Finally somebody said it ... "Wrymspan is Wingspan with extra fluff". Thank you good sir. Persoanlly if i am going to play a multiplayer solitair game i would rather play a streamlined game.
Thanks for the video, very informative. The one I picked out as a move up the short list is "Unconcious Mind". I will at least watch a few reviews! Best of fortune!
"Inventions: Evolution of ideas" is a fantastic game. I like it more than On Mars and Kanban. The theme is not as easy to get as it is in other Lacerda games, but after a few games, you get it.
It's a masterpiece. Beyond other Lacerdas and also beyond other all time favourites like Barrage or Brass: Birmingham. It's sculpted to offer huge strategic depth, without having a convoluted setup or rules that would need to be relearned every time. It does "complexity" better than any other game.
Yeah, I liked Wyrmspan, but can’t disagree what You said here. Bird theme was better, art was better, etc. And definitely the book for Dragons is the most useless component ever 😅
Well, I greatly enjoyed inventions. I will be curious what you think of Inventors of the South Tigris. To each his own 😉. You sparked my curiosity about SETI and Canopy Evergreen. Shipwrights Redux as well as the original Shipwrights fell flat for me. Thanks for the update!
I have talked briefly about Inventors of Tigris on a recent podcast. but that was a first time game with some rules comprehension issues so I need to try it more when the KS arrives.
I bought Dune: War for Arrakis in order to see if war games are for me. It turns out that they are, as this one is fantastic (and an actually thematic Dune game). Now I am looking forward to A Gest for Robin Hood to see if a 2 player COIN game can be for me as well.
Only got one game from 2024 and it was a KS: Primal the awakening, my first and probably last mini heavy game. Love it though. After that I just keep buying older 'proven' games usually and even that has slowed dramatically. This year I got: Whitehall mystery, Long shot the dice game, Ashes Reborn and the loop.
Wyrmspan for me improves Wingspan massively, I hate the feeder dice with a passion and balancing the action points in Wyrmspan is a fantastic improvement.
Oceania sorted out any flaws I had with normal Wingspan. The dice never really bothered me and for a light game, they fit just fine. I get that people want to minimise on the luck front but then you are still drawing dragons randomly anyway.
I’m very surprised about the wyrmspan commentary. Not because you prefer but it the reasons 1. I really saw very little hype around the theme. Most peole I know, myself included, rolled their eyes on the ridiculous dragon theme. The dragon book pretty stupid too 2. That is to say the reason I was excited about wyrmspan was because it fixed much of the game play issues I had with wingspan, with the lucky dice, the lucky personal objectives, egg spamming, and compete lack of interaction 3. Saying “why would I play this when I have wingspan” but then also commenting that you need expansions is somewhat contradictory 4. And of all things… the metal coins? They’re totally fine and are actually kind of neat. No better or worse than anything in base wingspan 5. I personally hated wingspan, not because of birds but because of the frustrating game play. Wyrmspan removes much of the frustration and replaces it with very interesting choices. I wouldn’t call it amazing, the length to luck ratio is a bit high, but it’s more fun to explore the combos without the “oh well, I didn’t get worms”
100% agree on your Wyrmspam-rant -- but unlike you I have NO interest in playing it. So -- everybody hyped about this BUT the 2 of us. Theme is terrible. How can this be better game-wise than Wingspan? The guild-track might be good, but I like the dice-birdfeeder. Love all these phantastic bird cards. (And unlike you - I even like the big box.)
To me it's the cards in glass roads that made me sell the game because I only liked it solo. The hidden card play made for the most random experience of Uwe Rosenberg's games. The "I think you think" does not fit to a Rosenberg game and did not make it feel "fresh". You can guess a lot and some things are clear, but in the end in >50% it's random if you get a perfect turn or others do. That's why I'm exited to seeing more about Black Forest because it keeps what I liked, remove what I strongly disliked and maybe add things I will also like.
It's been quite a disappointing year release wise. Highlights for me are expansions.. probably the forest shuffle and distilled cask strength expansions. Shipwrights easily worst 2024 game I've played this year.
