Published in 2017: Best and Worst games I've played and what remains to be tried. Opinions & suggestions are welcome!

26. Board Game: Riverboat [Average Rating:7.50 Overall Rank:890]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#26
Times played: 1

Kiesling #3: This is the other 'tile-laying on hexes' Michael Kiesling game of 2017 and the comparisons to Heaven & Ale (my #1) don't end here. There are buildings that score for the tiles placed around it, also scoring for completely filled areas on your board. Instead of a brewmaster you have a harbor master here, but it's located on the same area of your board, while it's still there that your score for ships heavily depends on how far it advances. So this game is obviously the result of tinkering with the same ideas.
There is one thing I enjoyed here more than in Heaven & Ale, and that's Phase I-II of each round, where you place your workers (not really like in WP games) to sign the places where you can place tiles. It has a simplified Rolling Japan-ish feel to it: territory cards are drawn and you have to place one of your workers on the territory of the given color, but often you try to place them in a way that you create large contiguous areas where you can place some of the best tiles available. Then you take and place tiles from the commonly available set one by one.

The rest is more of a standard complex euro that is not only point-saladey but the kind where you have to but can't focus on everything. It just feels exhausting in the end, and seems to be less of a nice and clean structure than Heaven & Ale was. I'm not saying it's a bad experience at all and I'm sure there is pretty much room to improve... but as you can see from the rankings, I strongly prefer H&A over this one.

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27. Board Game: Transatlantic [Average Rating:7.10 Overall Rank:1380]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#27
Times played: 1

Another Mac Gerdts game where his once-trademark rondel was replaced by Concordia-like deck building and... Well, it's not a bad game but it was still a slight disappointment. The 2017 prototype photos show a map; the map is missing from the game (and I just love maps). Ship card (flag) colors are very elegant, but when you make dark blue, dark green and black flags it's not that easy to tell them apart. Otherwise, it's a good engine-building eurogame where newer and newer ships are bought that transport more and more, are faster and faster and kick older ones out. Our first play was too long but I can imagine things going faster and more smoothly in subsequent plays. I'm just not forcing replays.

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28. Board Game: King's Road [Average Rating:6.60 Overall Rank:3989]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#28
Times played: 3

Knizia #6 - It's a new version of the simple but effective area majority game Imperium from New Games in Old Rome, or maybe closer to the 2002 Rome game (that contained reworked versions of 3 games). So besides the province cards, players have the same 3 special cards in hand. Main changes are 1, the king moves around the map, not in 1-2-3... order; 2, the game ends when 40 points are awarded AND then each region that wasn't scored in the last round is scored again. Both have quite significant effect on your decisions so now I know why it's listed as a new design. The generic fantasy theme the illustrations show is... okay, well, I guess that sells the game to present players more; but however much I'm enjoying Vincent Dutrait's artwork style it does not really help the gameplay here - region borders are hardly visible and the Kramerleiste (score track around the board) is not separated from the artwork enough so it's just too easy to remove score markers (looking exactly like your other markers) when (in the end of each turn) you remove all the player markers from a region. Overall, it might be a bit too simple and old-fashioned but it still works fine; also most of the improvements really seem to improve the game (except from the endgame scoring of unscored areas - I'm not sure about that one).

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29. Board Game: Das Vermächtnis des Maharaja [Average Rating:6.71 Overall Rank:7402]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#29
Times played: 1

It's a typical Schacht card game (see e.g. Gold!, Call to Glory, Don), pretty simple, pretty good but nothing extraordinary. Choose to take money from the bank (thus lowering the prices for everyone) or buy a ware (a numbered & colored card) from the market in order to fulfill one of the combinations shown on a few cards (that score you a few points and also might have an extra effect, maybe even forcing you to discard one of your wares). In a true Schacht fashion, only the wares that you have at least two of score you the points shown. I quite enjoyed the game even if it didn't give me the chills; it's okay.

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30. Board Game: Century: Spice Road [Average Rating:7.37 Overall Rank:256] [Average Rating:7.37 Unranked]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#30
Times played: 2

This game certainly got the hype, it is hailed as 'the Splendor killer'... and I just can't agree. Yes, it has the 'collect point scoring cards with the help of other cards showing colored resources and collecting max. 10 colored resources at a time' gameplay but comparisons end there; the feeling is rather different. It also has (once again) the resource conversion of Bazaar, a little hand building and more cube engine building... so maybe it has more of what optimization fan geeks love. Where it excels is the look of the cards. The illustrations are beautiful. The rest works, but it is mechanical and after you got the good cards it can easily get repetitive, Istanbul-style. The good news is that I liked Eastern Wonders more this year (but that was a spoiler from next year's list).

