Board game lovers, this one's for you! The holidays are the perfect time to gather around the table with family and friends for an epic game night. But with so many great options out there, it might be tough to pick your next game.
That's why we turned to the experts at BoardGameGeek to curate Holiday Gift Guide. They ranked the top games across all genres and player counts, from quick-playing party casuals to deep strategic mind-benders and immersive storytelling campaigns.
Whether you're looking for laugh-out-loud fun or a brain-burning challenge that will keep you playing long into the night, we've got outstanding picks for every type of gamer on your list. Pick a new favorite and create lasting memories with loved ones this season!
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Exit: The Game – Advent Calendar: The Silent Storm is an EXIT game and a 24-part adventure story in one. To unravel the mystery of the Silent Storm, you must open a little calendar door every day. Behind each, you will find a new exciting puzzle, the solution of which will help you to move onto the next room. Only if you follow the clues and solve all 24 puzzles will you find the thief and the book...and save Christmas.
Level: Beginner
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Time is running out! It's up to Indiana Jones and his friends to rescue the Ark of the Covenant before it falls into the wrong hands! Scour ancient Tanis to find the elusive relic, while building up your strength and resources — but if the sand timer suddenly swings over, it triggers a race to survive! Battle the scheming Colonel Dietrich, the dangerous Major Toht, and the ruthless Dr. René Belloq to save the Ark.
In Indiana Jones: Sands of Adventure, a game of co-operative strategy and quick card playing, players work together to defeat different villains before the timer runs out by moving characters, playing cards, upgrading tiles, and attacking enemies.
-description from publisher
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Cascadia is a puzzly tile-laying and token-drafting game featuring the habitats and wildlife of the Pacific Northwest.
In the game, you take turns building out your own terrain area and populating it with wildlife. You start with three hexagonal habitat tiles (with the five types of habitat in the game), and on a turn you choose a new habitat tile that's paired with a wildlife token, then place that tile next to your other ones and place the wildlife token on an appropriate habitat. (Each tile depicts 1-3 types of wildlife from the five types in the game, and you can place at most one tile on a habitat.) Four tiles are on display, with each tile being paired at random with a wildlife token, so you must make the best of what's available — unless you have a nature token to spend so that you can pick your choice of each item.
Ideally you can place habitat tiles to create matching terrain that reduces fragmentation and creates wildlife corridors, mostly because you score for the largest area of each type of habitat at game's end, with a bonus if your group is larger than each other player's. At the same time, you want to place wildlife tokens so that you can maximize the number of points scored by them, with the wildlife goals being determined at random by one of the four scoring cards for each type of wildlife. Maybe hawks want to be separate from other hawks, while foxes want lots of different animals surrounding them and bears want to be in pairs. Can you make it happen?
PARKS is a celebration of the US National Parks featuring illustrious art from Fifty-Nine Parks.
In PARKS, players will take on the role of two hikers as they trek through different trails across four seasons of the year. While on the trail, these hikers will take actions and collect memories of the places your hikers visit. These memories are represented by various resource tokens like mountains and forests. Collecting these memories in sets will allow players to trade them in to visit a National Park at the end of each hike.
Each trail represents one season of the year, and each season, the trails will change and grow steadily longer. The trails, represented by tiles, get shuffled in between each season and laid out anew for the next round. Resources can be tough to come by especially when someone is at the place you’re trying to reach! Campfires allow you to share a space and time with other hikers. Canteens and Gear can also be used to improve your access to resources through the game. It’ll be tough to manage building up your engine versus spending resources on parks, but we bet you’re up to the challenge. Welcome to PARKS!
—description from the publisher
PARKS is a celebration of the US National Parks featuring illustrious art from Fifty-Nine Parks.
In PARKS, players will take on the role of two hikers as they trek through different trails across four seasons of the year. While on the trail, these hikers will take actions and collect memories of the places your hikers visit. These memories are represented by various resource tokens like mountains and forests. Collecting these memories in sets will allow players to trade them in to visit a National Park at the end of each hike.
Each trail represents one season of the year, and each season, the trails will change and grow steadily longer. The trails, represented by tiles, get shuffled in between each season and laid out anew for the next round. Resources can be tough to come by especially when someone is at the place you’re trying to reach! Campfires allow you to share a space and time with other hikers. Canteens and Gear can also be used to improve your access to resources through the game. It’ll be tough to manage building up your engine versus spending resources on parks, but we bet you’re up to the challenge. Welcome to PARKS!
—description from the publisher
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We designed Trekking through History for gamers and non-gamers to play together. The goal was to make a game inviting for non-gamers, but with a little subtlety under the hood for gamers.
In the game, you go on a three-day tour of human history, traveling thousands of years in a time machine to experience great moments from our past.
The game takes place over three rounds, each representing one day of your trip. Each day, you visit a series of historical events, spending a different number of hours at each.
On each turn, you choose to visit one historical event, and spend a certain number of hours doing it. Doing so will yield benefits, like checking off items on your itinerary for points, and earning Time Crystals so you can bend the space-time continuum on future turns.
Along the way, you’ll also score points for visiting historical events in chronological order.
The player with the most points after three rounds wins.
—description from the publisher
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In Ark Nova, you will plan and design a modern, scientifically managed zoo. With the ultimate goal of owning the most successful zoological establishment, you will build enclosures, accommodate animals, and support conservation projects all over the world. Specialists and unique buildings will help you in achieving this goal.
Each player has a set of five action cards to manage their gameplay, and the power of an action is determined by the slot the card currently occupies. The cards in question are:
CARDS: Allows you to gain new zoo cards (animals, sponsors, and conservation project cards).
BUILD: Allows you to build standard or special enclosures, kiosks, and pavilions.
ANIMALS: Allows you to accommodate animals in your zoo.
ASSOCIATION: Allows your association workers to carry out different tasks.
SPONSORS: Allows you to play a sponsor card in your zoo or to raise money.
255 cards featuring animals, specialists, special enclosures, and conservation projects, each with a special ability, are at the heart of Ark Nova. Use them to increase the appeal and scientific reputation of your zoo and collect conservation points.
—description from the publisher
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Carnegie was inspired by the life of Andrew Carnegie who was born in Scotland in 1835. Andrew Carnegie and his parents emigrated to the United States in 1848. Although he started his career as a telegraphist, his role as one of the major players in the rise of the United States’ steel industry made him one of the richest men in the world and an icon of the American dream.
Andrew Carnegie was also a benefactor and philanthropist; upon his death in 1919, more than $350 million of his wealth was bequeathed to various foundations, with another $30 million going to various charities. His endowments created nearly 2,500 free public libraries that bear his name: the Carnegie Libraries.
During the game you will recruit and manage employees, expand your business, invest in real estate, produce and sell goods, and create transport chains across the United States; you may even work with important personalities of the era. Perhaps you will even become an illustrious benefactor who contributes to the greatness of his country through deeds and generosity!
The game takes place over 20 rounds; players will each have one turn per round. On each turn, the active player will choose one of four actions, which the other players may follow.
The goal of the game is to build the most prestigious company, as symbolized by victory points.
