Now – Roam
In Roam, you and up to three friends compete to find lost adventurers. Tarot-sized adventurer cards include characters from Near and Far, Above and Below, City of Iron, and Islebound. The opposite side of each card depicts a landscape split into six squares, and two rows of three of these cards are placed in the center of the playing area to make the board.
Each turn, you may activate one of the adventurer cards in your party by flipping the card face down. Activating an adventurer allows you to place search tokens on the board in the shape depicted on your adventurer card. When every square on a landscape card has been searched, the player who did the most claims the card, finding the lost adventurer and adding them to their party. Each adventurer you add to your party gives you points and a new search pattern that you can use.
When searching, you also claim coins, which can be spent to use special actions or purchase artifacts with useful powers. When one player has ten adventurers in their party, the game ends, and the player with the most points wins.
Now – Maquis
Maquis is a solitaire worker-placement game with variable goals and a play time of approximately twenty minutes. The player places his resistance agents on spaces around town to achieve his goals – blowing up trains, publishing underground newspapers – but at the same time Milice collaborators and Wehrmacht soldiers patrol the area. Agents who can’t make it back to the safe house at the end of the day are arrested, and never seen again.
April 16th – Giant Takenoko
Takenoko – one of the best simple strategy games, and a great gateway title for anyone looking to delve into more complicated board games. Loved by gamers and families alike, the creation of Antoine Bauza is about to come to Kickstarter for the first time. The product offered on the campaign might not be completely new, but it’s still in high demand and costs a fortune on ebay.
Giant Takenoko, because that’s how it’s called, is an extra sized version of the classic game, where all elements including bamboo shoots, hexes and the mr. panda himself are much much bigger than in the original version. The game is going to include the “Chibis” expansion as well, with an extra sized ms. panda.
April 16th – Terraforming Mars: Turmoil
Terraforming Mars is a classic in board game circles and So far, four expansions for Terraforming Mars have been released. Venus Next introduced flying cities, few dozens of new project cards, corporations, resources and fresh ways to win. Hellas & Elysium included 2 completely new maps with their own awards granting scores. Prelude gave players new cards and mechanics that speed up, and spice up the beginning of the game. Colonies allowed traveling to distant planets and establishing bases.
What is Turmoil, the newest expansion, bringing to the table? A lot. Apart from another set of corporations and projects, the main focus will be on the complicated martian politics involving parties with conflicting goals. We will be able to support or even influence them. Ruling parties will change each turn and provide various bonuses and penalties. New cards called “global events” will heavily affect the flow of the game and again make it more complex. Creators also promise to add new player boards, to replace the thin cardboard ones known from the original version.
April 16th – Anachrony: Fractures of Time
Anachrony came out a couple of years ago thanks to a publisher called Mindclash Games. The game has surprisingly deep and engaging storyline, considering its euro genre. Anachrony takes place in a dark, post apocalyptic world, where time traveling allows people to visit the past and foresee preventable cataclysms of the future. Gameplay involves worker placement elements, looking for goods, using specialists and using equipment.
Since the release, Anachrony has managed to get quite a devoted fanbase and plenty of favorable reviews. The newest expansion is supposed to take place in a slightly altered timeline, with new locations to visit and is centered on a newly discovered technology of Fluxes. These allow for instant moving of exosuits and workers and save time usually spent on creating new ones. A fresh attempt at the solo mode is also planned, along with a deluxe edition. Anachrony: Fractures of Time will also expand the number of buildings, worker types and projects while adding a fifth path to the game.
April 18th – On Mars
On Mars is created by Vital Lacerda, the designer of Escape Plan, Lisboa, The Gallerist and plenty of others. Ian O’Toole is again responsible for art in the game, and again is one of the key reasons to get it.
On Mars takes us to the red planet in the middle of 21st century. You and your team will be tasked with building a self sustainable colony. You will have to mine resources, create buildings, expand territory, conduct research, construct vehicles and finally: make your company a fully independent organism. Clever use of resources like electricity and food will be vital to surviving and achieving victory
The key mechanic involves traveling between the orbit and the titular Mars itself. Depending on your location you get a completely different set of available actions, and have to use a special travel action to change where you are, and perform different tasks next turn. Dividing the actions into 2 groups creates an interesting approach to turn order, different than what most games on the market have.