I would have told you that Decrypto had been out for way longer than five years. Like Just One, Decrypto arrived in 2018, out of the blue, and immediately established itself as a go-to word game. To think there was a year in which we received Decrypto and Just One. The heart quickens. We had no idea how good we had it.

To celebrate five years of success, Scorpion Masqué has released a 5th anniversary edition, spicing up the classic—board gaming has a short memory—with 440 new words. Does it change the game in any appreciable way? No, this is still very much the Decrypto people know and love. It does freshen things up a bit, though, for those who’ve put their copy of the original release through its paces.

It takes a round or two to get used to Decrypto’s structure, and it’s difficult to describe in absence of the game in front of you. What I’m trying to tell you is, what I describe may not sound fun. I assure you, it is.

The players are divided into two teams, each of which has four secret words that everyone on the team can see. Each round, one player on each team (the “Encryptor”) has a secret three digit code that they need their teammates to guess.…

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The world needs more board games born of nature documentaries. I guess it wouldn’t hurt if designers more often tried on the animus of quarreling creatures, either.

Kelp is the first design credit for Carl Robinson, developed and published with Wonderbow Games. Deeply asymmetrical in design, Kelp pits a shark against a octopus amid a kelp forest, a two-player salt-water game of cat and mouse. Deck building versus bag building. Cards versus dice. A Lego (for moment, anyway) vs. Mahjongg.

The Octopus

The octopus's game is one of survival. The kelp forest is divided into a 3x3 grid, each containing a standing tile facing the octopus player. One tile is the octopus. The others are divided among shells, traps, and (potentially) octopus food.

Players choose two actions in any combination: play a card, draw back up to the hand limit, or discard to hide a revealed tile. Each card bears a cost of revealing zero, one, or two tiles. The actions include learning (adding cards to the deck), swapping adjacent tiles, shuffling tiles randomly, hiding tiles, and eating.

The octopus's aims are twofold: outlast and/or eat. If the shark reaches exhaustion in the hunt, the octopus is victorious. Eating all four food options also results in instant octo-victory. In…

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I’ve had the chance to meet some of the team at Gamelyn Games at past conventions. I always stop and stare.

How do these guys keep coming up with so many strategy games that basically fit in a handbag?

I’ve had the chance to play Tiny Epic Galaxies and Tiny Epic Quest. Both games were fine; I would give Tiny Epic Galaxies the edge in terms of gameplay, and Tiny Epic Quest the edge in production because all of the tiny meeples can be outfitted with swords and shields. For a game that can be played on an average-sized kitchen counter, the amount of game in the box is a marvel for the Tiny Epic series. Prices are just as fair, with those games costing me about $25 each.

Our Meeple Mountain team is working with Gamelyn to go “back catalog” and review some of the older Tiny Epic games that we have not covered previously for the site. I signed on for Tiny Epic Mechs (a game that I bought personally) and Tiny Epic Western, a review copy sent by the publisher.

After getting a round of plays in summer, I admit that I align very closely with the game’s current ranking on BGG. It’s a fine time, with an easy teach and a serviceable solo…

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“It’s like Memory, combined with scribbled pictures. Wanna try it?”

This was my intro to the kids to get them to try That’s Not a Hat (2023, Ravensburger) after a long week of car travel for spring break. My daughter will generally try anything, but games that feature pictures usually make her jump, so she was on board.

My son was a slightly tougher sell. “Is it cooperative?” he asked.

“No. We’ll each have a couple of cards in front of us, but the goal is to try and remember what everyone has in front of them. If you don’t, you’ll take on ‘penalty points’ and the person who has the most penalty points triggers the end of the game.”

My son turned skeptical. “I’ll play if it’s quick.” (Apparently, he had a hot date with the LEGO set perched nearby.)

That’s Not a Hat is, in fact, quick—10-20 minutes in most cases with three or four players. Longer than that, and then you have a different question to answer: is this a gift worth giving?

Bluff, Then Re-Gift

That’s Not a Hat is a bluffing game laced with elements of the game Memory for 3-8 players. To begin play, each player has a single card in front…

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Let’s burn some bridges today.

For the past few years, people have heavily pushed for diversification in board gaming. This includes not only getting people from different cultures to play board games but also game designers and game settings. This is understandable, considering that many board games used to be euro-centric with settings involving colonization and war.

However, for some reason, this discussion of diversification does not extend to artistic expression. Cultures all have their own ways of expressing their stories and communicating their philosophical ideas to the masses. One glance at Bollywood reveals Hindus' love for musicals and absurd action sequences. Hollywood has shown the world the result of corporations digging their talons into artistic integrity. Japan has popularized its "anime aesthetic," also known as Big Eyes, Small Mouth, in its media.

I bring this up because board game reviewers love to toss anime board games into the nearest Bermuda Triangle, hoping the masses will never notice them. If I sound like I'm donning a tinfoil hat, let me ask one question: when was the last time Shut Up & Sit Down or The Dice Tower featured an anime game? Precisely.

Let's solidify this argument further by discussing Tragedy Looper's brief history. Z-Man Games localized the game in 2014, and it received a mixed reception. While some players…

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Overview

The throne of Moody Bear Kingdom has been empty for years. Only the one with the most power will be able to claim the kingdom’s throne. Will the player with the most gems rule or will the Dark Night Villain come to consume everything?

Moody Bear Kingdom is a quick Traitor card game for three to five players. Players work together to seek these elusive gems before the Villain’s henchman, the Dark Swallow, shows up.