Thank you for doing what you do. Even when I'm not into the games you're reviewing, I'm definitely squinting at your heavily-stocked shelves behind you for ideas 😆
Some notable potential additions for best games released so far in 2024: - Ezra and Nehemiah (Garphill) - El Burro (Spielworxx) - Harmonies And for most anticipated: - Civolution (by Stefan Feld but NOT on Queen Games but on Deep Print Games)
@@TheBrokenMeeple Because Deep Print Games has some really good and experienced people behind it and it won’t hence be „just another Feld“ like his various games coming from the Queen Games serial production line (and are massively overpriced). It looked interesting to me but then I heard Paul Grogan singing the praises so I got very intrigued. And I like the fact that this is a civ game without some military confrontational elements (which I rarely like in civ games - I rather have a pure engine builder or a pure area control game. A mix between those rarely works well).
Thank you for the overview! Slay the Spire knocked it out of the park for us :D - also we do quite enjoy Forest Shuffle with the mountain expansion as filler. Think many of your presented games are not yet released here. SETI really sounds interesting and triggers my inner physicist :D I do have two play groups - one prefers Wymspan, the other Wingspan or so they claim :P ... I just think of them as different games and do enjoy both with these groups :) ... Tastes can not be disputed I guess :D Otherwise Black Rose Wars, Primal, 7th Citadel and Deeprock Galactic 2nd Ed. are the most recent arrivals and will hopefully see play soonish. We do love crunchier co-op puzzle adventures ^^ Wish you many fun game rounds :D
My top three favorite new for 2024 games that I played so far (not necessarily in this order) are 1. Let's Go to Japan 2. Star Wars Unlimited and 3. Raising Robots.
For me, surprise game is Skyrise Delulxe (over produced but great game play), looking forward to Windmill Valley and unconscious minds. Big disappointment is Fractured Sky, but Inventions is a hit with us. Wyrmspan is a miss compared to Winspan. 🤠👍
My favourite of year so far is definitely Slay the Spire - the Board Game. I got the collector's version and the gigantic playmat. Overall great gameplay and quality components. I'm a huge fan of deck building, also really love co-op. So this was a given for me. Yeah it was quite costly at the time, however for what i got I'm definitely happy with that purchase. I'm also someone who loves thematic games. I've always had a much easier time to teach those rather than the more abstract ones. Since there should be a logical reason for the actions one takes during the game. Instead of "beacuse i get points". Also can't stand Terra Mystica! Played it once and the instructor didn't really do a great job teaching. I've tried to learn the rules by myself but keep falling asleep. On multiple occasions, so i just gave up! 😅 Other than that this year have been a bit slow with newer games so far. I got Skytear Horde Monolith, but since it is basically an expansion i dont relly count it as a new game. It was fun though. Anyway hope you'll have a lovely weekend! My vacations start at 8pm tonight. Hope to fill the next four weeks with lots of games!
My gripe with Merv is that it looks like a game where players can specialize in one of the sections of the board and it would be reasonably balanced, but it isn't, and the wall building event is boring, no one will ever suffer from that if playing marginally good.
The only ones I've got released from this year so far are Seaside and Fateflip: Washed Ashore. I agree about Wyrmspan, was disappointed they didn't make one about bats and other flying creatures.
I'm with you on Wyrmspan - that Wingspan is a fine game, whereas Wyrmspan changed the theme to something I could not care less about, has more complicated mechanisms, but no greater payoff. I'll stick to Wingspan and find out about real birds, rather than stare at made up dragons which definitely don't. Also with you on SETI; I spent most of Expo demoing it, and I'm very keen to acquire a copy and be able to play it properly. As for Lacerda games, I didn't like CO2 when it first came out, and everything since then has been worse. I'm still trying to decide if Windmill Valley is good, bad or indifferent. But a few games of it, then a switch to Lost Ruins of Arnak on BGA, reminds me that one of them makes my soul sing, and the other .... does not. I think it's the way that WV makes chaining actions so much like hard work, whereas it's really easy in Arnak. And yes, Black Forest is an auto-buy for me.
Not much for me in the games you mentionned. Was interested in Sankore because I really liked Merv but since it’s more complex and fiddly I will pass. I also will keep playing Wingspan.
Great video Luke! I think the worst thing I've played by far this year is Botany (I think it's just delivered to backers so far), I don't think you'd like it either Luke haha
I bought Wyrmspan thinking that even though I love Wingspan, I have played it to death, and so a change of pace might revitalize the system... I will be keeping Wingspan.
So many good games, no, fantastic games from previous years that I haven't played yet, so being a slow half of a board game year does not look that bad to me!
