantasy Flight Games territory again. So Game of Thrones has a lot to answer for. Game of Thrones, second edition, um, pretty much launched um my gaming group. Without this game, I don't think we would have the gaming group we have today. Um, Game of Thrones is a massive skirmishy war game where you play the houses of Westeros, and if you get the Mother of Dragons expansion, you can play um with the Esos board and play as the Targaryens, but you you're playing as like the Starks, the Barathrians, the Lannisters, the Torrells, and all of those kind of houses, and each house is represented by the character cards, which is what you use in combat. And the premise of the game is simple: get seven castles, literally get seven castles on the board. So if you look at the board here, um yeah, you've got the Westeros, which is beautifully laid out, and you've got this lovely marble pieces. Like even back in the day, like when this game came out, like this this wasn't standard, you didn't have these kind of this these components that were standard, they're a lovely marble effect, and you're trying to get these castles which are just printed on the board. You just got to control them, that's all you've got to do. But the problem is there's not enough of them, and you're constant in contention with the other players on the board, and it has this beautiful order mechanic where you're placing order tokens face down and simultaneously all at the same time, and then you reveal, and this is where everyone usually swears, um, because they go, Oh, I thought you weren't going to invade, and you're like, Yes, I am. Or you can kind of pretend to have alliances with people to support them in the battle that they're gonna have, and then backstab them and do something else. So it's just honestly, it creates um you know, it creates friends, but also ruins friendships in the best possible way. Uh, and this game, uh I really wish they'd do a third edition of it. I really wish they'd kind of revamp it a little bit, smooth some of the uh the quirky edges of the game and and kind of bring it into 2026. But yeah, this game's always gonna sit high on the list. We still play this once a year, it still comes out, but yeah, this founded the gaming group, so it's always gonna have a special uh place, and the fact that it brings a large group of people together in that experience, and and you know, it is a bit of an event-y game, it can take long if you dawdle and you don't focus on on the game so much, but yeah, it's it's just it's just bloody, bloody cool. It's just great fun. So that's Game of Thrones. Um, then on to our number two,

No. 2 - Imperium Classics

SPEAKER_00 41:58

which is uh Imperium Classics, so the Imperium system. So again, another David Tursey design along with Nigel Buckle. Um, and this one was published by Osprey, but Imperium has had many iterations now. We've got Imperium Classics, Legends, Horizons, those are the three. Uh I own all three of them. Um, reason why Imperium's hit the list, I got late to the party on this, came out in 2021. I think I picked up Imperium about maybe two years ago, and I bought it mainly to play solo. Um, so I'm a big solo gamer as well. I do like to play with with um different members of the gaming group, big big games, but I also like to play solo games, and this one, the way this worked mechanically, just I don't know, it kind of tickled the the right part of my brain, and it just made me go, Wow, I can't believe this exists in the way it exists. So, for those that don't know, Imperium is a is a deck builder. Um, when you look at it, it doesn't look like much. Um, you have a market of cards just like a deck builder would. Um, but you play as nations, you play as the Romans, the Celts, the um the Macedonians, the Scythians, and all sorts of different um factions, and they've expanded that now, and I think there's like 30 um a variety of ones that are based on real history and some that are kind of fantasy-based, like the Arthurians um and aliens. We can play as aliens, which is good, good fun. Um, but the way this system works mechanically is so you have a deck that's unique to your faction, and in that deck is basically when you deck out, and when you cycle that deck, you'll take a card from a different deck called the development deck, and that goes into your discard and you shuffle. So every time you go round, you're pulling a card from which is again unique to your faction, into your deck, and then when you deplete that, then you ascend from like a barbarian state to an empire. So you have uh another card on the side, which is like uh shows you what state you're in, and that helps you get certain cards on the market or prevents you, depending on where you are, because if you're Barbarian state, you're not going to go for civilized cards because you you're barbarians, right? Um, but when you're an empire, you're not interested in the uh the barbaric stuff, so it's a nice pivot in the kind of the midpoint in the game. But once you kind of um ascend, which gives you another card. So, for example, in Romans, you get Julius Caesar, bang, great stuff happens. Um, then you can start developing, and this is the bit I really love is that when you deck out again, you've got like a sh your own personal shop of cards that you have to spend resources for to get those into the deck, and they are powerful, they are like really good. You you hinge your whole strategy in how that works around those development cards. And again, the way that you kind of put cards into history, which pretty much means you're trashing it from the game, but you took it under your your main um nation card, and they can score you points as well. And they're just different the way the mechanics in this game work, the way that you're you know, just a deck of cards makes you feel like you're starting off in this small settlement and building up this empire, and some of the nations are bonkers, and the fact you're chaining actions, you're building a tableau of really cool um uh experiences and stories. I I just could not love this game anymore. Um, and it's not everyone's cup of tea, it's very kind of heavy for what it's doing, but again, like coming from a lot of those heavier games, it really starts to scratch that itch, right? And uh yeah, I just love this. I just fell in love with Imperium. I've played it so many times now, like 30, 40 times, and uh I'm nearly nearly through all of the nations. I think I've got two more left, so I'm gonna have to rectify that this year and finish those off. And and what David's done and and Nigel, what they've both done now is they're taking the system and moving it into different IPs, right? Um, the latest one they've done is Star Trek Captain's Chair, which is one of my ultimate favourite games, and IP wise, it's Star Trek, what's not to love, right? Um, and it doesn't work exactly the same. They've they've changed different things because you have spaceships uh uh that warp to to the neutral zone and and different things like that. But the premise, the heart of of the Imperial system, or the Imperium system rather, is is there and and I I just fell in love with that. And as a solo game, it's probably my go-to solo game where I want to just shut my myself away for an hour or two and just again just scratch that that itch and and take a settlement from nothing to to something and recommend Imperium a lot. Um if you've not played it, check it out, check some playthroughs out, um, and and see if you you enjoy it. So then we go to our number

