I just love a good one-time-play mystery game.

If you’ve followed some of my other work at Meeple Mountain, you know that I consider myself a seasoned purveyor of the finest in single-play escape room/mystery box games, such as Exit: The Game, Unlock!, Cold Case, Suspects, and the Unsolved Case Files series. When I learned that Ravensburger published a series of one-shot “audio mystery” games known as echoes, I signed up to get a copy of the latest game in the series, echoes: The Cursed Ring.

All four of the games in this series play the same way. Players take on the role of investigators who have the ability to hear voices and environmental effects from objects no matter how old the objects are. That means you have the ability to swoop in, pick up broken glassware, and hear the story of how that glass shattered in short sound clips.

Each echoes production includes 18 clue cards and six chapter tiles, and these items must be scanned using a free app to hear the sounds that will help piece together answers to the mystery at hand. All of the games play under an hour, and are meant to only be played once.

So, let’s give echoes this much: the system is really, really…

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I love board games of all sorts. Deck building, roll and move, area control, and light card games are some of my favorites, but in general I’ll play just about anything. However board game apps don’t generally appeal to me. They’re flashy and fun, but I play board games for the people, which is probably one reason I’m personally not a fan of solitaire gaming. However there’s a subgenre of board games that mixes the digital and the analog in clever and innovative ways, leveraging technology while still giving me a hands on experience with my friends and family. I’ve previously covered two superb examples in this group: Dropmix from Hasbro and Beasts of Balance from Sensible Object. I’m really excited to show off a new addition to this crew: Blinks from Move 38. Let’s dive in and see what the fuss is about.

Blinks Overview

Before we dive into the game system, let’s introduce you to a Blink, the star of the show. A single Blink is a hexagonal plastic piece with a plastic shell, a soft rubber top, lights, and a single game.

Each Blink contains not only the instructions for its own game, but also the ability to teach…

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In this review anything that might be considered a spoiler is hidden in a collapsible window with a spoiler warning on it. In all other ways, this review is spoiler-free.

Escape Room: The Game (Escape Rooms II) is, as the title suggests, a tabletop escape room simulation which can be found at big-box stores like Walmart and Target. This version of the game is the followup to Spin Master’s other release, Escape Room: The Game. Both versions are cooperative and play the same way, but there are different scenarios included in each box. In Escape Room: The Game (Escape Rooms II)—going forward simply referred to as ER II—there are three independent scenarios which increase in difficulty. The Secret Agent scenario is the first and easiest, followed by The Dentist, and finally Space Station, which is the most difficult. Like many escape room games, each scenario in ER II can only be played through once. However, Spin Master has found a way to solve the destructive nature of this style of game: any component that needs to be “used” in some way will have a printer icon. If anyone else wants to play the game, they may simply go to the Escape Room website, download, and print…

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In the heart of Warsaw, just past the Building of Culture and Science, hidden in an apartment-turned-studio behind a chocolate shop, a small team of designers are doing something revolutionary. With ambition to rival Heracles, THM (Three Headed Monster) is developing a truly hybrid gaming experience using artificial intelligence. And even if you've decided that tech has no place in your tabletop fun, I encourage you to read on and learn about what could be the future of integrated gaming.

[caption id="attachment_14593" align="aligncenter" width="659"] The tower reads RFID chips on the back of the cards.[/caption]

Up until my play of Beyond Humanity: Colonies, my main understanding of app use in board games was CGE's excellent Alchemists. In Alchemists the app hid information and could be replaced by a very bored 5th player, so I expected a simple database of information and a neat little gimmick. What I got was a living world.

Setup

[caption id="attachment_14594" align="alignright" width="300"] This was our new home[/caption]

After connecting the main tower (the chip reader) to the app and picking our characters, it was time to choose our starting world. There are over 700,000 planets to choose from, each with its…

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Wizards of the Coast was not going to take this lying down. Their Magic: The Gathering Online (MTGO) program had been successful for years, but it wasn’t free-to-play. In fact it was as expensive as the physical product. Changing MTGO to a free-to-play system would take a complete overhaul of everything.

And that’s the story of Magic: The Gathering Arena (MTGA), which users can now download and play for free. Have Wizards of the Coast succeeded in their top-to-bottom renovation?

Magic: FREE-TO-PLAY!

Note: There will be a lot of jargon that non-Magic players may not be familiar with. I’ll try my best to explain required understanding, but know that Arena does a great job of holding your hand until you feel comfortable with the system.

Magic Arena is, as…

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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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This article contains no spoilers. Any photographs from actual gameplay are taken only from the Tutorial scenario.

We loved Chronicles of Crime so much that we nominated it for a Diamond Climber award for Best Kickstarter Game, and for Best Coop Game, and it won both of them.

Sherlock is old news, there is a new detective at the helm. With you and your team of investigators hot on the case, London has never been safer...right?

In Chronicles of Crime, you and up to three friends join together to solve crimes around London in this cooperative criminal investigation boardgame. Unlike other titles in the genre, Chronicles of Crime incorporates QR codes, so components are reusable for future cases. Each character can play a different role in each case, and the locations you visit will be host to various events--once an innocent park, now the scene of a murder. Each story arc is made up of multiple scenarios (cases) and is brought to you by a different author. Aside from adaptability based on the game's components, Chronicles of Crime is app-driven, leading you through the story one stage at a time. And when you visit a crime scene, you can experience it as if you are actually there thanks to the integration…

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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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