Perch is coming out this year! Also surprised you didn't mention Botany being released this year as it had quite a large backing. Locally, I'm also looking forward to the dutch release of Rebel Princess as till now its only been available in Spanish/English in my country and all the text on the cards is Spanish :/ I would prefer 100% english but the import costs are just way to pricy for a little card game. So when its released in dutch at least it will be a language I can read...
This post ran longer than I expected, sorry! I have to admit I find Inventions unnecessarily labyrinthine, and just *too* dry. At the end of the day the chain actions are just so... uncompelling, and that's pretty much all it is. There's just not enough there, and to me it feels like it has been deliberately designed to hide that fact(imo) in an arbitrarily tangled up mess of wires that exist purely to waste time. I think it's obtuse, and worse, I think it has been designed to be obtuse *on purpose* just so us fans can say "look how complex and therefore good it is." I've never gotten that impression from his games prior to Weather Machine, but that feeling is particularly strong here. I am really hoping and praying that the upcoming Speakeasy will be a thematic and mechanical "return to form." On a very surface level, it certainly looks that way, but I have to admit my patience at excess rules that seem to exist for the sake of existing (and I say that as someone that loves On Mars and everything that comes before it), with no interesting thematic justification is wearing thin. Both Weather Machine and Inventions are very guilty of this, and I'm getting a bit jaded with spending £150 to see the same recurring issues. I love Vital Lacerda designs in general but somehow Inventions comes out of the oven feeling simultaneously half-baked AND overdone. I guess that's quite an achievement?
Managing the challenge that Inventions offers, pretty much feels like cheating at a choose-your-own-adventure book: look ahead to the outcome or two (plus 'bonuses'/'bennies') that, at least appear to, have the highest "game-theoretic value" at that juncture, and then reverse-engineer the way to accomplish them. Not too much one can do to meaningfully affect other players' paths through the game either. I have to give credit for the analogy to a user who rated and reviewed Inventions (very low rating) at BGG.
How can you say you were disappointed by Wyrmspan when you never expected anything from it in the first place? Was there ever a point when you said hey I want to check this out and then you were disappointed because it wasn't as good as you expected? I just don't understand the terminology of disappointment that you were using
Wonderful video, Luke! I am excited to get my pre-ordered copy of Windmill Valley, and you have put Black Forest on my radar. Cheers to you, good sir!!
@@junyanliu3621 He has Kanban EV, The Gallerist, Lisboa, and Vinhos Deluxe Edition by Eagle Gryphon Games (although, a lot of people say the original 2010 rules version of Vinhos is better). I don't care about any of them, though.
@@junyanliu3621 I think he's said that On Mars, for him, is just too fiddly with special "and then" rules and such, and too burdensome for set-up, explanations for new players, etc. for its own good. But, I think he's said that it's not "bad". So there's that.
The Sankore mold stuff delaying actual delivery is going to significantly impact how it will do in 2024, if it even gets out by the end of the year. Still don't expect it to be great, but it'll likely be a 2025 disappointment for me.
@@TheBrokenMeeple Yeah - that's what drove the publisher to delay the game out. The earliest delivered games had issues with mold in certain bags. Unsure if it's a replacement of those components or an entire reprint.
An interesting concept for a video, though I think it went on too long. I'd suggest heavier editing. For an overview video such as this I don't know if we need so many detailed thoughts. Or perhaps separate videos for each category.
I don't care about most Stonemaier stuff, even older ones, so I was ready to skip Wyrmspan. I'm glad I didn't though. The track that TheBrokenMeeple doesn't care about replaces the randomness of the dice tower. It also improved on running the same row over and over again by making such runs limited and more costly each time. If you want a more strategic Wingspan, this is it. (and I don't care about the theme anyway)
Love myself a themeless brain-burny mechanical game if it's done well. As you know, Inventions is my favourite board game by a Huge margin. It has a fast setup (by far the fastest 4.7 complexity game to get going) and it leaves extreme room for player improvement over multiple games. This makes it the most refined Lacerda. There's so much room for smart creativity... Or should I say "inventiveness". The recent Lacerdas have been better and better at being Pandora's (sand)boxes. I think this may be the least luck-dependent Lacerda. I'm not against theme, but a great abstract is just fine for me. Love Sankoré too, although setup is much more annoying.
From the games I've played I do not recall it ever been a super fast setup. 4.7 makes no sense complexity wise but then I never trust that stat on bgg.
I think 4.7 is fair for hitting the target range of 125-145 in scores, with total clarity of what one is doing to get there (as it was with Weather Machine). It needs a lot of nuance in thinking. Playing a mediocre game of Inventions is pretty simple. Similarly for playing Weather Machine and not challenging for Nobel prize.
