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Best Games of 2024 · Pick Up and Deliver

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Welcome to pick up and deliver the podcast where I
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: pick up my audio recorder as I step out for
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: a walk and deliver an episode two while I stroll around.
• 0:11
  Speaker 2: I'm Brendan Riley. Greetings listeners.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: It's a lovely day here in suburban Chicago, and I
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: mean lovely. It is late February, but the Google tells
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: me it's fifty three degrees out right now, and boy.
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: It feels it.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: I went out without a jacket on, and I don't
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: think I'm gonna get cold while I'm out walking around
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: talking to you. I did give up on trying to
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: record on my new audio recorder for the time being.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: I'm back to using my phone and hoping it doesn't
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: die before the recording comes in. I'm trying to get
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: a couple episodes recorded today and then well, we'll see
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: what happens anyway, So that's what I'm doing. I wanted
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: to get a couple more episodes out here in February
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: before we hit March. So I have a tradition at
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: the beginning of the year, which it's fair to say
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Day February twenty seventh is not the beginning of the year,
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: but usually one of the first episodes.
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: I do is my year in review of the previous year.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: Now, as longtime listeners know, when I say the previous year,
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: I don't mean the year that ended a two months ago.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: I mean the year that ended fourteen months ago. There's
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: a lot of podcasters and other media folks who do
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: like a best of twenty twenty five at the beginning
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: of twenty six, or even at the end of twenty five.
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: I don't get exposed to enough new games to do
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: a best of that quickly. I don't.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: This podcast does not have enough reach that I'm getting
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: all kinds of brand new review copies or anything, and
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: I hear about a lot more games than I get
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: to play. So it just doesn't seem reasonable to try
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: to do a best of the previous year when there
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: are so many games that have heard good things about
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: that I haven't tried yet. That still feels like the
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: case for twenty twenty four, honestly, but We're far enough
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: away now that I feel like that's what I'm gonna do.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: So today is the best of twenty four. So what
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: I do is I do the top five games. I
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: pay got my top five games, and then I usually
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: give out a couple of superlatives as well, meaning awards
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: that I give to other games, and I'll also call
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: out some honorable mentions and other games that I enjoy.
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: So that's what I'm doing today. Just to give you
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: some context, I have thirty eight games from twenty twenty
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: four that I've played the way you know, I track
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: my games the way that I some of this list.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: As I go into Board game Geek and I have
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: it do an advanced search, and I say games published
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: in twenty twenty four. Only then I order them an
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: order of Board Game Geek rank, and I look through
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: the top ten thousand games. As soon as I get
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: to a game that's rated higher than ten thousand, I
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: stop looking and I note down every game in that
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: selection that I've played, and then discount games that are
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: reprints or significant re implementations for the most part, like,
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: for instance, I enjoyed doorf Romantic Sakura, but I'm not
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: including it in the conversation here because it feels like
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: that's an expansion more, that's a standalone expansion more.
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: Than a new game.
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: And then of those games, I note which games I've
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: played and also which games I think I probably should
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: play like if I had played them, these games might
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: affect my ratings or conversations. So I'm going to start
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: with the games I haven't played but would like to
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: or think I should, and I could see if I
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: had played these maybe they would end up in the
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: list somewhere. So I have not played and these are
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: in no particular order, except the first three are games
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: that I have copies of and have not played, so
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: that's especially shameful. Gloom Haven, Buttons and Bugs. To be fair,
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: my son has a copy of that, but I could
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: play it if I wanted. Sultan Sea and Kingdom Legacy
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: Feudal Kingdom. That's a solo game, so again I could
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: play them. There's also SETI, Search for Extra Intelligence, Sex,
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence, Terminus Andromena's Edge, Rebirth, Shackleton Base,
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: A Journey to the Moon, Agent Avenue, Defenders of the Wild, Harvest,
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: Wilmott's Warehouse, Compile, Sakore, The Pride of Manfa, Musa Into
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: Mill Valley, Black Forest, River of Gold, Captain Flip Leviathan,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: Wild's MLEM Space Agency, Galileo Galilee.
