Disney Lorcana. If there’s any single thing we will remember from Gen Con 2023, it will definitely be Disney Lorcana.

The game, published by Ravensburger and arriving at retail today, was the most anticipated product at the show. It created a frenzy each and every day of the convention—the black market for the cards was epic, the lines for getting a single starter set of the cards were brutal, and the Lorcana foot traffic on the expo hall floor was intense.

Disney Lorcana is a collectible card game (CCG), which I find is often referred to as a trading card game (TCG). To be honest, I’m not big enough in either world to help sort out the difference, but in terms of impact, I think Lorcana will become the biggest CCG/TCG product of all time because Disney fans are the most hardcore fans of any entertainment property I have ever met. Games like Magic the Gathering (MTG) have a big lead…but, Disney!

I’ve certainly read stories about epic auction prices for Pokémon cards; in rare cases, $300,000 for a card is crazy town to me. But when I walked into the Gen Con expo hall on the second day of the show, I met a line that wrapped all the way around the block…and that was the…

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I’m a sucker for Batman films, but once the net loosens a bit, my experience with the world of Batman becomes a little spottier.

Luckily, it’s essentially impossible now to avoid a run-in with The Caped Crusader and the gallery of misfits that populate Gotham City. There are too many TV shows to count, and while I don’t read comic books, a recent visit to a comics store in Chicago tells me that iterations of the character are exploding even now. The recent film The Flash seemed to feature Michael Keaton’s return as Batman more than The Flash character himself, at least in the previews.

One of our tabletop marketing partners reached out because he had a new copy of The Arkham Asylum Files: Panic in Gotham City ready to ship. I watched the trailer, and had to admit that this looked like a fun activity, even if it was very close to the line of board game versus video game. There are plenty of tabletop elements, all secretly packaged in a handsome black box, but players must use an app to drive the entire gaming experience.

(As of the writing of this article, Panic in Gotham City is only playable on newer iOS devices. That meant I actually couldn’t play this game when I first got it.…

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Over the summer, another box arrived from Funko Games.

When this happens, the kids—similar to those scenes in the film Children of the Corn—seem to rise out of the floor, appearing next to me as I open the box.

As I have previously shared, games from Funko are my favorite kind of family experience. The production is solid, the games are reasonably priced, and the rules overhead is low. Sure, many of the products are not built for the long haul—I’m finding that more and more games across all publishers fit this description—but for a couple of weekends, I’ve almost never gone wrong with a family-weight Funko game.

I’m happy to report that Marvel Battleworld: Ultimate Armory meets expectations.

More of the Same (i.e., Perfect)

Much like Marvel Battleworld: Treachery at Twilight (the second set of minis in the series), Ultimate Armory doesn’t mess with the original series of rules and gameplay. Mostly, you are just getting more characters: in my set, I had Fireclaw, Vision, Ms. Marvel, and a few others to add to my collection.

The main benefit here beyond variety: you can add more players if you have more minis and location/enemy cards to fight. (Easily the best new one in the game is…

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For some reason, I have very fond childhood memories of Shrinky Dinks. Most likely, the memories stem from the fact that Shrinky Dinks. Are. Amazing. They might just be the best thing to come out of the 1970s. What’s not to love about taking a drawn, colored picture and tossing it in the oven for a minute or two and watching it curl and shrivel into a wee chunky keepsake?

One of the most nostalgic days I can remember as a parent is the day I found that Shrinky Dinks still exist. I had always assumed their magic was born of some toxic amalgam that had long since been banned from the public square—but there they were. Suddenly, all the hours spent with colored pencils and extreme heat came flooding over me and I was eight years old again. We’ve had them in the house ever since.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I opened the newest skirmish game from the Op to find acrylic standee characters not unlike the indomitable Shrinky Dinks. Where some might say, “Where are the minis?” I shouted, “Yes!!”

Disney Sorcerer’s Arena: Epic Alliances Core Set is a mouthful of a title, but…

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“OPEN THE THANOSTONE DADDY!!!”

My 7-year-old daughter and 5-year-old son were fired up when I returned from Gen Con 2021. While they may have been excited to see me, they were more excited by the miniature Iron Man inside the plastic packaging protruding from my bag of 15+ games I needed to review after the convention.

