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

20. For Northwood! A Solo Trick-Taking Game

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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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Catch up on my Top 100 Games (of all Time) 2023 Edition:

100 through 91
90 through 81
80 through 71
70 through 61
60 through 51
50 through 41
40 through 31
30 through 21
20 through 11

Top 100 Games (of all time) 2023 Edition – 10 through 1

10. Detective: A Modern Crime Board Game

Let’s start off with Detective: A Modern Crime Board Game at #10 this year. Detective is deduction game where you and your teammates are trying to solve cases. The base box comes with five cases that take about 2-3 hours each. And you’re up against the clock, in the game, to solve everything and figure out what answers you need as you get quizzed on what happened and the who, what, and why of the case at the end. Plus little details that you might have missed or you can piece together.

This is like a crime television drama. I don’t love watching those, but playing in one is amazing. You actually get to put together deduction skills and piece together what happened. Sometimes it’s easy, and other times it is hard, but it’s always worth it.

And this game does a good job using technology as you play. Part of how you get information is interacting with a computer and a database to pull up details that might already exist on the case. Or it might be details that already exist on people in the case. It really helps make Detective into a great immersive experience.

Buy Detective

9. The Great Split

Next up we have The Great Split, a new game to the list and one that does a single thing well. In The Great Split, it is primarily an “I split, you choose” game. What does that mean? It means that I have a group of cards and I put them into two groups. You pick one of those groups and I get the other one back. Then we both use them for scoring, which is what everyone is doing at the same time. So, I love the simplicity and simultaneous nature of the game play.

Plus the scoring is nice in the game as well as it isn’t too difficult or too easy. What it mainly is, is pushing up on on tracks for artwork, literature, gems, and money. And each of them is going to score in a different way. Some of them score with how well you are doing against a market or against a scoring track. Others score, the gems, with your lowest of the two gem tracks. So it’s figuring out what you want to go for, because that’s not all the scoring.

There is also contracts in the game. Those are on the tracks as well, but you have other tracks that you want to push up on. Because they make the contracts you have, loaning your art pieces out to museums and stuff like that, worth more. But if you’re pushing up on those tracks, you aren’t on the main scoring tracks, so it’s a really good balance. And all of that with very simple rules teach and very simple game play.

Buy The Great Split

8. Floriferous

Now we have Floriferous, a game that has made it’s way higher up on the list from last year. And some of that is what I redid how I thought about the list, some. I now put more stock into the games that I want to play all the time and do play often, as well as the ones that give me a great experience when I play them. Which is why there are fewer campaign games in the Top 10, though, don’t worry, their are still several.

But Floriferous is a drafting game of building up your best bouquet of flowers. But how you draft and how you know what you are scoring is what I love about the game. You lay out the cards to be drafted from at the start of the round. And then players take turns drafting from the first column of cards. Where you draft in that column then determines your drafting order for the next column. It makes for great decisions as decide to take a less ideal card to make sure you get the perfect card next column.

And then there is the scoring. A little of the scoring just exists at the start of the game. Most of what you score you need to draft. So I need to draft a card that says “2 points for all purple flowers”, for example. And I can do that, but the scoring cards are always at the bottom of the column. That means when I take a scoring card I’m going to be going last next round which is a choice, as I said above, that I really love.

Buy Floriferous

7. Planet Unknown

Next up we have Planet Unknown a terraforming, polyomino laying game. And it’s one that is not that hard to teach, if you have the game in front of you. But it does some very cool things, which I’ll get to in a second here. But the game is about filling up your planet with tiles, clearing out meteors that have hit your planet, and building up on various tracks of nature, water, technology, rover mobility, and civilization.

The game is able to be played in two ways. The first way is a simple generic way where everyone has the exact same thing. I think it is a solid system if everyone is learning the game, and you have new to gaming people in there. But once people know the system at all, flip over the boards and the groups going to the planets. That is when the fun begins as everyone is working a little bit differently and has their own ways and timings as they go up the tracks while still playing the same game.

And the one thing I haven’t touched on yet is how you pick your tiles. There is a lazy susan in the middle with all of the tiles on it. And on your turn, you turn the lazy susan to the side you want facing you so you get the tile that you want. It’s a tough decision, and then everyone else takes from the side facing them. Or at least kind of facing them, because they’ll have a marker, placed at the start of the game, that determines where they take from. I love that mechanism as I can get what I want, or I might choose to mess with you.

Late Pledge Planet Unknown

6. Lost Ruins of Arnak

Then we have Lost Ruins of Arnak. And this one I do want to specify that it is a top 10 game for me with the first expansion. The second expansion definitely keeps it up this high as well, but the first one is needed, in my opinion. It takes Lost Ruins of Arnak from a fun game to one of my top games of all time.

So how does it play, and why do I like the expansion so much. Well, at it’s heart, The Lost Ruins of Arnak is a resource management game of going out, collecting resources and turning them in to move up a research track. But there are a number of twists with it as well. Because I also am building up a deck of cards that let me do more actions or power up the actions that I do take. And I love that aspect to it.

