Dicing with depth...

Players:  2-4 Ages:  13+ Time to play:  45 minutes Today I'm going to be reviewing the excellent Takenoko by Asmodee games.  It was released way back in 2011 and was designed by Antoine Bauza, who also designed the hugely popular 7 wonders game series. In Takenoko, players cultivate and irrigate plots of land in the Imperial gardens of the Japanese Emperor.  Each player grows three species of bamboo (Pink, Yellow and Green), on the appropriate coloured land tiles.  Along the way they'll be getting help from the imperial gardener whilst at the same time managing the appetites of a greedy panda.  The player who manages their plots the best wins! Now I can't get started on describing the how to play without at least mentioning the how beautiful this game looks.  It is a riot of colour throughout, from the incredible artwork on every piece of cardboard to the exceptional components contained within. Included in the game are 28 beautifu...

Players:  2-4 Ages:  10+ Time to play:  90 minutes It is my great pleasure to review the amazing Super Meeple version of Tikal, a game that was released 20 years ago, but is still as fun as ever, and can easily hold its own against more modern games in this genre. Tikal was released way back in 1999 by Ravensburger games.  It was designed by Michael Kiesling and Wolfgang Kramer, and in that year it won the coveted Spiel des Jahres .  It's actually part of a trilogy of games from Kiesling and Kramer known as the Mask Trilogy , because the original artwork on each of the boxes had a different style mask depicted on it. And although the gameplay has certainly has stood the test of time, the same might not be said for the original components.  Functional as they are, coloured dowels and cardboard squares don't quite stack up against the plethora of components available nowadays.  Thankfully, in this new edition, the artwork and components have b...

Players:  2-4 Ages:  8+ Time to play:  30-45 minutes Survive: Escape from Atlantis! was designed by Julian Courtland-Smith and was released way back in 1982.  The game was titled "Escape from Atlantis" in some countries and "Survive!" in others.  The game has had many publishers over the years and some rule modifications, but the 30th Anniversary Edition currently in circulation is published by stronghold games.  In Survive: Escape from Atlantis! you play as an intrepid group of explorers on the island of Atlantis which is sinking into the ocean.    Your aim is to evacuate your explorers from the island onto one of the safe islands located in each corner of the map.    Each of the explorers has a number printed on the bottom representing their value which players are only able to see at the placement phase at the beginning of the game.    At the end of the game the numbers on the bottom are revealed and the player wi...

Players:  2-4 Ages:  10+ Time to play:  30-45 minutes Samurai is a tile laying strategy game designed by Reiner Knizia and originally released in 1998.  It is part of the Knizia tile laying trilogy which also consists of "Tigris and Euphrates" and "Through the Desert".  This game has now been re-released as part of Fantasy Flight Games' "Euro Classics" line.  With the aim of upgrading and refreshing components and bringing these classics to a newer audience. Samurai sees each player competing to gain favour with the three factions which are represented by three different types of pieces scattered around the islands of Japan.  Simply put, the person who has collected the most of each type of piece wins. Now there's one thing that immediately stands out when you look at samurai and that's the beautiful game design.  It's always a joy to review a game who's artwork totally encapsulates the theme, such as the recently rev...

Players:  1-4 Ages:  13+ Time to play:  30-45 minutes Sagrada is described as a "dice drafting and windows crafting" game and was designed by Daryl Andrews and Adrian Ademescu.  It was released in 2017 by Floodgate games.  The object of the game is to construct a stained glass window using brightly coloured dice.  Each player has to contend with various placement rules and of course the other players who may take the dice required from the communal dice drafting pool.  Skill tokens can also be acquired and spent by each player to enable them to use special tools which can help players meet their objectives. It's not very often that you come across a game with such a unique and iconic design, and one which jumps out at you from the shelf when you look at it, but Sagrada is one of those games. The box art is really something.  So vibrant and full of colour, you get drawn towards it like a moth to a flame, and when you open the box every com...

Players:  2-4 Ages:  10+ Time to play:  60 minutes Time to go back, to a much simpler time... in fact a much, much simpler time.  When all we had to worry about was feeding ourselves and protecting ourselves from a menagerie of predatory animals.  It might sound like a night out in your local town, but I'm actually talking about the neolithic era, which saw the dawn of agriculture, human technological advancements such as tool making and the beginning of permanent communities. "Stone Age"designed by Bernd Brunnhofer is a worker placement game for 2 to 4 players which was released in 2008.  In this game you play the leader of your own tribe competing against other tribes for resources in the neolithic era.  You need to gather resources in order purchase huts to house your growing population and also spend time collecting technologies in the form of civilisation cards. Along the way you'll be making decisions on where to send your workers...