—description from publisher
Carnegie was inspired by the life of Andrew Carnegie who was born in Scotland in 1835. Andrew Carnegie and his parents emigrated to the United States in 1848. Although he started his career as a telegraphist, his role as one of the major players in the rise of the United States’ steel industry made him one of the richest men in the world and an icon of the American dream.
Andrew Carnegie was also a benefactor and philanthropist; upon his death in 1919, more than $350 million of his wealth was bequeathed to various foundations, with another $30 million going to various charities. His endowments created nearly 2,500 free public libraries that bear his name: the Carnegie Libraries.
During the game you will recruit and manage employees, expand your business, invest in real estate, produce and sell goods, and create transport chains across the United States; you may even work with important personalities of the era. Perhaps you will even become an illustrious benefactor who contributes to the greatness of his country through deeds and generosity!
The game takes place over 20 rounds; players will each have one turn per round. On each turn, the active player will choose one of four actions, which the other players may follow.
The goal of the game is to build the most prestigious company, as symbolized by victory points.
—description from publisher
Travel back in time to the greatest city in Mesoamerica. Witness the glory and the twilight of the powerful pre-Columbian civilization. Strategize, accrue wealth, gain the favour of the gods, and become the builder of the magnificent Pyramid of the Sun.
In Teotihuacan: City of Gods, each player commands a force of worker dice, which grow in strength with every move. On your turn, you move a worker around a modular board, always choosing one of two areas of the location tile you land on: one offering you an action (and a worker upgrade), the other providing you with a powerful bonus (but without an upgrade).
While managing their workforce and resources, players develop new technologies, climb the steps of the three great temples, build houses for the inhabitants of the city, and raise the legendary and breath-taking Pyramid of the Sun in the center of the city.
Each game is played in three eras. As the dawn of the Aztecs comes closer, player efforts (and their ability to feed their workforce) are evaluated a total of three times. The player with the most fame is the winner.
Gear up for a thrilling adventure to recover a legendary flying machine buried deep in the ruins of an ancient desert city. You'll need to coordinate with your teammates and use every available resource if you hope to survive the scorching heat and relentless sandstorm. Find the flying machine and escape before you all become permanent artifacts of the forbidden desert!
In Forbidden Desert, a thematic sequel to Forbidden Island, players take on the roles of brave adventurers who must throw caution to the wind and survive both blistering heat and blustering sand in order to recover a legendary flying machine buried under an ancient desert city. While featuring co-operative gameplay similar to Forbidden Island, Forbidden Desert is a fresh, new game based around an innovative set of mechanisms such as an ever-shifting board, individual resource management, and a unique method for locating the flying machine parts.
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Ticket to Ride: First Journey takes the gameplay of the Ticket to Ride series and scales it down for a younger audience.
In general, players collect train cards, claim routes on the map, and try to connect the cities shown on their tickets. In more detail, the game board shows a map of the United States with certain cities being connected by colored paths. Each player starts with four colored train cards in hand and two tickets; each ticket shows two cities, and you're trying to connect those two cities with a contiguous path of your trains in order to complete the ticket.
On a turn, you either draw two train cards from the deck or discard train cards to claim a route between two cities; for this latter option, you must discard cards matching the color and number of spaces on that route (e.g., two yellow cards for a yellow route that's two spaces long). If you connect the two cities shown on a ticket with a path of your trains, reveal the ticket, place it face up in front of you, then draw a new ticket. (If you can't connect cities on either ticket because the paths are blocked, you can take your entire turn to discard those tickets and draw two new ones.)
If you connect one of the West Coast cities to one of the East Coast cities with a path of your trains, you immediately claim a Coast-to-Coast ticket.
The first player to complete six tickets wins! Alternatively, if someone has placed all twenty of their trains on the game board, then whoever has completed the most tickets wins!
Part of Ticket to Ride series.
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In Marvel Dice Throne, you become one of eight of Marvel's most famous heroes, including Black Panther, Captain Marvel, Black Widow, Scarlet Witch, Loki, Thor, Doctor Strange, and Miles Morales Spider-man! Every Marvel Dice Throne hero was painstakingly designed and balanced to provide the most thematic experience possible, allowing you to truly embody your favorite heroes like no other game. Featuring all-new mechanisms and asymmetrical designs, these are our most innovative and exciting heroes yet.
Marvel Dice Throne is a heart-pumping, fast-playing game of skilled card play and dice manipulation supporting multiple modes of play, including 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 2v2v2, or free-for-all.
Attack your opponents and activate abilities by rolling your hero's unique set of five dice. Accumulate combat points and spend them on cards that have a large range of effects, such as granting permanent hero upgrades, applying status effects, and manipulating dice directly (yours, your teammate's, or even your opponent's).
All 8 heroes are compatible with the entire Dice Throne ecosystem
Use upgrade cards to improve your hero abilities as the game progresses
Play action cards strategically to manipulate dice and surprise your foe
Features a deluxe, highly functional, Battle Chest storage system
Each hero in the Battle Chest has their own beautiful set of custom swirl dice
—description from the publisher
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My City is a competitive legacy game in which you develop a city on your own playing board through the ages.
The game consists of 24 episodes, beginning with the development of a city in its early preindustrial stages and progressing through industrialization. During each game, players customize their experience by adding elements to their personal boards and adding cards to the game. Players' choices and action made during one session of gameplay carry over into the next session, creating a personalized gaming experience.
For players who do not want to experience My City as a legacy game, a double-sided game board offers an alternate set-up for repeatable play (some elements from the legacy experience are needed for the repeatable play game, players can unlock these elements by playing through the first 4 episodes).
My City is a competitive legacy game in which you develop a city on your own playing board through the ages.
The game consists of 24 episodes, beginning with the development of a city in its early preindustrial stages and progressing through industrialization. During each game, players customize their experience by adding elements to their personal boards and adding cards to the game. Players' choices and action made during one session of gameplay carry over into the next session, creating a personalized gaming experience.
For players who do not want to experience My City as a legacy game, a double-sided game board offers an alternate set-up for repeatable play (some elements from the legacy experience are needed for the repeatable play game, players can unlock these elements by playing through the first 4 episodes).
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Terraforming Mars: The Dice Game is a card-driven dice game in which players use special dice to develop their corporations and terraform Mars into a new home for humanity. The dice represent resources that players spend to play cards and perform other actions. During the game, you increase your production of dice, terraform, place cities and greenery tiles on the board, and gain various bonuses. Each turn, you either produce new dice (Production Turn) or perform actions (Action Turn).
Whenever you terraform Mars (raise oxygen or temperature, or place an ocean tile), you gain 2 Victory Points (VP). You can also gain VP for placing tiles and playing cards, as well as winning Awards and Milestones.
The game ends when two of the three global parameters — oxygen/temperature/ocean — have been completed. The player with most VP wins.
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Introduced by the Moors, azulejos (originally white and blue ceramic tiles) were fully embraced by the Portuguese when their king Manuel I, on a visit to the Alhambra palace in Southern Spain, was mesmerized by the stunning beauty of the Moorish decorative tiles. The king, awestruck by the interior beauty of the Alhambra, immediately ordered that his own palace in Portugal be decorated with similar wall tiles. As a tile-laying artist, you have been challenged to embellish the walls of the Royal Palace of Evora.
