Side Room Games | Nerdologists https://nerdologists.com Where to jump in on board games, anime, books, and movies as a Nerd Wed, 12 Nov 2025 16:46:16 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 https://nerdologists.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/nerdologists-favicon.png Side Room Games | Nerdologists https://nerdologists.com 32 32 Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition – 20 through 11 https://nerdologists.com/2025/11/top-100-games-of-all-time-2025-edition-20-through-11/ https://nerdologists.com/2025/11/top-100-games-of-all-time-2025-edition-20-through-11/#respond Wed, 12 Nov 2025 16:07:30 +0000 https://nerdologists.com/?p=9886 What games are on the penultimate list of my Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition? Join me for 20 through 11.

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Today the list is will finish. Join me on Malts and Meeples over on YouTube to watch that. But let’s catch up and see what games just miss out on the Top 10 of the Top 100 Games. These are all amazing games and just looking at the list, there are a ton that I want to get played right now. So don’t look at these are games that are lacking, but more amazing games that you can try.

Top 100 Games (of all time) – 20 through 11

20. For Northwood! A Solo Trick-Taking Game

For Northwood
Image Source: Side Room Games

Published By: Side Room Games
Designer: Wilhelm Su

Buy For Northwood!

A solo trick-taking game seems like it shouldn’t work. But For Northwood! works really well. It’s a simple trick taker, you need to follow suit if you can. But the twist is that you need to win a specific number of tricks each time. You play over eight rounds and need to win between 0 and 7 tricks, exactly. That sounds impossible, but you get powers that help you manipulate your hand. It’s always a question of, which one do you go for, in terms of tricks to win, and as you get further along, can get manipulate your hand to make it work.

19. Marvel Champions: The Card Game

Marvel Champions
Image Source: Fantasy Flight Games

Published By: Fantasy Flight Games
Designers: Michael Boggs, Nate French, and Caleb Grace

Buy Marvel Champions

I love Marvel and this is the game that gives me the Marvel feel to it. You are a superhero and you want to stop the bad guys scheme and defeat them. But, thematically, when you are in your hero form the bad guy is going to fight you and you take damage. So you need to manage going between your superhero and alter ego form so you don’t get hit. Of course as your alter ego, the villains are going to be scheming away. And you can create all sorts of fun combinations of heroes and villains to face off.

18. Floriferous

Floriferous
Image Source: Pencil First Games

Published By: Pencil First Games
Designers: Eduardo Baraf and Steve Finn

Buy Floriferous

This game is one that I think is really overlooked in the gaming community. It’s a clever drafting game that does two very interesting things. The first thing is how scoring works. You don’t have much scoring that just happens, instead you draft your scoring cards. So there is always a choice between, do I draft more flowers or do I draft scoring cards. The other is how the drafting works, and this it maybe a bigger twist. You draft from a column, how high you are in the column determines when you draft next round. So it’s very possible you want to draft a less ideal card to get a perfect card.

17. Stars of Akarios

Stars of Akarios
Image Source: OOMM Board Games

Published By: OOMM (Open Owl Studios)
Designers: Brendan McCaskell, Jonathan Thwaites

Buy Stars of Akarios

I love my big campaign games, and Stars of Akarios is one of my favorites. This one works so well for me with the tactical space combat, the planetary exploration, and a story that doesn’t take itself too seriously. The tactical space combat really shines in the game as you use your dice to position your ship, attack, and avoid the enemies the best you can. And the exploration is a bit like The 7th Continent/Citadel where you flip over cards and create a map and really explore as you go.

16. Clank!: Catacombs

Clank! Catacombs
Image Source: Dire Wolf

Published By: Dire Wolf
Designer: Paul Dennen

Buy Clank! Catacombs

While i just did sell all of my other Clanks, this Clank! Catacombs spot is for all of them. Clank! is a push your luck game where you build up a deck of cards to get into a catacombs, in this case, and get out with the most points and best treasure that you can. Of course, if you are too noisy doing that, you clank, and when the enemy activates it might knock down your health. So it’s this push your luck in making noise, and going deeper. I like, too, with Clank! Catacombs, the map gets built as you go, so the board really is different every time.