So let’s talk about what the expansion adds and why I think Expedition Leaders is very important to the game. In Lost Ruins of Arnak, base game, everyone has the same camp, same workers, and same starting deck of cards. And there are two tracks which you can go up on. It’s fun. But Expedition Leaders says your camp, your cards, how many workers you have, all of that can be unique now. Because you have a leader that makes you unique and I really love that.

Buy The Lost Ruins of Arnak

5. Terraforming Mars: Ares Expedition

Terraforming Mars: Ares Expedition is the next game on the list coming in at #5. And it is one that I haven’t played in probably eight months. I really need to get it back to the the table. But I love this engine building game and another game about terraforming a planet, but this time, I’d say, it’s way more about building up that engine to generate more resources and points.

The game, like I said, is about building up that engine and determining when to activate everything, and when to pick an action to do based off of what you think your opponent is going to do. How does that work? Well, the game has five actions and the actions that are played out by the players that round are the ones that are going to happen.

The actions also fire off in a particular order. So if I pick research it’s action #5, so it’ll go last. Someone else might pick activating actions, and that’s #3, so it goes in that order. Which ever one you pick, you get a special bonus for it, while your opponents get whatever the basic action is (which you do as well). So it’s about trying to not match with your opponents to get more actions done and to figure out what benefits you the most. Of course, if everyone is doing that, well, then no one might pick that one action everyone wants.

Buy Terraforming Mars: Ares Expedition

4. Stars of Akarios

Now we’re onto one of the big campaign games. And you can see game play for this one on Malts and Meeples. Stars of Akarios is a game that I absolutely enjoyed all that I did. Some parts are better than others, but as a whole, I think the game is a ton of fun. It’s a big space adventure that gives me vibes from Enders Game and Space Dandy, two really different things, but it works for this game.

The game is split into three parts, but we’re going to talk about two of them. First part is planetary exploration. This has a 7th Continent type feel to it with flipping over locations and interacting with places. Plus there is a lot of story that you can find as well for the different planets. There are skill checks and things like that, but a lot of it is story and the choices you make in that story unlocks new things that you can do.

The main part of the game is tactical space combat. It’s about using your dice to flank and out maneuver the enemies so that you are in the right spot for a big hit and they can’t hit you back. I adore the puzzle that this game provides in this space combat. It is good enough to just be a game by itself, but the story and the world/universe that is being built in the game is just amazing. I can’t wait to get back to it, and maybe it’ll be a campaign game that I come back to and try and play through solo sometime.

Buy Stars of Akarios

Note the 1.5 version of Stars of Akarios is coming out. There should be a late pledge available soon.

3. Dice Throne

Next up is Dice Throne. I believe that my #2 and #3 flipped spots from last year. Dice Throne is a battling game of taking characters up against each other and rolling dice, Yahtzee style, to deal damage. You get a better roll, like a large straight or all sixes and you get to do more damage.

The game really shines in two areas. The first is how they manage to make all of the characters feel different. I have Marvel Dice Throne pictured here, but in the video I have Dice Throne Season 1 and I figured out coming soon there will be 35 different characters. And all of the characters do feel different. They come with different tokens that change up how they interact with the enemies or how they ramp up to deal more damage themselves.

And then there is the card play in this game. What doesn’t make it just pure dice chucking are these cards. Some of them are upgrades to your attacks that offer better results and more damage when you roll them. Other times, and I’d say most often this, it’s about getting better results on your dice. You don’t want to end up being stuck doing nothing if you try and shoot the moon and go for all sixes. So you keep cards to manipulate the dice. It’s a great system that offers more depth than you’d think from the initial description.

Buy Dice Throne

2. Tainted Grail: Fall of Avalon

Now we have Tainted Grail at #2. This one moved up, I think, because I made it through all three campaigns, wrapping up the third one this year. And all of them offer something unique and fun that is really enjoyable to play. I love how you start in the middle with the first campaign and then the second takes place 500 years later and the first 500 years before it. It offers a lot of interesting storytelling, which the writer really takes advantage of.

The game play is also pretty slick once you get into it. The combat and diplomacy checks are done through card play. And while that is an important part of the game, it’s not too hard to build up something that is powerful enough. Or players with specialize in different areas. One element about the combat that I really like is that you need to pay attention is to the enemies attack. How much damage you deal determines the enemies attack. If you aren’t careful, you’re going to take a lot of damage.

But the game really shines around the exploration and survival aspects of the game. I think it’s best on story mode because the story is so good. But you always need to be keeping track of the menhir that you have lit. Because if they go out, then you start to lose parts of the map as the wyrdness takes over. And that limits where you can explore. And as I said, exploration is the best part of the game. It is a chance to dive into that story. So it’s a balance of story, resource gathering, and then just surviving that makes Tainted Grail work so well.

