Alright, here are the games currently on my radar!
Scythe
This is the big one, and you might be living under a rock if you don't know about it already. It is the latest offering by Stonemaier Games, who literally wrote the book on kickstarting board games, and the hype train is huge partially because the playtesting was so extensive. Right now, the campaign is at 14,205 backers with $1,419,223 pledged. There's still 3 days remaining, so there's still plenty of time for the 48-hour rush to push it over its final 1.5 million dollar stretch goal. It has smashed multiple records already. Along with their tremendous track record, Stonemaier Games also has a 1-month full-refund policy, which makes it even safer to back. For the record, I am probably
not going to back this, though there is still time for me to cave.
This is mainly a euro game, though it is dressed up as a 4X war game with giant mechs in fields and such. From what I've read of it, my best comparison is probably
Eclipse, though the campaign page says that its main influences are
Terra Mystica and
Kemet. The latter is mainly for the combat system, but playtesting reports and (p)reviews indicate that there isn't as much combat as there is the
threat of combat, which is why I liken it to Eclipse -- another 4X-ish euro game in which players, at least in my experience, often engage in arms races without really committing to meaningful battles until late, and only a few times at that.
The art is beautiful, the theme is intriguing, the production quality should be stellar. The one thing that impresses me the most is the elegant Upgrade system. When you take an Upgrade action, you remove a cube from an action on the top half of your player board, which uncovers more benefits for taking that action, and then you place that action cube on an action on the lower half of your player board to cover up some of its cost. I just find that really neat.
I am hesitant to back it mainly because the game feels too big and long, such that I don't think I would be able to get it played very often at all. I am also unsure of whether the theme really comes through. A notable example of this is in their "encounter cards", which are supposed to add a bit of flavour to the game through unique illustrations and some odd option choices. However, the actual in-game benefits from the options of different encounter card all boil down to very similar things for game-balance reasons (gain popularity and a bit of something else; pay money to get something good; pay popularity to get something great). It probably works well in practice, but it just sounds kind of dry to me.
Also, there was a
recent review by a
fan and backer of the game that sought to list some things that people might not like, given that it is almost universal praise and hype otherwise. There is enough there that I'm feeling OK about not backing it.
Kodama: The Tree Spirits
A relatively light game by the publishers who put out
Lanterns. It is similar to a popular Print-On-Demand game called Kigi, by the same designer.
This is literally a tree-building game. Cards are illustrated with branches, which you place on top of your tree trunk or other branches to grow the tree out. The cards have various features in the illustrations which you are trying to chain to score points -- fireflies, flowers, mushrooms, caterpillars, clouds and stars. Players also have 5 kodama cards with additional scoring objectives, scoring one at the end of each of 4 seasons. For more diversity, each season will also bring with it a randomized Decree card which adds or changes the rules slightly.
I really like the art and the theme, and the gameplay sounds interesting. I am hesitant to back mainly because I think I already have enough games of this lightness. My preference is more for middle-weight fare. But if this sounds even mildly interesting to you, you can watch
Rahdo's run-through to get an idea of how it plays.
Islebound
This project just went live today, and I am backing it already. I am biased in favour of Red Raven Games, even though their KS projects tend to have higher international shipping.
A gameplay video from Rahdo should be coming, but a prototype rulebook is available for now, and it is available on Tabletopia.
This is a worker placement game (sort of) set in the same world as Above and Below, which I posted about back when it was on Kickstarter. You command a ship and her crew and sale from island to island; the speed of your ship limits your choice of island to visit each turn. The islands have various actions on them, e.g. collecting resources, hiring crew, building buildings with special powers.
Different islands have different costs, and some may require you to exhaust crew members, who will need to be rested at certain islands and ports. You can also take control of islands via force or diplomacy (or sometimes either). When you control an island, you don't need to pay the cost to use it and opponents must pay coin costs for the island to you instead of to the bank.
I like this twist on worker placement (it is similar to a game idea I've been stewing over for ages) and I always enjoy games where I get to build stuff for special powers. As usual, I am a big fan of Ryan Laukat's art style and fantasy worlds.
The Great Dinosaur Rush
I haven't looked too much into this game yet, but the unique game mechanism is intriguing. It's a set collection game where you play as a paleontologist diggin up dinosaur bones, represented by wooden sticks (like the roads in Catan). The (incredibly inaccurate but probably very fun) twist is that you assemble the bones into whatever dinosaur shape you want, scoring points on various categories.
Definitely going to consider backing this, but I have to look more into the non-dino-building mechanisms to see if it's something I'd really enjoy. The cost might put me off though, since I am already blindly throwing money at Red Raven Games.