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31. Board Game: Gentes [Average Rating:7.47 Overall Rank:732]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#31
Times played: 1

It's a perfectly playable game somewhere halfway between a civilization game and a JASE. It has a few small good ideas (especially the one about learning professions), it's not bad at all. But, well, it's also rather forgettable, and by this I mean I don't even want to retry - it was okay but nothing stood out and nothing really intrigued me about it.

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32. Board Game: Seikatsu [Average Rating:7.22 Overall Rank:1707]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#32
Times played: 3

This is just a typical Knizia matrix game (from other designers). It's best with 3 but 2 does work. It has tiles with two distinct features (birds and flowers - you might also say suits and values), very little hand management (2 tiles in hand), tile placement on a hexagonal board, in-game scoring (for birds that are the same as the one placed, on adjacent places) and endgame scoring that sounds innovative but is actually a mechanism that has been used by Knizia a few times (well, in 2-player games and only on a square grid) - each player scores rows (for flowers) from a different perspective (see Sono from a 1990 Knizia book, also Manitu from a 1995 one, also Dragon Master and Robot Master), only missing the ingenious "highest lowest" twist. But it's a nice game, only not that special after these. Also it's beautiful. My kids liked it and I'll be happy to play it more with them. I just wish it offered something more to make me more enthusiastic.

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33. Board Game: Ingenious Extreme [Average Rating:7.47 Overall Rank:11278]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#33
Times played: 30ish (vs AI)

Knizia #7 - Well, I'm actually playing this game a lot in an app form (Axio Octa), trying to convince myself it is greater than it feels to be. Axio is so good that it's hard to admit this 'extreme version' does not work nearly as good as Axio nor as Ingenious (aka Axio Hex). And the main problem seems to be the number of colors and/or the number of tiles you have at hand. The differences originating in the layout are fun (being able to score diagonally, but not being able to place tiles this way etc.) but that you have still only 6 tiles while you should collect points in 8 colors means it's a lot harder to actually score points. Extreme indeed, but too often it feels like you're missing out on points if you aren't lucky to have the tiles you need (when a group of spaces all have the same color), but it's not even that easy to get specific colors behind your screen now (e.g. for a few rounds some colors are definitely tied as being your lowest color, so until you can place all your tiles of the lowest colors you just can't swap tiles and it might be already too late to get the color you need only then). It is fast to play in the app form but I don't really think I want to play it a lot f2f.

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34. Board Game: Jump Drive [Average Rating:7.01 Overall Rank:1015]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#34
Times played: 1 + a few solo plays

Disclaimer and some info on my preferences so you can know what to do with my opinion: I like San Juan, didn't like my only play of Race for the Galaxy but had good fun playing Roll for the Galaxy several times. So how is Jump Drive? It definitely works as a gateway to RftG: while the rulebook does not explain everything as well as it should, the game itself is relatively simple and streamlined. Too bad it's also multiplayer solitaire even more than true MPS games like Take it Easy! or Karuba. What is your influence on others' results? Well, there are a few cards that give you more points or cards based on the number of certain cards at your opponents (well, this effect is not strong enough to take into consideration if you are an opponent), and the game may end one round earlier if you manage to score more points in so many rounds. Otherwise it's not only MPS because everything happens simultaneously, but also the results aren't comparable at all - I drew these cards unseen, you drew those cards unseen, we both built our engines but it's silly to compare those results in the end.
However, I must admit it works slightly better as a multiplayer experience than I thought it would, and seeing your engine start to work can be fun. But that's it.