Buy Tainted Grail

1. Gloomhaven

My #1 hasn’t changed, it’s still Gloomhaven. Though, you can say that it is Gloomhaven, Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion, and Frosthaven all rolled into one. Jaws of the Lion might be a game that I show off here on Malts and Meeples. And I’m now playing through a campaign of Frosthaven.

This is a classic dungeon crawling game where you go into a scenario and need to tactically move around and kill all the bad guys. Or at least that’s the objective in a lot of base Gloomhaven’s scenarios. The other ones offer more variety. But it’s also a game of leveling up your characters, unlocking more abilities, and then eventually retiring and getting a whole new character to play with.

And getting those abilities and playing them out is where the game is amazing. You play out two cards from your hand each turn. They have abilities on the top and bottom. And you’ll activate one of the top abilities and one of the bottom ones. Plus you need to figure out where in initiative that you want to go as well.

And the variety in them and how different the characters are is impressive. It’s like a lot of the games in my Top 10, I like the variable player powers and variability in what you are doing. Gloomhaven and all the following games offer a ton of that. And it’s sad to lose a character to retirement that you’ve spent time with, but exciting to unlock something new. This is just an amazing game that deserves the love it gets.

Buy Gloomhaven

Thanks for Joining Me

Thank you for joining me as I went through all of the games on this list. I really have fun doing this every year. And I hope that you have fun watching along. I appreciate everyone who has been in the chats and watched the videos. It means a lot to me to see that people are enjoying it. Let me know what some of your favorite games are.

Upcoming Streaming

And join me for future upcoming streams. I made a comment that my Monday streams might be changing. We’ll have to see on that, it might just be less often, or it might move to a different night, it depends on some variables as I look at the new year. Right now, though, that it’s changing. I plan on streaming Monday nights at 9 PM Central. I won’t have some on the 25th of December, I will be around next week.

Then on Wednesday, I generally stream a campaign game. I won’t be doing that this upcoming week. And I’ll be missing the following week. But as I start 2024, I plan to stream Rogue Angels. A game that I think will be in my Top 100 starting next year. One of my rules was that I needed to have played a physical copy. And thus far I only have played it digitally. Now I’ll be able to play it in person, which I’m really excited for. So join me for that starting in 2024. And Wednesday streams start at 8 PM Central time.

But the best way, 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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Stars of Akarios

Stars of Akarios is a space adventure game where you are dealing with the fallout from your home planet, or at least your schools planet having been destroyed. You don’t really know why, but as you explore and come across new things, you realize that the stability of your world wasn’t quite as a solid as you expected.

Stars of Akarios is split into three areas. Firstly, and this is the main part of the game, you play tactical space combat. Flying your ships around and dealing with enemies on a hex based board. Then there are two areas of exploration, planetary as you fly around with your main ship to find points of interest in various systems. And planetary exploration where you reveal tiles and interact with points of interest. But it is mainly that tactical space combat.

ISS Vanguard

ISS Vanguard also offers space exploration but at a different level. Humanity has been called out to the stars. In previously thought to be dead DNA with no real reason for it, a secret message was found, some coordinates that led humanity out into deep space. You navigate the stars and explore planets to figure out why humanity was called out there.

ISS Vanguard is also split into multiple parts. Firstly you have planetary exploration as you go down to the planet, interact with points of interest, make discoveries, and possibly fight monsters. Then you play a ship phase as well. In the ship phase you are researching discoveries you’ve found. Using production to improve your ship. Getting new crew ready to go on missions and dealing with situations that arise on your ship. As well as navigate the stars and planets to find new places to explore.

Similarities

The biggest is that they take place in space and are epic space games. Both of them promise a big space story them, and both of them, as far as I’ve played, deliver on that. They provide very different space stories though. Stars of Akarios is much lighter, it reminds me of something like Farscape. ISS Vanguard is more serious in what it’s doing and reminds me of Another Life, a very different type of space show.

Both of them also have different phases or parts of the game that play very differently. Technically both of them will let you travel between other missions. How that is handled is differently. In Stars of Akarios it is very basic resource management. Do you have resources to travel, you can travel. If not, you start taking stress. ISS Vanguard, it is almost and equal phase to the game as a planet. Building up the ISS Vanguard to be able to explore more is an important part of the game.

Differences

There are a lot, I highlighted a number of them in similarities, actually. That is not the right spot to do it, but it makes sense. There are elements that sound similar that play differently. And it’s worth noting those because some of those things might draw you to both, but only one might work for you.

Space Combat

Firstly, Stars of Akarios is built around space combat. When you fly in the stars you most of the time find space combat. It is tactical in nature, and really doesn’t exist at all in ISS Vanguard. ISS Vanguard is one big ship you travel with. And while in Stars of Akarios you pilot the Sparrow between points, you scramble the fighters a lot. So that is a different feature to that game.