@@nkorppi So it's already a pretty stale game with a definite relatively small range of scores known to represent, in final state, well considered play. Lacerda games get so stale with their point ceilings.
@@coltonbeatty6117There's always room for one more point. :) Every board game has diminishing returns in points, unless it is a broken mess like Pipeline. The way to have no points limit is to have some imbalanced cards or strategies. Maybe only Ultimate Railroads does it better.
Serious honest question: Why do people dedicate so much time to games they don't like? I know games meny people dislike and I love and viceversa. Can we agree on changing sentences like "This game is boring" to a more somewhat professional "I find it boring"? I think the ponit of listening each other is sharing our passion about the hobby, not ranting too much time about things we dislike. And this is not personal, I think this happens to most board game content creators.
Because that's what critics do. It's assumed that when you're watching a critic, they are giving their opinion. If they had to preface every positive or negative comment they made with a disclaimer that others may find it better or worse, it would be tiresome.
Basically what Albelb said. Disclaimers are only a thing because these days everyone is either afraid of their own shadow or everyone is way too easily hurt by the smallest of comments on the internet. It should be always obvious that it's purely opinions, but as critics we are supposed to speak our mind and tell it how it is, not sugar coat it.
I value negative reviews especially of otherwise acclaimed games so that I can judge if theres an element of gameplay im going to dislike. Exclusively positive reviews arent really any use at least to me.
Well, to me there is more than just "I find it boring". When a lot of people find a game boring and you can also see that in figures of 100s of people on BGG (mainly the rating, but also comments), then a game can be seen as boring in general. In that case it's more the exception that one likes it than one dislikes it. E.g. if one reviewer has a different opinion than a lot of other reviewers and the majority of players, then you can be cautious and listen carefully why exactly that persons' opinion is so different. But if that person shares the opinion, then to me it's just a confirmation. I'm personally interested in more just mediocre to crappy games being identified and clearly presented as such instead of listening to hours and hours of praising all games in existence. There are so many new games coming (far too many) that every negative review to me is a help to sort out.
Black Forest is fundamentally different from Glass Road other than the dials. When I say sequel I'm talking more about say Tainted Grail and TG Kings of Ruin. They are different games but one is a direct sequel of the other.
Finally somebody said it ... "Wrymspan is Wingspan with extra fluff". Thank you good sir. Persoanlly if i am going to play a multiplayer solitair game i would rather play a streamlined game.
Best new games I’ve played this year so far - Pampero, El Burro, 7th Citadel
Ohhhhh Pampero! Do tell!
Thanks for the video, very informative. The one I picked out as a move up the short list is "Unconcious Mind". I will at least watch a few reviews! Best of fortune!
"Inventions: Evolution of ideas" is a fantastic game. I like it more than On Mars and Kanban. The theme is not as easy to get as it is in other Lacerda games, but after a few games, you get it.
A good strong theme doesn't need 5+games to make itself clear to people.
It's a masterpiece. Beyond other Lacerdas and also beyond other all time favourites like Barrage or Brass: Birmingham. It's sculpted to offer huge strategic depth, without having a convoluted setup or rules that would need to be relearned every time. It does "complexity" better than any other game.
@@nkorppi I really love Inventions. Right now, it's my favorite board game, my number 1, I just think it's perfect for me
Yeah, I liked Wyrmspan, but can’t disagree what You said here. Bird theme was better, art was better, etc. And definitely the book for Dragons is the most useless component ever 😅
Well, I greatly enjoyed inventions. I will be curious what you think of Inventors of the South Tigris. To each his own 😉. You sparked my curiosity about SETI and Canopy Evergreen. Shipwrights Redux as well as the original Shipwrights fell flat for me. Thanks for the update!
I have talked briefly about Inventors of Tigris on a recent podcast. but that was a first time game with some rules comprehension issues so I need to try it more when the KS arrives.
@@TheBrokenMeeple From what I can tell it is their heaviest game. Heavier than Ezra & Nehemiah which really isn't too bad weight-wise.
I bought Dune: War for Arrakis in order to see if war games are for me. It turns out that they are, as this one is fantastic (and an actually thematic Dune game). Now I am looking forward to A Gest for Robin Hood to see if a 2 player COIN game can be for me as well.
Only got one game from 2024 and it was a KS: Primal the awakening, my first and probably last mini heavy game. Love it though.