In the game Azul, players take turns drafting colored tiles from suppliers to their player board. Later in the round, players score points based on how they've placed their tiles to decorate the palace. Extra points are scored for specific patterns and completing sets; wasted supplies harm the player's score. The player with the most points at the end of the game wins.
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In CATAN (formerly The Settlers of Catan), players try to be the dominant force on the island of Catan by building settlements, cities and roads. On each turn dice are rolled to determine which resources the island produces. Players build structures by 'spending' resources (sheep, wheat, wood, brick and ore) which are represented by the relevant resource cards; each land type, with the exception of the unproductive desert, produces a specific resource: hills produce brick, forests produce wood, mountains produce ore, fields produce wheat, and pastures produce sheep.
Set-up includes randomly placing large hexagonal tiles (each depicting one of the five resource-producing terrain types--or the desert) in a honeycomb shape and surrounding them with water tiles, some of which contain ports of exchange. A number disk, the value of which will correspond to the roll of two 6-sided dice, are placed on each terrain tile. Each player is given two settlements (think: houses) and roads (sticks) which are placed on intersections and borders of the terrain tiles. Players collect a hand of resource cards based on which terrain tiles their last-placed settlement is adjacent to. A robber pawn is placed on the desert tile.
A turn consists of rolling the dice, collecting resource cards based on this dice roll and the position of settlements (or upgraded cities—think: hotels), turning in resource cards (if possible and desired) for improvements, trading cards at a port, possibly playing a development card, or trading resource cards with other players. If the dice roll is a 7, the active player moves the robber to a new terrain tile and steals a resource card from another player who has a settlement adjacent to that tile.
Points are accumulated by building settlements and cities, having the longest road or the largest army (from some of the development cards), and gathering certain development cards that simply award victory points. When a player has gathered 10 points (some of which may be held in secret), s/he announces this and claims the win.
In CATAN (formerly The Settlers of Catan), players try to be the dominant force on the island of Catan by building settlements, cities and roads. On each turn dice are rolled to determine which resources the island produces. Players build structures by 'spending' resources (sheep, wheat, wood, brick and ore) which are represented by the relevant resource cards; each land type, with the exception of the unproductive desert, produces a specific resource: hills produce brick, forests produce wood, mountains produce ore, fields produce wheat, and pastures produce sheep.
Set-up includes randomly placing large hexagonal tiles (each depicting one of the five resource-producing terrain types--or the desert) in a honeycomb shape and surrounding them with water tiles, some of which contain ports of exchange. A number disk, the value of which will correspond to the roll of two 6-sided dice, are placed on each terrain tile. Each player is given two settlements (think: houses) and roads (sticks) which are placed on intersections and borders of the terrain tiles. Players collect a hand of resource cards based on which terrain tiles their last-placed settlement is adjacent to. A robber pawn is placed on the desert tile.
A turn consists of rolling the dice, collecting resource cards based on this dice roll and the position of settlements (or upgraded cities—think: hotels), turning in resource cards (if possible and desired) for improvements, trading cards at a port, possibly playing a development card, or trading resource cards with other players. If the dice roll is a 7, the active player moves the robber to a new terrain tile and steals a resource card from another player who has a settlement adjacent to that tile.
Points are accumulated by building settlements and cities, having the longest road or the largest army (from some of the development cards), and gathering certain development cards that simply award victory points. When a player has gathered 10 points (some of which may be held in secret), s/he announces this and claims the win.
Draft dice and use the tools-of-the-trade in Sagrada to carefully construct your stained glass window masterpiece.
In more detail, each player builds a stained glass window by building up a grid of dice on their player board. Each board has some restrictions on which color or shade (value) of die can be placed there. Dice of the same shade or color may never be placed next to each other. Dice are drafted in player order, with the start player rotating each round, snaking back around after the last player drafts two dice. Scoring is variable per game based on achieving various patterns and varieties of placement...as well as bonus points for dark shades of a particular hidden goal color.
Special tools can be used to help you break the rules by spending skill tokens; once a tool is used, it then requires more skill tokens for the other players to use them.
The highest scoring window artisan wins!
Each round in Blank Slate, pick one of the 250+ word cue cards (which have 500+ total cues) and reveal it. Each player then writes the word they think best completes the phrase, trying to exactly match another player's word without giving a single hint.
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Two rival spymasters know the secret identities of 25 agents. Their teammates know the agents only by their codenames — single-word labels like "disease", "Germany", and "carrot". Yes, carrot. It's a legitimate codename. Each spymaster wants their team to identify their agents first...without uncovering the assassin by mistake.
In Codenames, two teams compete to see who can make contact with all of their agents first. Lay out 25 cards, each bearing a single word. The spymasters look at a card showing the identity of each card, then take turns clueing their teammates. A clue consists of a single word and a number, with the number suggesting how many cards in play have some association to the given clue word. The teammates then identify one agent they think is on their team; if they're correct, they can keep guessing up to the stated number of times; if the agent belongs to the opposing team or is an innocent bystander, the team's turn ends; and if they fingered the assassin, they lose the game.
Spymasters continue giving clues until one team has identified all of their agents or the assassin has removed one team from play.
Two rival spymasters know the secret identities of 25 agents. Their teammates know the agents only by their codenames — single-word labels like "disease", "Germany", and "carrot". Yes, carrot. It's a legitimate codename. Each spymaster wants their team to identify their agents first...without uncovering the assassin by mistake.
In Codenames, two teams compete to see who can make contact with all of their agents first. Lay out 25 cards, each bearing a single word. The spymasters look at a card showing the identity of each card, then take turns clueing their teammates. A clue consists of a single word and a number, with the number suggesting how many cards in play have some association to the given clue word. The teammates then identify one agent they think is on their team; if they're correct, they can keep guessing up to the stated number of times; if the agent belongs to the opposing team or is an innocent bystander, the team's turn ends; and if they fingered the assassin, they lose the game.
Spymasters continue giving clues until one team has identified all of their agents or the assassin has removed one team from play.
No moderator, no elimination, ten-minute games.
One Night Ultimate Werewolf is a fast game for 3-10 players in which everyone gets a role: One of the dastardly Werewolves, the tricky Troublemaker, the helpful Seer, or one of a dozen different characters, each with a special ability. In the course of a single morning, your village will decide who is a werewolf...because all it takes is lynching one werewolf to win!
Because One Night Ultimate Werewolf is so fast, fun, and engaging, you'll want to play it again and again, and no two games are ever the same.
This game can be combined with One Night Ultimate Werewolf: Daybreak.
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The boundaries between worlds have drawn perilously thin. Dark forces work in the shadows and call upon unspeakable horrors, strange happenings are discovered all throughout the city of Arkham, Massachusetts, and behind it all an Ancient One manipulates everything from beyond the veil. It is time to revisit that which started it all…
In this game, you, on your own or with a friend (or up to three friends in this revised version), become characters within the quiet New England town of Arkham and work to investigate the recent strange happenings and solve the mysteries. You have your talents, sure, but you also have your flaws. Perhaps you've dabbled a little too much in the writings of the Necronomicon, and its words continue to haunt you. Perhaps you feel compelled to cover up any signs of otherworldly evils, hampering your own investigations in order to protect the quiet confidence of the greater population. Perhaps you'll be scarred by your encounters with a ghoulish cult.