Planetary Exploration

Also, planetary exploration is different. Both let you play with that to find story elements. But in ISS Vanguard it is about the new discoveries you find. And it is about managing your resources and dice to make sure you can complete what you need to do. A lot of that involves story and exploring, but done in an Awaken Realms style. I say that as it reminds me of Tainted Grail that way.

Stars of Akarios, it is very different. That is a 7th Continent style exploration where you place out new locations as you move around. The grid allows you to move around it and explore new things. And it offers challenges that just pop up. You get ideas as to what might be coming or is happening on a planet, but less explicit detail about locations.

Tone

I mentioned this already, but I want to talk about tone more. The two games play with different tones. ISS Vanguard is a reverent game as you look to the stars and wonder. The question is, what is out there? When we get beyond our sun and our solar system and even our galaxy, what is out there? That is the question that you try and solve.

Stars of Akarios borrows from so much. And I say borrows because I don’t think it steals. I get the feeling of a lot of sci-fi shows, movies, and stories. To name a few I feel like I see Farscape, Battlestar Galactica, Space Dandy, Enders Game, and more in the bit that I have played. And a mish mash of all of those things is going to feel less cohesive. But it opens itself up for a wide variety of fun moments.

Battle – ISS Vanguard vs Stars of Akarios

So as they both enter the ring we see that they are heavy weights in the campaign space game area. Both offering different fun and exciting moments. And for a lot of people who they want to win is going to come down to your preference in how the games work. Because as much as I compare the two and the two will be compared they are very different experiences.

And for me, it’s a very tight battle. Next week I wrap up 10 different experiences with both games in the span of a year. I see what makes them different and I see what is exciting about both. And in all fairness, neither of them is going to leave my collection because they both are great.

So as we watch them duke it out, the question I ask is which would I want to continue playing solo. My experience with both of the games so far, which do I want to see? I think that answer is Stars of Akarios, which is my winner.

Stars of Akarios for me is an experience that works well solo. The elements of the game are fun to play solo and I like being able to collaborate with myself in the midst of space combat to see how I can work together with my ships. ISS Vanguard is streamlined well for solo, but it’s an experience that I’d love to play with more to see what happens next and to spread out that decision making to experience the full story.

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You can catch up on part 1 here.

ISS Vanguard

Now that we’re done with the first planet we’ve experienced about half the game. I say about half the game, but I do expect the planet exploration is going to be the largest section of the game. We go out and explore and each planet is going to have something different and unique to explore. We might even come back to planets and explore them more quickly a second time.

The other part of the game which I really didn’t get into yet was the ship phase of the game. In the ship phase you do a number of things. Research new technology, travel to new planets, build or get new landers, heal up crew members, or deal with unrest or issues with the crew. It’s an interesting element to the game. It reminds me of how Tainted Grail has resource management in it, but this seems bigger but less punishing.

But that part of the game is going to be less. I play maybe two or three hours on a planet and then 30 to 45 minutes on the ship. That ratio is going to be around there somewhere, but I’m not sure where. I expect that it’ll be a lesser part of my journey though. And while it is impactful, it likely will have less of the overall story for the game.

I like how it is setup though. Instead of needing 10 sheets to keep track of it and marking and erasing everything, it is a book. Not just a book, though, it is a binder with card sleeves and other things in it. So the state is easy to save and you don’t need to worry about erasing through the paper or not getting everything cleared.

Upcoming Streams

So next Wednesday at 8 PM Central time I am going to be playing more ISS Vanguard. That is going to be the game of choice for at least another eight weeks, and it might be longer. There are too many campaign games so I want to get to them as they come in. But if I really am enjoying ISS Vanguard, which I am so far, I might not want to quit.

Then my other streaming day is at 8:30 PM on Monday, again central time. But join me then for random board games, and I might even start to mix in some painting. I have an idea for next week that I want to play Planet Unknown. So expect to see what as next weeks streaming game. It’s one that I have played a few times now and I want to play more and see how it goes solo.

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ISS Vanguard Setup

Let’s talk about the setup for ISS Vanguard. You got to see the finishing touches as I start the stream. But that isn’t all of the setup for this game. In fact, there is a fair amount to go through and get ready. But, like something like Lands of Galzyr, I didn’t find it too bad.

Pregame Setup

The biggest thing you are doing is getting the cards in the right order. So that means that you sort the cards, really sort the chunks of cards, by their type into numerical order. You maybe saw how many “Point of Interest” cards there are, don’t worry, you don’t go through and get them in numerical order. They are already in that, just wrapped in four different packs of sleeves. That is what I mean by sort.

The one negative I will say about sorting everything or getting them to go where they should, is that you are told what order the dividers go in, that’s great. Then you are told what card goes with them, also great. Except, it’s just telling. Some of them are really obvious, unique discovery, I know what is. It says unique discovery on the back. Some of the others you need to flip back and forth from the setup page to this is everything in the box page.