After that I just keep buying older 'proven' games usually and even that has slowed dramatically.
This year I got: Whitehall mystery, Long shot the dice game, Ashes Reborn and the loop.
32:09 you might want to think again about using the term AP-ness 😂
Gutter mind 😜😜
Great cast, thx
Our favorite shiiiiiiiiirt!
Wyrmspan for me improves Wingspan massively, I hate the feeder dice with a passion and balancing the action points in Wyrmspan is a fantastic improvement.
Oceania sorted out any flaws I had with normal Wingspan. The dice never really bothered me and for a light game, they fit just fine. I get that people want to minimise on the luck front but then you are still drawing dragons randomly anyway.
I’m very surprised about the wyrmspan commentary. Not because you prefer but it the reasons
1. I really saw very little hype around the theme. Most peole I know, myself included, rolled their eyes on the ridiculous dragon theme. The dragon book pretty stupid too
2. That is to say the reason I was excited about wyrmspan was because it fixed much of the game play issues I had with wingspan, with the lucky dice, the lucky personal objectives, egg spamming, and compete lack of interaction
3. Saying “why would I play this when I have wingspan” but then also commenting that you need expansions is somewhat contradictory
4. And of all things… the metal coins? They’re totally fine and are actually kind of neat. No better or worse than anything in base wingspan
5. I personally hated wingspan, not because of birds but because of the frustrating game play. Wyrmspan removes much of the frustration and replaces it with very interesting choices. I wouldn’t call it amazing, the length to luck ratio is a bit high, but it’s more fun to explore the combos without the “oh well, I didn’t get worms”
Surprised not to see Leviathan Wilds on this list (aka Shadow of the Colossus the board game)
100% agree on your Wyrmspam-rant -- but unlike you I have NO interest in playing it. So -- everybody hyped about this BUT the 2 of us. Theme is terrible. How can this be better game-wise than Wingspan? The guild-track might be good, but I like the dice-birdfeeder. Love all these phantastic bird cards. (And unlike you - I even like the big box.)
To me it's the cards in glass roads that made me sell the game because I only liked it solo.
The hidden card play made for the most random experience of Uwe Rosenberg's games.
The "I think you think" does not fit to a Rosenberg game and did not make it feel "fresh".
You can guess a lot and some things are clear, but in the end in >50% it's random if you get a perfect turn or others do.
That's why I'm exited to seeing more about Black Forest because it keeps what I liked, remove what I strongly disliked and maybe add things I will also like.
It's been quite a disappointing year release wise. Highlights for me are expansions.. probably the forest shuffle and distilled cask strength expansions.
Shipwrights easily worst 2024 game I've played this year.
That said, I will take a dud year now and then, as it has meant I can afford the budget to catch up and get some long-term backlog wants instead.
Thank you for doing what you do.
Even when I'm not into the games you're reviewing, I'm definitely squinting at your heavily-stocked shelves behind you for ideas 😆
I appreciate that!
Some notable potential additions for best games released so far in 2024:
- Ezra and Nehemiah (Garphill)
- El Burro (Spielworxx)
- Harmonies
And for most anticipated:
- Civolution (by Stefan Feld but NOT on Queen Games but on Deep Print Games)
I would try Ezra and I want to try Harmonies. Civolution...........not so much, it's a Feld. Why the publisher distinction?
@@TheBrokenMeeple Because Deep Print Games has some really good and experienced people behind it and it won’t hence be „just another Feld“ like his various games coming from the Queen Games serial production line (and are massively overpriced). It looked interesting to me but then I heard Paul Grogan singing the praises so I got very intrigued. And I like the fact that this is a civ game without some military confrontational elements (which I rarely like in civ games - I rather have a pure engine builder or a pure area control game. A mix between those rarely works well).
Civolution sounds like it will be a VERY different Feld game. We will see!
I'm sorry but Harmonies is so overhyped. Its a decent little game but not worth the 8.2 score on BGG. 7.4 at best
@seraphiccandy21 I'll certainly temper expectations
Thank you for the overview! Slay the Spire knocked it out of the park for us :D - also we do quite enjoy Forest Shuffle with the mountain expansion as filler. Think many of your presented games are not yet released here. SETI really sounds interesting and triggers my inner physicist :D
I do have two play groups - one prefers Wymspan, the other Wingspan or so they claim :P ... I just think of them as different games and do enjoy both with these groups :) ... Tastes can not be disputed I guess :D
Otherwise Black Rose Wars, Primal, 7th Citadel and Deeprock Galactic 2nd Ed. are the most recent arrivals and will hopefully see play soonish. We do love crunchier co-op puzzle adventures ^^
Wish you many fun game rounds :D
Yes, Slay the Spire is my favourite release of the year so far too :)
I`ve played SETI as the first game when UKGE opened. Wonder if played with you :D I`ll be going to ESSEN, happy to demo it again and buy it also
Ive only played Donut Shot and Captain Flip. Donut Shop is nice, Captain Flip is forgettable.
