Expand Your Game

Spirits of Christmas: Review Information: Mechanics: C ooperative, Rondel, Multi-use Cards Player Age:  12+  Player Count:  1 - 6 Players Time to Play:  30 - 45  Minutes  Game Designer:   John S. Bailey Game Artist:   Emmie Bailey Publisher: Humble Bard Games Year Published:  2025 BGG Weight:   2.00 Disclaimer:   A review copy for the game was provided by the publisher. Introduction : Spirit of Christmas is a cooperative puzzle with limited communication that uses a rondel and a limited action allowance of shillings, after all, what does Scrooge value more than his shillings?  The players are trying to create three chapters linked to the classic tale of the ghosts of past, present and future. Once each chapter has been completed the players have won, run out of shilling along the way and players have lost. Game Anatomy: Shilling Tokens: Shilling tokens are your life-force and the action allowance system. To move acr...

Crafting the Cosmos: Review Information: Mechanics:  Rondel, Mancala, Point Salad, Tile Placement, Variable Player Powers Player Age:  14+ Player Count:  2 - 4 Players Game Designer:  David Gordon (I), TAM Game Artist:  Greg May, Dann May BGG Weight:  3.00 Publisher:  Office Dog Time to Play:  60 - 90 Minutes  Year Published:  2025 Disclaimer:  A review copy for the game was provided by the VR Distribution Introduction: Crafting the Cosmos is a game where players design and fill their own cosmos. This is achieved by using a clever mancala mechanism on the central board where actions aren't granted by the position of the first or last mancala action. Instead, the benefits/resources are determined by the entire state of the main board after the movements have been made. Game Anatomy: Main Board: During this game, players share a main board that will work as a shared state of mancala. On this board, there w...

Ink: Review Information: Mechanics:  Abstract, Rondel, Tile Laying Player Age:  12+ Player Count:  1 - 4 Players Game Designer:  Kasper Lapp Game Artist:  Chris Quilliams BGG Weight: 1.33 Publisher:  Final Score Games Time to Play: 30 - 45 Minutes  Year Published:  2025 Disclaimer:  A review copy for the game was provided by the VR Distribution Introduction: Ink is an abstract game of creating your objectives in pursuit of deploying all of your ink bottles. This is done by clever tile placement and selective drafting. In the game, players are slowly building a group of colours, placing as many white spots as they can, while creating certain-sized coloured groups to meet the objective value they place. Game Anatomy: Ink: Each player will have 24 ink tokens to place during the game. These tokens will be separated into two piles. One for the palette card and one joker pile (this ink can go on any colour). Palette car...

Shuffle and Swing: Rapid Review  Information: Mechanics:  Rondel, Worker Placement, Area Control Player Age:  14+  Player Count:  2 - 4 Players Time to Play:  40 - 80  Minutes  Game Designer:   Robert Hovakimyan Game Artist:  A. Giroux, Gary Chalk Publisher : Bitewing Games Year Published:  2024 BGG Weight:  3.39 Disclaimer:  A review copy for the game was provided by the publisher. Rundown: Shuffle and swing is set in the roaring 20s where players are jazz-loving mice working together (kind of) to build two out of three instruments. These instruments are built using a collection of cat workers. This is a rondel and area control game with each instrument having a unique way of scoring based on the players who hold a majority in some specified way. Each turn players will move their mouse pawn, select a die then distribute awards, perform the corresponding action, move the die, and tick up the die used.  Move Mouse...