Starting Setup

For the most part, though, it is a very slick setup. And you can make it even slicker by just playing the tutorial. It’s the same planet I start on, same bits of story, same events even. But the difference is certain things, like picking your crew, they don’t happen like I did it. So the game picks for you already, probably ideal really, but not what we are doing. There are more videos walking through the tutorial anyways.

And it’s worth noting that no matter how many times you play ISS Vanguard, the pregame setup still needs to happen. I still pick out the characters I want to play with. So there is always some setup but it’d be much faster subsequent times.

Exploration

And then, next week I expect it to be basically planet exploration. How do I balance my exploring of the planet with completing the objectives. Since we are on the outside of a giant sphere bigger than our solar system, we aren’t coming back tot he same spot. So I want to see what is here, but not at the cost of failing the mission.

Upcoming Streams

Next week I am back to my normal time. That means Wednesday stream will be at 8 PM Central time. You can find the link for that here. The plan is to wrap up exploration if possible. Though, while I suspect I’ll be able to this time. In future streams some of the planetary exploration might take longer to complete. But join me for that and for the ship phase as well as I stream.

And then next Monday, I keep on promising smaller games. I have a couple new roll and writes I could try or other smaller games to get to the table. So that’s going to be the plan, it might even be revisiting a roll and write which I’ve already enjoyed. But I think, and this is just a gut feeling a few days out, I’ll be playing Bargain Basement Bathysphere again.

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How To Play Stars of Akarios

This is a bit tricky, because the game has a lot going on. So I’ll give more of a general overview of the three different aspects of the game. And yes, you do need to know all three of them to play the game, but some of them are easier than others. But before, that a bit of the story or world, you are part of an academy of space cadets just graduating. There is an attack, and now you’re on the run and need to figure out what is going on.

Tactical Combat

The main focus of the game, or most common scenario, is tactical space combat. You as the space cadets are taking your ships out on missions. This might be to explore areas or reach areas on the map, but generally always to fight. Based off of dice that you roll you activate different maneuvers and attacks. Then the enemies activate and do the same thing based off of their AI. So you are doing a space dogfight as you all are trying to get into position to shoot the other ships.

Exploration

The other two parts are exploratory. The first is space exploration where you are on the main ship, the Sparrow, and flying around to different points. This is can lead to finding some random things, but generally you are looking for specific plot points that you know about to progress your story. The other is planetary exploration. It is what it sounds like, exploring planets, dealing with whatever is happening on them, and then possibly coming back when you’ve completed other missions.

All of this is interspersed with story that you read. And then, often times, choices that you make from that story. It might not change which scenario you go to, but how you start that scenario might change.

What Doesn’t Work?

I think that space exploration is just fine. It is the simplest and least story focused part of the game. You might fly into a sector and find an event that happens. Or you might find a side quest and decide to do that. But all of that costs resources that you might not want to be spending. So instead, you just fly to the location you want and call it good.

And this isn’t so much of a negative for me, but something to be aware or, or two things really that might bug others. Firstly, you have minis the enemies have standees. You can buy the ships for the enemies, but that’s an extra cost, so know that going in. And the other thing is that it’s a table hog. When I was playing this I had it set-up below the topper so I could leave it up. It has a solid save system and storage system, but it’s a big game.

What Works?

Mechanics

Firstly the tactical combat is amazing. Each scenario is a different puzzle. I don’t forget which game it was, I think game 6, but that one there were two enemy factions that would fight each other. So I flew off and hid in a corner and they took each other out. I just needed to swoop in for final clean-up duty. Now that isn’t always the case, there are other times I needed to escort the big ship across the board. Or to keep it from getting attacked and destroyed. Missions vary every time and I think they do a good job with that variety.

I also really like the planetary exploration. It gets compared to 7^th Continent which I think is far. You have points of interest you can interact with, and then you can move from different card to different card and explore the map as you go. That section that I’ve seen anyways they’ve played around with it in good ways to make it feel different. The first planet you get to, to learn how to use planets, gives you some really fun and interesting interactions.

Story

And I enjoy the story a lot in this game as well. It’s not the best writing, and it pulls from things. The first planet you go to is obviously playing around with some ideas from movies. But that’s fine because it’s all fun story. And for me that’s what matters more than having perfect writing. I also like that it isn’t a grim and dark world. Yeah, lots of bad things happen, but unlike Tainted Grail the whole world isn’t bleak.

Ease of Play

Finally, I think the mechanics of the game are easy to learn. Again, you mainly do mechanical things in tactical combat. But all of that is easy to do and a lot of fun. It uses a modifier deck like Gloomhaven does. It has you rolling dice to assign to actions. There is some randomness to what you can do. But not too much randomness and you can always do something, or take some stress and reroll for a better result. Plus while there is luck on the roll and flip, you can then plan out everything otherwise. So can sit down and figure out your optimized combination to get into a flanking position, for example.

Who Is This For?