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: And Creature Caravan.
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: Now these are all games that I've heard good things
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: about that I think I would probably enjoy and that
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: I would like to play at some point, but I
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: haven't played them, and so I can't easily reflect on
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: how they fit into my twenty twenty four games.
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: So let's just jump right into the beth, the big meat.
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: What are my top five games? I will say most
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: years I have a little bit of trouble. Maybe I
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: come up with eight to ten that I think, ah,
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: this could be I know, no kidding, had somewhere in
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: the neighborhood of fifteen games that I given a different
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: day and a different level of I don't know, peak
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: or whatever, could put in my top five. I think
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty four was a strong year for games, and
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: I really like many many of the games I've played.
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: That said, here's my top five. Number five The Gang.
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: The Gang is a cooperative game in which you are
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: trying to put in order, put everyone's hands in order,
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: and it's Texas hold them poker.
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: So you get two cards and then there's these little.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: Chips, and the chips go from one to five, and
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: the idea is, if you think you have the very
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: best hand out of the people at the table, you
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: take the five chip or it's just one to however
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: many players there are, so if there's five players.
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: You would say one to five.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: And if you think you have the very best hand
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: based on just the two cards you have, you take
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: the five. If someone else thinks that the very worst one,
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: they take the one. Then everybody just kind of negotiates.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: But the only negotiate you can have is taking a
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: chip or not. You're not allowed to say anything about
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: what cards you have. You can speculate about what other
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: people have to a degree, but how much you can
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: do that is a little limited. Then once you've done that,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: then the flop comes out. You play three cards out
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: and everybody takes a chip again, a different chip, and
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: the first chip you have just as a clue to
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: the other people about how the quality of your hand changes,
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: like if you take the one. Then the flop comes
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: out and you grab the five. That tells everyone that
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: there's like synergy there that you didn't have before. Then
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: you put out another card and everybody takes a thing,
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: and they put on another card, and everybody takes a thing,
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: And it's after that third or that last reveal when
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: everybody takes a chip that you have to be right
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: in order to win the round, you have to have
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: the right order from one to five with that group. Now,
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: I don't particularly like poker that much, but I find
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: the Gang really interesting. It's just the right balance between
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: deduction and a little bit of mystery. There's conversation to
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: be had, there's real thinking about the value of your
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: hand and trying to reflect against other people, and really
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: some interesting deductions to be made about when somebody feels
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: like their hand value went up or down. I think
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: it's great and I would buy a copy, but I
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: don't think my wife would enjoy it at all, and
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know how much the other
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: groups I play with would enjoy it, so I haven't
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: picked up a copy for myself. But I really like it.
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: And anytime someone says, hey, you want to play the Gang,
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: I will be there. So that's the Gang.
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: Next up, we have my number four best game of
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: the year, Wondrous Creatures. Wondrous Creatures is a really cute
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: tableau builder slash work replacement game where you have these
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: nifty little workers and they go on to this board
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: and you collect resources and use the resources to buy
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: different cards, and the cards come in different flavors. The
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: cards are all like creatures, and they come in sort
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: of different type of creature, and each different type of
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: creature is giving you a different sort of thing on
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: your board. It's an endgame scoring, or it's efficiency booster
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: or whatever. There's a really neat kind of resonance there.
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: You have these little eggs you can pick up, and
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: the eggs allow you to score things.
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: They also allow you.
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: To pick up cards faster. It's just it's a really
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: neat set of systems. There's nothing in it that's dramatically new.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: I don't know if there's any mechanisms in it where
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, I've never heard of that before. The
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: eggs are interesting because you get them in their face up,
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: and then when you use them, you flip them face
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: down and so you can't use them again. But then
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: there are actions you could take that will recharge them
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: and let you use them again. So there's this interesting
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: back and forth to be managed with those.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: It's very pretty as well.
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: The creatures look neat, and one of the creatures is
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: a little bigger and.
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: Has a magnet in the top.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: And then you get your captain who has a special power,
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: and then you put it on that creature and it
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: slots on with a magnet.
