It's New Game Friday! David Wiley (Cardboard Clash) is here to tell us about the new games.
Here’s what is new this week:
- DarkStar
- Four Against Darkness: Zealous Zouaves
- Open Ocean
https://www.pnparcade.com/collections/new-games
Open Ocean
As a budding marine biologist, you’ve traveled across the globe exploring the hidden wonders of the underwater world. It’s been your lifelong dream to study the vibrant ecosystems of the coral reef, and now you are about to start your undersea exploration! There’s only one problem: the day before you arrived a typhoon hit the reef. All you can see now is one tiny coral, but hey… at least it’s a start! Most of the reef’s residents seem to have sought safety from the crashing waves out in the Open Ocean. They are just waiting for the waters to calm before returning home.
If you like card drafting, placing cards into spacial areas (think like tiles from Carcassonne - where you place it matters for the placement and for future placement opportunities), and lovely sea-themed artwork - you won’t want to miss out on Open Ocean! This is a clever one where you play a card from your hand and pass it, but when playing a card there are placement limitations and the chance to attract other cards from the center pool of 8 cards into your area. The cards themselves are simple to look at and understand, unlocking the ability to get this to the table quickly and played with ease. And with this delightful theme, it is sure to be a hit whether playing solo, 2-player, or with 3-5.
Darkstar
Whether intentionally or otherwise, the Outsider star-drives disrupted the Imperial transport grid. The Empire fell apart once it was denied easy access to its far-flung arms. The Principles of the major Houses adapted to this situation by asserting executive authority over their cut-off galactic cantons. The ensuing wrangling has brought things to a parlous state: the deep-defence network has been de-activated, the majority of Empire squadrons have been destroyed, and the collapse of unsuccessful Houses has riddled the Empire with power vacuums.
If you like Space Battles and Science Fiction, then you will be excited to try out Darkstar. This one has you sending out fleets of ships around a map, launching missiles that will destroy squares on the map for the entire game, and trying to obtain three colors of deep-defence codes to earn a Deep Defences tech card which will win you the game if you hold it in your Draw phase. With multiple ways to lose, the ability to concede, and more - this won’t be the the faint-hearted to play. However, it does promise to offer some really fun and interesting gameplay experiences, including 2-player rules.
Four Against Darkness: Zealous Zouaves
Give your adventurers a common identity as members of the same mercenary band or belong to a knight’s household.
This is the 4AD addition you never knew you needed. Yes, friends, there’s so much more! Did you expect to find rules for level 0 characters? Like the Spanish Inquisition, no one expects such a thing yet here it is! It also gives you 39 new traits and a Pixie class to use in your campaigns. Plus the real star in here: 17 knight orders, 9 mercenary companies, and rules on how to design your own to integrate into your game. Plus they come with heraldry that you can use and now I need to know how we ever got along in this game without having heraldry. It is clearly something that was sorely needed to make the game complete!
Pick up all the new games here:
https://www.pnparcade.com/collections/new-games
Game of the Week: Cunning Folk for just $1
Rival witch covens have been warring for the souls of Ipswich’s townsfolk for years, but it ends now. You’ve been tasked to search home by home to find the witches and end this feud.
If you are better at bluffing than me, you might want to check out Cunning Folk. The concept is simple, look at a face-down card and announce the ability you are going to use - regardless of whether the card matched that ability. If no one says anything, you get to do the ability even if the card wasn’t a match. If they do challenge you, the card is revealed to everyone and either they will get a penalty if you were truthful, or you will if you tried to bluff. If someone is wrong - or caught - twice they are out of the game. Use one of the elders to find the opposing witches and elder to win the game, or be the last one standing. Sure to be a ton of fun with the right crowd for bluffing and deduction games, and using only a handful of cards to make this an easy game to make and quick to get out at a game day.
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!