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35. Board Game: Sakura [Average Rating:6.20 Overall Rank:6125]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#35
Times played: 2

No, it's not the new Knizia game but a fellow Hungarian designer's game of the same name. So... I was somewhat cautious after his earlier card game I played, Dudab, but I can say Sakura is a huge improvement. It's got a few popular card game mechanisms in its blood. The core idea is like UNO meets something Knizian, resembling quite a few of his card games - when it's your turn you always have to play one card on each of two decks, 'tricks', one where cards have to be placed in an ascending order and one where these have to be placed in descending order. When you play a card on a deck like this you either have to follow suit or you have to place the same number (in a different color). If you can't place a card you take the deck and start another deck. There is a passage between 13 (the highest card) and 1 (the lowest card). That's it, but it's got more. There are "punishment points" on the cards (just like those ox heads in 6 nimmt!) that score you (bad) points in the end. But also there is money on these cards which give you money and you can buy immediately used helping cards from a dynamic display. Overall, it works fine for what it is, looks good, even if it might be slightly too long for what it has to offer. While I wouldn't call the finished product very 'Knizian' it did remind me of the weaker Knizias in the way it's a game that works, without being memorable or having any feature that would make me strongly recommend it to others. But still, I'm already happy to see small Hungarian games being so well-made.

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36. Board Game: Bali [Average Rating:6.82 Overall Rank:4173]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#36
Times played: 1+a few plays of Rapa Nui online

I heard so good things about Rapa Nui that I hoped more I guess - it seemed to be right up my alley (and failed like Biblios and Port Royal). It's not bad, one of the numerous games where you have to play certain ware cards to be able to score the remaining ones in your hand in the end, it even has some nice ideas like 'play a card, draw a card and score the card below the drawn card', but it all feels a bit too mechanical, or maybe too luck-dependent for the mechanism (don't get me wrong, I know there is a lot of skill involved, it just feels like there are more random elements than what I'd like in a game as mechanical as this one). Or maybe it's just me who is completely clueless - I just can't figure out what I should do - and don't really feel like I cared (even though I did give some further tries to Rapa Nui online). And as for the expansion modules included, they are nice for variety, also add a bit of extra consideration, but also some extra luck element - so, in the end they don't make the game better for me.

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37. Board Game: Noria [Average Rating:6.54 Overall Rank:2359]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#37
Times played: 1

I wish someone designed a really good game with wheels where those wheels make a really interesting game. After Tzolk'in where those markers could have been pushed downwards in excel sheets, action markers located on wheels can be relatively easily manipulated here so in the end the whole wheel gimmick loses its importance. What's left is a pretty standard JASE: even though the beautiful illustrations show an Avatar/Pandora-like scenery (with tiny, fiddly game components), it's about buying transportation, mines, producing stuff from the resources and pushing your markers upwards paid by this stuff. Also some tinkering with multipliers (some gamers liked it, some loathed the idea). Not without ideas, still it doesn't feel like anyhing special that I haven't seen in other, better, more streamlined and better-developed games before.

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38. Board Game: Minute Realms [Average Rating:6.50 Overall Rank:5446]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#38
Times played: 1

A harmless and fast game about kingdom building? The game that came to mind while playing was Tides of Time (which I enjoyed but still not enough to buy). Nice paintings, building your few-card kingdom in front of yourself, possibly discarding one or two cards, and despite the oil paint style the cards are mostly about a simple set collection (collect this or that color). It works; it just isn't really exciting and... Tides of Time is just thousand times better.

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39. Board Game: Cat Lady [Average Rating:7.09 Overall Rank:924]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#39
Times played: 1

Just like Minute Realms, or even more so... Meh. Or Mew. It works. Another game like Sushi Go, collect a bunch of cards that you can score different ways in the end, like in Ra, but not even in several rounds, and with an even less interesting card collection mechanism (draw entire columns or rows from a 3x3 grid of cards; of course not from the one where the new cards were placed). It features a cute theme and fine illustrations, which save it somewhat and it could be a game I give to non-gamer, cat-lover friends, but overall, it's not exciting and not that interesting, it simply just... exists.

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40. Board Game: Montana [Average Rating:6.76 Overall Rank:2143]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#40
Times played: 1

I expected a lot from a new Dorn game. I always do and usually I'm not disappointed, but now I was. Well, it might have been a result of a negative groupthink... and probably it's better with two than with four. Anything is possible, but I just didn't enjoy the experience. It feels like a disjointed mix of some worker placement, a spinner for some randomness (which I'm fine with), an Amun-Re-like (but way less interesting or effective) auction at one space. Placing 8 tokens on the board is the winning condition in a 4-player game but after some rounds of pumpkin actions it's not that impossible (it did happen) that you can place 5 tokens on the board in a single turn (well, doubling your turn), so first play impressions can be rather unpleasant. Too bad I didn't really feel like I wanted to repeat.

