Top 10 Game Surprises of 2022

[Music] thank you [Music] welcome back to today's Tower winter spectacular I'm Tom vassell I'm Mike delicio I'm Chris Yates I'm Z Garcia all right before we get started in today's big top 10 here with the top 10 surprises of 2022. I want to do some thank you to some of our Kickstarter backers we want to say thank you to Daniel Weitzman Joshua wrathkamp David Thomas Kevin burkhards Meyer Lee Cheeseman DJ Dole Paul O'Shea Courtney Wilson Sean B Roberts Borger Hernandez Gonzalez and Kurt Evans alrighty well so as we do our top tens every year there are so many games that I love to talk about and to that end I make a top ten and then I make another top ten my next top ten but this is different than that these are my biggest surprises over the course of the Year pleasant surprises we don't we normally as we do the dice tower winter spectacular we don't want to like really sit there and go these are the biggest disappointments of the year because I don't have enough time to put to do number one Mike delicio or whatever oh they could do like this list already has a lot of uh trauma for me so let's really why because there's going to be 55 furnace jokes in the in the chat if there haven't been already there were two so far they've been two yeah there you go there you go there were half a dozen in the last stream too you go I made a mistake I'm fallible okay kinda Florida foilable all right so um for this list we did pick games that are not in our top ten right so it is possible that one of our top 10 games and for me at least one of them was like oh wow this surprised me but it was also so good at top 10. yes these don't make the top 10 but these are all very pleasant surprises this was my number one in this list I instantly knew what it was actually I knew my top two instantly um other than that though I was going through a list I was like yes I wasn't expecting much out of that gate where I didn't know what to expect right right did you rank these from number one as the most surprising I did that's what I agree with yeah yes it's like wow I really like this game and it kind of came out of nowhere for me yeah we're gonna have at least one three-way crossover and possibly more two three I don't think so I doubt it very highly I'm gonna say there are two three-way Crossovers and one shows up on five lists multiple choice for fairness again there we go we don't have a People's Choice on this right oh I'm sorry I was thinking about it still do it that's all right Tom you can still do it nah my mic is lower all right well we'll fix we'll we'll make sure I'm not on mute again I'm not right this time no all right because you're yelling okay I'll stop why are you yelling okay calm down relax Tom all right we don't want to get blather too much about this year let's get started blather blather blather ing blatherskites Mike blah blah blah my number 10 is a game that it it surprised me in that when I saw the cover and kind of heard a description for it I thought okay this is going to be a cute kind of a kids game it it felt like a kid game for little children that don't know how to play real games no I'm just kidding I just expected a different experience to what I got which is a almost mid-weight Euro game my number 10 is first rat um I was really taken aback because you know you look at the cover and even you see the board and the components you're like okay this is going to be you know a light Breezy and it has elements to that it's not rules heavy at all which I appreciate it's pretty streamlined in his rule set but this is very much a Euro game that you could play with you know people that play more heavy games you can play it with people that play some lighter games I think excuse you know more to heavy than it does to light quite honestly and you know really impressive design I was very happy with it I enjoyed the game quite a bit but the surprise was this is one of those games I feel like the what you see the cover the Aesthetics kind of belie the experience you know what I mean it's a different experience than at least I was expecting and so that's why it showed up on my surprise list it's a very good game it's in the top half of the games I played this year for sure but I was mostly surprised because you see the theme you see the art You're Expecting I was expecting one thing and I got something quite a bit different very good first wrap my number that's like glowing praise it's in my top half just oh I agree with you Mike that this it seems to me this year was a uh kind of like an indie critical darling it's not indie it's not like if we're necessarily from a particularly small company I'm just saying one of those under the radar unexpected yeah surprise kinds of games for a lot of people I think right because this kept getting played at conventions of hours and all that and again the general reaction was oh wow not what I thought this would be right there's more game here than I thought you know I avoided it like a like a plagued rat okay I refuse you haven't played it I have not played it I will not play it okay I don't play games with rats you don't play games for children no little thank you children I won games about serious things well then give us a serious game here all right fine my number is about important oxygen and and plants giving us the oxygen we need for the living and the breathing and the whatnot my number 10 is planted Oh I thought you were going with something different okay no that's coming up later okay whatever he's thinking about it comes a big difference coming up later uh plans it here is again it was one of those kind of mass marketing games we got it here at Target it was a follow-up somewhat I mean not really but it was the second game that Phil Walker Harding and buffalo who you know was putting this out of Target had done together the first one was that camping one summer camp summer summer camp which was neat we were all like oh wow this is cool okay nice then this comes along it's very light drafting game but the components was a big part of the surprise no kidding you know where this came out and it was I don't know 29.99 or something so fairly affordable about what you'd expect to get for one of these Target only games the components were insanely cool screen printed bits wooden drops that were these neat plastic things a little plastic uh Sunshine tokens artwork insane artwork just gorgeous looking game the little baggies which were completely unnecessary but the components live in these little baggies uh drawstring things yeah it just sort of again if you told me oh yeah this was a Kickstarter and they unlocked a couple of stretch goals here and be like yeah okay I believe all of that and yet this was available for 29.99 I think think back five years to Target exclusive games right no the the level of design Improvement that was a bad year for Z five years ago right well yeah exactly 2017 garbage it's amazing I mean it really is amazing the the level of games that you can get at big box stores now you know what I mean it really is it's huge yeah that's a really good pick I like doing a lot also a game for children yeah again what's yours is that a Vitality game my number 10 is a game for children it's called oath swarm oh and by four children I mean uh takes up more mass and weight than most averages also a 30 game fun fact yeah yeah about 30 per Mission some so this is a big old Adventure game this is just huge uh it comes in four boxes up to if you get the full Kickstarter of all in pledge which when I saw you carry that in I thought I'm out there's no way I'm gonna like this there's no way I'm going to help him carry this in that is actually what I said yes this is not my back's going out because a Kickstarter yeah mostly you can send the medical bill to Kickstarter I think it's actually a reasonable thing I I like this one though there's a very smart game where you have two different phases of adventuring and storytelling in one part and then a really great boss battler in the second uh and I don't know I I have a tendency to look at big games like this and think probably big dumb game this is not this is big dumb smart game you know it's it's it's so solid it's so fun and uh and yeah it allows me to have enough fun to kind of look past the fact that it comes in so much stuff and it comes in a non-over-the-top deluxe version as well and that's something I would actually pull out and play this has been such a Love Fest this game at the dice tower I need to play this oh you haven't played I haven't played this one yeah everyone seems to love it I need to replay it honestly because it's been a long time but um yeah I'm surprised that it that so many people with such different tastes liked it I was not in the live play of it no that was before I got it was before we played it like way back in the day yeah maybe if I want to do as a catch-up palooza sometime all right my number 10 is one of the more divisive games in the dice tower because I know some people here did not like it I liked it I liked every game this company does but this one looked different and I didn't know what to expect and it's a very different game what they normally do and that's Nightfall oh interesting games normally makes big grandios near and far above and below and of course sleeping Gods the big giant one Nightfall you looked at it it's not that's a cool cover but the the board doesn't fascinating it's a smaller game than that cover would make it yeah there you go that's the whole game you're looking at there basically and it's also a a well there's multiple ways to play it but there's a team versus team which is why I like playing the best and I just wasn't expecting something so quick fast down and dirty like it's just not what Lockett normally makes at all well it's not his design but I mean he was involved in it sure but he was involved with developing and it's just not okay it's not the games his company makes right exactly yeah and I just I really enjoyed it and again the opinions here widely vary on this I know you're not a huge fan I barely remember it yeah well okay I remember your opinion of it you did not like it that's why I believe you because I don't remember it that well and I don't think Camille didn't like it Roy liked it um and yeah different people like different things I don't remember what you thought about it I haven't tried it he was playing I want to say it was seven maybe were you surprised yeah I liked it were you surprised by it because it's a non-locket design or I was surprised to buy it just was a very different game than I was expecting got it okay um that that's my surprise on this one not necessarily I thought it was bad but I also wasn't as excited about it because like oh it's not Ryan Lockett first of all sure and B when I saw it I was like oh night falls it sounds like a cool name also a great Batman book great Batman Ark yeah um but um when I then I saw it I was like and I read the rules and even reading the rules didn't get me excited but playing I was like this was really fun I really enjoyed it okay so Nightfall [Music] thank you my number nine is on here because it has helped contribute to me taking an introspective look at myself sitting myself down in a corner looking at a mirror and going Mike delicio are we getting serious here you used to say that you don't like hidden movement games very much oh I know what this one is last year one of my favorite games of the year mind management came out now my favorite hit movement game you're now like this genre not far behind it likely because of designs like my number nine which is Sniper Elite um I really again bounced off of most hidden movement games I've played up until the last couple of years I liked White Chapel I thought that was a fine game Furia Dracula didn't do it for me uh there were two or three others the the grandfather it's for little children Tom um it's fine it's fine but it's you know it didn't really stick it wasn't something I was like oh yeah let's play this so I used to say yeah I'm not