15. Roll Player Adventures

Roll Player Adventure
Image Source: Thunderworks Games

Published By: Thunderworks Games
Designers: Keith Matejka, James William Ryan, and Peter Andrew Ryan

Buy Roll Player Adventures

Another big campaign game here with Roll Player Adventures. This one is all about dice manipulation and a fun story. I had a great time playing through the first campaign, and the additional one that I have, I need to get to the table. The system works well, though I will say, with four players it becomes a bit easier than at lower player counts. But the simple map movement, the story, the skill checks and of course combat and leveling up make this a fun time.

14. The Fellowship of the Ring: Trick-Taking Game

Fellowship of the Ring Trick-Taking Game
Image Source: Office Dog

Published By: Office Dog
Designer: Bryan Bommueller

Buy The Fellowship of the Ring Trick-Taking Game

I like trick-taking games. Not a ton make it to my Top 100 games mainly because a lot feel similar. The Fellowship of the Ring: Trick-Taking Game is one that is different. Yes, it leans into a lot of standard things, but it’s also cooperative and story based. There are other cooperative ones out there, but the story based feels unique. Especially because this closely follows the books, so you get to chapters with Goldberry and Tom Bombadil as required characters which is fun. And the cooperative elements are challenging for the game.

13. Pirates of Maracaibo

Pirates of Maracaibo
Image Source: dlp games

Published By: dlp games
Designers: Ralph Bienert, Ryan Hendrickson, and Alexander Pfister

Buy Pirates of Maracaibo

The second of three new games on this part of the lit in a row. Pirates of Maracaibo is a pirate resource management game. I normally would want it to have more adventure, but this one is a ton of fun. I love building up my ship and seeing what strategy of building up ship, getting treasure, exploring, and competing quests can lead to victory. And it is great because all of them feel good to do. It isn’t a game where I feel like I need to go one way, though, I think some ways are more consistent.

12. Mistborn: The Deckbuilding Game

Mistborn Deckbuilding Game
Image Source: Brotherwise Games

Published By: Brotherwise Games
Designer: John D. Clair

By Mistborn The Deck Building Game

Another deckbuilding game on the list here with Mistborn. And I like Mistborn just a bit better than Clank! because of a little more pure deck building. But also it has a lot of fun elements to the game. It leans into Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn world and let’s you burn metals to play cards. I also like the turn track, you always bump up in power as you go up the track. This makes for a really great experience of feeling like the game is ramping up.

11. Sleeping Gods

Sleeping Gods
Image Source: Red Raven Games

Published By: Red Raven Games
Designer: Ryan Laukat

Buy Sleeping Gods

The final game on the list is another big one, though not a campaign game. Sleeping Gods is a sand box story game where you are dropped into an unknown world and need to find and deal with totems. Of course, it’s a new land, so you don’t know where those are. And there are monsters and other interesting things to deal with. You need to control 9 crew, but really, it’s one turn and you just need to remember a few key abilities as you play. So it sounds like a lot, either cooperative or solo, but it’s not too bad.

Join Next Week

Just as a reminder, I am streaming new videos most Wednesdays. Let me know what you want to see me play next on Wednesdays after this list is done. You can subscribe to the channel and click notify to know whenever a new video comes out. Currently I am playing through Legendary Kingdoms on Monday and then my wife and I are playing Baldur’s Gate 3 on Fridays. So join us for those videos.

And thank you for checking out the video and articles. Let me know what your favorite game from this chunk of 10 is and which one you would love to get played.

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Top 100 Games 2025 Edition – 90 through 81 https://nerdologists.com/2025/09/top-100-games-2025-edition-90-through-81/ https://nerdologists.com/2025/09/top-100-games-2025-edition-90-through-81/#comments Thu, 18 Sep 2025 15:57:58 +0000 https://nerdologists.com/?p=9818 What games have made it into my Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition? This week we are looking at games 90 through 81.

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Last night it was time for the next ten in my Top 100 Games of all time. Which games made it onto the list for the first time and which ones were back again? Join me every Wednesday over on Malts and Meeples YouTube channel for the next 10. And you can catch up on my Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition below. Now let’s see which games made it to my Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition 90 through 81.

