It’s easy to lose the thread on this one. The problem is that we’ve breached the upper threshold of games based on Frank Herbert’s Dune and they’re all starting to blend together. This one is the latest from Gale Force Nine and is effectively a re-working of the 1982 Eon title Borderlands. Fantasy Flight Games…
Gale Force Nine is an interesting company. They produced some of the very best board games of the previous decade, including titles such as Spartacus: A Game of Blood and Treachery, Sons of Anarchy: Men of Mayhem, and Star Trek: Ascendancy. Then, their all-star design team departed and things changed. I wasn’t overly optimistic that…
Pathfinder: Level 20 is the first design collaboration between Lynnvander Studios and Gale Force Nine. This small-box game is many things, but it definitely ain’t honest. Its first fib is the tall tale concept – anyone who has played the tabletop RPGs Pathfinder or Dungeons & Dragons knows that level 20 is a myth. It’s…
It’s 2014. Jimmy Falon takes over The Tonight Show, the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge dominates social media, and John Travolta introduces Adele Dazeem. But you know what I remember from that year? Sons of Anarchy: Men of Mayhem. As the follow-up to Gale Force Nine’s killer debut, it established a streak. A series of releases…
This is a nearly impossible task. Take a 40 year old board game – one which is a stunning masterpiece – and trim off three of the four hours while retaining something meaningful. It takes a certain degree of fortitude, or hubris, to look back at such a classic and even attempt to modernize it.…
I just finished reading my original review of Tyrants of the Underdark. I don’t normally go back and read my old work as sometimes it can be difficult. But this time it was a necessity In order to re-examine my feelings on this game and how they’ve changed over the past five years. It’s been…
I didn’t really expect to be writing about Spartacus right now. When the new edition arrived on my doorstep I was certainly surprised, but I was also curious and more importantly, interested in taking a reflective look at this title from an academic angle. Most of my plays of this game have occurred in the…
Sean Sweigart, Aaron Dill, and John Kovaleski are the three men behind some of the best thematic games of the past decade. They brought us Spartacus, Sons of Anarchy, and Star Trek: Ascendancy, among others. These are some of my favorite titles and still see regular play. That was before. Sean sadly passed away in 2016 and it…
Player Elimination 