really into that you know and so I've come to find that it depends on the design and this is a really really smart hidden movement one versus many game I remember playing the Prototype or not not maybe not prototype an early version with you and we had such a good experience and then the production copy came out and we played that and it was great you know so um this is a surprise because it is making me reevaluate I need to be careful about making these blanket statements so that I don't like a particular genre maybe I just haven't come across the right ones yet this is a really good one and uh now I feel less compelled to say I'm again I feel like this can't be as general you dislike when you like those games that much that's I agree that's what I'm saying it's making me I won't say that anymore I just there are certain is a liar well sure if you want to go in that direction Tom I also went to the corner and looked in the mirror and I saw Mike delicio because I'm a vampire but no I I was really close to putting this one was he about to kill you from behind yes the big old wooden stake he's a sniper no I I really like this one Mike you know it was very close to making my surprise list too nice hmm my number nine is um marble dice throme now I'm not a I played a little bit of dice throne in the past yeah that's right before Marvel came out but a little bit I wasn't super into it yeah for one thing the theme was not something that interested me which was like Gunslinger versus ninja or something and I'm like that seems really stupid I don't I'm not interested but you've always loved anachronistic stuff right smash up and that big one that they tried to remember they don't like anachronism the game and no but that's like I mean that's uh because you don't like that game right it's a game so tiny and random but you've always enjoyed that idea and I really don't I'm not a big fan of that generally but when they made and when they announced this and they made this I I thought the yard work was fantastic and I the thing that surprised me more than anything was how these characters feel like my idea of who these characters are this idea of oh uh Black Panther has that suit that charges up and then he explodes they got that in the game vibranium baby vibranium baby I I like the feeling of it lokia you just saw up there again that idea of he's tricking you he's always tricking you you can never Corner him you can never catch him they really nailed that feeling and again these are original designs not re-skins of the Gunslinger or the ninja or whatever and I thought that was really well made so this one kind of came out of nowhere I figured I like Marvel but the combination between dice throne and Marvel I was not expecting to be to enjoy as much as I did this ended up like I'm not interested pretty much in any other dice Throne thing but Marvel Dice Throne every time Z brings at it now he'll be like I'm playing Loki I'll be like I'm the Gunslinger yeah you said you like it deal with it I remember Z was very reluctant to play this Marvel dinosaurs for the first time oh all right let me play this piece of trash he was visibly ill physically ill says too much marble too much marble there's too much Marvel right now that is that is uh the uh General consensus one sixth of the list so far is Marvel that's correct good choice that's a good choice for all the other Marvel games that came out this year it's happening all right there we go not quickly checking my list okay I can say that go ahead my number nine also is a big overproduced game like my number 10 a little bit I mean overproduced of course being a broad generality here uh this is one that Mike turned me on to this year uh it's called burn cycle oh your list your surprise list surprised me sir okay this is the first time we've talked about bird cycle on this channel isn't it no it's him it was my top games I think it was my number five solo game I don't watch that stuff but yeah well you know get on board only Mike watches those movies wow all right wow no burn cycle is a really cool game from Chip Theory games it's Cooperative you have a little bit of this kind of um cyber hacking theme type going on but you're also like busting through this office building that is made up these nice nice neat neoprene mats and stuff it produced you know to chip Theory levels great uh but what it does that the other chip Theory games have not done so far is it strips out a lot of the complexities like the key words and the and the difficult rules to remember I haven't played this one a ton I think that it would go up higher in my estimation the more I play it it could even be you know potentially top of the year but it really surprised me that when we played it was very clean it was easy to manage and run there are a lot of different things going on different aspects of the game but they're all very fun they're all working towards this very cool puzzle of you know getting through the full floor getting to the next floor or whatever but I never felt like I'd sit there and say okay hold on what is explain this card text right explain this stuff to me and if I can have a game like that that has those chip Theory you know levels of of uh design and production development I'm really excited about that good call this surprised me yeah that's good I know it's a ship of your game for children is what it says baby's first child I will say that picture of it made it look fairly complex it's not easy no no none of their games are simple but it's it's I think on the lower specifically because of what Chris mentioned they cut the key terms down dramatically like that's been most of the complexity I think in their games it's like okay let me consult my eight and a half by eleven key terms chart you don't have that here so yeah yeah I liked a lot a genre that I'm getting sick of at this point in time is fill in a grid and then score off that grid can confirm he won't shut up about it that's true I talk about this a lot because there's a lot of games that are doing this nowadays yes the most recent one verdant is actually one of those games but there was a little game that came out another thing that I'm sick and tired of is train games that combine these two but that this little filler really was it's one of those games that feels heavier than it is and that's Village it finally caught on when you said that yeah well this is when I had very few people talking about have you played Village Green I have not okay it's like an iteration of that okay well I did not know that yeah but yeah but Village Green is from uh so is this Osprey they're both are no no but isn't Village Green from a different designer yeah I think that's pure Sylvester yeah pure Sylvester yeah and they kind of Dodge grand me I played it with you yeah I don't expect you to remember my face it's got a similar Vibe where you're putting cards in a grid and yeah okay anyway actually this is play a lot different than villagers because what this is is you're making little tracks that are going to end they all start on the top or the left okay and then they're going to go to the right or bottom based on how you play the card like Village Green right it's not like about train at all because the trains might go around but you're also collecting scoring cards and putting them on those tracks it's really a fairly deep game but offers only a few small choices it's it's that rare game that feels heavier than it is it's easy to understand but but I played this with you all know that in our game group we have the high level eurogamers who they play the high level stuff no not like they make Chris look like a child yeah they like this game that blew my mind really okay okay so I was I was pleased by that I think this is a neat game that is kind of it picks that same old boring train thing that a lot of people are like they're over by now but I think it's pretty solid that's worth checking out Village rails I haven't played that one but I I probably should yeah but I figured I would like that one yeah yeah okay [Music] all right well my number eight is a game that was a surprise there you're killing it I took like a quarter of a second pause before YouTube just jumped on me like wild Jackal you have no time here I know what it is while Serengeti you're right what no my number eight uh is not a surprise because it turned out to be a good game because I've liked other games by this designer before um but it was a surprise in that when I saw it on the table and you recommended Mike I think you would like this game you think you should try it I was intimidated it was the entire table was just filled with stuff and I'm like man this is you're telling me it's not going to be heavy you're telling me the turns go quickly you're telling me that it's a civilization themed game that plays much more quickly Jose my number eight is Mosaic yeah yeah this fulfilled all the promises that you you know for once Tom you didn't lie to my face um and and so I saw it and I was intimidated you did the rules and I kept waiting for more rules and you're like no let's go this is it and I'm like wow okay I get it like right away I didn't feel like you needed to keep explaining things throughout the game I loved the fact that it was a civilization themed game where there was some interaction but it's not the type of interaction of spend five turns to build something up oh I'm playing this card to destroy your stuff I hate that they didn't really have that here um I like the fact that there's a lot of times in a a wealth of stuff you're getting all kinds of of resources and it's like getting stuff yeah it really it's a game that makes you feel like you are producing your building and it also more than probably any other civilization themed game I've played other than maybe tapestry does not focus so much on area control and area majority it's a part of the game are you sure though scoring is pretty strong with that I get I never felt I'll tell you what I never felt freaked out about oh gosh I'm it was it was something I didn't have to be consumed by I guess whereas in a lot of Civilization games I can't do a lot of things I want to do because I'm worried that Chris or Wendy or somebody's going to get into my stuff I didn't feel that way here maybe it's just a perception maybe you know uh but but that's the way it felt to me and so it was a very positive experience it was a big grandiose looking game that was not overwhelming in its rule set I really enjoyed it so Mosaic okay I approve of that choice good choice my number eight is also a Civ game okay it's it's very small compared to Mosaic and it is a tiny epic uh uh tiling um no it is a game called first Empires first Empires is technically about you know civilizations my big surprise here was well a couple of things okay this is the follow-up the second game from sand castle games after president thank you which is a game I adore so I was a little apprehensive there for that sophomore sophomore slump so I wasn't sure what to expect this is from a designer whose last game Katara I didn't really dig that much and his games tend to be he is a lot uh like Pierre Sylvester in which his games feel minimalistic often in my opinion to the game's detriment like you you streamline the two you flicked too hard darn it that's how I feel about uh you know every uh vogels games but this one worked for me I thought what was there driving the system was enough mechanically it's really really simple was enough mechanically to give me some interesting stuff yeah this felt like like a little days of Wonder game I don't know how else to put it you know it's a good way to put the fact that it looks like a days of Wonder game because this is the same Artist as their old school artist that doesn't you know obviously helps that comparison but yeah I thought the the dice driven idea of it the way everything worked the having to balance I'm really good at movement but I don't have a lot of troops I have a lot of troops but they're not very mobile yeah or I can easily