With a revamped system of organization and a number of quality-of-life improvements, the box comes with everything you need to get your Arkham campaigns started, including enough cards and components for up to three other players to join you in your quest against the Mythos.
What Has Changed?
Support for up to four players with a single core set (the original core set supported only two players, meaning players needed two core sets to play with three or four players)
Two copies each of all 96 player cards from the original core set (the original core set included only one copy each of most of the player cards), some with brand-new art, along with two copies each of 13 additional player cards previously released in expansions and not found in the original core set
An included cloth Chaos Bag for the chaos tokens (not included in the original core set)
New organization within the box's packaging, making it much easier to find the cards for the player decks and for each scenario than before
Additional quality-of-life improvements, such as new "3" and "5" numbered resource and clue/doom tokens and even a lead investigator token
Revised "Learn to Play" rulebook to allow new players to jump into the game more easily
This revised edition is 100% compatible with all material previously published. Players who have all of the content released before this revised starter set will not find any new cards; this set contains the same cards, just more copies of them (and some with new art). "Old-timers" can continue where they left off under the new two-boxes campaign format (replacing the old "deluxe expansion + mythos packs" format) starting with Edge of the Earth.
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Queen Gimnax has ordered the reclamation of the northern lands. As a cartographer in her service, you are sent to map this territory, claiming it for the Kingdom of Nalos. Through official edicts, the queen announces which lands she prizes most, and you will increase your reputation by meeting her demands. But you are not alone in this wilderness. The Dragul contest your claims with their outposts, so you must draw your lines carefully to reduce their influence. Reclaim the greatest share of the queen’s desired lands and you will be declared the greatest cartographer in the kingdom.
In Cartographers: A Roll Player Tale, players compete to earn the most reputation stars by the time four seasons have passed. Each season, players draw on their map sheets and earn reputation by carrying out the queen's edicts before the season is over. The player with the most reputation stars at the end of winter wins!
—description from the publisher
Queen Gimnax has ordered the reclamation of the northern lands. As a cartographer in her service, you are sent to map this territory, claiming it for the Kingdom of Nalos. Through official edicts, the queen announces which lands she prizes most, and you will increase your reputation by meeting her demands. But you are not alone in this wilderness. The Dragul contest your claims with their outposts, so you must draw your lines carefully to reduce their influence. Reclaim the greatest share of the queen’s desired lands and you will be declared the greatest cartographer in the kingdom.
In Cartographers: A Roll Player Tale, players compete to earn the most reputation stars by the time four seasons have passed. Each season, players draw on their map sheets and earn reputation by carrying out the queen's edicts before the season is over. The player with the most reputation stars at the end of winter wins!
—description from the publisher
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"With great power, there must also come great responsibility."
–Stan Lee, Amazing Fantasy #15
Iron Man and Black Panther team up to stop Rhino from rampaging through the streets of New York. Captain Marvel and Spider-Man battle Ultron as he threatens global annihilation. Do you have what it takes to join the ranks of these legendary heroes and become a champion?
Jump into the Marvel Universe with Marvel Champions: The Card Game, a cooperative Living Card Game for one to four players!
Marvel Champions: The Card Game invites players to embody iconic heroes from the Marvel Universe as they battle to stop infamous villains from enacting their devious schemes. As a Living Card Game, Marvel Champions is supported with regular releases of new product, including new heroes and scenarios.
—description from the publisher
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You are a team of newbie astronauts sent on an actual mission in an actual spaceship in actual outer space! Exciting, right? It would be...if any of you actually knew what you were doing. Would have been nice to have at least one experienced pilot on board, but now that you're here, you'll just have to figure it out as you go along.
In Noobs in Space, a team of three to five players must complete a series of tasks and challenges together, using what little knowledge you have. Not all hope is lost because each of you has a small part of the solution; you just need to figure out how to put it all together. While one player may know the task at hand but not have the resources to implement it, those resources may be shared among three other players. They, on the other hand, do not know what is necessary based on the information they have. Since players cannot show cards to each other, there must be a lot of clear communication and interaction by describing or reading out cards in order to gradually find out what should be done — and all of this must be done as quickly as possible.
The story leads through several levels, and each level consists of several tasks, so the whole game is an action-packed event from beginning to end.
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Ohanami consists of a deck of 120 cards that are numbered from 1-120, with each card having one of four symbols on it. The game lasts three rounds, with players scoring at the end of each round, in addition to bonus scoring at the end of the game.
At the start of a round, each player receives a hand of ten cards. Each player chooses two cards, then passes the remaining cards to the left. All players reveal their cards at the same time, then decide whether to use 0, 1, or 2 of them in personal rows of cards. When you start a row, you can use any card; to add a card to an existing row, that card must be higher than the row's highest card or lower than the lowest one. A player can have at most three rows of cards. Discard any cards you don't use.
Players repeat this drafting, passing, and playing process until they have played ten cards. The first round ends, and players now receive 3 points for each blue card in their rows.
Players then receive a new hand of ten cards to start round 2, once again choosing two cards and passing the rest, but now to the right. Players continue building on the rows that they already have, scoring 3 points for each blue card and 4 points for each green card at the end of round two.
For round three, players have ten more cards and pass cards to the left once again. At the end of this round, players once again score for their blue and green cards, while also receiving 7 points for each gray card in their rows. Additionally, each player scores for their pink cherry blossom cards, with these cards having a pyramidal scoring structure: one card = 1 point, two cards = 3, three cards = 6, etc. Whoever has the highest total score wins!
Ohanami consists of a deck of 120 cards that are numbered from 1-120, with each card having one of four symbols on it. The game lasts three rounds, with players scoring at the end of each round, in addition to bonus scoring at the end of the game.
At the start of a round, each player receives a hand of ten cards. Each player chooses two cards, then passes the remaining cards to the left. All players reveal their cards at the same time, then decide whether to use 0, 1, or 2 of them in personal rows of cards. When you start a row, you can use any card; to add a card to an existing row, that card must be higher than the row's highest card or lower than the lowest one. A player can have at most three rows of cards. Discard any cards you don't use.
Players repeat this drafting, passing, and playing process until they have played ten cards. The first round ends, and players now receive 3 points for each blue card in their rows.
Players then receive a new hand of ten cards to start round 2, once again choosing two cards and passing the rest, but now to the right. Players continue building on the rows that they already have, scoring 3 points for each blue card and 4 points for each green card at the end of round two.
For round three, players have ten more cards and pass cards to the left once again. At the end of this round, players once again score for their blue and green cards, while also receiving 7 points for each gray card in their rows. Additionally, each player scores for their pink cherry blossom cards, with these cards having a pyramidal scoring structure: one card = 1 point, two cards = 3, three cards = 6, etc. Whoever has the highest total score wins!
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Romi Rami is a game that feels like it’s been around forever, with thousands of people quietly and gradually polishing it over time. Falling squarely in the family of ‘Rummy’ games, Romi Rami features a double market. The first one has number cards, and the second one has contracts to complete.
