New games for March 27, 2020 - Happy Robot Winter

It's an New Game Friday! And David Wiley (Cardboard Clash) is here to tell us about the new games.

Here’s what is new this week:

• Not So Happy Families
• Paper Pinball: Fight Back The Winter
• Robot Lab

This week's new games are all available at https://www.pnparcade.com/collections/new-games

Not So Happy Families

Welcome, Not So Happy Families is an easy to pick up and play card game for the family or light card game players. Based on the original card game classic “Happy Families”, this game has been re-developed to add some fun mechanics which add a little mayhem, and a few Black Sheep into the mix.

The game is also highly inclusive and has been designed to represent what a family unit is in 2019. Inclusion of single parents, elderly carers and same sex parenting are included to reflect the necessity for a more modern take on what a family is.

A fresh take on some classic card games you might be familiar with. If you have played games like “Go Fish”, and ones like “Rummy”, you’ll be treading in comfortable territory as you are trying to collect sets of like cards in order to score them for points, and your collection of cards comes from asking a player if they have a specific card. If they do, you get the card from them and go again. If not, you draw a card and your turn ends. Whomever gets to the barn on their score tracker will win. Looking to spice it up? There’s a Black Sheep variant to add more ways to score - or interfere with the game mechanics - into the mix.

Paper Pinball: Fight Back the Winter

Fight Back the Winter, which in some areas tried to rear its ugly head again this past week, and beat boredom with some more Paper Pinball. The third new entry in Season 2 is colorful and has a delightful fantasy theme to the machine. It is bound to be as fast, furious fun as the others. If you haven’t given Paper Pinball a shot, what are you waiting for?

RobotLab: The Card Game

It’s a STEM-inspired, color matching, robot building race of invention! Compete to win the coveted Devol Prize in Robotics! Can you outwit the other scientists and be the first to successfully complete your robot? Let’s get in the lab and find out!

Looking for a quick game to play with the kids while everyone is home? RobotLab is a great choice, as players are competing to be the first to complete the robot of their color by adding its head, two arms, and two legs. This one is fast-playing and fun for all ages, especially with the special event cards that can really mix things up and foil the work your opponents have done. Simple rules let you get playing fast on this little card-based game.

Game of the Week: Pentaquark

Some of the biggest questions in the world of science may be answered by studying quarks, the smallest of particles. The problem with trying to study quarks is that you can’t find just one quark; you need to find them in groups called hadrons, or some other exotic particles, like the Pentaquark.

In Pentaquark, you are trying to give science a helping hand by collecting the 5 quarks that form this particle at the detector of a massive particle collider. Move cards you need to the detector, discard others so they may come back as anti-quarks, and try to minimize the number of quarks scattered and lost. If too many cards are removed from the game, the Pentaquark has slipped through undetected once again!

Looking to add some science and some solitaire gaming to your home experience? Pentaquark has got the fun you’ve been looking for. Before Sprawlopolis came along, this was widely regarded as the best solo game in the Button Shy catalog. And rumor has it that this still holds up, even with all the other excellent games in there. If you missed their Reprint Kickstarter, or are waiting for your copy to arrive, now is the perfect time to try out Pentaquark. But if you decide you like it, be sure to act quickly on ordering a copy because this was hard-to-find for a long time and you won’t want to miss it again. But at least you’d have this nice PNP copy to keep you entertained.

Check out Game of the Week here: https://www.pnparcade.com/collections/game-of-the-week

See you next week with more information on our newest print and play games!