control areas but I don't have a lot of special cards all of that that makes that that little you know combination there works really well yeah it's not a revolutionary game it was not mind-blowing and I know that some of the people around here in the office thought it was just okay I don't adore it yeah but I was surprised by how neat it was considering how small it was yeah I thought it was just okay but I thought there were some smart decisions especially one similar to what I was saying with Mosaic where even if you your guys on the boards or your troops on the board they're not going to get wiped off right they're going to get maybe moved around so you're kind of like racing for objectives more than anything I agree on that yeah so well it surprised me but a different way no I was expecting this to be a better game top 10 disappointments oh yeah I don't I don't ever expect the sophomore slope I expect uh Terminator 2 every time I heard Avatar the way of water is terrible I don't know folks it's no Teen Wolf too at all I'm sorry that's right there you go first Empire too it's Jason Bateman yeah all right all right my number uh we're on eight my number eight I had a lot of hesitation going into this one and I think it's fair too from a company that has a pretty bad track record wasn't out of that yet it uh is a very anachronistic kind of theme you want to punch Genghis Khan until he helps you take down an ar-14 or uh um you know an F-14 you know you want to time travel and take all these different military pieces and make them fight each other okay what one of the designers first time designer is a member of a heavy metal band my number eight is a battle through history oh my word and then we'll move on so this is uh this there's a I guess this company that does this line of games based on different heavy metal bands when I heard that Sabaton was coming out with one a band that I really adore because all of their all of their albums are here's our world war one album right it's a concept album talks about all these different battles and all these different you know important figures in history it's like a history lesson in a in a CD and then they'll do one on Genghis Khan they'll do one on you know the um the winged hussars of Poland yeah they are just a fantastic nerdy historical band one and they're gonna make a game and I thought oh I'm simultaneously added and very nervous especially after we told you about the first game they made oh they made like a powerful game they made a couple of others a lot of one power wolf what is power wolf they're this band I'm gonna explain the entire baxton that's a band called powerwolf you could look them up online I I made that mistake I hate their music so very much yeah you don't like heavy metal anyway so this game is like a deck building game War game where you're fighting both stuff on the board in order to recruit it so then you can have better Warriors to go fight more stuff you can fight each other I thought oh no it has a really neat little system three tiers of you know ranged mid-range and then melee combat you go through the whole step it's actually a competent game and fun it's not amazing but it's confidence soundtrack all right okay I enjoyed this one it's not fantastic but good enough of a surprise to make it on this list I wonder where this is going to end up on your list it's not about this what do you mean that first one was such a bad game Chris is Chris is not enough he's close I have high respect for Chris's no he Chris is very like some trash but you know like he likes it's uh no I just can't I'm principle music-wise he talking about I don't know why it's the whole thing is dumb I need to hear some of this music no the whole thing just bothers me I don't know why okay all right I'm gonna play it uh while Tom attempts no we're gonna put the speaker right against my mic here we go I don't really have a good reason why this is it was better than I thought because it looked almost too minimalistic when I first saw that Jen kind of was like man looks okay um and that is the sequel to photosynthesis not really but Evergreen I thought this was a game you were talking about when you talked about planted oh okay interesting yeah because this cover is like doesn't really do anything it makes me think the Magic School Bus was like just through you don't like that color really that covers iggdrasil the life tree you would know that if you listen to Sabaton yeah there's a whole album about uh foliage which I have never pronounced that way before yeah you put oil you put a few extra syllables in there yeah that was a Tom Bass this is the most competent forledge I've ever seen so anyway again this shot here like the game looks better in person than this this shot does not make it look particularly good but it doesn't look that much better I like the game a lot actually though I was when I heard it was a sequel to photosynthesis and it's not really it's a little bit I don't know spiritual successor a spiritual successor it's the same designer though and I had kind of fallen off his photosynthesis pretty hard like me too I'm not as enjoying it so I was like I don't know this one is so much more fun to me it really is mostly because the other players are not messing me up although I think this game is a very very clever end game scoring mechanism where everyone's taking a card and the card that's not taken will affect endgame scoring and that the other games have done that but I always like that I think it's a neat idea yeah I agree with you this one just came together in a really good package that I was surprised I enjoyed it so Evergreen also does a band it's never clear [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] all right my number seven is a surprise for a couple of reasons number one is that it's a two player only game and I don't tend to enjoy those very often I don't play them very often that's one player too many says that's correct um and the second reason is is that it is a two-player version of a previously existing game that I thought absolutely did not need a two-player only version which one is this is what it is no my number seven is to start with the team blender duel the game that tokaido duo was was you know iterated from is this very Zen you know much much better multiplayer I I don't really choose to play tokaido as a two-player game which I guess because it's not very good which is why this was needed I guess but I Splendor definitely has a two-player game no it's the same as three as a four and four right but it's also a good two-player game I'm just debating that whether the Splinter should have made mindless because anyway that two-player I made my own argument invalid but but I would but when I first heard this I did I did say really why do we need tokaido Duo just right it didn't make sense when I heard it I thought this is probably how first of all I'm still thinking that so persuade me it is a it's a really good two-player game um it it still maintains enough of the feel of tokaido while being very much its own game and it is a very good two-player game and it does a couple of things that I think are unique it has multiple winning conditions which I've always I always like that especially in a two-player game where you can't focus on one thing that you have to be conscious of what the other player is doing because they can be rushing you know ahead in money or they could be rushing ahead in a set collection type of a thing and you are each controlling three different characters you're rolling three dice those dice represent each of the three characters you choose uh one the second player chooses one so you're active on everyone's turn and then you choose that third die and I like that mechanism in a two-player game which is so different from So Different yeah it makes it right it's again it's very much its own game but if you've played tokaido you're going to be like oh yeah okay I can see the the the connections the Thematic connections even some of the mechanical mostly through set collection um but it's a really good two-player game and again if anyone was interested in playing tokaido if they like the theme if they like the the idea of it but you want to play a two-player now you've got a real viable option because tokaido at 2 is not very good so I guess why why did I think it exists that's not a good you're right that wasn't a great thing to be surprised about but opposite of what you said I'm aware hey Mike I have a question for you how do you feel about hidden movement games I hate them I'm gonna go stand in that corner and look in a mirror for a while okay my number whatever it was seven is tokaido Duo this I don't think has been widely available I actually picked it up at Essen but I'll be interested to see what people think when it becomes more widely available I did like the geometry in the game I thought that was interesting sort of overlapping geometry yes of the way things move yeah someone moves on the outside now Tom's in yes geometry okay my number uh seven has to do with the Pythagorean theorem no tell me more yes you're in no it's a party game that really kind of again came out of nowhere surprised me I thought it looked cool but I was like ah you know usually party games the more sort of overdone or themed they are they start to lose something because there's too many steps too much like garbage that gets in the way I just want an obvious obvious straightforward party game this is Phantom ink and I thought Phantom Inc both retained a very specific theme this idea of communing with a spirit or whatever to get a clue so it retained that sort of High concept idea which again I think party games usually when they go too high concept they lose me along the way with minutia with stuff that just gets in the way I just want to guess a card or a color or something but that's it cards or colors don't make me guess anything else but um the idea in this does come through very well this idea of I pose a question to the spirit and they write out the the answer one letter at a time until I say okay stop and the other team can see what was written they don't know the question they just see part of the answer and you start trying to again figure out what the what that ghost what their clue is what their word is whatever it's neat it just it works well I thought it was cool we played this live and then immediately played it again I think and it's just this is kind of game I'm like yeah let's do it again now I want to be the ghost oh now I want to be the guesser whatever I really enjoyed this one it um it was a big surprise came out of nowhere just I I enjoyed it one of my favorite party games this year I think so Phantom Inc that is my number seven did you see it packs the the booth they had there with the giant like picture frame uh the ink yeah they had that at Gen Con too oh I didn't see the pack they were right behind us that pack so that's something I saw them a couple times at packs which is weird since they were literally they were literally right behind us very often walked around our own booth yeah yeah all right my number seven uh this belongs to a genre of game that I say I'm I'm pretty I'm pretty sick of I see new games come out in it I think I I have no interest in really playing games of that style Euro games yeah yeah yeah good heaven by the machine how do they keep saying why the machine every day it's it's uh it's it's social deduction okay so my number seven is feed the Kraken oh cause for a social deduction game a game that I I I uh you know a new one comes out good luck playing it without me have fun you know I mean it's and it's not that I hate them it's just that I I've played so many I've played a lot of them so many times and it's just it's fun it's fine it's fun right but uh but it starts to lose its its luster and and for me I'm set a phase maybe right now where I just I have no interest in playing that but this one has a great presentation the production it looks very inviting I I looked at it well if I'm gonna play