The goal of the game: Make the most points by optimizing the combinations required by the contracts. Keep an eye on the trophies (they change from game to game) which will propel you to to the top spot on the podium!
Romi Rami is a game that feels like it’s been around forever, with thousands of people quietly and gradually polishing it over time. Falling squarely in the family of ‘Rummy’ games, Romi Rami features a double market. The first one has number cards, and the second one has contracts to complete.
The goal of the game: Make the most points by optimizing the combinations required by the contracts. Keep an eye on the trophies (they change from game to game) which will propel you to to the top spot on the podium!
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During your turn, you assemble your hand, maybe place cards for their effect, and decide if you want to end the round. But do you think you are the one with the most points in hand?
You will have to choose: stop the round immediately or give the others an extra turn to try to extend the gap? Is it worth taking the risk?
The game ends when you reach 30/35/40 points (4/3/2 players).
The excitement of ending the round to catch your opponents off guard
The pleasure of playing your effect cards and making combos
It's a set collection card game like Rummy. The origami created especially for the game is just the illustrations on the cards.
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Sky Team is a co-operative game, exclusively for two players, in which you play a pilot and co-pilot at the controls of an airliner. Your goal is to work together as a team to land your airplane in different airports around the world.
To land your plane, you need to silently assign your dice to the correct spaces in your cockpit to balance the axis of your plane, control its speed, deploy the flaps, extend the landing gear, contact the control tower to clear your path, and even have a little coffee to improve your concentration enough to change the value of your dice.
If the aircraft tilts too much and stalls, overshoots the airport, or collides with another aircraft, you lose the game...and your pilot's license...and probably your life.
From Montreal to Tokyo, each airport offers its own set of challenges. Watch out for the turbulence as this could end up being bumpy ride!
AWARDS & HONORS
2024 - Nederlandse Spellenprijs 2024 Winner
2024 - Deutscher Spiele Preis 2024 - 2nd place
2024 - BG Stats - Most popular game
2024 - Gra roku (Game of the year Poland) - 2 player category winner
2024 - International Gamers Awards - 2 player category winner
2023 - Swams des Jahres winner
2024 - Dice Tower Awards - Best 2 player game
2024 - Dice Tower Awards - Best cooperative game
2024 - Dice Tower Awards - Most innovative game
2024 - Spiel des Jahres Winner
2024 - Best Light Game - BBQ Awards
2024 - Best Cooperative Board Game - Origins Awards
2024 - Best 2023 Insider Game - Les Lys (Québec)
2024 - Game of the Year - Spiel des Jahres 2024 (Germany)
2024 - Best 2-Player & Innovation Gameplay - Big Awards 2024
2024 - Best 2-Player & Cooperative Game - Golden Geek Awards 2023
Runner up for Best Innovative & Thematic Game - Golden Geek Awards 2023
2023 - Best Cooperative Game - Board Game Quest
2023 - Best 2-Player Game - Board Game Arena Awards
2023 - Best 2-Player Game - Squirrelly Awards
2023 - Best Board Game - Dicebreaker Tabletop Awards
2023 - Two Player Board Game Winner - Game Boy Geek
2023 - Best Co-Op Game - Gaming Trend
2023 - Seal of Excellence - Dice Tower
—description from the publisher
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This third expansion to Wingspan brings new species to our habitats by exploring the vibrant, intriguing, and magnificent birds of Asia. These birds were chosen from the over 2,800 species that live in Asia.
Wingspan Asia is several different things: a standalone game for 1-2 players (and the "duet" mode that can be used with any bird/bonus cards), a card expansion to the original Wingspan, and a 6-7 player expansion via the new "flock" mode (for which the player components from the core game are necessary).
—description from the publisher
Board game lovers, this one's for you! The holidays are the perfect time to gather around the table with family and friends for an epic game night. But with so many great options out there, it might be tough to pick your next game.
That's why we turned to the experts at BoardGameGeek to curate Holiday Gift Guide. They ranked the top games across all genres and player counts, from quick-playing party casuals to deep strategic mind-benders and immersive storytelling campaigns.
Whether you're looking for laugh-out-loud fun or a brain-burning challenge that will keep you playing long into the night, we've got outstanding picks for every type of gamer on your list. Pick a new favorite and create lasting memories with loved ones this season!
Exit: The Game – Advent Calendar: The Silent Storm is an EXIT game and a 24-part adventure story in one. To unravel the mystery of the Silent Storm, you must open a little calendar door every day. Behind each, you will find a new exciting puzzle, the solution of which will help you to move onto the next room. Only if you follow the clues and solve all 24 puzzles will you find the thief and the book...and save Christmas.
Level: Beginner
Time is running out! It's up to Indiana Jones and his friends to rescue the Ark of the Covenant before it falls into the wrong hands! Scour ancient Tanis to find the elusive relic, while building up your strength and resources — but if the sand timer suddenly swings over, it triggers a race to survive! Battle the scheming Colonel Dietrich, the dangerous Major Toht, and the ruthless Dr. René Belloq to save the Ark.
In Indiana Jones: Sands of Adventure, a game of co-operative strategy and quick card playing, players work together to defeat different villains before the timer runs out by moving characters, playing cards, upgrading tiles, and attacking enemies.
-description from publisher
Cascadia is a puzzly tile-laying and token-drafting game featuring the habitats and wildlife of the Pacific Northwest.
In the game, you take turns building out your own terrain area and populating it with wildlife. You start with three hexagonal habitat tiles (with the five types of habitat in the game), and on a turn you choose a new habitat tile that's paired with a wildlife token, then place that tile next to your other ones and place the wildlife token on an appropriate habitat. (Each tile depicts 1-3 types of wildlife from the five types in the game, and you can place at most one tile on a habitat.) Four tiles are on display, with each tile being paired at random with a wildlife token, so you must make the best of what's available — unless you have a nature token to spend so that you can pick your choice of each item.
Ideally you can place habitat tiles to create matching terrain that reduces fragmentation and creates wildlife corridors, mostly because you score for the largest area of each type of habitat at game's end, with a bonus if your group is larger than each other player's. At the same time, you want to place wildlife tokens so that you can maximize the number of points scored by them, with the wildlife goals being determined at random by one of the four scoring cards for each type of wildlife. Maybe hawks want to be separate from other hawks, while foxes want lots of different animals surrounding them and bears want to be in pairs. Can you make it happen?
PARKS is a celebration of the US National Parks featuring illustrious art from Fifty-Nine Parks.
In PARKS, players will take on the role of two hikers as they trek through different trails across four seasons of the year. While on the trail, these hikers will take actions and collect memories of the places your hikers visit. These memories are represented by various resource tokens like mountains and forests. Collecting these memories in sets will allow players to trade them in to visit a National Park at the end of each hike.
Each trail represents one season of the year, and each season, the trails will change and grow steadily longer. The trails, represented by tiles, get shuffled in between each season and laid out anew for the next round. Resources can be tough to come by especially when someone is at the place you’re trying to reach! Campfires allow you to share a space and time with other hikers. Canteens and Gear can also be used to improve your access to resources through the game. It’ll be tough to manage building up your engine versus spending resources on parks, but we bet you’re up to the challenge. Welcome to PARKS!