No. 1 - Too Many Bones

SPEAKER_00 46:43

one. So number one is of course for me it's too many bones, and it's actually probably my number one board game, full stop. It's the game I have played uh I think nearly 90 times. Um I'm on my road to a hundred plays of this game, which is a mad feat when you think about it, because each play can be about four, five, six hours long, depending on um what scenarios and and tyrants, which are the bosses, uh what you go up against. And the don't know why this game, I don't know why I love this game. I I passed on this game uh when it was released. I wasn't really that interested. Show up and sit down did a video on this, I think not long after it released as well. And it just I don't know, it just didn't grab me at the time, but yeah, it's not my go-to um kind of theme, and and usually it's sci-fi, it's usually space, to be honest, is what I love. But Too Many Bones is I don't know, it just does something so unique. And I don't know what happened on that particular week when I decided to take a punt and buy it, which is a bit of a punt because you know uh Chip Theory Games is the publisher, they do a fantastic production, it's poker chips, everything's poker chips and in neoprene, but it does mean it's expensive, it means that this game is probably gonna last longer than we do. Um, we will decompose long after the earth, but too many bones will will live on. And yeah, you you kind of basically have these uh gear locks, um, which are your kind of gnomey characters, and you'll pick your gearlock, and every one of them is uniquely different. They have a bunch of different dice, which are their skills, um, and they're completely different to one another, not not even remotely the same. Um, so every time you play a gearlock, it's a different game you're playing. And the fact you take this gearlock from being very weak, very underpowered, and you progress them through this one-shot style um system, and yeah, you basically kind of build them up and uh throw lots of dice, hence too many bones, and you're just bashing enemies, leveling up, getting better, getting more powerful, and you're getting ready to kind of go up against the big, big, big bad. And then you have lots of fights. And this this thing here is the battle mat, and you actually only have 16 positions on this battle mat, um, which is not a lot. So you don't tend to do a lot of moving around, and this thing becomes a puzzle. The way that you you kind of win uh too many bones is by understanding how the enemies work, their skills, their uh how they're gonna uh order in what initiative order and make the best of that situation uh to kill the right things or position play and and things like that. And I love the battles in here, and when you pull um the battles off in in you know, and everything's kind of against the odds, and you manage to do it, you just feel like a bloody hero. And Too Many Bones will always sit as number one. And the reason why, not only in my list of of you know games that made me love the hobby, obviously I love it as it's probably one of my favourite games, but during COVID, during lockdown, this is what got me through it. This game I played solo so many times, which is why my play count is so high. All I did was play Too Many Bones, and I never got bored of it. And you know, even after nearly 90 plays, I'm I'm still not bored of it, and um, I just love playing it. So yeah, as you can tell, I'm gushing over it. Um, but Chip Theory Games is another one of my favourite publishers. I I like a lot of their games, you know, fans of CloudSpire and uh Burn Cycle and and Roth and and uh other aspects as well, and Hoplomocus. Um so yeah, I I really love Chip Theory and what they do. I think they are a very unique publisher. Um, a lot of the things they do probably don't make much business sense, but you know, as consumers, just I just love the wackiness of their products and and the fact that they just have the ability to have fun, which is great. So there you go. That's my top 10 games that um basically uh I love about the hobby and that got me into the hobby or unlocked the hobby in different ways. And I'd really love to hear what you've got to say about your list. Share them with me, chop them in the comments, and yeah, I'd love to see what kind of got you you into the hobby