Ive heard good things about Cascadero.
I look forward to learning more about Black Forest and SETI, maybe Civolution as well. Shame about Inventions, glad I did not back it.
Unconscious mind is my first ever backed game since getting into the hobby and can't wait for it to arrive. Look forward to the review.
Hoping they'll give me an advance copy but i won't hold my breath.
Paul Grogan on Gaming Rules did an unboxing the other day, and I was pretty much salivating the whole time.
Do want now please.
Yeah I saw that too. Fingers crossed you get that copy man.
My top three favorite new for 2024 games that I played so far (not necessarily in this order) are 1. Let's Go to Japan 2. Star Wars Unlimited and 3. Raising Robots.
I guess Raising Robots was 2024.........wouldn't make top 3 but it was fine, just took way too long and I'd rather just play Wingspan.
Marabunta, my game of the year so far.
well done as usual... explained well... good job
For me, surprise game is Skyrise Delulxe (over produced but great game play), looking forward to Windmill Valley and unconscious minds.
Big disappointment is Fractured Sky, but Inventions is a hit with us. Wyrmspan is a miss compared to Winspan. 🤠👍
My favourite of year so far is definitely Slay the Spire - the Board Game. I got the collector's version and the gigantic playmat. Overall great gameplay and quality components. I'm a huge fan of deck building, also really love co-op. So this was a given for me. Yeah it was quite costly at the time, however for what i got I'm definitely happy with that purchase.
I'm also someone who loves thematic games. I've always had a much easier time to teach those rather than the more abstract ones. Since there should be a logical reason for the actions one takes during the game.
Instead of "beacuse i get points". Also can't stand Terra Mystica! Played it once and the instructor didn't really do a great job teaching.
I've tried to learn the rules by myself but keep falling asleep. On multiple occasions, so i just gave up! 😅
Other than that this year have been a bit slow with newer games so far.
I got Skytear Horde Monolith, but since it is basically an expansion i dont relly count it as a new game. It was fun though.
Anyway hope you'll have a lovely weekend! My vacations start at 8pm tonight. Hope to fill the next four weeks with lots of games!
My gripe with Merv is that it looks like a game where players can specialize in one of the sections of the board and it would be reasonably balanced, but it isn't, and the wall building event is boring, no one will ever suffer from that if playing marginally good.
The only ones I've got released from this year so far are Seaside and Fateflip: Washed Ashore. I agree about Wyrmspan, was disappointed they didn't make one about bats and other flying creatures.
Have you not seen Dune: War for Arrakis?
Yeah and I've no interest.
I'm with you on Wyrmspan - that Wingspan is a fine game, whereas Wyrmspan changed the theme to something I could not care less about, has more complicated mechanisms, but no greater payoff. I'll stick to Wingspan and find out about real birds, rather than stare at made up dragons which definitely don't.
Also with you on SETI; I spent most of Expo demoing it, and I'm very keen to acquire a copy and be able to play it properly.
As for Lacerda games, I didn't like CO2 when it first came out, and everything since then has been worse.
I'm still trying to decide if Windmill Valley is good, bad or indifferent. But a few games of it, then a switch to Lost Ruins of Arnak on BGA, reminds me that one of them makes my soul sing, and the other .... does not. I think it's the way that WV makes chaining actions so much like hard work, whereas it's really easy in Arnak.
And yes, Black Forest is an auto-buy for me.
I kind of agree with you about Wyrmspan. Have played it about half a dozen times and that's probably enough. Will stick with Wingspan.
Not much for me in the games you mentionned. Was interested in Sankore because I really liked Merv but since it’s more complex and fiddly I will pass. I also will keep playing Wingspan.
Great video Luke!
I think the worst thing I've played by far this year is Botany (I think it's just delivered to backers so far), I don't think you'd like it either Luke haha
I bought Wyrmspan thinking that even though I love Wingspan, I have played it to death, and so a change of pace might revitalize the system... I will be keeping Wingspan.