Gamers who like campaign games. I think that this one has a little bit of something for everyone. It really is one that I’d love to get to the table in a group, but I have no idea of when I could do that. It is maybe one that depending on how much space Lands of Galzyr takes up, I might set-up on the other end of my gaming table. But that’s not really relevant right now. It’s a big campaign game. If you don’t like big campaign games, I don’t think this one will change your mind. If you do, I think you’ll enjoy it.

Now, I do think that there is probably going to be an element that you might not like as well. Maybe the story could be too cliché. Or the space exploration just is very boring. Whatever it might be, I don’t think it’ll be the major part of the game, the tactical space combat. So if that element sounds interesting, I think the game will work better for you.

Final Thoughts

I really love this game. If you didn’t know that already, it is in my Top 10 games of all time. I think that the mechanics are just fun to play with. I don’t really mind any part of it. Like I said, I do think that the space exploration is a bit more boring. But it is also the smallest part of the three main parts of the game. So to me that is a minor issue at best.

And I really do enjoy the story. Which I think is one of the very fun parts of the game. It has a space opera feel to it but also I get bits of comedy in the game and so much more. I don’t know why, but I get of bit of Ender’s Game, Space Dandy, The Thing, and more thrown into this game. And I like that mish-mash of everything.

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

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The Game – Stars of Akarios

I think as I wrap it up I should talk about who this game is for. Because Stars of Akarios, like any campaign game is going to be a big ask for a lot of gamers. So instead of picking a group I think this will work for, I want to ask a few different questions about how you game.

Do You Want A Long Game?

This one is fairly obvious. I am 9 scenarios in, and I’m playing solo. I think the amount of time I’ve played is about 9 hours, probably a little bit less. And I say 9 scenarios, it is more than that because some of it is just reading and making a decision. But as I said on the video I was on page 37 of 197. Do you want to play something that long?

Do You Want A Game That Does A Lot Of Things?

I think this is the biggest question, and it’s also why I made sure I played as far as I did. The game has three parts. Exploring space, exploring planets, and space combat. Now space combat is the most common of them, but you do all of them, and all are important to the game. The space exploration can maybe be fast forwarded, but planet exploration and space combat are key. Do both of those interest you?

What Level of Writing Do You Expect?

Now, this is going to come down to taste, and what you expect from writing. I compare it to a game like Tainted Grail, and Stars of Akarios’s writing is just okay. I compared it to most literature, and it is not great. But, for me, the story in the game is fun, and I want to know what happens next. For me, that works as leading into the next bit of story and adventure that the game promises. But listening to what I read, did it make sense to you?

Do You Want a Directed Story?

Finally, with the story, how open a story do you want? Stars of Akarios is a game that gives you a lot of choice. Without spending much time on one of the planets, I found a couple of directions I could have gone. For some people, that is going to be great, and for me it works really well. I make a decision, and I get to see where that story goes. It means that next time I play it, I can make another and see what happens. For others, they feel like they miss out on story and want to do everything, so want it more directed.

Overall, I do think you need to be prepared for this game. Mainly in that this is a massive campaign and lifestyle game as you play it. And that is not a knock on the game, but knowing that it’s that big, you need to decide if it is for you. It is for me, but just because of that doesn’t mean that it’ll be for everyone.

Upcoming Streams

Next Monday is the continuation of my Top 100 Games (of all time) 2022 Edition. I am going to be going through games 60 through 51, getting to that mid point of the list. Here is a link to the upcoming video. If you want to catch it live, click that notification bell.

And coming up next Wednesday, I don’t know what I’ll be streaming. I think I have two different options, firstly, Chronicles of Drunagor is sitting on the shelf waiting to be unboxed and played. I could dive into a game of that, or do some smaller solo games. For those I have games like Set a Watch, Black Sonata, and Final Girl that I could get to the table as well.

Let me know what you want me to stream next? I am leaning towards Chronicles of Drunagor, if I have time to learn the rules but if not, what small solo game would you want to see?

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Stars of Akarios Tactical Combat

Thus far we haven’t experienced some of the game, mainly the space exploration has been limited and we haven’t gone down to a planet yet. What we’ve really learned is how space combat works and how to blow up the enemy ships, so let’s talk a little bit about the space combat.

Mainly because the space combat offers a lot of interesting tactical choices. Both with how you activate everything, when you use stress and supplies for that bigger hit. And so much of it is about how you fly around. The hardest part of the puzzle is to get your ships positioned correctly. I want to just rush up and get in their face and blast them. That is what you do in a lot of games.

But for Stars of Akarios you really want to get behind your opponent. That allows you to flip two cards and really decreases the chances you will miss. And at the same time, you want to position yourself so you won’t have ships flying up behind you. The enemy also gets advantage if they get behind you, so you can just fly into an area and not think about what could happen.

