Concordia Venus – The Goddess of Love brings Team Play to Concordia
Concordia Venus – The Goddess of Love brings Team Play options to Concordia. A game review by The Glass Meeple.
Read moreCategory: Strategy Games
Strategy Games, aka Euro Games, are a little more involved than Family Games. Game play involves more strategic and tactical decision making, interesting choices and engaging mechanics. There are usually multiple paths to victory. It may take you several turns to fully implement a plan.
Strategy Games are less luck-based than Thematic Games. There’s usually a way for players to mitigate luck-based mechanics like dice rolling and a catch up mechanism that keeps all players vying for victory until the end of the game. Play times typically run from 1 to 2 hours, but can be as long as 3 hours plus for more involved games.
Stone Age: Anniversary – What’s New & Different
I love Stone Age. I’ve been looking forward to the new Limited Edition Stone Age: Anniversary for months now and have done quite a bit of research into what’s new and different in it. How could the designer and publishers improve on this classic after 10 years in print? Well, let’s take a look. I’m not going to go into […]
Read moreThe 12 Game Gifts of Christmas: 12th Day
On the twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me Twelve Stefan Feld games, eleven Pandemic co-ops, ten Ticket to Ride games, nine Catan expansions, eight Unlock! escape games, seven Exit: The Games, six sets of Card Sleeves, five Zombie Dice!, four Games for Two, three Dice Sets, two Letters to Santa and a Hanabi co-op card game. 12 Stefan Feld Games Stefan […]
Read moreRailroad Revolution – Specialized workers lend layers of complexity
I happened to watch part of a Rahdo Runs Through Video on Railroad Revolution a little while back. What intrigued me about the game was how the various types of workers could affect actions. So, when I saw an open copy on Ward’s shelf at Atlanta Game Fest, I snagged it, read the rules and conned my husband and a […]
Read moreGreat Western Trail – Kansas City here I come!
I may not ride a horse any more, but I was born a cowgirl, so I was very excited when our friends Robyn and Dave suggested Great Western Trail. I even got to play it twice at Atlanta Game Fest! Great Western Trail is a medium to heavyweight Euro game. It took about half an hour to set it up […]
Read moreGrand Austria Hotel – A dice-selection Euro game.
I’m a fan of dicey Euro games. That is, games in which dice rolls determine your options for action – my husband calls this dice selection – and there’s some means to modify the dice results – though it may cost a bit. My favorite dicey Euro game of all time is Castles of Burgundy, which I still have yet […]
Read moreAcquire 2016 – A 3D Plastic Reprint of the Classic Stock Market Game
I still remember the day my husband came into the house breathless with excitement. He’d found a pristine copy of the highly-rated and valued 1999 Avalon Hill version of Acquire at our local thrift store. He says he got tunnel vision, his heart was beating so hard with excitement when he found it, that all he could do was carry […]
Read moreGames of Auld Lang Syne: 7 classic games that never grow old
Should auld acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind Should auld acquaintance be forgot and games of auld lang syne. It’s so easy to focus solely on the latest releases when choosing games to review, that I thought I’d change things up a bit and reflect on some of my favorite games of auld lang syne. I have so […]
Read moreIstanbul – A Lesson in Efficiency
I first played Istanbul at Atlanta Game Fest last year. It’s Euro-style play, colorful tiles and bits, and puzzley immersive play quickly enraptured my mind. After many plays since, I’ve decided that Istanbul boils down to a lesson in efficiency. Let’s see why. In Istanbul, your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to be the first to acquire […]
Read moreAgricola Revised Edition – How it compares to the original
I recently had the opportunity to demo, teach and play the new (and improved) release of Agricola, now published in the U.S. by Mayfair Games. We held an Agricola Release event at our store. To help prepare for the event and brush up on the rules, we pulled out our old copy of Agricola and played the weekend before. It was with […]
Read moreStone Age – A classic worker placement game
Stone Age is one of the first worker placement games I ever played – Agricola was the first. Designed by Bernd Brunnhofer, under the pseudonym Michael Tummelhofer, Stone Age was first published in the U.S. in 2008 by Rio Grande Games. Even though Stone Age is less than ten years old, I consider it a classic. It’s my go-to game when introducing new gamers to […]
Read moreKeltis – An Emerald Green Game for St. Paddy’s Day
On St Patrick’s Day it is customary to wear shamrocks and/or green clothing or accessories – the “wearing of the green” as they call it. So, it is no wonder that the first game I thought of when looking for an appropriate game for St. Paddy’s Day was Keltis. I did a little research on the origins of St. Patrick’s […]
Read moreDiscoveries: The Journals of Lewis & Clark – A Thematic Euro Dice Game
While I love my Euro-games, some of them feel like the theme was added as an afterthought. Not so with Discoveries: The Journals of Lewis & Clark cunningly designed by Cédrick Chaboussit, and beautifully illustrated by Vincent Dutrait. Discoveries, a gamers’ Euro worker-placement dice game, feels like the theme was the starting point and the mechanics were built around, and in support of, that concept. […]
Read moreGlass Road: Lighter Strategy Fare by Agricola’s Designer
Glass Road, designed by Uwe Rosenberg (best known for Agricola and other worker-placement Euro strategy games), commemorates the 700-year-old tradition of glass-making. The Glass Road is a 150-mile path through the Bavarian Forest near the border to the Czech Republic, a remnant and reminder of the great days of glass production. In the game Glass Road, your job, should you […]
Read moreTzolk’in: The Mayan Calendar – Time & 3-D Thinking
Tzolk’in: The Mayan Calendar is a worker placement game with a unique time element. The theme revolves around the Tzolk’in Mayan Calendar wheel in the center of the board that, when turned at the end of each round, rotates the five smaller wheels where you actually place your workers. As in most Euro games, your goal is to acquire the most […]
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