one it'll probably be that one you know but then the the whole design the whole development around it is is so very clever where you always have a lot of of interesting things going on there's three different teams one team the cultist is trying to get fed to the Kraken but that cultist can infect the other people at the table so even though there's a good guy and a bad guy team loyalties within those teams can also change and people are not aware to all of that there's layers of of that social deduction going on there's uh you know it it takes some riffs off of other games that we've seen secret Hitler and stuff with some of the um you know two cards that you can look at pass one on and then pass some of those on and stuff but it takes those and and does something neat and fun with them even those cards Within them if you have two of the same bad guy cards they have different abilities that the captain for the round can fire off so you have choices within choices sometimes even when you don't have an obvious choice and so I thought that this one takes the genre does some new stuff with it and this one I'd be happy to play again which is convenient because I think we're playing again this week yeah that's true all right my number seven is our first crossover and it is with you planted that's correct and this is again because I how Buffalo has been known for party games they've made some good party games I love faces imagine if they made better games [Laughter] I get what you did there a stupid thing that's the party games and they've made some really terrible games so when I heard they were jumping into plant genre which is definitely a big genre these days plants are big zombies right now yeah um they've been fighting for a long time versus Zombies natural enemies classic Rivals brothers and sisters but plant plant it just blew my mind with just how good the production are everything was for how low the price point was and it was also a very competent good game I'd just say I'll say it's better than verdant which just came out which is the same category of things I'd rather play planet um and I think I think more people would rather be playing of the general populace I think it's a more it's a it has a wider appeal yeah yes I also love drafting so there's that but yeah this one's just a lot of fun for me so Planet all right [Music] all right um my number six is a game that surprised me primarily because again this is a thing where this is a little bit more maybe personal but it's my list by golly so I'm going with it earlier this year one of the hottest games was a game that I played and I bounced off a very hard I had a very negative reaction to it I rated it poorly because for me I actively disliked playing it although I understand why a lot of people liked it I'm talking this isn't my choice but I'm talking about turing machine right a game about deduction people like Mike just doesn't like deduction games it's not true that's not the worst they said about you that's not the worst they said maybe that's the worst I'm willing to to say here publicly um but my number six is a game called tiwanaku which is a different type of deduction game and I think that really what it comes down to is as silly as this might sound these games I think really say a lot about the way your brain works deduction games specifically you normally yell about them right I usually don't do very well because a lot of times they're focused around numbers logic and logic right like a lot they feel like logic homework which is fine some people loved those and obviously turing machine has a lot of appeal and people love it but not work for me it felt like work it frustrated me this is a game that is much more about spatial awareness okay and it's it still is numerically based because each of those little circles are different crops and they all represent different numbers right and the board is going to be made up of different types of um terrain that are going to have crops on them and they're going to range from one square to I believe five yes and if it's let's say it's a three square piece of land it's going to have a one two and a three crop on it and so what you're trying to do is go the board starts empty and you're trying to figure out what the particular crop tile should be and you're going to get points based on how well you can deduce that and you do it just based on some very simple rules like two alike crops will never be next to each other even diagonally um you'll never have two of the same uh types of terrain next to each other even diagonally so you're deducing it's the same exact it's the same but maybe it is that worked out for you though so much more clear to me I don't like how that looked at all oh I think it's beaut I think it's absolutely maybe it looks better in person that picture looks really nice no it's it's a beautiful production um and and so I guess why it surprised me was that it reinforced that it's not necessarily deduction it's particular types of deduction uh that work for me versus going to the studio I don't think I've even saw it I picked it up at Essen ah yeah so have we reviewed it yet no I I I'd like other people to play it first I mean I I you know uh is it honestly I played it with Chris is it on a two-play Shelf no I can bring it in okay yeah so um yeah it just surprised me because it is I'm deducing some stuff he's deducing something yeah yeah no I'd I'd love to have other people try Mike is avoiding me correct um I solved it so anyway yeah uh tiwanaku and uh maybe it's the way I described it but I found it to be significantly easier to wrap my brain around I think part of it Mike is that it is not just a deduction puzzle like touring machine or people have said um even Cryptid yes like those are just solve the puzzle this is actually a board game you have pieces you move around you accidentally discover land types right and so the puzzle will unfold itself just from playing it right okay is that similar to that other what's the game where you picked where the the treasure was on the island um Oh you mean like a Gallego yeah is it like Tobago then I haven't tried I haven't tried that one you like Chris said you you're not trying to guess what the type of terrain is you're gonna move to an open spot and it's going to tell you what the type of terrain is you're trying to guess what the crops are on that terrain using those basic Simple Rules like on the back of the rule book they're like here are the like the the three deductive rules that people understand that they'll know how to how to do the game right okay so I think the fact that it is a board game it might be why it kind of sticks out to you more than just here's a puzzle solve it like you actually get to play you get to you know discover and unveil things and take chances based on what other people did that's true yeah instead of just hey self puzzle and that's the catch a palooza for me I like I'm gonna try this yeah yeah I'll be interested to see I have no idea if you guys would like it or not but no no no your reputation hinges on this thing fantastic I hinge my reputation and Chris's paycheck on whether Tom likes his game agreed double or nothing jeez all right Z would you like to throw something I'm good I'm okay guys would you like to throw something of mine in the pool no I'm okay all right here we go my number six is I get my expected to like so that's not the surprise because I ended up liking it it's a game that just everything I expected about it was different and I came out of it thinking I like this but literally nothing I thought it would be is this is revive is my number six wow Reviving no I just didn't know where you had ended up on this one you're gonna have to remind me or whatever I didn't think it would make your top ten but I'm glad to see it's here yeah yeah it's a game that everything about it was kind of unexpected it's post-apocalyptic but that cover doesn't really look post-apocalyptic the theme doesn't really come through either so it's not like it's that poster pocket like it I didn't get that it's I came from a company that I didn't know makes you know kind of heavy games but this was very crunchy yeah um it might be their crunchiest thing I think so yeah the whole that thing that massive connections there the pipe the very clever pipe game over there that was again something I looked at and thought what I think I'll not like this part as much as I like the map part wrong I like I like that a lot of those very clever so it's a game that again I was not sure how to attack it and every supposition of mine ended up being wrong but I liked it it's not one I'm gonna play all the time it's not it's not my favorite game from that company from a porta games but it is one that feels very personal to them I think I think it's the kind of game that they were like you know what we want to make this with these ideas and these weird rules and this kind of strange apparatus and they pulled that off so I I respect them for that though I did not before I had zero respect for the company but now give them a slow too too fast are we supposed to join you do you think do you think and and just kidding by the way about everything I just said except for the nicely this is a question I ask you it's the same type of question I ask myself if this was a space themed game do you think you would have liked it as much I would have liked it less I think right okay so so I think that whole black void yeah dots okay I'm like what happened to the printer you know what I mean yeah because this felt like it could have been you know space game yeah I suppose yeah anyway I just was curious about that because the funny thing is I like space themes in theory but I almost never like Space games because of the way they present look there is always let's run out of the black ink right you know so that this looks like the void of space and you see like twinkling stars but also I don't like that aesthetic that much okay there Roy right now anyway yeah uh revive is turned into an anti-space thing space isn't even in the game I know Mike was just a final frontier I was asking how much the theme helped his enjoyment in the game because it's not a terribly thematic game it's not it feels like you're just on an alien planet right it kind of feels like a space game honestly so anyway yeah all right my number six is a very historical game the theme and this one is is absolutely crucial right historical games uh you know we're accused of not really liking war games and stuff in the historical side of things this is one that's definitely not a war game but it has a lot of those rules that are very very absolutely driven by the theme the theme is that we are each gospel evangelists we're writers of different gospels the number that my number six is called acts of the evangelists this is a game that time you were going to say OT draft actually it has problems it has problems but I'm so Charming one of them graphic design yes you couldn't find a picture of the finished game I'm sure you're bypassing that problem actually but yes yeah the no the game has problems it comes on a rollout like uh um cloth mat and the edges are not perfectly I can see I can see you're just spraying right there in the bottom left-hand corner I can see a Fray yeah there's there's weird decisions with this game but I'm really Charmed by it partly because I love the theme you are going around interviewing different people in the uh Jerusalem area and surrounding areas getting different accounts of the acts of Jesus the Miracles he performed by the way before they die there's a hole they will die off mechanism that takes place over the rounds of the game so you might be like Mary hold on you know and so you get less points if you have to get a second hand account a garbage account but also you are collecting these these stories as cards you have um you you can you can put them in a chronological order or you can try to emphasize them with different teachings it uses you know thematic language and stuff like it like