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41. Board Game: Colorado [Average Rating:6.16 Unranked]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#41
Times played: 2

Well, it's a tile-laying game from a Hungarian publisher of mainly mass-market kids' games, seemingly their first try at making something resembling an Eurogame. It's not even that bad: it's a card-driven tile-laying game, it looks good (no, I have zero problem with the somewhat childish illustrations)... But it's underdeveloped as some cards (=actions) are a lot less useful than others and probably the game could have been a fine light family game in the hands of an experienced development team.

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42. Board Game: Critters Below [Average Rating:6.45 Overall Rank:9935]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

#42
Times played: 1

The weakest game published last year and I've played is unfortunately this crowdfounded, good-looking game by a Hungarian designer. But it just didn't work for us.
So, it has a nice theme: World War II (okay, not really, characters have animal heads for no reason), we're in the shelter, trying to survive attacks and stuff while waiting for the moment when we can safely go outside. In the round when one or more players decide to run outside and it's safe there, those players win.
Some cards mostly support the cooperative play variant, many cards don't support the solo variant, some cards I just don't know what are for (get 5 purple - bad - cards?). The concept is interesting but not that clean: while the game is not that complex, it has way too many rules for the total party game randomness it offers (or I'm just not an AT gamer enough to enjoy), the conception where you should cooperate a bit in the beginning just to survive until you can trick others is interestingish but doesn't really work here, especially if your special ability is of no use for the other players at all (I had the 'cure red' ability while no red cards turned up until the game was almost over). Too bad as I like the theme, I like the presentation, I like some ideas but overall it is too random and does not feel tested enough.

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43. Board Game: Splendor: Cities of Splendor [Average Rating:7.40 Unranked] [Average Rating:7.40 Unranked]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

EXPANSIONS

EXP #1
Times played: 6

It seems I admire Marc André for knowing how to make perfect expansions. Last year my #1 expansion was Barony: Sorcery where I wrote

Quote:

it feels essential to the game WHILE it's not a game-changer, so it does not change the style or approach of the game.

Well, just like in case of Splendor, those who are the biggest fans of the original may have thought it was unnecessary (not essential) but both in case of Splendor and Barony I just really like the base games so some spice and variation was more than welcome.
And the four modules of Cities of Splendor does just that! I still haven't given a try to the fourth module (the one with plastic power pieces) as, based on the rules, seems to be different in this aspect, but the rest is just what I want from an expansion. Module #1 does not even make the game a tiny bit more complex, just combining the idea of the nobles and the endgame conditions, while modules #2 and #3 add some extra special abilities (like sorcery in Barony) which are still simple and actually make the game go faster than before, quite a feat from an expansion. It's a really good one (and if you look higher in this list you may know I won't agree Century: Spice Road would be a Splendor killer).

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44. Board Game: Kingdom Builder: Harvest [Average Rating:7.78 Unranked] [Average Rating:7.78 Unranked]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

EXP #2
Times played: 1

Did you burn out on the Kingdom Builder expansions? Nomads was my #2 expansion in 2012, Crossroads was #1 the next year, then after some (well-documented) break the franchise returned with the okayMarshlands (which reached only #4 in my 2016 list). The number of voters suggests players gradually turned away from the series... But here, I'll state it: I think Harvest is the second best expansion of Kingdom Builder (behind Crossroads). Also it answers some gamer concerns about the luck factor (with the possibility to re-position some of your settlements in the end of the game). If you like Kingdom Builder, I say go for this expansion. You can skip Marshlands if you haven't bought that one yet.

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45. Board Game: Five Tribes: Whims of the Sultan [Average Rating:8.03 Unranked] [Average Rating:8.03 Unranked]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

EXP #3
Times played: 2

While I still think Five Tribes (my #1 in 2014) doesn't necessarily need additional complexity, this expansion is, in my opinion, better than Artisans of Naqala (which is still a nice expansion, also #3 in 2015). It's another expansion that adds some strong scoring possibility that is something you can't let only one other player gain an advantage of, so yes, it's also a strong winning path (well, in FT you need to follow a few winning paths at the same time to really win) which makes bidding for turn order more fierce than before. But it's cleaner, easier to learn, more elegant than AoN was which is a good quality in my eyes (although I'm not sure I'm ever going to play it 5-player).

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46. Board Game: Small World: Sky Islands [Average Rating:7.75 Unranked] [Average Rating:7.75 Unranked]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

EXP #4
Times played: 1

This expansion offers an additional (2-sided) board (with a tiny area majority element and even some blocking) to use with the base game boards, many additional races and abilities (some of them quite interesting, not only the ones that make sense only with Sky Islands). It's a nice expansion that is not essential but provides just fine variety to the game.