—description from the publisher
We designed Trekking through History for gamers and non-gamers to play together. The goal was to make a game inviting for non-gamers, but with a little subtlety under the hood for gamers.
In the game, you go on a three-day tour of human history, traveling thousands of years in a time machine to experience great moments from our past.
The game takes place over three rounds, each representing one day of your trip. Each day, you visit a series of historical events, spending a different number of hours at each.
On each turn, you choose to visit one historical event, and spend a certain number of hours doing it. Doing so will yield benefits, like checking off items on your itinerary for points, and earning Time Crystals so you can bend the space-time continuum on future turns.
Along the way, you’ll also score points for visiting historical events in chronological order.
The player with the most points after three rounds wins.
—description from the publisher
In Ark Nova, you will plan and design a modern, scientifically managed zoo. With the ultimate goal of owning the most successful zoological establishment, you will build enclosures, accommodate animals, and support conservation projects all over the world. Specialists and unique buildings will help you in achieving this goal.
Each player has a set of five action cards to manage their gameplay, and the power of an action is determined by the slot the card currently occupies. The cards in question are:
CARDS: Allows you to gain new zoo cards (animals, sponsors, and conservation project cards).
BUILD: Allows you to build standard or special enclosures, kiosks, and pavilions.
ANIMALS: Allows you to accommodate animals in your zoo.
ASSOCIATION: Allows your association workers to carry out different tasks.
SPONSORS: Allows you to play a sponsor card in your zoo or to raise money.
255 cards featuring animals, specialists, special enclosures, and conservation projects, each with a special ability, are at the heart of Ark Nova. Use them to increase the appeal and scientific reputation of your zoo and collect conservation points.
—description from the publisher
Carnegie was inspired by the life of Andrew Carnegie who was born in Scotland in 1835. Andrew Carnegie and his parents emigrated to the United States in 1848. Although he started his career as a telegraphist, his role as one of the major players in the rise of the United States’ steel industry made him one of the richest men in the world and an icon of the American dream.
Andrew Carnegie was also a benefactor and philanthropist; upon his death in 1919, more than $350 million of his wealth was bequeathed to various foundations, with another $30 million going to various charities. His endowments created nearly 2,500 free public libraries that bear his name: the Carnegie Libraries.
During the game you will recruit and manage employees, expand your business, invest in real estate, produce and sell goods, and create transport chains across the United States; you may even work with important personalities of the era. Perhaps you will even become an illustrious benefactor who contributes to the greatness of his country through deeds and generosity!
The game takes place over 20 rounds; players will each have one turn per round. On each turn, the active player will choose one of four actions, which the other players may follow.
The goal of the game is to build the most prestigious company, as symbolized by victory points.
—description from publisher
Travel back in time to the greatest city in Mesoamerica. Witness the glory and the twilight of the powerful pre-Columbian civilization. Strategize, accrue wealth, gain the favour of the gods, and become the builder of the magnificent Pyramid of the Sun.
In Teotihuacan: City of Gods, each player commands a force of worker dice, which grow in strength with every move. On your turn, you move a worker around a modular board, always choosing one of two areas of the location tile you land on: one offering you an action (and a worker upgrade), the other providing you with a powerful bonus (but without an upgrade).
While managing their workforce and resources, players develop new technologies, climb the steps of the three great temples, build houses for the inhabitants of the city, and raise the legendary and breath-taking Pyramid of the Sun in the center of the city.
Each game is played in three eras. As the dawn of the Aztecs comes closer, player efforts (and their ability to feed their workforce) are evaluated a total of three times. The player with the most fame is the winner.
Gear up for a thrilling adventure to recover a legendary flying machine buried deep in the ruins of an ancient desert city. You'll need to coordinate with your teammates and use every available resource if you hope to survive the scorching heat and relentless sandstorm. Find the flying machine and escape before you all become permanent artifacts of the forbidden desert!
In Forbidden Desert, a thematic sequel to Forbidden Island, players take on the roles of brave adventurers who must throw caution to the wind and survive both blistering heat and blustering sand in order to recover a legendary flying machine buried under an ancient desert city. While featuring co-operative gameplay similar to Forbidden Island, Forbidden Desert is a fresh, new game based around an innovative set of mechanisms such as an ever-shifting board, individual resource management, and a unique method for locating the flying machine parts.
Ticket to Ride: First Journey takes the gameplay of the Ticket to Ride series and scales it down for a younger audience.
In general, players collect train cards, claim routes on the map, and try to connect the cities shown on their tickets. In more detail, the game board shows a map of the United States with certain cities being connected by colored paths. Each player starts with four colored train cards in hand and two tickets; each ticket shows two cities, and you're trying to connect those two cities with a contiguous path of your trains in order to complete the ticket.
On a turn, you either draw two train cards from the deck or discard train cards to claim a route between two cities; for this latter option, you must discard cards matching the color and number of spaces on that route (e.g., two yellow cards for a yellow route that's two spaces long). If you connect the two cities shown on a ticket with a path of your trains, reveal the ticket, place it face up in front of you, then draw a new ticket. (If you can't connect cities on either ticket because the paths are blocked, you can take your entire turn to discard those tickets and draw two new ones.)
If you connect one of the West Coast cities to one of the East Coast cities with a path of your trains, you immediately claim a Coast-to-Coast ticket.
The first player to complete six tickets wins! Alternatively, if someone has placed all twenty of their trains on the game board, then whoever has completed the most tickets wins!
Part of Ticket to Ride series.
In Marvel Dice Throne, you become one of eight of Marvel's most famous heroes, including Black Panther, Captain Marvel, Black Widow, Scarlet Witch, Loki, Thor, Doctor Strange, and Miles Morales Spider-man! Every Marvel Dice Throne hero was painstakingly designed and balanced to provide the most thematic experience possible, allowing you to truly embody your favorite heroes like no other game. Featuring all-new mechanisms and asymmetrical designs, these are our most innovative and exciting heroes yet.
Marvel Dice Throne is a heart-pumping, fast-playing game of skilled card play and dice manipulation supporting multiple modes of play, including 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 2v2v2, or free-for-all.
Attack your opponents and activate abilities by rolling your hero's unique set of five dice. Accumulate combat points and spend them on cards that have a large range of effects, such as granting permanent hero upgrades, applying status effects, and manipulating dice directly (yours, your teammate's, or even your opponent's).
All 8 heroes are compatible with the entire Dice Throne ecosystem
Use upgrade cards to improve your hero abilities as the game progresses
Play action cards strategically to manipulate dice and surprise your foe
Features a deluxe, highly functional, Battle Chest storage system
Each hero in the Battle Chest has their own beautiful set of custom swirl dice
—description from the publisher
My City is a competitive legacy game in which you develop a city on your own playing board through the ages.
The game consists of 24 episodes, beginning with the development of a city in its early preindustrial stages and progressing through industrialization. During each game, players customize their experience by adding elements to their personal boards and adding cards to the game. Players' choices and action made during one session of gameplay carry over into the next session, creating a personalized gaming experience.
For players who do not want to experience My City as a legacy game, a double-sided game board offers an alternate set-up for repeatable play (some elements from the legacy experience are needed for the repeatable play game, players can unlock these elements by playing through the first 4 episodes).