chiasm if you use a chiasmus an ABC c EBA style of teaching that was found in Jewish literature and poetry and and instruction based on different symbols then you score bonus points for that this is one of the most thematic games I've ever played that I agree on I think it's really well done thematically yeah and I have fun with it I know that I enjoy the gameplay of it more than you you had some issues with how limited you were with arranging the the teachings and stuff yeah there's a lot of I want to like this game more I think it's a great theme I think it the theme works you know what the graphic design isn't even a thing I was thinking about because the gameplay was it was it was interesting but it just didn't hold water for me I had I had a lot of enjoyment with it to hold wine give it up for that thank you oh I just got like a like a Jason high five oh geez I feel dirty wow that's terrible I really like this if you are looking for that theme and you're okay with you know nitpicky rules because of historical stake and stuff but it's that type of game it's not a Euro game it's not a Cooperative game it's none of that stuff it is kind of its own historical game genre but I was impressed with it all right my number six is a game from a company that at this point in time has one good game out of three that they produced and this is the one of them this is the one yeah the other one was also on my like most anticipated games when I heard about it but it did not has great art but the gameplay didn't come through as well this one here is just silly stupid has Rodney Smith on the cover his voices in my head okay it's not really Rodney Smith but um might as well be he'll leave you to figure out who it is on your own um so this game has a bunch of stuff that should not work it has a little the little Plinko not Plinko the little the coin pusher the coin pusher machine you're pushing tokens on knocking them off you are different parts of the person's brain not in a uh not a schizophrenia schizophrenic way but more like you are the Innocence versus guilt like the two aspects like the two different people on the shoulders okay um it's has very few actions over the course of this game has a funny story that because you are a really dumb criminal like when you like have you ever seen this woman before like no I don't know who my girlfriend is or like I don't know who Susan is whatever you know your answer is okay you're trying to get this guy either convicted or off depending on the answers they make but it comes together in a funny interesting way um I would hesitate to say there's great game mechanisms here but I played it several times this year just because I'm like you guys gotta try this out it's fun which is a fun experience it's a really fun game to play I don't know how to explain it it's so funny the other game by this same publisher almost made my surprises list three thousand Scoundrels almost made my surprises list it makes my disappointment I know I liked it much better than anybody else here I think um but yeah because they are trying things right they may not all I give them that yes for sure they're definitely trying and they're you know unexpected games they're not gonna you don't know what to expect right it's a coin pusher game it's a card crafting game you know what I mean I agree no the company area control right right the company's doing weird stuff for sure I I commend them sure I agree yeah yeah so anyway voices in my head [Music] thank you all right my number five is a surprise because it's a gimmicky trick taking game and you know uh my history with gimmicky trick taking games being have people tend to think I hate the crew although I absolutely don't hate the crew I think it's a very good game my number five is Cat in a box so I heard this game described and I'm like that's cute it's a gimmick it's a good game it works it's a really good game good trick taking game and I had to fight against my own biases of it was so hot and hipster-ish you know I'm like okay I'll play it all right you know what this is legit the hype is deserved it works it's a gimmick that works it's not for someone that is learning trick takers right this is different right a trick taking game for people that like trick taking games that like weird trick taking games and like meta around the table interactions all of those things it does very well the fact that it adds this little mini almost area control element is just icing on the cake it would have worked just for the idea of pick whatever suit you want this card to be but that little extra of it might actually inform my decision a little bit on what card I choose it to be based on trying to get you know a grouping of your little tokens on the center board was really smart easy to teach if you know trick taking games and I can't stress that highly enough um plays quickly really like it I was surprised that it pulled off its trick as well as it did pun intended number five yeah it's interesting that it um this is also by the way my number five oh the cross over here I thought it was really interesting that a lot of trick taking games in this day and age have to have a gimmick yeah and rarely though is that gimmick something that is very smooth and clean and straightforward they get they get caught up in the gimmick in telling you a gimmicky story or having a gimmicky mechanism and so it's like okay but is the Bizarro this weird Bizarro gimmick worth the the heavy lifting right I think in kind of the box here it's thematic with the theme they picked it works well and it is not heavy lifting right it's it's a solid solid trick taking game so there you go yeah that's my five as well nice wow I feel your five no I'm sorry that's all right well you can make any game your number five Chris make it cat in the Box my number five is called town 66. the only game the Oink game is made Mike happy yeah I'm I'm shocked he doesn't even care about getting the Box anymore it's a pig the cat's dead I'm sorry to tell you about it no no ham 66 is a really cool puzzle uh you know puzzly titling game here where you can't repeat shape nor a color of building in this town in town 66 because they will cut your head off right if you have two triangle buildings next to each other it's an HOA game it's basically brokers it's more like the what's the other one with the wooden tiles that was really really popular I said pool because that's not what I meant yeah you meant um it is kind of a roof on Cork and it's fun because it has this idea where you you you can bow out early you can run out of tiles early and you're out of the round but only the last person who legally ran out of tiles is the winner and if you cannot place a tile without breaking any of those rules then you're eliminated and so it has this [ __ ] game from the guess yes very quick game it's a 15-minute game or something right so it has a fun little elimination type thing a push your luck aspect to it along with this quarkly kind of you can see the back of the other player's tile so you know what colors they have it's a fun little gift it is and that timing element is the hook right yeah that that because if you if you drop out you've got fewer tiles for the rest of the game not just that turn it's really smart yeah I really like this one I'm glad that you you uh you showed it to me because I I look at the Oink games that you pick up Mike questioningly as well you should there you go baby you're not going to make hey yo happening won the steel Innovation award sir yeah it's a big deal it's a big deal all the kids are talking about hey yo my number five is a glorious piece of art it's not it's pretty horrific both in terms of graphic design and art which means it's also published by Rio Grande oh boy wow but I looked at this and I was like ah this does not look like much and I really enjoyed it it's one of the best Euros I played this year and that is Space Station Phoenix oh wow this is a better looking one Tom this looks better no it is not have you looked at these tiles they are the the iconography here race for the Galaxy is like for children compared to this game okay um that box never looked this is turning into a best case look at that what's up everywhere and it also takes up the whole table it looks first of all it looks way more complex than it is it's very very simple okay because I'm like you can use any card in front of you or in front of someone else I'm like are you kidding me that's gonna let's be really confusing but it's not because you only have like six different types of cards and mine might be one and Chris's two and I'll be like I'll use the two of this action easy you know um but it has really cool Concepts you are building a space station and your powers compound and I'm man it's just it's a very fun engine builder because your engine really does get better but you're also dismantling your engine your nine cars are spaceships and you use each spaceship to do different things but you also need metal to build a space station right of course and the easiest way to get metal is to dismantle one of your cars right yeah and so because the game goes by you are running out of cards but also your space station gets better making your remaining cards more powerful it's a really cool okay way to do that yeah it's a neat idea you've played this one I'm not no this sounds like a Chris e game in many ways it does I think it is a Chris e game it was gonna put in a dice style Library I was very impressed and I know I've seen a lot of people playing it and talking about this year I think it could have been a much bigger game had they decided to you know I don't know make it space station Albuquerque Space Station what Albuquerque why that's a that's a Albuquerque is the new Manhattan did you hear that I did not hear that that's because I just made it up all right I think Holmes has a new man Adam I just went over by like three more housing things started on that oh the prices are reflecting that yeah and the traffic oh you're having yeah okay it's a hard knock life all right Space Station Phoenix [Music] [Music] my number four is a small box hello no if that wasn't this year Roland right version of an earlier game that I never played um oh wait but as the old joke goes doesn't really narrow it down does it really narrow it down my number four is long shot the dice game oh yes this is such a good I I thought this might be your top ten well I will tell you this would be in the top 20. for sure I mean this would be in the in the next 10 list uh actually my last four would probably be hovering around that area Okay um this is just such a clever uh racing game betting game um where it it doesn't even seem like you should call it a rolling right it does it doesn't feel like a rolling right at all just because it kind of uses those mechanisms it doesn't it feels like a straight up racing and betting game and it's just so smart in the way that it works but the rolling right is not gimmicky because it actually does help keep the footprint way down you have everything you need right in front of you you're riding on the actual cards there are horses that you can either you know bet on or you can kind of buy them and they'll give you some type of an ability and I also love love love that you can check off other horses right so that the more die rolls mean that you're happy basically like almost you can make it so that almost every roll is going to move one of your horses along such a really clever little game that like I said I had no history to to Longshot I never played it um and Chris introduced this to me and I was knocked out first time I played I'm like this is really good I probably did but this is really really knocked down different knocked out um really good well he was winning so just yeah I just got knocked out yeah there's so many different ways yeah I I like long shot the board game yeah that came out you know forever ago from z-man games but I think long shot the dice game is a better game wow it's really good it's much faster for one thing