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: It's cute, it's.
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: Well designed, interesting fun. I don't see Wondrous Creatures being
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: on game a ton of people are gonna be talking
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: about in ten years, and.
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: Probably if I redid a.
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: Top twenty top ten games of twenty twenty four in
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: a decade, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that Wonder
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: Screatures had fallen off. But for now, I really like
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: it and I'm looking forward to playing it some more.
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: That's Wonder's Creatures, my.
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: Number four from twenty twenty four, except we have my
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: number three from twenty twenty four. This game, it's not
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: surprising it would have made the list somewhere because they
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: usually do. This is Vladimir Succi Is Risky A probably
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: his most poorly received game from the Delicious Games era,
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: although Woodcraft I don't think got a ton of love either.
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: Resafa is the boringest theme. You are trading goods in
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: the Middle East, but I think that it's really neat.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: The action selection mechanism where you use your cards to
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: do two actions, and the cards have this color on them,
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: and the color connects to what kind of bonus that
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: you can acquire, and then you acquire these bonus cards
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: which make your actions more efficient. There's also a level
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: of action efficiency management where you're moving your trading caravan
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: around the desert and you are shipping moving goods from
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: one place to another and trying to maximize your points
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: as you do. That works really well, very interesting, fun.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: There's this whole water management element and you're building a garden,
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: so it is kind of the epitome of point salad.
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: You have a bunch of different ways you can earn points,
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: and that way it reminds me a little bit of Praga.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: I think Praga is better. Really, I really like it,
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: and I think there's a lot there. It's interesting and
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: it's a game I'm looking forward to exploring more. I
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: really wish the theme were better because it is not
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: a fun theme, and frankly.
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: The cover art is not good.
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: It's almost it's not as it's better than the cover
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: art on Messine the thirteen forty seven, but not dramatically.
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: So I think Vladimir Succi needs to.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: Have someone else pick out his cover artists and do
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: a little bit of work on the cover design, because
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: I think he is missing something there. But all that said,
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: Risafa is my number three game of the year from
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty four. Next up number two, Kinfire Dove. Now
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: technically this is three games. They all came out at
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: the same time. This is a cooperative game in which
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: you are spending cards judiciously to defeat a variety of enemies,
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: with the idea of getting through the stack of enemies
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: you can get to the end boss and that way.
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: It's a little bit like Ghost Story. It's sort of
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: like faster ghost Stories. The game has really interesting scaling
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: difficulty depending which boss you're facing in which people you're
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: bringing with. I love the way that the characters overlap,
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: the way the game's made it. It's a two player game.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: You get two characters in the box, but they've released
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: three different boxes and each one has two different characters
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: in it, and all the characters can be used in
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: all the different boxes. So if you buy all three,
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: you have six characters and three different adventures you can
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: go on and you can mix and match. I've had
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: fun every time I play this. I really like the
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: card design and the mechanisms that are going on. Each
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: character has their own little powers and they're all kind
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: of interesting in various degrees. So I've had a really
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: good time with kin Fierdeve as we've played it. It's
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: a game I'm looking forward to playing more, and I
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: hope they'll release more of them. We'll see each additional
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: one they release would be hard to work because you.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: Have to make it fit with all the other ones.
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: And one of the bosses would be particularly hard because
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: the boss has as part of their and challenges cards
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: that interact with.
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: The with the six different characters.
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: So if you were to release more characters, now that
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: boss is becoming less effective against the characters unless that
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: boss unless with new boxes, you release new cards for
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: that other boss, which is kind of weird. So there's
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: a design challenge there that they've set up for themselves,
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: but it's a minor problem in an otherwise really interesting game,
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: So one I will enjoy playing more in future.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: That is Kinfire delve.
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: And finally, my number one game that I've played from
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty four thus far.
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: Is Unconscious Mind.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: Unconscious Mind is Johnny Pack design along with a couple
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: other people. It hits all of my buttons. It is
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: delightfully crunchy. It has complex system that you can learn
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: and get better at as you explore them. It's beautifully rendered.