Upcoming Streams

On Monday, my plan is going to be streaming a roll and write game. I picked up Trek 12, so my hope is to get that one to the table. Though, Long Shot the Dice Game, Super Skill Pinball 4-Cade, Isle of Cats: Explore and Draw, and Cartographers are all on the short list as well. Same with Sagrada if I don’t want to do a roll and write game.

Then on Wednesday, at 8 PM this time, I will be streaming more Stars of Akarios. I believe that I have one more space mission to get through and then it’ll be to a planet. One question I have for people watching, do you want to see the whole campaign? From what I can tell this is a huge game, you don’t play every scenario but there are a lot. I’d like to get through the prologue at least, but ideally further into the story than that. Let me know how far you’d like to see?

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Top 10 Campaign Games

10 – Marvel Champions: The Mad Titan’s Shadow

I had to put one of the campaign boxes onto this list for Marvel Champions. There are a number of them, a Spider-Man one, a Red Skull one, Guardians of the Galaxy, soon to be Mutants as well. But I went with The Mad Titan’s Shadow just because that box feels the most epic. And I can take anyone into that one and it makes sense thematically.

I’ve heard that these are lighter campaigns which is not a bad thing. It means that I could and maybe will, set it up sometime and just play it over a few evenings. And you know I’m going to be running Thor up against them, or maybe Doctor Strange. There are enough characters know that it might actually be a tricky decision.

9 – Massive Darkness 2

I picked this one up because it did have a campaign. And I want to get it to the table, at least for scenarios fairly soon. I like that you level up a lot in this game, and the minis are cool, the classes are cool, the weapons are cool.

Plus, this is also a lighter game. You don’t need to know nearly as much how to play it as some of the other games on the list. That means that even if I don’t play it as a campaign soon, it’s probably one I can sit down and knock out a scenario with some friends easily in an evening.

8 – Reichbusters: Projekt Vril

One that I also need to sort some more, which is why I haven’t played it yet. Reichbusters came out with an errata pack for improved card wording and rules. But because that was coming, I waited on playing it. Now I own it and, well, I need to sort the cards in.

This is going to be a game of sneaking into enemy base and trying to stop their experiments. Think kind of Howling Commandos vs Hydra, if I were to take it over to Marvel. There are crazy experiments going on, and monsters you need to fight. But every mission has an objective and if you’re too noisy, well, things are going to go sideways for you fast and you’ll get swarmed. So it’s not a guns blazing game, which I think sounds interesting.

7 – Betrayal Legacy

I did put a few legacy games on the list. Legacy games are campaign games too, and it surprised me a little bit, but the one at the bottom of that is Betrayal Legacy. I love Betrayal at House on the Hill, even with it’s wonky scenarios and problems with sometimes the traitor being too strong, sometimes the other characters. And I want to see what the legacy one has to offer.

I am really curious about the legacy aspect of it. You play as a family versus a character coming back generation after generation. I want to know how that plays out in the game. I think it could offer some cool game options and ways to progress and tell a bit story.

6 – Descent: Legends of the Dark

Moving back to just a campaign game, we have Descent: Legends of the Dark from Fantasy Flight Games. This is going to be their Descent, but not third edition, game, of exploring tiles, fighting monsters, and interacting on the map.

Like a lot of bigger Fantasy Flight games in recent history, Mansions of Madness, Journeys in Middle-Earth, and Star Wars: Imperial Assault, there is an app piece. I like it for this game, it was a bit much in Journeys in Middle-Earth, but in Descent it offers some fog of war. It is in that category of games like Massive Darkness 2 for me. It looks like a blast to play as a fun dice chucking game.

5 – Folklore: The Affliction

Now moving into another bigger game, and I think the top 5, with the exception of the legacy ones, are the heaviest of the campaign games that I own, at least right now. Of course there are more coming in. But Folklore: The Affliction is going to be a game that borrows a lot from pen and paper RPG’s. You roll more than a standard six sided die. And that is intriguing to me.

Plus, I like that it’s a darker setting. I don’t need all my fantasy to be grim and dark, but sometimes that is what I want. And since I always am the Dungeon Master for D&D, I believe that it’ll give me that RPG feel without me needing to be in charge of everything. Though, if I paly it solo, I will be, but I’ll be doing the same thing as the players.

4 – Aeon’s End: Legacy of Gravehold

Another Legacy game and this one just came in from Indie Boards & Cards. I played through the first Aeon’s End Legacy on stream. And I had a blast with that game. Plus, just in general I really like Aeon’s End, so much so that I keep on backing and tracking down everything for it.

Legacy of Gravehold is going to be another legacy campaign. Where I knew a little bit of the campaign for the original Aeon’s End Legacy, I know nothing about the story this time. I just know that the box is bigger and heavier. That probably means more cards, but I’m hoping for more story as well.

3 – Clank! Legacy

And the other legacy game is Clank! Legacy. This one is higher for me just because I want to play it with some friends. I love the Acquisitions Inc theme on it as their game play is hilarious. And I suspect that the humor in the game will be great as well. Plus, I like the system that it is built upon. I prefer Clank! In! Space! to Clank I think, but the legacy version with the fantasy theme, I’m still there for it.