and I think it doesn't really lose much I think it's great you can kind of sell this on two different crowds do you like horse racing betting type games absolutely yeah do you like rolling right games I do here's one with not as much here's one with a nice centerpiece too right yeah I think that's why this one works so well yep there you go my number four five four all right my number four is a game called endless winter oh this is a big game this is not for children this is for grown-ups right I played it and I understood it the end hey Matt slow clap for Z Garcia I did good he did good all right that's what he got is it is it a surprise because you thought it was going to be too much overwhelming I figured yeah um there's also a billion things in this game you know not just what comes in the box but all these crazy expansions and whatnot right it was just not really on my radar as much yeah I'm like okay eurogame the Euro game a little bit with a cool look yeah yeah but no it's it's really solid I like everything that's going on in and I was like okay yes yes oh I like that this is captivating this it reminds me of revive a little bit Yeah I can see that there's yeah the interlocking things the things yeah that work with each other yeah yeah yeah I never got that High Five by the way yeah yeah I'm gonna put it on your tab it was implied take it out of Christmas chat [Laughter] wear one of my hats for two minutes one free dishwashing all right what about my number uh four this is a this is day one guys calm down this is a title laying game for two players uh that I don't think any of you have touched nor would ever wants to touch it's called the two heirs that is correct this has one of the weirdest covers ever it's got this really nice like painting in the background on this weird cartoony frame it's very doofy looking I looked at it and I said I looked I said that looks terrible I want to play it so forced 1d2 and we had a really fun time actually forced Jason to play with you did I saw that but he liked it he liked it I liked it when he liked it this is a really neat clever game where you have a a rondelle of tiles that you're drafting from on the side uh and then you are building a shared grid of these different buildings and Landscapes and stuff the way that you Orient the buildings either towards yourself or towards your opponent is a very simple way of saying I control this building I own it I built it and so you are you're building in the same area you have this really interesting soldier system where the more soldiers you have in the rondelle the more range you have to move and to get benefits from it the more soldiers you have in the map that you're building up the easier it is for you to build out you have to build adjacent to those soldiers so this is a fun little little balance of these two systems that don't sound like they work intrinsically well together but they do I was really impressed by this I'll be this company has made a lot of games that I thought were almost good and then I thought this one was really good so it's a big standout for them so I like it two heirs that sounds neat every year I think there's a prize there should be a prize given for worst most generic name for a game oh I know what this is just off of that what is it Guild of merchant explorer that is correct the Guild of merchant explorers that's almost a joke time it really it was a patrol yeah let's make it a lot of words too this combined with the cover which is pretty but not inspiring combined with the boards which are neither pretty nor inspiring like put a bunch of cubes on the board yeah if if you showed me this and said that's fun I'd be like that is not fun looking at all and yet I really like this game it's essentially a rolling right but you're putting cubes out um and what makes this game is you get these cards that give you a way to put cubes out that no one else has and that's always the thing I like the power cars yeah it makes it very fun very replayable I imagine it is not particularly popular this year I know everyone I've taught it to has enjoyed it I've heard it well but it's like AEG went out of their way to get people to not buy the game well you need something to give away next year at Gen Con yeah if all their games are popular what are they going to give away you're right though it's a huge box an ugly cover a terrible name for such a good game it's really fun yeah I like this one a lot and but I'll tell you what when I first got like fine it's AEG that was its Saving Grace because I really do tend to like AEG games these days if I don't like an AEG game that's kind of the you know they out there that that was the only thing that kept me playing it but when I started I was like wow this is really entertaining so I like that I but I agree man it's almost like they were trying yeah to to have one not be a hit I don't get it I'll wait for the actual flipping right the space ones if you could mark because look the cubes don't move right you remove them at the end of the each round round you keep you keep some spots out there and I'm sure they probably tried it as a role right and they're like I don't want to erase this board three times I think I think I I almost guarantee it was developed as a rolling right this doesn't work you don't want to keep it racing the board yeah the form factor is right even though it feels fiddly for for a lot of it the cubes though the cubes cubes the cubes foreign [Music] there might be but but I I don't think so because this is a incredibly lavish production uh my number three is my father's work um what surprised me here there are cubes in my copy oh okay because you need to move those pieces across and they keep falling over oh yeah I'm like we're using cubes yeah yeah that's that's true that's true um I suppose what surprised me about this game was how you know it's so hard we use this word thematic a lot right and it can mean so many different things a lot of times you lean on narrative to have theme okay you know what I mean and this game has make no mistake it's one of the most verbalist games I've ever come across like there's a lot of writing and there's a there's an app that'll that'll narrate some of it uh at least partially by Ben Maddox uh who works at Dice Tower sometimes but a lot of it is you read it yourself but that to me is not the most thematic part of the game the the Thematic part of the game is this idea of generations and how well that is implemented throughout the game I just really was kind of Charmed by the game it's a very dark game it's like it's like a almost a Gallows humor it's not like really gross or anything but it's kind of like this Gothic gallowsy kind of kind of game kind of closer to like Universal monsters that type of a thing right yeah yeah um and I and it's really a work replacement game and it's a Euro game right it's more a Euro game than a narrative game it's just a Euro game with a lot of words um but that theme that idea of playing through these different Generations really works for me and this is another game I saw on the table and I thought this is going to be a kitchen sink game they threw everything they can think of in here but it's really not it's a relatively streamlined design um and I was just I guess surprised at how much I felt that this theme came through it's hard to pull off a thematic Euro game and I think they did it very very well here with my father's work a very impressive design the thinking about trying to design this game my head just goes right yeah yeah it must have been a lot of a lot of work so there's one I haven't tried I'd like to yeah two players this one works for yeah that's good news for me all right my number three is the first game I thought of when I uh I knew we were doing surprises the it was you thought it was like definitely number three I thought of it it was the I'm like oh definitely this game because it really was a very clear surprise a game that unless you'd been like come and sit and play I'm like no I'm like I would have never seeked it out not a theme I like making fun of a Trope or make or kind of based on a thing I don't like it's Starship captains I mean I just no I'm not interested you show me that cover with the cartoony thing the Sci-Fi dorkiness and the obvious play on Star Trek and I'm not interested you tell me I can push little characters in a little circle track and I'm all in they should have left thing most Innovative thing this whole year that's I mean I'm so encouraged by this because I am with you 100 I saw this I'm like I just don't care but I've heard so many good things I may be playing it for the first time live tomorrow on the winter spectacular ladies and gentlemen I'm very much looking forward to it because of everything I'm hearing so I'm glad that you're reinforcing this I'm looking forward to it now I uh because he said it you were not no no it I was I wasn't before I started hearing people I I trust their opinion and ANSI uh say that it's a good game so that was a dig there you go I got that let me say it again I don't trust his opinion I'm glad we clarify things right here keeps the keeps the office happy yeah yeah Starship captains again I played it with Tom and I I came away pleasantly surprised mainly because I played with Tom and I enjoyed it reasonable but also because the game is not what I expected it was it's light-hearted it has that weird humor but none of those things got in my way I just dug into the game everything worked out well mechanically it had a couple of clever moves in it the way things sort of Spawn and move around the table means it encourages you moving around different planets and whatnot I thought that was handled really well yeah the whole thing I was not interested at all this kind of nouns we covered in the news and I'm like cool not for me super don't care and yet I really liked it did you have a negative interest in it as much Kinda Yeah uh now it's positive Insurance plus my favorite time plus 3.5 we'll stop both fires again sure yes all right my number three is uh my number three is a game that you introduced to me yeah I'm curious if you remember the uh when when we first played I was there it's uh it's called alaka Blast this is oh my gosh what I haven't thought of this game since that review went up yeah this is oh my gosh so it has that cover first of all oh the cards are one they're worse yeah those are cards better and so what's neat about this one is this is um this is this it almost has a little bit of a Challenger's type thing going on where I'm back in everyone at the table uh has a hand of cards and you're choosing one person to have like a little like oh you and I are gonna battle and as he is teaching me these rules of like I oh no what have I gotten myself into so the cards have different colors they have different values the the numbers uh have uh the numbers favor certain cards the colors favor cards in the opposite direction and you're just trying to kind of outplay the other person and like oh like uh Tom you're not gonna duel this round will you flip over you decide whether you're gonna fight in colors or in numbers also right yeah so you do get you uh so you expect a player get to make that choice it works really well it's actually very fun and there's I like that offsetting thing very quick very easy going uh it has just enough going on to it that is not just like a flip over cards let's see what happens but it's also that's that's basically the game flip over cars and see what happens fractal fractal juegos fractal juegos yeah yeah it's a Spanish company I believe I love the name yeah I did a review of it so you can go watch that Tom if you're more uh he doesn't watch your reviews Chris's sorry Chris has sold me on this yeah but I all he had to do is say Challengers meanwhile Roy is vomiting on the console I liked it it's not like an amazing game but it's it's it's so much more fun than I thought going into it looking at it having you teach it it's one of those games where you know the teach sometimes you're