Newsletter No #90

This month on the endless Reiner Roulette we’ve been checking out Rebirth - a chunky and very pleasant box from Mighty Boards. It’s immediately delightful and interesting, but underneath the wrapper of theme it plays in a way that borders on abstract.

Each turn players will place just one tile onto the board, scoring points immediately. You’ll usually get MORE points for placing tiles of the same type next to each other - encouraging players to try and greedily carve out sections for themselves - but with almost no restrictions about where you can place a tile on your turn, it’s equally tempting to hop around - dotting your tiles all over the map to take control of castles and plonk down additional chunks of cathedral.

As flippant and simplistic as that explanation sounds - it’s not FAR off a full rules explanation? And yet as with many of our favourite s loads of room for chin-stroking strategies, fine moves, and HUBRIS.

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Arguably this might have been one that should have had a video review back when it came out, but just recently Res Arcana crashed back onto our radar - like a fun torpedo, or a very big dolphin. Arguably that’s directly down to Res Arcana Duo: the teeny standalone 2 player version that doubles up as an expansion for the base game.

In contrast to the original game’s big deck of cards, here you’ve got a mere SIXTEEN - all of which are always in play. WHOA. So immediately, this game of slightly-fuzzy economic wizards becomes something extremely knowable and sharp. For a game that LOOKS identical, it’s honestly quite interesting how different that simple shift causes it to feel?

It’s still unclear whether it’ll be the original game or Duo that ends up hogging the limelight in our upcoming coverage - although knowing our preference for smaller, sharp boxes, I suspect you won’t need a massive crystal ball.

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Good gravy - a trick-taking game, listed as a part of our upcoming coverage? We do wonder sometimes if there will come a point where we start to get bored of these, but judging by just how much our grandparents’ generation seemed to endlessly love Hearts and Bridge - that simply might not happen. Card games: They’re GOOD?!

Three Chapters is an interesting one in the ways it tries to harness the lore of fairy tales, using this familiarity as a means of squeezing more rules into the game. Frustratingly tricky to explain quickly and clearly, it’s a card game with savvy drafting at its core: you’re trying to grab cards that’ll let you win the actual card game, but ALSO collecting sets that’ll score independently, at the end?

It’s fiddly, but we reckon that the juice is worth the squeeze: keep your eyes peeled for more on this one, soon!

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Matt: I've been really enjoying chipping away at Blue Prince over the past few weeks - a fascinating puzzle game that's ostensibly about trying to make your way across a map, using a tile drafting system that adds new rooms at the moment at which you enter them. 

In practice, this means physically moving - in first person - through a mansion that YOU build, which also resets itself at the end of each day. In the abstract world of board games, sure! Why not! Here though, this magical physicality is… A LITTLE SPOOKY?

Much of the game relies on manipulating different economies to get keys to unlock doors, coins to buy tools and gems that allow you more choice when it comes to drafting new rooms.

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So many of the mechanics are clearly inspired by tabletop games, and you really do need to enjoy this core loop of drafting tiles, placing tiles, and efficiently managing economies if you want to see the OTHER stuff that this game is doing.

And let me tell you - this game is doing A LOT of other stuff. How much exactly? I won’t tell you! I can't tell you! I don't want to look it up.

OH! The music is incredible, too. Sporadically you’ll hear an oboe gently noodling in the background, and oh my gosh - OH MY GOSH - it is pure, actual heaven.

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