Catch Up on the Top 100 Games

100 through 91

Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition – 90 through 81

90. Wandering Towers

Wandering Towers
Image Source: Capstone Games

Published By: Capstone Games
Designers: Michael Kiesling and Wolfgang Kramer

Buy Wandering Towers.

This is just a fun simple game of trying to remember where you wizards are hiding and get them to the main tower. I like how easy it is to make it work. You play out two cards and if you have potion bottles filled you can cast a spell. The spells are simple, the cards are simple, you choose to either move a wizard or a tower as far as it says on the card. But it’s still a lot of fun because of that memory aspect and burying your opponents wizards under a stack of towers.

89. Grove: 9 care solitaire game

Grove
Image Source: Side Room Games

Published By: Side Room Games
Designer: Mark Tuck

Buy Grove.

This one is two games in one really with Grove and Orchard. I put them together because the games are very similar, though I do slightly prefer Grove. In this game you stack cards to get matching tree types to overlap. As they overlap you tick up dice that are going to give you more points. The more points you have at the end of nine cards, the better you do at the game. Grove adds in scoring cards, and that addition is what pushes it over because it’s bonus scoring, but also how many points you need to beat to win the game.

88. Via Magica

Via Magica
Image Source: Hurrican

Published By: Hurrican
Designer: Paolo Mori

Buy Via Magica.

It is weird to think that drawing chips out of bag and everyone getting a cube to add to their spells, basically bingo, can make a fun game. But it is great in Via Magica. This is a simple game with powers that you get from completing spells. It’s one of two games that actually has abilities or powers from completing spells on this section of the top 10. But it’s all about drawing those chips and hoping to get the right ones. Or then being smart about the spells you take so you can always use the chips.

87. No Thanks!

No Thanks
Image Source: AMIGO

Published By: AMIGO
Designer: Thorsten Gimmier

Buy No Thanks!

This section of the list has a few push your luck games on it. No Thanks! isn’t a tradition push your luck game, but it does have those elements. In particular, you need to decide when it is worth taking a card. Cards are bad, cards give you points, so you want to say no thanks to them. But you need chips to do that, so No Thanks! is a game about determining when there are enough chips on a card to make it worth taking. Because, not only a chips needed for saying no thanks, they are also negative one point per chip at the end of the round.

86. Strike

Strike
Image Source: Ravensburger

Published By: Ravensburger
Designer: Dieter Nuble

Buy Strike.

Imagine a gladiatorial battle in the Coliseum. Actually don’t, this game is all about rolling dice to get pairs and knowing when to stop if you don’t get pairs. You just want to be the last one in the game and that’s it. It’s a simple game and simple system but it is always fun when it hits the table. I think everyone just likes to make a decision to roll a fist full of dice. And if you don’t get any matches, you can always roll more dice that you held back, but beware the one because when a die lands on that side, that die is gone forever.

85. Marvel United

Marvel United
Image Source: CMON

Published By: CMON and Spin Master
Designers: Andrea Chiarvesio and Eric M. Lang

Buy Marvel United Multiverse Core Box.

Do you want to team-up as Marvel heroes to defeat villains in a fast and easy game? Marvel United is great for that. You pick your hero, the villain to go up against, and a few locations and you are ready to play. This game is all about managing what the villain is doing, and they do some fun stuff, and then chaining off of what your superhero teammates did, because you use the last card played, to have a great turn. This is a great game to teach people cooperative game play because you can really cooperate. And there is so much for it.

84. Homebrewers

Homebrewers
Image Source: Board Game Geek

Published By: Greater Than Games
Designers: Matthew O’Malley and Ben Rosset

Buy Homebrewers.

I like brewing beer, I did it for a long time. I’m not sure it’s hobby I’m going to return to. But I can still get my beer brewing fix with Homebrewers. This is about brewing the best beers you can. You brew a beer and you go up on a track, then you need to deal with the spent grains, sanitize, get more grains and brew again. All of that is like homebrewining.

But then the game offers different ingredients you add to your brewing. And these cards stick around between brews. So if you brew a porter with almonds, you now always will. And those ingredients give you brew something special that might be more money, or it might be that you move up on another beer. At the end, you just want to be the best homebrewer out there.

83. Chronicles of Drunagor: Age of Darkness

Chronicles of Drunagor
Image Source: Creative Games Studio

Published By: Creative Games Studio
Designer: Eurico Cunha Neta

Buy Chronicles of Drunagor.

