April has been a super slow month for gaming for me. I've actually gotten a ton of painting done, more on that at the end of the post. Between that and the house getting sick a couple times, gaming itself has been slow.
Honorable Mentions
Empires End
This is a strange one. I was initial very excited to give this game a try. It was described to me a bit as a "reverse engine builder" which fascinates me as a concept. Your engine runs fine at the beginning but you bid to avoid taking on disasters that will smash your engine. It's in theory all about carefully choosing when you can handle taking on the problems. I compare it to Arkham Horror in terms of how it feels but being competitive instead of coop, there's no shared misery as things break or go wrong. It plays much like Space Base (also from this designer). In the end I liked it but it wasn't "fun." I don't think I feel the need to get a copy but would probably play again.
Top 5 of April 2025
5. Skara Brae
This month is all about Kickstarters delivering. From Garphill games I got the Skara Brae and the Anarchy KS in. This is a resource shuffling game with the twist that there are debatably too many resources to manage. I thought this was interesting as I love the shuffling back and forth this style of game delivers but I want more plays to make a final judgement. Its probably my least favorite of this publishers games but I've become a bit of a Garphill fanboy lately so that isn't to say its a bad game.
4. Deep Regrets
The main praise for this Kickstarter has to be given to the transparency from the creator of the game. He has been straightforward and up front about every issue and decision that went in to the campaign. The game itself is sort of a push your luck eerie fishing game with a cthulu theme but I was impressed that there was more depth than I was expecting. I'm reserving as bit of judgement for now as we only played once and out play took significantly longer than anticipated due to baby but the art work and components are 10/10
3. Minecart Town
This is the second (of 3) resource shuffling games to make the list this month. This is a little game from japan. Another Kickstarter, this one was described to me a bit like Furnace with the added wrinkle of logistics. Though I think that is an accurate description, the end result was a bit lighter than I was expecting. Its a cute, one-step-above-filler game I can see myself playing quite a bit more of.
2. Hadrians Wall
The third and final resource shuffler is actually a roll n write. Well a flip and write technically but a bit of a resource shuffler nonetheless. I had heard this was similar to a full blown euro game just distilled down into a roll and write format and to be honest that's a fair assessment. I'm not normally a huge "... and write" fan but this one swayed me. It feels like a good high score chaser, with a theme I enjoy. The smartest move as many before me have mentioned is the inclusion of physical resources which make the tracking from box to box much less cumbersome and add the tactility I feel the genre is missing. I'd like to play through most of the solo campaign before I move on to The Anarchy but I have quite high hopes for that title as well.
1. Tether
Oddly, both my most played and favorite this month is a short little two player only card game. One player plays runs vertically, the other horizontal. The cards are flipped on each side. So one side might say 17, the other 71. On first play I wasn't smitten but we managed 7 plays of this last month and with each game I feel the strategic depth growing. One particular thing is the game has three end game conditions. Whether the largest configuration reaches 14 cards, the draw deck runs out, or one player leads by 6 points. It feels like each time we play this one I can see new strategic wrinkles to the system. An obvious one maybe but if I play the 17, the 71 is out of the pool for me. Real simple but a lot of fun.
On to the check in, We managed to play a game of Halo Flashpoint. Photos of painted figures soonish. The game is ok. Typical Mantic fair where I think the game is fine but nothing spectacular. I decided after we played, I'd paint what I had but was not going to preorder the other large box coming out.
I've also been hammering away on 3 different historical projects that I am excited to share with you all pretty soon.
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