So, we ripped it open. “It” is Marvel Battleworld: Treachery at Twilight, a series of collectible Marvel characters paired with a dice-chucking game where each player takes control of a superstar from the Marvel catalog as they take on fights with baddies from the Marvel universe.

As I am learning with products from Prospero Hall and Funko, the games seem to always work. Marvel Battleworld: Treachery at Twilight is no exception.

[caption id="attachment_239172" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Adorable!![/caption]

Ryan’s World Has Taught Me Everything

If you are a parent of a child older than 5, you have probably heard of Ryan’s World; Ryan at one point was the most popular child on YouTube. His “unboxing” videos, where he took great joy in opening up new things while on camera, are famous, but his toy line is what brought me into the fold.

For a mere $50 (yikes!), we had…

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I could keep going — the rulebook starts with a three page short story describing the lore — but underneath all its glitter and chrome, Soulgivers is an abstract game at heart. This may be because of its minimalist design or may be a natural consequence of how the game works.

How the Game Works

Soulgivers is a two-player game of tactical movement and deterministic combat. Both players control a team of units called Soulgivers, each with their own unique powers and abilities. Both players are racing to retrieve a piece called the Fragment and bring it back to their home territory. The first team that can get the Fragment all the way home wins. Design-wise, Soulgivers shares a lot of DNA with Capture the Flag.

The game is played on a grid, with the Fragment starting in the center. Each team has two places to enter the board called Portals (blue and orange), which is also where players must bring the Fragment to win. The…

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It’s not too often that a “board game” shows up on the shelves of an Apple Store, or in the “tech section” of Best Buy or Target. But that’s just what you can expect when you’re talking about Beasts of Balance, a technological dexterity game from Sensible Object, a game design studio whose self-professed mission is “Making games for our connected world”. And they’re clearly on to something because they’ve won awards for their games...lots of awards. But we’re here to talk about Beasts of Balance right?

Overview

Beasts of Balance is a dexterity / stacking game with a twist. One goal of the game is to fill your Bestiary, a visual diary of sorts, with a variety of animals; at last count there were over 100 different permutations! The game includes 6 creatures, but there are at least 5 or 6 other creatures that can be picked up aftermarket.

Beasts of Balance includes a base, called the plinth, which pairs with an app on your phone, tablet, or smart TV. Each time you select an item…

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Back in the 1960’s the undead crawled their way into pop culture thanks to George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead. Ever since they gnawed their way into our hearts we just can’t let them go. There are books exploring creation myths and offering survival tips, movies about how zombies have destroyed civilization or how we finally conquered the disease. You can even find shows exploring what it would be like to be a sentient zombie with feelings and relationships. We find zombies as the theme in films, books, videogames, and board games; just check out our review of Zombie Kids! Our obsession with zombies is here to stay and I’m not complaining. But that does mean that a new zombie themed game faces tough competition as it tries to stand out in a crowded market of undead.

In today’s review we find ourselves preparing weapons, gathering supplies, and trying to complete our missions before the zombie horde takes over the mall. Let’s chow down on this review of Tiny Epic Zombies.

Overview

Tiny Epic Zombies (TEZ) is a fast paced survival game. It’s a game of board management and turn efficiency. You play either a human or a…

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Some artists play guitar, or drums, or piano, still others play brass or woodwind instruments. But there’s a segment of the musical population that use samples as their instrument, mixing and remixing sound, both common and uncommon, with oft times sublime results. Layers and loops of sound, swirling, solid and pumping, rising up in crescendos, then crashing down to barely a whisper.

In Dropmix, from Hasbro and Harmonix, players are given the tools to make their own genre bending mixes, using samples from decades worth of songs, and artists from all over the musical spectrum.

Does it work? You bet it does, and stunningly well. Read our review of Dropmix to find out more about this unique game / musical experiment.

Dropmix Overview

So what IS Dropmix? It’s part sampling kit, part musical instrument, part game, and ALL awesome. Dropmix is the brainchild of Hasbro Toys and Harmonix (makers of Rock Band, Dance Central, and the original designers of Guitar Hero). You might say that Harmonix knows a thing or two about music, specifically licensed music. And that last bit is an important distinction because in Dropmix players will be mixing sound clips from some of today’s…

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