still just like sinking into your chair more and then you play it and you're like okay and that's what that was what that one was Alika blast all right my number three is first heard the news of this the news of which we announced like six years ago as a joke and then they announced it for real this year and I said dumbest idea I don't care about this game one wit barkham horror played it you know same company really enjoyed it oh boy that is Twilight inscription seriously yeah I gotta I again I I went into this with a fairly negative attitude I was like I don't want to play a worldwide version of Twilight Imperium and I didn't right you didn't it's just a really good rolling right game yes it has the same them as Twilight Imperium yes the the different factions have sort of a thematic power that's sort of like the one that they sort of have in Twilight Imperium you're saying sort of a lot I am I actually un did what I said by saying it three times but um it's fun yeah now yes there's some things could have been better like I think they could have reduced board size a little but it has a good it it's it's pretty easy to teach this game to people actually I it's one of the easiest for it's easiest for how heavy the game is and it's an easy teach in that compared to let's say Adrian's wall yeah I mean I could teach write inscription in half the time it takes Hadrian's Wall they take the same amount of time to play okay um and I do wish it was the slightest bit shorter I think right but it is fun yeah it made my solo games list and it was a similar thing it was I thought this might make your list for this this one it didn't I didn't want to repeat lists but this also was a huge surprise to me and I even mentioned that in the solo list I'm like I thought this game was a joke I really thought it was like oh I still think that well it's because you haven't played it it's good it's really good I'm not I don't think Z would like it actually not I mean if you go into it expecting not to like it you probably won't like it oh come on now well obviously that I'm just like even if I was expecting them I mean that's part of what this list is sometimes you go into a game and you expect not to like it and you don't and sometimes you're surprised I don't know if this would surprise you he did make some very unfounded rude remarks about space games earlier so yeah there is is that and there's a lot of black in this game what reason is that that makes no sense in my brain yeah I don't know I just don't like the color black on a board or the aesthetic of empty space these paint markers are legit though oh yeah you go and watch like the Hubble telescope any sci-fi movie any sci-fi movie has a the shot the first shot the establishing shot is space solar flare and then they'll never show it to you again they're not hanging outside like showing you the ship when you hear the conversations from within the ship could you imagine that movie that movie sucks Interstellar shuttle out of the space Steph a little bit it's mostly again that's the problem with a board game they can't I have to stare at the establishing shot the entire time as opposed to like [Music] um it's really enlightening Z that's an interesting analogy all right Twilight scriptures I like Space games though thank you [Music] foreign [Music] for a couple of reasons number one and this is nothing against this designer because he's a very popular designer especially over the last few years kind of has come out of nowhere to becoming a very prolific a very popular designer John declare I haven't tended to like his games very much I was very bored with Mystic Veil it didn't it did nothing for me I wasn't interested necessarily in that dead reckoning game Space was fine um you know I liked it better this is not dead I wasn't Tom because I had intended to like his games yeah I also saw this I'm like this is going to be this big bloated mess again declares a National Treasure but also you're right yeah it's not this is for a game of this scope right for a game of this scope and physical size it also is a relatively Street streamlined rule set and I really appreciated it I I like pirate themes no I who said was that you or have you played it have you played it yeah I played this yeah I don't know about the whole relatively streamlined rules I was really excited for a game of this size yeah okay I was so psyched because of the pirate thing because of the clear cards or whatever and then as I taught as I taught as I was taught it and played it there was always like oh and one more thing thing moment it was like an apple presentation that just wouldn't stop no well okay we can agree to disagree on that I I'm not saying it's a light game but I'm saying that one more thing my expectations going into it was that it was going to be overwhelming and Bloated and I don't think it is um it's a really really good uh exploration I like how they handle the the the combat with the the little Cube Tower I think is a really clever fun gimmicky but yet still functional and slightly unique uh way to handle a combat I like the MPC ships that you can fight against you don't necessarily have to be fighting against the other people um directly I like the way that the card crafting is implemented here I especially my favorite part of the game is how you handle your crew the upgrading of your crew I think that's great I like the fact that your deck is not bloated and overwhelming that those things matter to me I guess and so when I played it I was like oh wow this is really buying my expectations again it's going against what I thought it was going to be I had such a good experience with it continued to have good experience with it that's why it's my number two so you're number two no my number two is um blows away the original and this is the one I thought you were going to say a while ago when you said a game now only for two people this is Splendor dual my number two yeah I could have put this on the list Splendor duel is takes Splendor and injects life into it I thought good I like that put that quote on the box yeah because Splendor is so by the Numbers it is sort of soulless in many ways first half of the quote goes on the box yeah I don't know yeah no I gave you the quote I gave you the call now I'm just expanding on it get your quote uh where's my check um I think this one there's more game in and for one thing than the original Splendor which is kind of weird what you don't normally make a the dice game or the whatever or the 4-2 game yeah and there are more rules yeah tokaido Duo is a little bit like that there's multiple ways to win again kind of like to kairo Duo I think it's very interesting you need to keep your eye on three you know competing things and and which one you pursue mechanically it very much recalls Splendor this idea of you buy things cheap now that give you discounts and those things stack so you can get more expensive things the basic idea of of Splendor raise to something but man there are secondary unique little powers on the cards there's that interesting drafting thing where you the the tokens are spread out on a grid and you can take a a you know set that's touching all of these are more interesting than the original one every single one of the things they change I'm like oh I'd rather do the new thing than the old thing every everything they made made it a better two-player game right yeah katala is all over this game and it's also neat he can make even Splendor fun right that quote it's also neat if you've played sobek2 player to kind of see where those two games kind of melted because you can kind of see the the grid system there that idea it's just yeah it's really good actually I think it's very much close to Seven Wonders duel over seven wonders I feel like this is a very similar growth to me yeah yeah yeah this is a really good pick yeah I didn't quite put it on my list I don't know why this one missed my list I didn't think of it oh wow really yeah it really is good all right all right well my number two is a crossover it's with Tom I am oftentimes a defender of of beige games oh okay but my goodness the Gilda Merchant explores I I like the cover I I do but it's not a cover that sells the game I think that's the problem you like the name no okay no but the cover that was just fine I think really I don't know I like the cartographic kind of look to it and it fits with what's going on and it looks like the inside maps and everything but it just it just does not pop in fact it does the opposite of pop it fades into the crumbling walls of the game store on which the you know on which it is sitting on the shelf of yes it's just it disappears but the game is so good or you're teaching it to us or flip over this card put two cubes in green I was like oh man I've played this game you know a couple dozen times flip over this card put two cubes in blue got it here's this card where you get two absolutely unique cards that are both amazing sounding and then you get to pick which one that you want to use for the rest of the game so much fun oh my gosh it's like it's like the player powers and Voyages of Marco Polo yeah it's that level of so exciting you look at what everybody else says you can build a straight line of the ocean as far as you want but I can also build on five mountains which you can only build one on normally we're both sitting there jealous of each other's Powers but also very happy with the powers that we have it's a great mix this game is so cool and uh yeah it the level of beige that it has it even caught me off guard put that on the box all right my number two I'm surprised that no one here has said yet although I know one of you has it in their top 10 hats yes it's my it's in my I don't think it's you okay well you know but I know that you all like this game and this was a game that was not sent to us as a review copy we are in the middle of a store and you guys pointed out to me and I was like fine I'll randomly buy this game yeah oh yes I know that yeah yeah I'll tell you who's list the song yeah correct this guy uh I'll tell you who pointed it out this guy my number two is uh Caesar's Empire another kind of boring name based on the asterisk and Obelix Comics but has nothing to do with them no it's it's a it's the very definition of a super filler it it it's overproduced for sure it's a ticket to ride size box but it could have been in a a really small box I won't say oink but not too far off oh my God no Tom okay it can't be in an oink-sized box no but but seriously like you're connecting all these things with little plastic Miniatures of these little Legionnaires but this game which plays once you know what you're doing in 15 minutes it's a really fast game it's simply put something down everyone scores points or you scores of other people's score points and Men I just I really like it I was really surprised how much I enjoyed this one it's very Ticket to Ride I mean it's the best comparison where it's like a root Builder but like but yeah like Transamerica Transamerica is what I like yeah that like they keep hitting you with points so it's like yes oh you did a thing there you go there's some points oh you did that six points that's got a good someone else did something four points for me yeah that's a great feeling uh it's not on my surprises this time yeah yeah anyway I thought I thought this would be on everyone's list actually but anyway my number two Caesar's Empire foreign [Music] my number one was my Clear Choice the gap between one and two was pretty immense first game I thought of when when I knew we were doing this list and the reason why it is such a surprise is that this is a game by a publisher that has produced three games this is the third game of this publisher the first game by this publisher actively terrible second game by this publisher not a whole lot better I played this game and I enjoyed it so much I was convinced I played it wrong because the other two were so bad I'm like I'm trying to think of that poetry and you're trying and you're asking this