I love my big campaign games. And Chronicles of Drunagor is no expection. It is just lower on the list because one of them has to be and it is one that I haven’t played a ton of. There is so much in the game, but I highlight three things in the video. I want to highlight one here, the activation system. You use different colored cubes to activate abilities of those colors. But when you run out of cubes or need a specific ability, you need to pull back those cubes. Then you cover up a spot so you can’t use it. It’s a unique system that I find a lot of fun.

82. PUSH

Push
Image Source: Ravensburger

Published By: Ravensburger
Designers: Prospero Hall and Brian Kirk

Buy Push Here.

I like simple push your luck games, and PUSH is my favorite of them. This one is just push your luck, but as compared to other simple push your luck games, this one offers just a few choices. Mainly you create three stacks of cards on your turn. But those stacks can’t have the same color or number in a single stack, aka you can’t have two blue cards in a stack. Well, that is easy enough, you could stop early. If you do that, then other players could push their luck for more points. And then there is the die, if you have the roll the die, you might lose cards. It’s all about balancing that risk for points.

81. Potion Explosion

Potion Explosion
Image Source: Horrible Guild

Published By: Horrible Guild
Designers: Stefano Castelli, Andrea Crespi, and Lorezno Silva

Buy Potion Explosion Here.

If you want a game that feels like app game, Potion Explosion definitely meets that need. It is one of those games where if like colors are touching they explode, or in this case, you get them. And it’s all about chaining together colors of marbles the best you can, and then you use them to complete spells. And those spells give you points that you need to win the game, but they also give you one time abilities that you can use to chain together more marbles and complete more spells. This game is just tactile and fun.

Join Next Week

Just as a reminder, I am streaming my Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition every Wednesday night at 9 PM Central Time. The next few videos have their links up, so you can click notify on them to know when I go live. Or you can subscribe to the channel and click notify to know whenever a new video comes out. Currently I am playing through Legendary Kingdoms on Monday and then my wife and I are playing Baldur’s Gate 3 on Fridays. So join us for those videos.

And thank you for checking out the video and articles. Let me know what your favorite game from this chunk of 10 is and which one you would love to get played.

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Message me on X at @TheScando
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Table Top Takes: For Northwood! https://nerdologists.com/2023/05/table-top-takes-for-northwood/ https://nerdologists.com/2023/05/table-top-takes-for-northwood/#respond Mon, 22 May 2023 11:48:27 +0000 https://nerdologists.com/?p=8016 Does For Northwood from Side Room Games live up to the promise of a trick taking game and a solo game all in one tiny box?

The post Table Top Takes: For Northwood! first appeared on Nerdologists.]]>
Let’s take a look at a game that I played solo not that long ago on Malts and Meeples. I’ll add the video below. But For Northwood! A Solo Trick-Taking Game offers something that is unique. Trick-taking, if you aren’t familiar is when you are trying to win or lose a series of cards played. Generally one being the “trump” suit that can beat any other suit, but you need to play the same suit. It’s a bit confusing without examples, so watch the video and read how you play For Northwood! below.

How To Play For Northwood!

Like I said, For Northwood! is a trick-taking game but a solo one. Let’s start a bit with setup for the game, though before we go into play too much. In For Northwood you are trying to win the favor of some animal royalty at 8 different locations. These locations are from 0 to 7. Plus you have some friendly creatures already to help you.

Each round consists of visiting one of these locations, fiefs, and trying to win a certain number of tricks. You guessed it, from 0 to 7 depending on which one you are at. The royalty flips a card and then you need to follow suit, if you can, and you are looking to get the exact number of tricks won by playing the highest number. Or if you are out of that suit, with a trump card.

However, the royalty is just flipping cards. That means that you get random cards to play against in your trick-taking. So that is where your four friendly creatures come in. They all have a power that you can use once per fief to manipulate your hand or the cards being flipped. So it is also the question of how you use them to get the number you need.

What Doesn’t Work

I have one main thing that doesn’t really even bother me, but it might bother some. This game has luck to it. Even with using the helpers, and you can try and get specific helpers in play in some situations, it is tricky. You don’t plan it right and now you know that you’re done for in a hand. There’s no reason not to stop playing that hand then, but it’s so limited that it could be frustrating.