Terraforming Mars: The Dice Game is a card-driven dice game in which players use special dice to develop their corporations and terraform Mars into a new home for humanity. The dice represent resources that players spend to play cards and perform other actions. During the game, you increase your production of dice, terraform, place cities and greenery tiles on the board, and gain various bonuses. Each turn, you either produce new dice (Production Turn) or perform actions (Action Turn).
Whenever you terraform Mars (raise oxygen or temperature, or place an ocean tile), you gain 2 Victory Points (VP). You can also gain VP for placing tiles and playing cards, as well as winning Awards and Milestones.
The game ends when two of the three global parameters — oxygen/temperature/ocean — have been completed. The player with most VP wins.
Introduced by the Moors, azulejos (originally white and blue ceramic tiles) were fully embraced by the Portuguese when their king Manuel I, on a visit to the Alhambra palace in Southern Spain, was mesmerized by the stunning beauty of the Moorish decorative tiles. The king, awestruck by the interior beauty of the Alhambra, immediately ordered that his own palace in Portugal be decorated with similar wall tiles. As a tile-laying artist, you have been challenged to embellish the walls of the Royal Palace of Evora.
In the game Azul, players take turns drafting colored tiles from suppliers to their player board. Later in the round, players score points based on how they've placed their tiles to decorate the palace. Extra points are scored for specific patterns and completing sets; wasted supplies harm the player's score. The player with the most points at the end of the game wins.
In CATAN (formerly The Settlers of Catan), players try to be the dominant force on the island of Catan by building settlements, cities and roads. On each turn dice are rolled to determine which resources the island produces. Players build structures by 'spending' resources (sheep, wheat, wood, brick and ore) which are represented by the relevant resource cards; each land type, with the exception of the unproductive desert, produces a specific resource: hills produce brick, forests produce wood, mountains produce ore, fields produce wheat, and pastures produce sheep.
Set-up includes randomly placing large hexagonal tiles (each depicting one of the five resource-producing terrain types--or the desert) in a honeycomb shape and surrounding them with water tiles, some of which contain ports of exchange. A number disk, the value of which will correspond to the roll of two 6-sided dice, are placed on each terrain tile. Each player is given two settlements (think: houses) and roads (sticks) which are placed on intersections and borders of the terrain tiles. Players collect a hand of resource cards based on which terrain tiles their last-placed settlement is adjacent to. A robber pawn is placed on the desert tile.
A turn consists of rolling the dice, collecting resource cards based on this dice roll and the position of settlements (or upgraded cities—think: hotels), turning in resource cards (if possible and desired) for improvements, trading cards at a port, possibly playing a development card, or trading resource cards with other players. If the dice roll is a 7, the active player moves the robber to a new terrain tile and steals a resource card from another player who has a settlement adjacent to that tile.
Points are accumulated by building settlements and cities, having the longest road or the largest army (from some of the development cards), and gathering certain development cards that simply award victory points. When a player has gathered 10 points (some of which may be held in secret), s/he announces this and claims the win.
Draft dice and use the tools-of-the-trade in Sagrada to carefully construct your stained glass window masterpiece.
In more detail, each player builds a stained glass window by building up a grid of dice on their player board. Each board has some restrictions on which color or shade (value) of die can be placed there. Dice of the same shade or color may never be placed next to each other. Dice are drafted in player order, with the start player rotating each round, snaking back around after the last player drafts two dice. Scoring is variable per game based on achieving various patterns and varieties of placement...as well as bonus points for dark shades of a particular hidden goal color.
Special tools can be used to help you break the rules by spending skill tokens; once a tool is used, it then requires more skill tokens for the other players to use them.
The highest scoring window artisan wins!
Each round in Blank Slate, pick one of the 250+ word cue cards (which have 500+ total cues) and reveal it. Each player then writes the word they think best completes the phrase, trying to exactly match another player's word without giving a single hint.
Two rival spymasters know the secret identities of 25 agents. Their teammates know the agents only by their codenames — single-word labels like "disease", "Germany", and "carrot". Yes, carrot. It's a legitimate codename. Each spymaster wants their team to identify their agents first...without uncovering the assassin by mistake.
In Codenames, two teams compete to see who can make contact with all of their agents first. Lay out 25 cards, each bearing a single word. The spymasters look at a card showing the identity of each card, then take turns clueing their teammates. A clue consists of a single word and a number, with the number suggesting how many cards in play have some association to the given clue word. The teammates then identify one agent they think is on their team; if they're correct, they can keep guessing up to the stated number of times; if the agent belongs to the opposing team or is an innocent bystander, the team's turn ends; and if they fingered the assassin, they lose the game.
Spymasters continue giving clues until one team has identified all of their agents or the assassin has removed one team from play.
No moderator, no elimination, ten-minute games.
One Night Ultimate Werewolf is a fast game for 3-10 players in which everyone gets a role: One of the dastardly Werewolves, the tricky Troublemaker, the helpful Seer, or one of a dozen different characters, each with a special ability. In the course of a single morning, your village will decide who is a werewolf...because all it takes is lynching one werewolf to win!
Because One Night Ultimate Werewolf is so fast, fun, and engaging, you'll want to play it again and again, and no two games are ever the same.
This game can be combined with One Night Ultimate Werewolf: Daybreak.
The boundaries between worlds have drawn perilously thin. Dark forces work in the shadows and call upon unspeakable horrors, strange happenings are discovered all throughout the city of Arkham, Massachusetts, and behind it all an Ancient One manipulates everything from beyond the veil. It is time to revisit that which started it all…
In this game, you, on your own or with a friend (or up to three friends in this revised version), become characters within the quiet New England town of Arkham and work to investigate the recent strange happenings and solve the mysteries. You have your talents, sure, but you also have your flaws. Perhaps you've dabbled a little too much in the writings of the Necronomicon, and its words continue to haunt you. Perhaps you feel compelled to cover up any signs of otherworldly evils, hampering your own investigations in order to protect the quiet confidence of the greater population. Perhaps you'll be scarred by your encounters with a ghoulish cult.
With a revamped system of organization and a number of quality-of-life improvements, the box comes with everything you need to get your Arkham campaigns started, including enough cards and components for up to three other players to join you in your quest against the Mythos.
What Has Changed?
Support for up to four players with a single core set (the original core set supported only two players, meaning players needed two core sets to play with three or four players)
Two copies each of all 96 player cards from the original core set (the original core set included only one copy each of most of the player cards), some with brand-new art, along with two copies each of 13 additional player cards previously released in expansions and not found in the original core set
An included cloth Chaos Bag for the chaos tokens (not included in the original core set)
New organization within the box's packaging, making it much easier to find the cards for the player decks and for each scenario than before
Additional quality-of-life improvements, such as new "3" and "5" numbered resource and clue/doom tokens and even a lead investigator token
Revised "Learn to Play" rulebook to allow new players to jump into the game more easily
This revised edition is 100% compatible with all material previously published. Players who have all of the content released before this revised starter set will not find any new cards; this set contains the same cards, just more copies of them (and some with new art). "Old-timers" can continue where they left off under the new two-boxes campaign format (replacing the old "deluxe expansion + mythos packs" format) starting with Edge of the Earth.