game you have not you're asking yourself Mike if you had such a bad experience with the first two why would you play the third one to which I respond you're not the boss of me if Tom asked me I'll have to answer otherwise I didn't make him play it as I hope no I I backed it on Kickstarter which is even more is age of Atlantis see again I was I was like surely I'm playing this wrong because this is a really good game this this was hovering around my top 10 of the year it's that good um okay there are still some significance there are issues primarily the biggest issues I have are like things like the rule book The gameplay no no it's no we if we cut games it's not like rules are left out it's just like they they did the thing like who's the company that insists on having rules on four sheets when they probably need it to be on like eight or twelve we talk about this all the time our our sponsor not them somebody else good cover Mike but but this is this is my biggest issue with this game is that the some of the rules are actually on a player Aid and I don't love when companies do that but anyway the gameplay the gameplay is really good and it's it's it's even very hard to describe it's a bunch of tech you have everyone has this this massive Tech Tree and everyone has the same technology like you didn't lead off with the tech tree beyond the sun looks like a mic game right from this picture right it really does but I'm telling you I honest I I don't want to say whether because every time I say I think someone's gonna like something they end up hating it but and every faction has a unique power which you also like it also has these big creatures that only you control that you can bring out on the board which you also like right how have you not played this because I hate the first two games right so did I but it is anchored by some really solid Euro mechanics um and it it it's really good it's really good and I again I don't know how to put it other than I was convinced I played it wrong the first time because I was like this is really good what am I missing here I love that this is a game you backed on Kickstarter that's the second thing to be bad well no I had I had only played I'd only played the second game once at that point I'm not gonna throw my gun advice I also backed us on kicks yeah yeah yeah because it looks it looks amazing all these games look amazing I'll say even the first two games the El Dorado game and Windward they all look fantastic yeah that's true and they have some interesting themes right you want them so bad to be good and the windward with the whales or whatever the the flying the airships that bad I haven't played that it's it's mediocre okay but that's about that second game I'll say it to me that's the second one it's medium the Quest for El Dorado no the first one is it's terrible yeah it's terrible I would put my type of there's a mic anyway there you go it's also really good and we'll see you know we'll see if you guys like it but I I really liked it all right well my number one is not going to be in nearly as exciting as Mike's number one there is or as much as a of a surprise is it a Crowther no no uh it's just one I was not man I thought you I thought one of you two would put it on no um I wasn't that surprised I that would have been good I mean that makes sense to be surprised I was interested in it yeah I was kind of interested I was hoping I'd like it and I liked it yeah this is one that I thought oh boy especially after the last one which I liked but I thought maybe we're running out of steam here a little bit this is Star Wars the Clone Wars the top ten which was again it was you know there's all the pandemic games which I like pretty much most of them the world of wargarth one I thought yeah neat I sure about this replayability um and again it's kind of like we're starting to run out of steam here a little bit maybe we're getting to the we've been in the cash cow territory now we're getting to like the really obvious wallet snatching territory you know what I mean like get your hands out my pants z-man you can put that quote on the box as well if you'd like don't don't put that quote anywhere put it put that on Twitter right now but Star Wars the Clone Wars I thought was a nice upswing again where just like I was talking about some of these other ones where I expected one thing and kind of at every turn got a different thing this was a bit like that where I thought okay pandemic I know pandemic I get what they're doing with the pandemic system oh wait what like they kept taking some of the basic core ideas and pandemic going we're not doing that like that's a core part of pandemic like you can't not include that part right no that's not in it I thought that was really clever and interesting the fact that you know um they managed to pull things off I thought were impossible to to strip away you know that they couldn't do and then the theme comes through the game is fun it's got a good amount of cooperation it's just fun it's a good one with a nice amount of replayability Right In The Box too which is saying something considering the last one the World of Warcraft I thought I'm worried about the replayability like immediately three games better than a World of Warcraft I think so yeah considerably I would say I would say so too especially for that idea of you don't draw cards at the end of every turn Dom something is as base as that as mine is melting your mind should be melting okay I'm pulling a Jedi mind trick on you right now this is not the pandemic all right what well it's coming into my mouth oh I get it I get it okay okay I don't get it I'm gonna continue before I say something bad uh my number one surprise um in one way this doesn't seem like it should be a surprise for me I love small box push your luck games that's one of my favorite little genres of games hey yo on the other hand I hate Uno so what about I also hate llama whatever one is don't llama dice this game is so good this game is so good point this Choice 100 that's copyright don't take my gimmick because somebody explained to me though what this title means no no one knows Mama yeah it's a it's a it's a copyright thing like they couldn't call it llama dice so they decided okay explain that to me I don't know llama in German is I think an acronym it means something but anyway yeah yeah there was some reason for it it wasn't a great reason they're like llama diocese we can't do that but don't llama dice okay so I mean I did not like the original llama the card game at all and the mic comes in one day with a game called Don't llama dice which I refuse to even look at I was daring people to play it yeah you taught it to both of us at one point yeah do you like it I liked it better than llama yeah do you like llama not particularly do no I'm not llama no not at all okay good because I hate llama that's better yeah this is a push your luck dice game it's better it has a little bit of that um shut the box kind of idea where you have cards in front of you you're trying to roll dice to match those numbers uh but if you don't match the number that you have there's a center row so at the top there are the two through six there's a one through llama card up there you have to add cards to your little array in front of you if you don't get rid of cards and at some point if you don't match your row or the center row you bust llama drama but you can bow out at any that's what it's called it is called llama drama laptop which would have been a better Title by the way great title actually then don't llama dice yeah that would have been a great title but you can bow out at any time and just take the number of points you have in front of you and so you have good choices every turn it's a good question yeah yeah yeah it's a nice push your luck system and it it's llama in that uh sometimes if you clear all your cards and stuff you can get rid of one chip that's the main thing it can be a one point chip Tom or a ten point chip but you can use that you can actually strategically you can utilize you can purposely choose right you can choose you could choose to like bow out when you're at six points and there's a four there to be like okay I want to get to 10 so that I can clear that out yeah that's what they call me on the app yeah so to go from the previous game to this one this is a huge swing up and score makes sense that makes sense all right this is a crossover time now my number one is a crossover there's no three-way crossover it was so wrong I thought it would be a three-way crossover because I thought my number one was on Chris's list which makes me think is it in his top ten um but it brings the list full circle way back to the very beginning game which was yours oh and that is first draft first rat which blew my mind because again I thought it was a kid's game and it is not it's really this is this is my current someone comes in like I'm looking for a game to play there's four of us I don't know what to play we got 45 minutes or an hour and I'm like done how do you feel about rats or the Space Program actually I really like talking about how I'm still not convinced any rat has ever made it to the Moon but we think they made it to the moon we're like yeah good job I'm sure he's there living a great life and for all we know the rocket ship just falls into the river and then the rat drowns and dies what I know I play a darker version of games than you do Z but I like this a lot it offers that whole idea of moving forward but you can reset sometimes you're trying to figure out what strategy you're going to go you're gonna go for a lot of cheese every time I play I picked something different there's not that many strategies sure but it just it plays quickly I like the art there's just something about this um the title is particularly not easy to read on the cover just all you see is the word is rat um but man I just find this one to be really fun yeah I I agree this is one that it could have made my surprises list for sure because the well you would have wanted to tell me to play it I I was and I'm very reticent to do that because of the amount of times right where we we come in oh I I I think you'll like this game brah I hated it right that happened to him more often you all might think don't tell me what to think well like yeah you might like I don't know yeah it's like whenever Tom asked me if if I think he'll like a game I like go into how can I be as emotionless as possible how can I betray this I'm not sure I'm not sure Tom why don't you try it for yourself is that like Hal 9000 over there I'm afraid I can't tell you perhaps perhaps you'll like it Tom perhaps you won't only you know the answer see this is what my Exotics are like off air correct I power down all right well there you go our top 10 surprises for the year now that's it for surprises the next three days we're gonna be doing top tens of all different people here at dystar will be giving you the top tens and we'll see I know some of them some I don't know a lot of them and that's it for now but we'll be back in 18 minutes playing trekking through history oh that's a good one you're going to want to watch it's gonna be on a different Stream So switch over to there but anyway thank you for everybody for watching until next time I'm Tom vassel I'm Mike delicio I'm Chris e I'm Z Garcia surprise [Music] thank you [Applause] [Music]

Channel: The Dice Tower

Views: 127,809

Keywords: board game, board, game, dice, card game, cards, catan, monopoly, tower, dice tower, vasel, review, tom vasel, vassel, settlers, gaming, GeekUsername: TomVasel, board game review, boardgame, uno, ticket to ride, apples to apples, educational games, educational, top 10, juegosdemesa, Brettspiele, ボードゲーム, brädspel, jeuxdesociété, משחקילוח, 보드게임, deskováhra, graplanszowa, bordspel, 棋盘游戏, gioco da tavolo, desková hra, gra planszowa, настольная игра, trò chơi trên bàn cờ, jogo de tabuleiro, لعبة اللوحة

Id: jejWk_ewgz8

Length: 104min 18sec (6258 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 12 2022