What Works

Let’s talk, though about what works. Because I think there are a lot of good things going for it. Firstly, I really like the creature royalty. It’s a mainly random setup, you have one helper from each suit and two fiefs with each suit. But beyond that how they come up is random. You might have the most useful card to help get 0 tricks on the 0 trick fief. So it’s always a puzzle as to how you make it work. And that is also always going to be a rotating puzzle.

The speed of the game works as well. It’s really fast to play. Longer than some solo games, I will say, but still a very fast time, about 15 minutes, box says 20. But when you know what you’re doing, it’s probably under 20 minutes with setup which is great.

The solo experience also works. It’s trick-taking which is generally not solo. But this works for that. You need to plan out which fief you go to based off of how you can win tricks in your hand. Then it’s more of what I’d call a card shedding game. But it is done in a trick-taking fashion which is great. And it’s like some other solo games, solo hidden movement, where I wasn’t sure how it would work, but it works very well.

Finally, the game is simple. The most complex things are on the royalty cards. I’ve played a number of trick-taking games where they try and add in too much. That bogs down how easy the game is to teach and how fast the game goes. This game knows what it is, sticks to it, and it’s great that way .

Who Is It For?

Who this if for, is fairly simple. It is a game for people who like solo games. Will people who like trick-taking games like this one? Possibly, but I do think that it’s a game that is more built for solo gamers in terms of who is a fan of a style of game. The trick-taking is a smart card shedding style, but it lacks some of the nuances that trick-taking games often show off.

Final Grade on For Northwood

I like this game a lot. And I need to dive into the story book or challenge aspect of the game. That basically gives you specific setups to see if you or how it takes you to beat the game. That is going to add even more variability to the game which will be nice as I see this as a solo game I am going to play a lot.

I also see why it won’t be for some. If you love trick-taking games but haven’t done solo, it might be a good spot to jump in. But if you have tried solo games and don’t love them, then I don’t know that this will change anything for you. Which I get, solo gaming isn’t for everyone.

Overall, this game offers something and it does it well. And for me, that is what I was looking for. So for me, one that I highly recommend if you like solo games. And one that I kind of recommend if you really like trick-taking games and kind of like solo games.

My Grade: A
Gamer Grade: B+
Casual Grade: B

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For Northwood! – Game Play https://nerdologists.com/2023/05/for-northwood-game-play/ https://nerdologists.com/2023/05/for-northwood-game-play/#respond Tue, 09 May 2023 11:37:47 +0000 https://nerdologists.com/?p=7991 Join me for a solo trick taking experience in For Northwood! from Side Room Games over on Malts and Meeples YouTube.

The post For Northwood! – Game Play first appeared on Nerdologists.]]>
It’s another small solo game from Side Room Games, this time For Northwood! a trick taking game. Side Room Games has also helped put out Grove and Orchard, but For Northwood! is a very different game. And the idea of a solo trick taking game is an interesting one. How does this game work, and why might be something that you want to check out. I will say, I mess up the rules at the start, but I fix it fairly quickly in the video. And I’m still slightly under the weather.

For Northwood!

This, like I said is a solo trick-taking game. You try and use your hand of cards as you visit various fiefs to win the favor of the royalty there. It’s a pretty simple system, but not that easy a game to beat, which is what I’m looking for in a solo game.

The interesting thing is that each fief has a target. So for one it might be that you want to win 7 tricks, another is that you want to win 0, that’s the range. But to win at that fief you need to hit that number exactly. That’s the rule that I missed as I tried to get going quickly. But it offers a very big challenge and while you can plan out trick taking, that by itself would just offer a whole lot of luck.

But you always have helpers. Either from the leaders of the fiefs you’ve won the hand at, or from four characters in front of you that you start with. So that offers an interesting variability to the game. You can see me try and use them more in the last game of the two that I played. It’s really about trying use those abilities to setup your hand or get rid of cards in order to able to get that right number of tricks.

The game itself isn’t too long either. I feel like once I was into the swing of the second game I could move along quite quickly. Compared to Grove and Orchard which also come in that size, or slightly smaller boxes, it is slower. But for a solo game, it works well because it’s not too much room and the game play isn’t too long so it works nicely as a filler.

