My sister and I recently went antiquing; she was looking for a new side table, and I was looking for anything related to local history, including books, art, and ephemera. Sadly, nothing caught my fancy in that regard, but much to my surprise, I did stumble upon an old engraving of another place of interest, one with a connection to board gaming: Essen, Germany!
As anyone reading this knows, the biggest board gaming event of them all is Essen Spiel, which takes place in Essen, a mid-sized city on the other side of the world from where I am. As the last thing I expected to find in an antique shop in my small Ontario town was a print of a city that I only know about because of its connection to the board gaming hobby, I gasped when I saw the print hung on the shop wall! Naturally, I bought it! It is very thematic, so I think it will be a nice addition to my board game room! laugh
And I swear I did not plan this, but the first on the list of games I played this past week is ANTIQUES! a game I bought in Essen, you guessed it, last fall!
1x antiques
This past Wednesday, I had such a wonderful play of Antiques. The combination of tile drafting and contract fulfillment, plus the personal and public goals, all fits so well together and suits my gaming preferences so perfectly. It goes by so quickly, and it’s just so much fun! Definitely one of the plays this week that I enjoyed the most.
1x blazon
I never hear anyone talking about Blazon, which is a shame because I think it’s such a great solo puzzle (I’ve yet to try the multiplayer game). The solo Blazon is comparable to a slightly more intricate Shifting Stones. In order to win the game, you must accomplish a series of 25 goals by the end. You will either draw new cards each turn or put cards on the board to change the board’s state to accomplish the objectives. You already know how beautiful it is because Ian O’Toole did the art and graphic design! a treasure that goes unnoticed!
Second Edition of Cat Rescue (new to me!) 2x
Add cat cards to the board while adhering to certain rules in this adorable little abstract puzzle game. Any other card in that row or column must be moved one space over as you add a card. In order to “adopt” a group of cats, it is necessary to arrange them in a line of colors. I enjoy the puzzle, and the theme is sweet of course, but this game is all about sliding cards – literally every turn you are sliding 2-4 cards – but the cloth board does not allow for sliding. cry You must pick up multiple cards every single turn, and it gets…tedious. So, the gameplay is lovely, but I kind of hate the cloth board in this one. I will keep the game for a while though, in hopes that the publisher puts out a cardboard or neoprene board so the game is not such a pain to play.
Two confusing Lands
For 1-2 players, Confusing Lands is a card layering game in a small box. The freedom to choose which goals to score is my favorite aspect of this game. Each card you make has two sides: one side has a new scoring goal you need to try to reach, and the other side has more features to help you do so. However, your final score will be reduced by 10 points for each new scoring goal you add to your landscape! So there’s a bit of push-your-luck when you choose to go with the scoring goal side – will you be able to gain more than the 10 points it will cost you to play it? This short game has a lot of fun choices!