PHASE D: WHAT'S HOT, WHAT'S NOT

SPEAKER_00 50:58

space. So here we go. So let's move on to the next segment, um, which is uh what's hot and what's not. So this is where I'm gonna drop into um the the BGG homepage and I'm gonna look at the hotness. Here we go. These are the the hotness as of today. Um so every time we do an episode, these will change. And I'm just gonna give you my initial thoughts uh about the hotness and whether I've heard of these games, whether I think they're they're gonna be good, or yeah, everything in between really. So the first one here is uh Lands of Evershade. I have actually heard of um Lands of Evershade before, and it's basically uh by Awakening Rounds, yes. It's uh basically uh an RPG style game, and the thing that I have been kind of attracted to, I'm just gonna scroll down, are the player boards actually. I love a player board. I love a real good dual layer player player board that kind of handles lots of cool stuff. And this player board does look amazing in kind of how that works. Um, you know, and I'm gonna scroll over here as well. And you've kind of got the your equipment here, everything kind of thematically makes sense. You're putting your helmet there, your armor there, weapons on each sides, and different sorts of things, and yeah, it just looks pretty cool. But as I said, like as a fantasy game, um, it's not something I'm drawn to immediately, but I am um intrigued about how that goes for sure. Okay, so number two, Dark Pact. Uh, not heard of this, but I think show up and sit down. I've just dropped a video um on this one, so I know nothing about this. I'm not a big uh kind of Cthulhu style um you know lover. Um, so being cultists and things like that. It's just not normally my theme. Um, so yeah, it's probably one I'll I'll check out just because show up and sit down. I've done it, and I tend to watch some of those videos and and see what kind of happens. Um, but yeah, that's uh Data Pack. Don't know anything about it. Maybe I'll have to check that one out. Now, Rolling Deep, I do know a little bit about. So I'm gonna jump into this one. So Rolling Deep appeared on my social media feed like a lot of games do, just it appeared there. I was doom scrolling one night, and this cuphead style art just came up on the screen, and I was like, what is this? What's this all about? And if you just you know quickly share off the what this looks like, yeah, you've kind of got um this journey to the centre of the earth um theme, but drawn in a cuphead style. But what attracted me to this was the words Ballatro. Okay, so Ballatro is a uh a video game, a roguelike poker video game where you start with a uh a kind of a poker deck and you enhance that deck through getting jokers, which twists up um pretty much how the cards will work and play. And you're playing poker hands to basically generate the best score that you could possibly get to beat these blinds, which get ever increasingly more difficult, and it's just so much fun. If you haven't played it, just download it, it's like five quid, maybe ten pounds. Just download it. And now this apparently is Bellatro with dice, so that immediately had my attention. Um, and yeah, I think you basically do a roguelike run, you have your dice which uh represent the different explorers, and you're kind of going deeper and deeper into uh the journey of the center of the earth, and uh yeah, trying to get the best score you can. And I think as you play, you unlock things so that when you play again, you can basically take advantage of the things and the runs that you've done before. I am keeping my eye on this one. Um, I'm I'm definitely intrigued. I think they're doing a crowdfund in June or July. Um, I'm definitely on the list to check it out. So, yeah, um, if that sounds like your jam, then then come along, check it out. Well, Eternal Decks, I just talked about that. Um, so I don't need to say anything about it. There's a reason why it's a number four. It does pop up on the hotness every now and then. People do talk about it, and it's probably just got back in stock in the UK. Maybe that helps. Um, but yeah, Eternal Dex is number four. Now, World Order number five. World Order is hegemonic uh project uh games, uh, who also did hegemony. And hegemony I really enjoy. Um, only again recently got back into hegemony, uh having got my own copy. Um, but world order is their kind of sequel, which is a bit lighter, um, but more kind of uh you're managing uh a country, so you play as the United States or the EU or China or Russia, and you're kind of doing area control uh across the world, and it's got deck building elements in it. And I've played this uh a few times. I played a game of it um last year, and I've also played a demo of it at I think at UK Games Expo. And again, we've had a lot of fun with this. I think this has got a lot of promise. Um, I think I prefer hegemony because it's more about the the social classes and pitching against each other, but I did like what this was doing, and I like the fact that you can curate your your deck of cards to kind of what you want to do, um, whether you want to kind of go for economic wins or or or warfare and all those kind of things. Um, it has some cool chonky tanks, which everybody everybody loves a chonky tank. And uh yeah, that's kind of in there as well. So, world order, yeah, one to keep your eye out, I think. Um so that's pretty much that. So, yeah, that's the what's hot, what's not. That's just a little review of the top five. I'm not gonna go for the whole hotness there. Um, so yeah, okay,