Upcoming Streams

Next Monday I’ll be streaming another solo game. To be determined as to what that game is going to be. I have a new solo train game that I need to learn the rules to. I was hoping to do that before yesterday’s stream but I ran out of time. So that or Skytear Horde might be the game that I look to play. Either way start time is around 8:30 PM Central.

And then next Wednesday, it is down to the planet in ISS Vanguard again. You can click the notification bell for the stream here. That is at 8 PM Central like normal. Join me for some more planetary exploration and maybe a ship phase as well as we’ll see how long we stick on the planet.

And if you want to know when I go live or a new video goes up (it’s basically always live), please consider subscribing. You can do that here. And click that notification bell on the channel and you’ll always know when I go live.

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TableTopTakes: Grove by Side Room Games https://nerdologists.com/2023/01/tabletoptakes-grove-by-side-room-games/ https://nerdologists.com/2023/01/tabletoptakes-grove-by-side-room-games/#comments Mon, 30 Jan 2023 12:45:05 +0000 https://nerdologists.com/?p=7733 Grove from Side Room Games builds upon their previous game Orchard, is Grove a step up in complexity in a good or bad way?

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Using the Orchard setup of nine cards, Grove promised a twist on that, however slight it might be. And I’ve played Orchard a lot, over 500 times in the past few years. So I really like Orchard, but will Grove from Side Room Games pass it up? Or does it even do enough different?

How To Play Grove?

Grove can be played in two different ways, so let’s talk about the basic way first. Grove is a 9 card game with an 18 card deck. You use half of the cards and you are trying to layer cards so that you match like trees. When you layer cards you bump up the value of the tree being scored in that spot by one. So if I layer a lemon tree with one lemon and a lemon tree with two lemons, I place a die with the three face up. Then if I layer again with a two lemon, I go up to five. The goal is to get the highest total possible.

However, Grove offers two things to not make a match. Firstly, you can layer glades over anything. So empty spots on a card. Over a tree of some time, you can do that and now put another tree down there. Or over a die, you can do that, the die stays, and you can grow that tree type again. Or there is a squirrel, it allows you to break a match completely, say oranges onto a lemon, but it kills that spot. And that spot as well as any adjacent scores -1 point.

Then you just add up the pips on the dice and that is your score. How you score doesn’t change with challenge mode, but challenge mode changes what you target to score.

Grove Components
Image Source; Board Game Geek – @Herald Selenay

Challenge Mode

The other way to play the game is a challenge mode. On the backs of each card is a scoring challenge. So you pick two out of the deck of unused cards at random and you try and score those. That can vary from two times the score of oranges, or have all the limes in play, or get three lemons next to each other.

Each challenge gives you points as well as has a specific point total on the card. So maybe you get two times your orange score and get three lemons or any fruit next to each other. The double your oranges is 44 points and the three fruit adjacent is, let’s say, 28, so you’d need to score 72 points to win the game.

What Doesn’t Work?

The challenges are hard, and while they tried to balance it, I think that sometimes you just flip a challenge card, especially like get all 15 dice into play, and that’s not worth it. It’s a lot of effort, you keep the score of the dice you have in play low, and you don’t get enough points to offset the low dice or the target score. Now, being hard isn’t the issue here, it is the balance.

The other question is how long does the game play work? Especially the base game, I don’t know that it is better than Orchard. If you are just looking at layering cards, I think that Orchard offers the same puzzle, without the glades and squirrel, just rotten apples, that creates a more interesting game play.

What Works?

Grove Game Play
Image Source: Board Game Geek – @Herald Selenay

Like Orchard, the game play is very fast for Grove. I have played it over 100 times in the month of January, I’ll probably play it over 400 times throughout the year. Why, I use it as a palate cleanse when I have a few minutes between meetings at work. Or over lunch as I want to keep my brain engaged and busy, but I don’t want to work through lunch. And it doesn’t take up much room.

I also really enjoy the challenges. Yes, some of them I feel like are less balanced. But my negative of how long the game play will stay interesting is really taken care of by the challenges. It gives you that extra puzzle to work towards. Yes, some might not be worth trying to score, but depending on the cards you get, it might be. It really depends and I think that it works really well for the game.