This is a deck building push your luck game. You are going into it trying to complete missions and get treasures. And it’s competitive in that you are trying to be the best so that you can end up with the franchise within Acquisitions Inc. I have to imagine that the whole of the story is going to be goofy, and it sounds like there is a lot to unlock so that is exciting as well.

2 -Middara: Unintentional Malum

A huge box with two more huge boxes on the way. I give that as my excuse for not getting it to the table sooner, I want Acts II and III to show up as well. But really, it’s just such a table hog and such a big game, I am not sure that I want to play it solo, but I really do want to play it.

Middara has more of an anime style to it’s game look. The artwork, and from what I can tell, the world building and story look fairly anime. It is going to be a leveling up, dice chunking, monster fighting, dungeon crawling game. And I think it’s going to be one that I find to be a lot of fun to get to the table and play. But like I said, I suspect the game would work best with four players, or two players controlling two characters each.

1 – Stars of Akarios

Call me cult of the new if you want, and it’d be fair in this case. But I am excited to plays Stars of Akarios. This is a big space exploration and adventure game. What really intrigues me is how it is split into two parts. There is that space exploration and then you can be down on an planet as well. That is intriguing.

It also looks like it uses a combination of cards for modifying your attacks and things but also uses dice. And just the production quality on the game is great. While it is a big game, compared to some of the others, it looks like it should be easier to play solo. And I want to get it to the table and play it on Malts and Meeples.

Final Thoughts

I say this almost any time I talk about a campaign game. And I feel like I can redo this list in different ways pretty often. But I have a lot of them coming in. 15 more campaign games in fact, which is a lot. Now some can be played as more of a one off situation such as Primal: The Awakening. Otherwise might be smaller sit down and play a campaign of it in a sitting, Spire’s End: Hildegard. But most of them are going to be much much bigger than that.

Just to show everything that is coming, and there is a lot, in alphabetical order, we have:

1. The 7th Citadel
2. Arydia: The Paths We Dare Tread
3. Chronicles of Drunagor
4. Divinus
5. Ehterfields
6. Frosthaven
7. HEL: The Last Saga
8. ISS Vanguard
9. Mythwind
10. Oathsworn: Into the Deepwood
11. Primal: The Awakening
12. Sleeping Gods: Distant Skies
13. Spire’s End: Hildegard
14. Valor & Villainy: Lludwik’s Labyrinth
15. Vampire: The Masquerade – Chapters

What campaign games do you own, if any, that you want to get played?

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Pros

• Existing Game
• Cooperative
• Variety
• Components
• Aesthetic

Cons

• Variety
• Price Point

The Page

It helps when it’s an existing company and an existing product to make a good page. And Orange Nebula does a very good job of showing off what they have. And it helps with it as well because they have a lot of reviews to put up on the page. I’ll add some in the game section below as well.

Plus, Orange Nebula is very good at their design. The aesthetic of the game is sharp and the artwork is very good. It reminds me a bit, and even in the game, of TIME Stories. The game might have a lot going on with it and components, but the aesthetic is clean.

However, this game has big components to it. And it is a table hog. Not only is it a table hog, it feels like some of the components are big for the sake of being big so it fits into the box. Mainly, there is one board that BoardGameCo talks about where it’s two tracks and that’s in a large tray. Is that the best use of space and money. Could that be combine with something else to make it a better use of everything?

The Game

So this is a survival and exploration space game. But it’s not something like ISS Vanguard where the whole thing is a huge mission. Like I said, this game gives me some TIME Stories vibes. Each box is it’s own separate planet and separate mission that you can go on. But there are three missions per planet which makes it more replayable. And you win or lose and you don’t get the retry in the same way as TIME Stories.

But that means that this game is a framework that teaches you how to explore and do the basics of the game. Each planet is going to have it’s own rules for specific things. And that might be a more challenging part of the game play for some people. While the basics are the same, you’re going to need to spend time to learn how to play a new planet before you play it. They have a challenge level and that’s not how hard it is per se, it’s more the complexity around rule bending, so how much you need to learn to play it.

But back to the game, this is a cooperative survival game. And I think think that’s the biggest thing to know. You’ll be assigning dice to take actions. And you will be exploring the world and the story that is happening. But you can’t just explore, you need to figure out how to survive the planet. And I like that it isn’t as heavy a narrative game. It makes it feel different than other games because of that.

Back Or Brick

For me, this is a Back. I almost backed it the first time that it was on Kickstarter because the theme is one that I like. I feel like that was about the same time that ISS Vanguard was on Gamefound or I knew that was coming up there. So I passed on it, and then it came out and I started seeing reviews about it and I knew I wanted to track it down. Thankfully it came back to Kickstarter so I could get it all now. All nine planets will be coming into my collection.

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

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