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47. Board Game: Onitama: Sensei's Path [Average Rating:7.77 Unranked] [Average Rating:7.77 Unranked] [Average Rating:7.77 Unranked]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

EXP #5
Times played: 2

A few new animal cards packaged in an unnecessary (overproduced for 16 cards) box. But I like it, as many cards are longer-range than your average animals in the original Onitama, these can make the already good original somewhat more interesting strategy-wise.

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48. Board Game: Azul: Joker Tiles [Average Rating:7.42 Unranked] [Average Rating:7.42 Unranked]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

EXP #6
Times played: 3

Well, it's an unnecessary expansion (promo) but it looks beautiful and is still fine. It adds a little additional consideration and variety to the game while it still does not help in my issue with the 2-player play (that can be too luck-dependent if does not end in 5 rounds, however, in 5 rounds it's rather hard to collect 15 tiles of 20 same-colored tiles for the 10-point color bonus). Here you have only 18 tiles of a color to use for the 10-point color bonus so it becomes almost mission impossible in a 2-player play. I still like the joker tiles but I'm not sure I want to use them anymore when playing 2-player Azul.

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49. Board Game: Ticket to Ride Map Collection: Volume 6 – France & Old West [Average Rating:7.67 Unranked] [Average Rating:7.67 Unranked]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

EXP... +1
Times played: 1

Based on a single play, this expansion would be probably only #6 or #7 in this list. We have played France 2-player and it wasn't that good. However, I trust Alan R. Moon and the DoW developers (all the previous map collection items ended up #1-3 in my previous lists). While I do think even the 2-player experience may get better upon further plays, I strongly suspect France works better with more. Also I haven't tried Old West yet, even if that one looks more like the TtR expansion I would enjoy. So, for now, it is listed here but without ranking.

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50. Board Game: Ticket to Ride: First Journey (Europe) [Average Rating:7.04 Overall Rank:2210]

Laszlo Molnar

(lacxox)

Hungary
Budapest
Hungary

Samurai, Tigris, Yellow, Babylonia. Through the Desert, Ingenious, Stephensons Rocket also rock!

Knizia tile laying rules! Samurai is #1, closely followed by the three games with two rivers

The children's games of this year I learned weren't that exciting so they don't deserve more than a single item here...

CHILDREN'S GAMES
CH #1
Ticket to Ride: First Journey - Europe
And here it is again, a TtR game (have I told you I'm a fan?), even though it's practically the same as last year's #1, only set in America. Unlike their big brothers, it's no use buying both the USA and Europe maps here as the games are really extremely similar - unless you want to teach something to your kids about the other continent's famous sights and attractions, but I guess there are cheaper solutions for that. Still, the game is a very good introductory variant for kids (age 5+ or 6+) before the real thing.

CH #2
Kuflinyomozók
A cooperative memory+guess who? game on a map, in basic concepts it's a bit like a simplified Whoowasit? concept if you like, based on a popular new kids' book/movie franchise that Veronika loves (well, so do we) - so she got the game for her birthday and it was a success.

CH #3
Rally Run!
Hey, a Memory variant! Well, actually it was rather fun at that, being surprisingly confrontative for a kids' game. It's a race game that would fit an item in this list as well: your cars have to reach the middle tile and then return to a corner defined by the face-down marker found by your car there. But you need to find fitting tiles for your car to reach that tile and quite a few of the tiles are dead ends; also instead of revealing a tile next to your car, you can swap two tiles. It's surprisingly fun for what it is (also for the small box - just another quality Haba production).

CH #4
Crocofant
And another example for how 70 to 80% of kids' games is a variant of Memory. Its only saving grace is the look (one of the dice shows a skin pattern and the other one some animal so you can see a crocodile-skinned elephant, a crocodile with the stripes of a tiger etc.) which is quite cute. However I guess they should have found more different animals than leopard and tiger (even though their pattern is of course rather different). In the memory game you roll the skin die and try to find an animal with that pattern, then as soon as one of you succeds you start to roll the animal die and so on, so it's practically Memory made harder. The other rule is also a pretty unimaginative kids' game (36 tiles, two dice, find the combination on the cards) but of course it works.

Proceed to the section of games I still would like to try >>

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