Who Is It For?

This is for the solo gamer or the gamer who is looking for that palate cleansing game. I use it after a long day or like I said at work between meetings. It is the same area that I use Orchard for. And I have two copies of Orchard, one for work and one for home, and I’ll likely do the same with Grove. But if you are like me and like small solo games, Orchard is going to be a good option.

Final Thoughts on Grove

Grove, I was worried when I backed it on Kickstarter. My concern were the challenges, was it going to make the game too complex. How was scoring going to work and would it take a simple experience and drive the complexity up. What works so well with Orchard is how clean and simple it is. Grove, in all fairness, does make you think more, especially with the challenges.

But the challenges don’t add in complexity to the game. It makes some choices harder, but the game is still as simple to get the table. And I really appreciate the twist now on the game. Like I said, if I play base game, I will play Orchard. It offers more satisfying game play for me, but with the challenges, Grove offers more puzzle to it than Orchard.

My Grade: A-
Gamer Grade: A-
Casual Grade: B-

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Crowdfunding Futures https://nerdologists.com/2021/10/crowdfunding-futures/ https://nerdologists.com/2021/10/crowdfunding-futures/#respond Tue, 12 Oct 2021 14:59:32 +0000 https://nerdologists.com/?p=6225 Crowdfunding board games never stops, what upcoming campaigns have my attention for the month of October?

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Welcome to the Kickstarter and Gamefound stock market. If you’re into board games you probably know about both of them already, at least in name even if you don’t spend too much time on them like I do. But this going to be a new article that I do once, maybe twice a month. Probably twice a month to talk about the crowdfunding games that I know of that will be coming out in the next few weeks or maybe ones without a date that I’m seeing that interest me.

The Focus of Crowdfunding Futures

Like I said this is meant to allow you to know about what is coming out. It isn’t going to be a breakdown of a Kickstarter or Gamefound like my Back or Brick articles are. Instead this is going to be touching a little bit on what I know about the campaigns. Also why I am looking at the campaigns.

I won’t be covering all of the Kickstarters coming out. If you want lists of what all might be showing up in the next month there are some great YouTube channels that cover that.

BoardGameCo

Tantrum House

Liege of Games

Maybe I’ll eventually get to the point where I cover crowdfunding as much as I do, but now I want to highlight the stuff that I’m interested in and that might not be only games that you expect.

Marvel Dice Throne

No surprise here, I was stoked when this was announced. You can read my news article on it here. Dice Throne is a competitive head to head, vs or team based battling game. But it’s mainly meant to be head to head. In it you upgrade your characters characters, roll dice, and deal damage. Marvel Dice Throne takes the base game and with all new characters and abilities gives it a Marvel twist.

What to Expect In This Campaign

Going off of what Roxley has done before, I think it’s safe to assume to that there will be eight total characters. The first two seasons had eight characters each, though season one initially launched with six. This is also a game that you’ll be able to get after that fact at retail. The bonus to backing on the Kickstarter will be that they do swirly dice that are better looking than the normal ones. It isn’t a major thing.

You are probably looking at about $80 for the big box version of it. You might have the option to just pledge for a duel box or two as well. With shipping you are looking probably over $110 or so, which in my opinion is reasonable. The game has a lot of replay value and combinations for fighting. Also the quality of Roxley games is extremely high with Game Trayz and very nice dice.

Lords of Ragnarok

This one you’ll be able to find over on Gamefound, and if it sounds interesting I highly recommend checking it out here. The reason you’ll want to check it out is that Gamefound campaigns tend to give you a bonus for signing up to get notified. In this case that’s going to be a free $8 hero expansion if you back the game.

Lords of Ragnarok is going to be a reworking and improvement of the Lords of Hellas systems. The main concepts remain the same but it should streamline and focus more on the aspects that people really liked. It’s a game where everyone has different things they can do better but you are pivoting and becoming more unique as time goes on.

Lords of Ragnarok
Image Source: Awaken Realms

What to Expect In This Campaign

This is Awaken Realms, this is going to be a big campaign. And it’s going to be a campaign where it could be very expensive. I do appreciate that Awaken Realms tends to keep the base price pretty reasonable, but if you want it Sun Drop painted it’ll cost you a pretty penny, and it does look nice. Also be aware that there will likely be two wave shipping. If you select one save you’ll get it with that second wave which means waiting longer.