So many good games, no, fantastic games from previous years that I haven't played yet, so being a slow half of a board game year does not look that bad to me!
OMG! Sequel to Glass Road!!! How did I not hear of this before.... must pre-order! Love Uwe!
The best (and only) game I've played that was released in the first half of 2024 is Salton Sea.
Perch is coming out this year! Also surprised you didn't mention Botany being released this year as it had quite a large backing. Locally, I'm also looking forward to the dutch release of Rebel Princess as till now its only been available in Spanish/English in my country and all the text on the cards is Spanish :/ I would prefer 100% english but the import costs are just way to pricy for a little card game. So when its released in dutch at least it will be a language I can read...
I don't usually bother with Kickstarter any more so those releases don't bring me in until release.
Completely agree with Inventions. Huge disappointment.
This post ran longer than I expected, sorry!
I have to admit I find Inventions unnecessarily labyrinthine, and just *too* dry. At the end of the day the chain actions are just so... uncompelling, and that's pretty much all it is. There's just not enough there, and to me it feels like it has been deliberately designed to hide that fact(imo) in an arbitrarily tangled up mess of wires that exist purely to waste time.
I think it's obtuse, and worse, I think it has been designed to be obtuse *on purpose* just so us fans can say "look how complex and therefore good it is." I've never gotten that impression from his games prior to Weather Machine, but that feeling is particularly strong here.
I am really hoping and praying that the upcoming Speakeasy will be a thematic and mechanical "return to form." On a very surface level, it certainly looks that way, but I have to admit my patience at excess rules that seem to exist for the sake of existing (and I say that as someone that loves On Mars and everything that comes before it), with no interesting thematic justification is wearing thin. Both Weather Machine and Inventions are very guilty of this, and I'm getting a bit jaded with spending £150 to see the same recurring issues.
I love Vital Lacerda designs in general but somehow Inventions comes out of the oven feeling simultaneously half-baked AND overdone. I guess that's quite an achievement?
Managing the challenge that Inventions offers, pretty much feels like cheating at a choose-your-own-adventure book: look ahead to the outcome or two (plus 'bonuses'/'bennies') that, at least appear to, have the highest "game-theoretic value" at that juncture, and then reverse-engineer the way to accomplish them. Not too much one can do to meaningfully affect other players' paths through the game either.
I have to give credit for the analogy to a user who rated and reviewed Inventions (very low rating) at BGG.
How can you say you were disappointed by Wyrmspan when you never expected anything from it in the first place? Was there ever a point when you said hey I want to check this out and then you were disappointed because it wasn't as good as you expected? I just don't understand the terminology of disappointment that you were using
More than I'm disappointed that even when taking something as excellent as Wingspan you can still make it worse!
Great episode! Love the content!
Thank you!!
Wonderful video, Luke! I am excited to get my pre-ordered copy of Windmill Valley, and you have put Black Forest on my radar. Cheers to you, good sir!!
Thank you!!
I'm a huge Lacerda fan, but i tend to agree, a few of his games get very dry with crunchiness.
Just his recent stuff - I still adore the 4 I own.
@@TheBrokenMeeple which four they are ? just really curious
@@junyanliu3621 He has Kanban EV, The Gallerist, Lisboa, and Vinhos Deluxe Edition by Eagle Gryphon Games (although, a lot of people say the original 2010 rules version of Vinhos is better). I don't care about any of them, though.
@@coltonbeatty6117 I am surprised he does not have on mars.
@@junyanliu3621 I think he's said that On Mars, for him, is just too fiddly with special "and then" rules and such, and too burdensome for set-up, explanations for new players, etc. for its own good. But, I think he's said that it's not "bad". So there's that.
Thank you so much for the Arachnophobic warning, you have saved my life!
:-) Yeah I appreciate it when I get them too!
We did get
Dawn of madness
Finaly
The Sankore mold stuff delaying actual delivery is going to significantly impact how it will do in 2024, if it even gets out by the end of the year.
Still don't expect it to be great, but it'll likely be a 2025 disappointment for me.
Mold? Oh I missed that - ewww.
@@TheBrokenMeeple Yeah - that's what drove the publisher to delay the game out. The earliest delivered games had issues with mold in certain bags. Unsure if it's a replacement of those components or an entire reprint.
have you done a themless top 10 yet? must have.. would be a lot of roll & writes if it was me
If I have, it hasn't been for a long long while. It may be time to renew it.