Queen Gimnax has ordered the reclamation of the northern lands. As a cartographer in her service, you are sent to map this territory, claiming it for the Kingdom of Nalos. Through official edicts, the queen announces which lands she prizes most, and you will increase your reputation by meeting her demands. But you are not alone in this wilderness. The Dragul contest your claims with their outposts, so you must draw your lines carefully to reduce their influence. Reclaim the greatest share of the queen’s desired lands and you will be declared the greatest cartographer in the kingdom.
In Cartographers: A Roll Player Tale, players compete to earn the most reputation stars by the time four seasons have passed. Each season, players draw on their map sheets and earn reputation by carrying out the queen's edicts before the season is over. The player with the most reputation stars at the end of winter wins!
—description from the publisher
"With great power, there must also come great responsibility."
–Stan Lee, Amazing Fantasy #15
Iron Man and Black Panther team up to stop Rhino from rampaging through the streets of New York. Captain Marvel and Spider-Man battle Ultron as he threatens global annihilation. Do you have what it takes to join the ranks of these legendary heroes and become a champion?
Jump into the Marvel Universe with Marvel Champions: The Card Game, a cooperative Living Card Game for one to four players!
Marvel Champions: The Card Game invites players to embody iconic heroes from the Marvel Universe as they battle to stop infamous villains from enacting their devious schemes. As a Living Card Game, Marvel Champions is supported with regular releases of new product, including new heroes and scenarios.
—description from the publisher
You are a team of newbie astronauts sent on an actual mission in an actual spaceship in actual outer space! Exciting, right? It would be...if any of you actually knew what you were doing. Would have been nice to have at least one experienced pilot on board, but now that you're here, you'll just have to figure it out as you go along.
In Noobs in Space, a team of three to five players must complete a series of tasks and challenges together, using what little knowledge you have. Not all hope is lost because each of you has a small part of the solution; you just need to figure out how to put it all together. While one player may know the task at hand but not have the resources to implement it, those resources may be shared among three other players. They, on the other hand, do not know what is necessary based on the information they have. Since players cannot show cards to each other, there must be a lot of clear communication and interaction by describing or reading out cards in order to gradually find out what should be done — and all of this must be done as quickly as possible.
The story leads through several levels, and each level consists of several tasks, so the whole game is an action-packed event from beginning to end.
Ohanami consists of a deck of 120 cards that are numbered from 1-120, with each card having one of four symbols on it. The game lasts three rounds, with players scoring at the end of each round, in addition to bonus scoring at the end of the game.
At the start of a round, each player receives a hand of ten cards. Each player chooses two cards, then passes the remaining cards to the left. All players reveal their cards at the same time, then decide whether to use 0, 1, or 2 of them in personal rows of cards. When you start a row, you can use any card; to add a card to an existing row, that card must be higher than the row's highest card or lower than the lowest one. A player can have at most three rows of cards. Discard any cards you don't use.
Players repeat this drafting, passing, and playing process until they have played ten cards. The first round ends, and players now receive 3 points for each blue card in their rows.
Players then receive a new hand of ten cards to start round 2, once again choosing two cards and passing the rest, but now to the right. Players continue building on the rows that they already have, scoring 3 points for each blue card and 4 points for each green card at the end of round two.
For round three, players have ten more cards and pass cards to the left once again. At the end of this round, players once again score for their blue and green cards, while also receiving 7 points for each gray card in their rows. Additionally, each player scores for their pink cherry blossom cards, with these cards having a pyramidal scoring structure: one card = 1 point, two cards = 3, three cards = 6, etc. Whoever has the highest total score wins!
Romi Rami is a game that feels like it’s been around forever, with thousands of people quietly and gradually polishing it over time. Falling squarely in the family of ‘Rummy’ games, Romi Rami features a double market. The first one has number cards, and the second one has contracts to complete.
The goal of the game: Make the most points by optimizing the combinations required by the contracts. Keep an eye on the trophies (they change from game to game) which will propel you to to the top spot on the podium!
During your turn, you assemble your hand, maybe place cards for their effect, and decide if you want to end the round. But do you think you are the one with the most points in hand?
You will have to choose: stop the round immediately or give the others an extra turn to try to extend the gap? Is it worth taking the risk?
The game ends when you reach 30/35/40 points (4/3/2 players).
The excitement of ending the round to catch your opponents off guard
The pleasure of playing your effect cards and making combos
It's a set collection card game like Rummy. The origami created especially for the game is just the illustrations on the cards.
Sky Team is a co-operative game, exclusively for two players, in which you play a pilot and co-pilot at the controls of an airliner. Your goal is to work together as a team to land your airplane in different airports around the world.
To land your plane, you need to silently assign your dice to the correct spaces in your cockpit to balance the axis of your plane, control its speed, deploy the flaps, extend the landing gear, contact the control tower to clear your path, and even have a little coffee to improve your concentration enough to change the value of your dice.
If the aircraft tilts too much and stalls, overshoots the airport, or collides with another aircraft, you lose the game...and your pilot's license...and probably your life.
From Montreal to Tokyo, each airport offers its own set of challenges. Watch out for the turbulence as this could end up being bumpy ride!
AWARDS & HONORS
2024 - Nederlandse Spellenprijs 2024 Winner
2024 - Deutscher Spiele Preis 2024 - 2nd place
2024 - BG Stats - Most popular game
2024 - Gra roku (Game of the year Poland) - 2 player category winner
2024 - International Gamers Awards - 2 player category winner
2023 - Swams des Jahres winner
2024 - Dice Tower Awards - Best 2 player game
2024 - Dice Tower Awards - Best cooperative game
2024 - Dice Tower Awards - Most innovative game
2024 - Spiel des Jahres Winner
2024 - Best Light Game - BBQ Awards
2024 - Best Cooperative Board Game - Origins Awards
2024 - Best 2023 Insider Game - Les Lys (Québec)
2024 - Game of the Year - Spiel des Jahres 2024 (Germany)
2024 - Best 2-Player & Innovation Gameplay - Big Awards 2024
2024 - Best 2-Player & Cooperative Game - Golden Geek Awards 2023
Runner up for Best Innovative & Thematic Game - Golden Geek Awards 2023
2023 - Best Cooperative Game - Board Game Quest
2023 - Best 2-Player Game - Board Game Arena Awards
2023 - Best 2-Player Game - Squirrelly Awards
2023 - Best Board Game - Dicebreaker Tabletop Awards
2023 - Two Player Board Game Winner - Game Boy Geek
2023 - Best Co-Op Game - Gaming Trend
2023 - Seal of Excellence - Dice Tower
—description from the publisher
This third expansion to Wingspan brings new species to our habitats by exploring the vibrant, intriguing, and magnificent birds of Asia. These birds were chosen from the over 2,800 species that live in Asia.
Wingspan Asia is several different things: a standalone game for 1-2 players (and the "duet" mode that can be used with any bird/bonus cards), a card expansion to the original Wingspan, and a 6-7 player expansion via the new "flock" mode (for which the player components from the core game are necessary).
—description from the publisher