I wanted to make a top 10 games list, but I could only come up with 9 games that truly warranted being on it, so in the end it just had to be a top 9 list. Why is it always ten anyhow? Just because we've got 10 digits? It's an arbitrary number I say, so my list is just as valid!
So, here are 9 amazing games, all of which are definite desert island material. These are my most beloved games and they all offer huge amounts of depth and variablity while not leaving the fun behind.
9. Pax Pamir
The simplest of the Pax games. This one doesn't look like much, and it comes in a tiny box. The initial looks of it will turn many gamers off, but man is it a doozy. It's probably the tightest design out of all the Pax games, cutting away most of what is nonessential (and even more has ended up on the cutting block for the second edition!)
This is a streamlined Pax experience that reaches its culmination with the addition of the Khyber Knives expansion, which completes the game and is a must have.
Why is this at the bottom of the list? I like my chrome and rough edges in games, and the other Pax games definitely have more of those. Still, this is one of the coolest gaming experiences you can have with intrigue, spies, wars, trade, and politics in a fascinating foreign landscape.
8. The Artifact
This is an unknown gem that is actually still in print! You can order it from Print and Play games right now in fact, though beware, the price is a bit high because it is made in the US and spots some excellent production values.
What is The Artifact about? It's a four way blind role-playing board game with hidden identities that requires a Game Master to keep track of things. There are goals and strict rules and it plays in an evening.
Four different factions find themselves on a space station, each trying to achieve its own set of goals. Who will come out on top? The Pirates who are trying to gain The Artifact (roll credits!)? The Mad Scientist who is trying to get paid? The telephone company employees who might or might not be government spies? Or will it be the mysterious alien who might or might not be a shapeshifter, a swarm hive mind of man-eating xenomorphs or maybe even the sentient computer in control of the whole station? Or maybe the factions will negotiate to team up and go for a shared victory. Everything is possible!
Fight through crowded corridors and fog of war or take the less traveled path and blow a hole into the side of the space station, put on your space suit and enter from that way. But wait, did the commander just turn traitor? Was he a government spy all along?
This game offers so many hilarious situations and plays differently every time. It really shouldn't work but somehow manages to do so anyhow.
7. Pax Renaissance
The very best of the Pax games. Pax Renaissance is complicated, obtuse, terrible to learn and teach and doesn't hold your hand. It drops you into renaissance Europe with naught but a few coins in hand and you have to make your way into controlling kings, empires, republics, bishops, knights, nobility.
Cut a deal with Vlad the Impaler to behead your enemies. Lead the Ottoman Empire into war. Become the Pope - or become the Antipope and lead the reformation to victory. Initiate the Renaissance through free elections in many states (the outcome of which you control of course) or win through conquests as you take over Europe. Go off and win through trade in a Globalization victory or just be the one who was the greatest patron of art and science at the end of the game while plotting to disrupt your enemies throughout the game.
And this is just a sliver of what's possible in this 90 minute game. Yes, it does indeed play in that short amount of time. Oh what stories this game tells.
6. Pax Porfiriana
So if Pax Renaissance is the best Pax game, why is this here?
Because it is rough, it is crazy, and it is bold. You play with less than half of the cards the game comes with every game, yet somehow it always congeals into a cohesive whole without throwing all the balance out of whack.
The artwork is... strange, the cards are hard to wrap your head around, their layout is alien. It is as if this game came from another dimension where design principles took a very... different part in their evolution.
But once it clicks, this game becomes a masterpiece.
You are a Mexican landowner trying to become the next leader of the country by toppling the nefarious leader Porfirio Diaz. You do so by acquiring land and soldiers to do your bidding, by assassinating your opposition, by controlling events in your favor and changing the political climate. Maybe you will lead the country into a bright economic future or trigger a great depression, it is all up for grabs.
But what if you've been beaten down? What if you've been unjustly attacked by other players' armies? What if your land has been taken, your allies assassinated and you're left with the dregs? You'd be outraged, wouldn't you?
And thus, you start courting this outrage, making your plight public. You collect outrage points, start assassinating your own cards as strawmen to show the public how dire the need is to topple this unfair dictatorship.
Unlike any other take that game, being take thatted in this one just opens up another path towards victory for you. Nobody's ever out of the game in this brilliant and chaotic ride.
5. High Frontier
The Space Game.
This is the one. Kerbal Space program distilled down to its nuts and bolts. High Frontier lets you colonize and industrialize space on an absolutely breathtaking map of the solar system that isn't to scale, but instead based on potential energy. This game is a labor of love 30 years in the making and it shows. Not only are its systems accurate to real life specs and amazingly easy to get the hang of once you get over the initial hurdle, it is also a tightly designed competitive game that holds up to many repeat plays.
And here's the secret: Everyone makes this out to be a dry, serious, scientific, educational rocket game. And that's part of it, sure. But what they don't tell you: The end game turns into crazy speculative sci-fi. Things that can happen are:
- Terraforming Venus by throwing a giant rock at it
- Leaving the solar system in a massive generation starship
- Becoming the supreme cult leader
- Destroying Earth by throwing an asteroid at it
- The Emancipation of all robots
- The creating of great amounts of anti matter
- Leading a revolution on Earth
- Creating a black hole
And many more.
