Expand Your Game

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...

Octocube - Review Information: Mechanics:  Drafting, Set Collection, Magnets Player Age:  8+ Player Count:  2 - 4 Players Game Designer:  Karl Lange Game Artist:  Clément Masson BGG Weight: 1.00 Publisher:  Sit Down! Time to Play:  25 Minutes  Year Published:  2024 Disclaimer:  A review copy for the game was provided by the VR Distribution. Introduction: Octocube is a magnetic set collection game encompassed by a fun nautical theme. For starters, magnet-based games are far and few between so the attraction of this game is automatic. However, what makes this game truly special is that the player piece is a six-sided octopus that collects treasure at the bottom of the sea. The octopus grabs a hold of whatever they desires (tiles) one piece at a time as they moves throughout the grid. Players will recall their octocube to score points for sets of the same tile type. This, while also building their own 4 by 5 grid to score points...

Piles: Review Information: Mechanics:  Real-Time, Set Collection, Memory Player Age:  10+ Player Count:  2 - 8 Players Game Designer:  KC Schrimpl Game Artist:  Alexandr Nikiforov BGG Weight: 1.00 Publisher:  Lost Boy Entertainment  Time to Play:  10 Minutes  Year Published:  2023 Disclaimer:  A review copy for the game was provided by the VR Distribution. Introduction : The clean laundry has been stacked into one big pile since it's such a chore to put away. Your goal is to organise this chaos in real-time into six piles, all containing one clothing type of different colour schemes. This is done by swapping cards one card at a time with the middle display. The catch is this is also achieved with only one pile of four cards at a time, so you cannot swap out two or more cards from the one pile at the one time. This classic memory mechanism can really leave you guessing which pile contained which clothing style as key items appear fas...

Azul Duel: Review Information: Mechanics:  Abstract, Drafting, Tile Placement, Duel Player Age:  10+ Player Count:  2 Players Game Designer:  Michael Kiesling Game Artist:  Maëva da Silva BGG Weight:  2.35 Publisher:  Next Move Games Time to Play:  30 - 45 Minutes  Year Published:  2025 Disclaimer:  A review copy for the game was provided by the VR Distribution. Introduction: Many popular games are getting duel re-interpretations that are reworked and optimised for two players, the latest of these games being Azul Duel. The base game of Azul is a popular abstract mechanism with clever tile placement and drafting, but the question is whether the two-player edition holds up to the original classic or might it even outdo it?  Game Anatomy: Tiles: There are five tile colours; red, yellow, black, dark blue and light blue. Factories: There are four small factories and one large factory. Each of these have a day and night section. The...