Ava: It’s Gencon this week, and do you know what that means? We’ve got to get in the news-canoe, sail to the heart of a newsicane, going right by a violent newscano. I’m all on my ownsome, without a Quinns to cling to. Wish me luck, and good news to you all.
This is the news, be careful out there, there’s a lot of it about.
First up we’re taking a trip to Cooper Island, a game that finally answers the question: ‘what if a eurogame, but taller?’
It’s been a while since we reviewed a classic of a card game, but holy cow!
6 Nimmt isn’t just great. It’s up there with Arboretum, Jaipur, Condottiere and The Fox in the Forest.
In fact, there’s more flow tucked into this tidy, tiny box than we’ve seen since Love Letter. Not sure what the heck “flow” is? Click play, and find out.
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Our series on the best games that you can play with a 52 card deck has dealt out a wild card!
Cribbage is a great game for 2 players (though you can enjoy it with 3 or 4) that people are still playing after four hundred years. And yes, that means it’s a profoundly weird thing to learn, but it also means that there’s an undeniable magic to it.
For help internalising the rules of Cribbage, we thoroughly recommend Cribbage With Grandpas, which is better than a phone game about Cribbage has any right to be.
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Ava: Quinns, Quinns, there’s a news emergency! The news pumps are overflowing.
Quinns: Don’t worry, Ava! That’s what they’re supposed to do.
Ava: But no, Quinns, you don’t understand, my cynicism valve has got wedged to ‘can only be excited about cats, Queen and civil disobedience’.
Quinns: Oh dear.
Ava: I’m even a bit surly about the moon!
Quinns: Well, that’s no good. Let me see what you’ve written, then you can report to Decontamination Chamber B for De-Grumping.
If you’re in the mood for some Fantasy adventure, Too Many Bones is big, beautiful and… waterproof?
But don’t let a little plastic scare you away! Not since Matt’s Gloomhaven review have we been so enamoured of a co-op game of monster-thwomping. This game is brave, bizarre, and absolutely worth your attention.
Have a great weekend, everybody!
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Having just arrived back from Belgium’s fantastic Zomerspel tabletop convention, Matt and Quinns were inspired by Belgian chips to create this episode of our award-winning podcast. It’s long, crunchy, filling and if you eat nothing except this podcast then you will probably die? Games discussed in this episode include the fascinating Taverns of Tiefan Thal (01:51), the taut little Feld game Carpe Diem (13:48), the simple-yet-delightful Luxor (26:47), the gross-yet-charming Silk (33:13) and the simply superb Rail Pass (49:37). Matt and Quinns also discuss some of the video reviews they’ve been working on, including Pipeline (1:00:58) and Too Many Bones (1:06:54). Enjoy, everybody!
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Ava: It was a busy weekend for ‘sports’ or as I like to call them ‘meat-games’, but that doesn’t mean the news wheel has stopped turning. Games gonna game and news is gonna news.
Quinns: Oh, you watched the Cricket World Cup final?
Ava: And something called ‘wombledown’ happened? I was drowning in crickets yesterday and it was a treat for rules-lawyers and fans of obscure tiebreakers everywhere.
Quinns: Ever on-brand, I was too busy playing board games this weekend to watch “sports”! I got to introduce four entire people to El Grande. I understand that the winner of Wimbledon was Woody Harrelson?
Ava: Sounds believable to me. Having had to research ‘Woody Harrelson’s face’ for the Monikers box, I doubt I’ll ever be able to escape his sturdy, well-cleft visage. Truly his countenance is a caballero hidden in the castillo of our hearts.
Welcome, everybody, to the excessively digressive games news.
Today we’re very proud to present our review of Capstone Games’ Pipeline. A game of pipes, lines, and… erm… the stuff that goes inside of pipes?
You mustn’t let Pipeline’s lack of theme bother you. Where we’re going we don’t need theme. Playing Pipeline, you’re going to feel the rush of seed money, the thrill of turning a profit, the rollercoaster of handling each new round at greater and greater speeds. In fact, this could be the year’s single best economic board game.
Have a great weekend, everybody!
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Quinns: If you own the party game Monikers, then this is an emergency! There are just 24 hours left to back our Serious Nonsense Box on Kickstarter. Packing a whopping 330 new cards, all of them hewn from tiny fragments of our funny bones, it’s a massive expansion and we’re tremendously proud of it.
But guess what? If you don’t own Monikers, the good news is that the Serious Nonsense Box is a completely standalone game. The bad news is, that makes this an emergency for you as well.
There’s no time to waste! Well, actually, there are about 22 hours to waste. But absolutely no more than that.
Thanks so much, everybody.
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Kylie: Wolfgang Warsch’ gorgeous new game, Fuji, pits players as mismatched adventurers who find themselves on top of Japan’s most famous volcano. But it was poor planning on the part of the travel agent, because right as you reach the top, Mount Fuji begins to erupt. You and your companions will have to race against the flow of lava, back to the safety of the village.
Did I mention that this is a co-operative game? Together, players will either scramble to safety, or burn to a crisp.