It's a long game, but worth every second of it.
4. Sidereal Confluence
What a title, huh? I wouldn't pay it too much mind. They probably just realized Cosmic Encounter was taken. And it does look like Cosmic Encounter at first, what with the asymmetric constellation of different alien factions that players can take control of. But it turns out to be a very different beast.
While both games have negotiation at their core, there are a lot of important differences to note. In Cosmic Encounter, you negotiate alliances during attacks, the space for negotiation is limited and mostly amounts to whom to gang up on. In Sidereal Confluence meanwhile, negotiation is constant and at the heart of the game. It's all about trade, and everything goes. Future deals are binding! What other game lets you do that?
I've never had as much fun wheeling and dealing as in this game. There is zero luck, but different player constellations mean that no game will ever play out the same, even with the same factions in play.
Surprisingly, all interaction in this game is positive. Very rarely do you deliberately deny someone a trade just to hurt them, as they are a valuable trade partner and you're always trying to curry favor. In fact, you actively try to help your opponents make better deals, since when they are better off, you will have more resources available through trading with them in turn, creating a positive feedback loop that feeds into itself like crazy.
I've heard it said that if a good player plays this game, he raises everyone's end game score by about 10 points, not just his own, and it shows. I've never seen a competitive game that fosters such warm feelings towards each other amongst its players.
3. Root
It's new, I know, but it's here to stay. I've been playing prototype versison of this game since the beginning of the year, I've played it more than pretty much any other game and I still want to play it all the time.
Unlike the other games in this list, I don't think much more needs to be said about this one. It's a well known game and the hype train is going strong right now, so I'm sure everybody already knows all about it.
Cute game about animals being excellent to each other!
2. Spirit Island
The best coop game in existence. Yes, better than Gloomhaven. It unjustly got dealt some bad reviews by The Dice Tower and Shut Up and Sit Down. This game is so massively replayable it's uncanny. So many different spirits, scenarios, and adversaries, it offers endless amounts of combinations to vary up the game. It's as if you could play Pandemic and decide to fight crime instead of viruses. Or maybe the whales. Whatever takes your fancy.
Fight the whales!
Ahem...
Spirit Island is a game about island spirits (huh, whoda thunk) defending their island from colonizers. You draft cards and use them in various ways to get rid of the menace invading your island, all while coordinating with your spirit mates and lamenting the blight that is slowly taking over what used to be a wonderful natural paradise.
This games often seems hopeless, you'll have to concede some land to the invaders, the white plastic starts spreading, the level 2 invader cards come out, you have to turn over the island card to the blighted side, all seems lost, they're everywhere!
Then suddenly you realize you've gained enough power to remain almost blightless for a turn. Oh, and the next. Oh, and you're getting fear cards left and right, helping out even more, driving the accursed invaders off your land. Level 3 invaders? Let them come, you're ready! AAAHAHAH!
DIE MOTHERTRUCKERS! DIE! MUAHAHAHAHAHA
Note: Get the Branch & Claw expansion. It doubles the power decks and most crucially adds the event deck, which is neccessary for this not to devolve into a dry puzzle game by adding some much needed uncertainty.
1. Argent: The Consortium
I don't like worker placement games. But I like this one. I've never seen anything like it.
The chancellor of the magical university has decided to step down and the players are now trying to take his place. Equipped with a variety of underling mage workers with different magical powers and a starting spell, they get to it.
Unlike other worker placement games, this one is extremely interactive. Push other people's mages off the board (not to worry, they will get compensated for it... most of the time), push for tempo and end the round before other people can pull off all their plans, research spells, destroy rooms full of your opponents or just travel to a different plane where you can do everything you want without being caught up in all the mayhem that all the other players are causing.
Who wins at the end? Well, that depends on the consortium voters in charge of electing the next chancellor. The catch? Their identities are secret. Slowly during the game you can use some actions to discover what the victory conditions of each respective game actually are. The end scoring in this game usually can't be calculated in advance, as nobody has access to the whole picture (unless they invested a ton of resources into gaining this knowledge). Revealing the voters and counting up the votes in the game's great reveal is the most exciting that end game scoring has ever been. A nail biter until the end.
Of course, after a game of this, you'll want to play again right away. But hey, what's this? All the worker placement tiles have a back side? And hey, you've used less than half of the ones in the box in that game (Since you own the expansion. You do own the expansion, right?). So the next game is completely different! Different board layout, different voters, different spells, different magical items, different end of round bonuses, different supporters. Different... wait, the mage powers have a different backside? So not even your workers will be the same! And that's without even counting the scenarios that come in the expansion. And hey, maybe the Archmage will come for a visit and leave their staff up for grabs for yet more possibilities.
It's like the castle of Hogwarts, shifting around, never the same. If you enjoy discovery in your games, this one has an incredible amount of variety to it. You'll never have to play the same game of Argent twice (but you'll want to and you can).
Submitted September 02, 2018 at 10:25PM by dota2nub https://ift.tt/2LQ0x3i
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