PHASE E: JUST ABOUT TO PLAY

SPEAKER_00 56:41

so let's talk about the next segment, which is uh just about to play. Um, so this is all things that I'm kind of excited for or looking forward to to playing. Um that that's coming up in the gaming calendar. So, what we got here on my notes down on the side. So I mentioned it earlier, the Scythe Rise of Fenris campaign. I've been itching to get another Rise of Fenris campaign ongoing since we played it about, I don't know, six years ago. And we've managed to get five people together who are committed to do the uh the seven or eight games uh that I needed to do the campaign. And I can't wait. I can't wait. I had a blast doing it the first time. I'm looking forward to getting more scythe to the table, uh, as I know the other guys are, and um, yeah, I think we start in a few weeks, so yeah, wish us luck on that. And last time I did awful. Um I've never been that great at Scythe as a game. I'm hoping I might do better this time, fingers crossed. Um, the other thing that I'm doing is playing March of the Ants. So, March of the Ants um is a little surprise game, it's a four X game, but instead of spaceships and and uh taking over colonies, you are uh basically a colony of ants taking over the garden. And I quite like the fact they've kind of turned that 4X genre on its head and done it around ants and the garden just uh basically ripping each other to pieces. And it's a very cool game, and in the way it works with its turn structure, in the fact that you do an action and your neighbours get to do a reaction to your action, so you're always constantly engaged, you're always doing something, and yeah, and we got some uh some friends coming around to to play that as well. So, yeah, looking forward to do some some more March of the Ants uh coming soon.

PHASE F: THE LAST PLAY

SPEAKER_00 58:23

So, yeah, and I think that takes us to the last play. So we are at the end of uh episode one. I just want to thank everybody for for listening, new and old who's turn as well that have come in to join. I hope you enjoyed the episode. I hope you enjoy the the new format and and how it works. And and yeah, feedback is always key. Uh, I always ask for it and uh I really appreciate everything you do. Um if you want to get engaged, drop some comments in in the YouTube video if you're watching, um, or if you're listening, then jump onto our socials and Facebook and Instagram and and all those kind of stuff. You know what to do. And I really ask if you're you know, if you're watching this on on YouTube as well, you know, hit hit the sub. You know, we're a small channel at the moment, we've just started off, and really appreciate your support to kind of keep us going and and yeah, get get those subscribers up and and get notified when we kind of release new episodes and things like that. So so yeah, and I think the only thing left to say is just remember you only grow old when you stop playing. Take care.