I was way too excited to get this upgrade to a Bruno Cathala card game.
Rick and Morty and Superfriends
Dice Tower News reports that two new games based on its GRYPHON card game engine are now available for pre-order: Rick and Morty: The Look Who’s Purging Now Card Game and Challenge of the Superfriends. “With the GRYPHON card game engine, two to four players have a deck of 10 cards from which they will draw a hand of three cards. Each round, players will select one card from their hand to play simultaneously with the others win the round.”
Source: http://www.dicetowernews.com/cryptozoic-announces-two-new-card-games-using-their-new-gryphon-card-game-engine/55170
Brikks Coming to Essen
With SPIEL ‘18 right around the corner, W. Eric Martin continues his preview on BGG, this time focusing on Brikks, the third of Schmidt Spiele’s roll-and-write series. The first two, Noch mal! And Ganz schon clever, have been big hits. “Brikks takes the familiar challenge of Tetris and converts it into a roll-and-write game. (Roll-drop-and-write? Drop-and-drop since you’re dropping dice?) You’re trying to fill as many rows as completely as possible to score points, while the desire for energy so that you can rotate quadrominoes pushes you to take risks and stack blocks in a way that you might not want to do.”
Source: https://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/81937/spiel-18-preview-brikks-or-taking-tetris-tabletop
New Expansion for Legend of the Five Rings: The Card Game
According to the Fantasy Flight Games website a new premium expansion for Legend of the Five Rings: The Card Game, Children of the Empire, will be out in the first quarter of next year. “A Premium Expansion is a new level of product for Legend of the Five Rings: The Card Game, featuring 234 cards (three copies each of 76 cards and one copy each of six cards), a number comparable to the Legend of the Five Rings: The Card Game Core Set. Unlike previous expansions, Premium Expansions are not tied to a specific clan, nor do they form part of a cycle—instead, these expansions focus on developing specific themes and mechanics, rewarding every clan with a wealth of new cards in a single expansion.”
Source: https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2018/10/10/children-of-the-empire/
Stronghold Pre-Orders
Lots of pre-orders are now available from Stronghold Games, from AuZtralia (“by renowned game designer Martin Wallace and thematically linked to his game A Study in Emerald”) to Terraforming Mars: Colonies (“features colony tiles where you can build colonies and send your trade fleet. It also includes new cards and corporations”).
Source: https://strongholdgames.com/store/available-for-preorder/
Fantastic Beasts
According to tabletopgamingnews.com, USAopoly has released Fantastic Beasts: Perilous Pursuit. “Play a quick game to learn dice combinations, or extend every session to get to know the best ways to stay on top of the game. As each player completes sets, the others can capitalize on their powers to capture all the runaway Beasts.”
Source: https://www.tabletopgamingnews.com/USAopoly-Releases-Fantastic-Beasts–Perilous-Pursuit
Clank! Expeditions: Gold and Silk
Just released from Renegade Game Studios is the first board expansion for its hit deck-builder Clank! In Clank! Expeditions: Gold and Silk there’s a double-sided board featuring two new adventures: one into the Ruin Dwarven Mining Company aka Ruin DMC (ha!) and the other into the Spider Queen’s Lair.
Source: https://www.renegadegamestudios.com/clank-expeditions-gold-and-silk
The Castles of Burgundy Goes Digital
Also from BGG comes news of The Castles of Burgundy app being ready next year. “Digidiced now sets out to develop the digital adaption. The game will be released on different platforms (iOS, Android, PC, Mac and Linux) and offer cross-platform play, different interfaces for big and small screens, 9 languages and the usual good feature set provided by Digidiced.”
Source: https://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/82076/app-news-glimpses-through-ages-expansion-and-castl
British Tabletopping
The Economist reported on the growing tabletop gaming scene in Britain, focusing on Games Workshop’s increased business. “Shares in the Nottingham-based company have risen by 660% over the past two years, making it the most successful firm in the FTSE 250 share index.”
Source: https://www.economist.com/britain/2018/10/06/britons-are-increasingly-turning-to-tabletop-games-for-entertainment
From Honshu to Hokkaido
On BGG Kalle Malmioja reflects on the process of developing Hokkaido, the next in his series of map-building card games, which can be pre-ordered now. “One of the most common points of feedback from Honshū is that the trick-taking/auction phase is a lesser part of the game, and players want to focus more on the map building.”
Source: https://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/81863/designer-diary-honshu-hokkaido
R.I.P. Greg Stafford
According to ICv2.com, Chaosium founder Greg Stafford passed away at the age of 70. “Greg Stafford was a visionary designer of role-playing games, and one of the early pioneers of the medium whose ideas continue to influence the design of role-playing games to this day.”
Source: https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/41585/r-i-p-greg-stafford
Upcoming Board Game Conventions
November 1-4. Midwest GameFest. Independence, Missouri.
November 8-11. Gamehole Con. Madison, Wisconsin.
November 9-11. ConQuest Avalon. Sacramento, California.
November 9-11. U-Con. Ann Arbor, Michigan.
November 15-18. Chicago Toy & Game Fair. Chicago, Illinois.
December 27-30. CAP-Con. Atlanta, Georgia.
Visit casualgamerevolution.com for more convention listings.