Set Up

[caption id="attachment_270005" align="alignnone" width="1024"] The Red Volcano team needs to collect 3 Lava Gems. The Iceberg team needs to collect 3 Snow Diamonds. They can use the Mace of Light to stop the Dark Swallow from ending the game.[/caption]

The game features two types of item cards, Lava Gem cards and Snow Diamond cards. The object of the game is for teams to get all three of their Gem cards before the Dark Swallow makes its appearance. 

Also in the deck are three character cards which work in combinations of two or three, to determine special actions. Certain double card combos allow players to exchange cards, spy at another player's hand, rearrange the first three cards in the draw deck, or steal a card. And a three card combo allows players to demand…

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Soda Smugglers is the first in a series of three games from designer Reiner Knizia and publisher Bitewing Games. Called the Criminal Capers trilogy, the series consists of three card games. All three games—Soda Smugglers, Pumafiosi, and Hot Lead—occupy a seedy underworld of anthropomorphic animal gangsters and cops. All three feature simple rules, easily teachable in under five minutes. You might even be able to teach all three in that time, actually, assuming a particularly keen audience. Finally, all three feature absolutely fabulous art from Paul K. Halkyon.

Pop

If we assume that each entry in Criminal Capers establishes canon for the others, which seems reasonable, then all three take place in a world where soda is a controlled substance. In Soda Smugglers, players try to provide the soda supply to match ravenous black market demand. Each round, one player takes on the role of a customs official inspecting suitcases at the border, while the other players offer bribes in an attempt to get their goods across.

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FORK, you should know, is an acronym. Fox, Owl, Rabbit, Kale. FORK is also a joke. This family-weight trick-taking game for 2-6 players is themed around the food chain. Foxes eat owls and rabbits, owls eat rabbits, rabbits eat kale, kale sits inert.

[caption id="attachment_268430" align="alignnone" width="1024"] FORK![/caption]

Each player is dealt one fox and a number of cards depending on the player count. You take turns playing a card face down to the middle of the table, then all cards are revealed and nature has its way. If there’s more than one fox, the foxes are discarded. If there’s one fox, the fox gets to eat an owl or a rabbit, provided there is one, and the player who played the fox keeps their meal as a scored card. If there is then an uneaten owl, the owl gets to eat a rabbit, provided there is one, and the player who played the owl keeps their meal as a scored card. If there is then an uneaten rabbit, the rabbit gets to eat a kale, provided there is one, and the player who played the rabbit keeps their meal as a scored card. Any kale that happens to survive this…

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11:57

I cannot stand the social deduction game Werewolf, nor its dominant variant One Night Ultimate Werewolf. In both, players are assigned secret roles as the denizens of the unfortunate village where the events take place. Perhaps you will be the Troublemaker, swapping player roles while others sleep, or the Insomniac, who wakes up in the middle of the night to check their role. You may well be the werewolf, terrorizing the town and ripping innocents to shreds.

The goal of the game depends on your role, but most of the villagers want to figure out who the werewolf is and execute them. The game alternates between Days, when players discuss and accuse and vote to execute, and Nights, when players close their eyes and specific individuals are prompted to perform actions corresponding to their roles. One player is the Narrator, a thankless position that has been replaced in recent years by an app, who times the Days and leads the other players through the script for the Night phase.

Werewolf is extremely popular, and I’m happy for those who enjoy it. Just don’t make me play. There aren’t many games I would pass up…

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Barrakuda is another entry in publisher Helvetiq’s ever-growing roster of modest games in modest boxes. 2-4 players compete as divers, racing to get eight coins into their individual safes. Six cards, representing six locations with the numbers 1-6, are put in the middle of the table in any order and configuration the group wants, so long as all the cards are orthogonally connected to the whole. A little wooden fish, the titular sphyraena, is placed on the 6. In addition to a modest amount of starting gold, each player gets six cards: the numbers 1-5, and a Barracuda.

Turns include three phases: move the divers, move the barracuda, and execute actions. Players simultaneously choose a card from their hands, reveal their cards, and move their divers to the corresponding locations. Played cards stay out on the table, in the order played, until each player either uses a location ability that allows them to pick some up, or they run out entirely.

Next, the titular barracuda moves. If nobody has played the Barracuda card, or if more than one player has played it, two dice are rolled. These determine how many spaces and in what direction the fish moves. If only one player has played the Barracuda card, they roll the movement die and choose if and in what…

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Bang! The Dice Game (2015, dV Giochi) is very clearly an inspiration for Cult of the Deep (2022, BA Games), especially if you have played both games and recognize the biggest shortcoming of Bang!:

If you are murdered, you’re out of the game and get to watch everyone else play without you.

Now, in Bang!, it sucks to die early. My only two games featured me dying off first. But that is countered by the fact that the game is so short, ending in about 15 minutes.

What if I offered you the chance to play a single game of Bang! for two hours?

[caption id="attachment_259147" align="alignnone" width="1500"] The dice are fabulous[/caption]

It’s Taking FOREVER to Kill That Guy!

Cult of the Deep is a hidden role dice game. Like Bang!, you’re dealt a card that tells you who you are: the High Priest, the Faithful, a Cabalist, or a Heretic.

If you are the High Priest, your role is public, and almost everyone else is trying to kill you. If you’re the Faithful, you’re trying to keep the High Priest alive. Cabalists want the High Priest dead, but they’ll settle for killing both the High Priest and the Faithful, while the Heretic wants everyone else to die, even if…

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