But expect a lot from this campaign. Awaken Realms games always have a lot of things in them, and it’s great. There will be lots of stretch goals and add-ons and mostly the add-ons will be cosmetic, which is really nice. Generally they’ll do an all in game play bundle which will save you a little when all is said and done.

Grove

A completely different game from Side Room Games. It’s not a big company, but that’s fine because they don’t make big games. However, Side Room Games makes my most played game of this year, Orchard. This is going to be another small solo game, which, I am hoping, is as simple to play as Orchard and maybe even uses similar mechanics, but puts a twist on it. Out of these three games the one I know the least about.

What to Expect in this Campaign

This is going to be by far the cheapest of all of them. They are saying that this game is going to cost $15, which makes it pretty easy for me to want to back it. Now, with shipping I expect $20-25 total because of container costs but it’ll still be cheap.

Honestly, beyond that I don’t expect much from this campaign. I’m not sure what was done for Orchard, if there were any exclusives, and I’m fine if there aren’t. This is going to be coming to Kickstarter, so no sign-up bonus. But if I just get the game and can help support the company that is what I care about more than getting all sorts of fancy things on a smaller Kickstarter.

What Upcoming Crowdfunding Are You Looking Forward To?

There are going to be more bigger ones coming this year. I know that Slay the Spire might even still be hitting this year, it is just in the process of being refined and playtested even more. It’s one that I’m going to be very curious to see what that game is like.

Are any of these three ones that you will be backing?

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Back or Brick: Elements of the Gods https://nerdologists.com/2020/11/back-or-brick-elements-of-the-gods/ https://nerdologists.com/2020/11/back-or-brick-elements-of-the-gods/#respond Wed, 25 Nov 2020 14:13:17 +0000 http://nerdologists.com/?p=4998 Will you be able to outmaneuver your rival gods and get your worshippers in this area influence game? Pros Looks amazing with the minis and

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Will you be able to outmaneuver your rival gods and get your worshippers in this area influence game?

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/sideroomgames/elements-of-the-gods?ref=profile_saved_projects_live

Pros

  • Looks amazing with the minis and the map
  • Elements make sense in what they do
  • Price
  • Established company
  • Solo Play

Cons

  • Abstract in nature
  • Confrontational

The Page

I’m going to start out by saying my normal thing, this page looks good. An established company like Side Room Games should know how to run a Kickstarter, and they don’t disappoint. And I think they also know what makes a solid looking Kickstarter as well. They have what is generally a pretty abstract game, and they created minis for it, for the elements for the monuments for the gods, and while they didn’t go overboard and make them not functional, they did a good job of giving this game some bling, which Kickstarter games generally need.

I also want to call out that while you don’t know how to play from the first two paragraphs, they do a good job of giving you the tone of the game. You have an idea of what might be happening in the game, and sometimes even after reading through the rules section of the Kickstarter page I won’t understand that. And with that said, I didn’t have have to scroll down 70% of the page to find the rest of the rules, they give them to you early, and you have a how to play video you can checkout as well.

The Game

I think that the game itself looks interesting. They do a good job of highlighting the game play, which I like, and the fact that it can be played solo is always interesting to me. However, I wonder a little bit about the solo play on this, they do have a playthrough I can checkout. This game seems like it’ll be better with a higher player count.

For me I get a little bit of a Fae vibe, though this does seem quite different, but just with manipulating things and the idea of worshippers, like I said, I don’t think this is super accurate comparison. But the aesthetic gives me a similar vibe.

Back or Brick

For me, I want to say that this one is a back, but just with Kickstarters and holidays, I don’t think that I will actually back it for financial reasons. I hope that I can pick it up later, because I think this is the type of game that I’d really like a lot. It seems like it’d have both strategy and tactics, which I find to be a good combination in a game. And the look of it is very nice. The one thing that worries about this plan is that it is a KS exclusive, which I believe that there other games might have been as well, so there only might be limited stock later. I do see that they have a retailer pledge, so fingers crossed my FLGS will be getting some copies.

How about for you, is this game a back or a brick?

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