Great summary, thank you!
Now I have to play Windmill Valley. I do not see the hype, but as everyone is praising this game, I must miss something.
Same here. Nothing wowed me but it’s getting stellar reviews so far
I wouldn't go stellar, I mean I gave it a 7, 8 if you want to play solo, it's certainly a good game, but remember we've not had the best year so far.
An interesting concept for a video, though I think it went on too long. I'd suggest heavier editing. For an overview video such as this I don't know if we need so many detailed thoughts. Or perhaps separate videos for each category.
I could smell wymspan a mile away. you confirmed it.
It's staring us all in the face, but SM is a master of marketing!
I don't care about most Stonemaier stuff, even older ones, so I was ready to skip Wyrmspan. I'm glad I didn't though. The track that TheBrokenMeeple doesn't care about replaces the randomness of the dice tower. It also improved on running the same row over and over again by making such runs limited and more costly each time. If you want a more strategic Wingspan, this is it. (and I don't care about the theme anyway)
6 Nimmt is a terrible game?! 😱
so edgy Luke :P
Someone has to be! :P
Love myself a themeless brain-burny mechanical game if it's done well. As you know, Inventions is my favourite board game by a Huge margin. It has a fast setup (by far the fastest 4.7 complexity game to get going) and it leaves extreme room for player improvement over multiple games. This makes it the most refined Lacerda. There's so much room for smart creativity... Or should I say "inventiveness". The recent Lacerdas have been better and better at being Pandora's (sand)boxes. I think this may be the least luck-dependent Lacerda. I'm not against theme, but a great abstract is just fine for me. Love Sankoré too, although setup is much more annoying.
From the games I've played I do not recall it ever been a super fast setup. 4.7 makes no sense complexity wise but then I never trust that stat on bgg.
I think 4.7 is fair for hitting the target range of 125-145 in scores, with total clarity of what one is doing to get there (as it was with Weather Machine). It needs a lot of nuance in thinking. Playing a mediocre game of Inventions is pretty simple. Similarly for playing Weather Machine and not challenging for Nobel prize.
@@nkorppi So it's already a pretty stale game with a definite relatively small range of scores known to represent, in final state, well considered play. Lacerda games get so stale with their point ceilings.
@@coltonbeatty6117There's always room for one more point. :) Every board game has diminishing returns in points, unless it is a broken mess like Pipeline. The way to have no points limit is to have some imbalanced cards or strategies. Maybe only Ultimate Railroads does it better.
Serious honest question: Why do people dedicate so much time to games they don't like? I know games meny people dislike and I love and viceversa. Can we agree on changing sentences like "This game is boring" to a more somewhat professional "I find it boring"? I think the ponit of listening each other is sharing our passion about the hobby, not ranting too much time about things we dislike. And this is not personal, I think this happens to most board game content creators.
Because that's what critics do. It's assumed that when you're watching a critic, they are giving their opinion. If they had to preface every positive or negative comment they made with a disclaimer that others may find it better or worse, it would be tiresome.
Basically what Albelb said. Disclaimers are only a thing because these days everyone is either afraid of their own shadow or everyone is way too easily hurt by the smallest of comments on the internet. It should be always obvious that it's purely opinions, but as critics we are supposed to speak our mind and tell it how it is, not sugar coat it.
I value negative reviews especially of otherwise acclaimed games so that I can judge if theres an element of gameplay im going to dislike. Exclusively positive reviews arent really any use at least to me.
Well, to me there is more than just "I find it boring".
When a lot of people find a game boring and you can also see that in figures of 100s of people on BGG (mainly the rating, but also comments), then a game can be seen as boring in general.
In that case it's more the exception that one likes it than one dislikes it.
E.g. if one reviewer has a different opinion than a lot of other reviewers and the majority of players, then you can be cautious and listen carefully why exactly that persons' opinion is so different.
But if that person shares the opinion, then to me it's just a confirmation.
I'm personally interested in more just mediocre to crappy games being identified and clearly presented as such instead of listening to hours and hours of praising all games in existence.
There are so many new games coming (far too many) that every negative review to me is a help to sort out.
"No sequels". Number 1 best game...... a sequel.
Black Forest is fundamentally different from Glass Road other than the dials. When I say sequel I'm talking more about say Tainted Grail and TG Kings of Ruin. They are different games but one is a direct sequel of the other.
Really happy to hear that Black Forest is shaping up nicely!