iOS/Android (coming in 2019), PC/Mac/Linux (available now) • Artifact, if you’re not aware, is the latest digital CCG to hit the market, this time from streaming bigwig, Valve. While playing Civ VI on my laptop, I was inundated with ads for the game [there was one, and it was only when he logged in -ed.] and, [being a simpleton -ed.] couldn’t resist. After playing through the two tutorial matches I can only say one thing for certain: I’m not a huge fan of CCGs.
iOS/Android (eventually), PC/Mac (Early Access now) • When Lord of the Rings LCG from Fantasy Flight Interactive launched in Early Access back in August, reviews were rather tepid and some were downright hostile. It’s a shame because the game itself is pretty good, but it’s not what fans of the physical version wanted: a direct copy of their favorite LCG to play on the go. If we look at it as a completely separate game, however, it’s pretty fun, albeit a bit limited by the growing pains associated with an Early Access game. What may have been the biggest gripe was the pricing scheme which was confusing as hell, especially compared with the simplicity of the LCG model it was attempting to emulate. Well, that’s all changing as free-to-play is going out the window. More on that later, but for now you need to know that Asmodee and FFG just added a new mission to the game that can be had for the low, low price of free.
iOS, Android • I realize that mushrooms are merely the sexy parts of a gigantic microscopic decomposer spreading for miles under the forest floor, slowly digesting any and everything dead, but they’re so damn tasty. Seriously, I love the things and would put them in nearly everything if they didn’t cause all three of my kids to display their revulsion via dry heave noises. I’ve never actually gone and hunted my own from the wild because I’m ignorant and lazy [two qualities that define Dave regardless of activity -ed.]. For those of us who love the shroom, but aren’t devoted mycophiles, there’s Morels, a 2-player card game released in 2014 that’s making its way to mobile next week.
As we get our new forums up and running, I wanted to mention that lots of folks had seen their activation emails go to their spam folders, so keep an eye on that. If you’re having troubles, hit me up on Twitter (I’m “rinelk”); if not, feel free to use your new forum account to make suggestions on this post. While I’m at it, KeyForge releases today, and my thoughts on that border on marketing spam themselves, so this seems like a good opportunity to bring them up.
iOS, Android, PC/Mac/Linux • Last Friday we skipped our normal Scrying article to bring you a new screenshot of the upcoming Leaders & Wonders expansion for Czech Games Edition‘s magnum opus, Through the Ages. Well, my embarrassing pleas to Vlaada to be noticed and get into the beta have born fruit! I’m not helping playtest the new expansion (they’re not stupid), but I should be in the beta once it goes live. Also, they sent me a couple more screens from which we can extract completely erroneous information. Let’s put on our deerstalkers and get to work.
iOS Universal, Android • Tinder-esque role-playing roguelike, Meteorfall, landed on the App Store back in January like a…um…hmm, something falling from the sky? Can’t think of a good metaphor. It will come to me at some point, I’m sure. Since its release it’s been the recipient of several updates including the massive (and free) Necrodude update which added a new hero, the titular Necrodude. Yesterday another update crashed into Meteorfall like a…jeez, I really just can’t think of anything. Anyway, it’s called the Demon Update and the changes it makes to the game are on the hefty side.
iOS Universal, Android • The wonderful folk in our forums directed me to some questionable reviews posted on the just released mobile strategy title Chaos Reborn: Adventures. One of them gives the game one star on the sole basis that Julian Gollop, the creator of the original XCOM, created this game and it’s nothing like XCOM. I found this funny as hell because we usually criticize when creators keep redoing the same thing over and over but now Chaos Reborn is being flogged because it’s not just like another game that the designer created 23 years ago. What’s even better is that Chaos Reborn: Adventures is actually a remake of a game that Julian Gollop designed well before the idea of cryssalids ever entered his brain. Anyway, I’m rambling here. The major point to take from all this is that Chaos Reborn: Adventures is now available for both iOS and Android.
iOS, Android, PC/Mac • We’ve been fans of Nomad Games since the early days when their only title was a solitaire take on Talisman. Since then they’ve been the developer of Talisman: Digital Edition mainly with a few other games tossed in here and there. There was a Fighting Fantasy gamebook and, more recently, a digital version of AEG’s Smash Up. Over the past few months, however, they’re really spreading their wings and hitting the digital board game scene hard. In June they announced that digital versions of Mystic Vale, Cat Lady, and Space Base were in the works and today they dropped an even bigger, juicier morsel: AEG‘s (and now Z-Man’s) mega-hit, Love Letter, is coming to digital in October.
PC/Mac • It was over 3 years ago, when Asmodee Digital was just revving up, when we overheard Fantasy Flight was working on a digital version of their popular Lord of the Rings Living Card Game (LCG). We also quickly learned we weren’t supposed to overhear such things and let it drop with the hope that an official confirmation would be coming soon. It took them a couple years, but confirmation came in 2017 with the announcement of a new in-house developing arm of FFG, Fantasy Flight Interactive. Today, their first foray into the world of board game (card game?) ports has gone live. You can now pick up an Early Access version of Lord of the Rings LCG for PC/Mac.
iPad, Android Tablets, PC/Mac/Linux • One thing I look forward to every year is a Jeremy Handel sighting at Gen Con. He’s incredibly hard to find, but when you do you won’t be disappointed because he’ll be dressed as someone else. Sure, there’s a lot of cosplay at Gen Con, but not many people cosplay as characters from Sentinels of the Multiverse. This year, my son and I ended up getting sick on Saturday and our time in the convention center was nil from Saturday morning on, so I didn’t get a chance to find Jeremy this year [for the record, we did meet up with Jean-Marc Giffin of Handelabra who was affable as always -ed.], but I did get a chance to play a ton of his latest game, One Deck Dungeon. That’s because Handelabra released the major expansion, Forest of Shadows, the Wednesday night before the Con opened.