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: It is a really fun game to look at on
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: the table. It feels a little different than other things,
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: but accessible. It makes your brain hurt as you play,
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: and I like the theme. The theme is neat, and
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: you're one of Sigmund Freud's early comrades and in trying
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: to figure out how the brain works, and I think
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: that what you're doing in the game is really neat.
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: The way the game works is really neat. The components
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: are beautiful. All in all, it's just a masterpiece and
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: I'm really excited to keep playing it. This is Unconscious Mind,
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: my number one game from twenty twenty four.
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: All right, Brendan, All done?
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: Oh no, I've got a few more things to say
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: about twenty twenty four. First off, I have one, two, three, four,
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: five superlatives to grant. I'm not going to spend a
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: ton of time on these, but these are just other
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: games I want to call out for specific awesomeness. Beginning
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: at the best weird game Arcs.
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: I got to play Arcs.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: It is a trick taking game that's area of control
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: and it is just weird as is always true of
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: Cole WHIRLI games. A lot of the mechanisms are just
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: one step too far. They're a little too weird. But
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: it is the first of his games that I not
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: only thought I would like, but actually did really like
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: when I played it. I really liked ARCS. It is
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: very swingy, really weird. Sort of reminds me of the
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: weird moments in the more interesting Martin Wallace games, and
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: I think there's a lot to be discovered there. I
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: don't think I'm going to get to play ARCS very often,
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: but if I.
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: Do, I will enjoy it. That's ARCS.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: I have two games that I'm going to give the
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: award Best Adaptation. I played both of these in twenty
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: twenty four. Both of these in twenty twenty five. They
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: are twenty twenty four games, and they're both pretty interesting.
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: The first one is the mist Born deck building game.
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: This is an adaptation of the Brandon Sanderston Myst Born series.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: The premises you are magicians and you burn metal to
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: do magic. It's an interesting premise in the world. Building
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: is good. I bounced off of miss Bourne. I'll probably
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: try it again at some point. They're very popular, so
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: there must be something fun about them.
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: But the duck building game is great. There's a bunch of.
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: Different ways to approach it, different ways to win. The
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: resource management is fundamentally interesting and complex. I like the art.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: Everything about it is great. So if you get a
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: chance to the mix Misborne the Duck Building Game, you should.
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: The other adaptation all point too that I really enjoyed
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: was Slay the Spire. I got to play this one
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: time recently, and it really was very interesting.
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: It was a really good adaptation of the video game.
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: I did play it with somebody who hadn't played the
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: video game, and they did not get the board game
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: at all, So I wonder how much playing the board
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: game helps. But I think that they have done an
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: excellent job in adapting what's going on in the video
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: game to fit the board game space. I like the
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: idea that when you upgrade a card, you just flip
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: it over inside it sleeve.
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: That's a clever way to handle that issue.
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: And there's just a ton going on that I think
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: makes for really fun gameplay. I enjoyed my play of
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: Slave the Spire very much, and I'm looking forward to
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: playing it.
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: More at some point. That is Slay the Spire the
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: board game.
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: Next up, I have two games that I'm gonna that
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: I want to give the award best Theme or best
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: fun Theme. By fun, I mean interesting, weird, unusual. These
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: two are Undergrove, which is Elizabeth Hargrave game about being
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: mushrooms and being in a network, or being trees and
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: being in a network and networking with mushrooms. So it's
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: trees and mushrooms building a network. It is a tableau
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: building engine builder with an awesome theme. And the other
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: thing I want to point to is Fromage. This is
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: a game about making cheese and selling cheese, and I
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: love it. I think it's a it's a hoot, plays
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: really fast, It's satisfyingly crunchy, but not brain burning. It's
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: just right for a good tasting board. So it's from
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: a So Fromage and Undergrove get my best Theme Best
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: Fun Theme of twenty twenty four. And then finally, I
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: guess I'm feeling hungry, or not finally, but I guess
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: I was feeling hungry. I also have Best Little Snack.
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: These are games that are quick to play, easy to learn,
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: but have something really interesting going on. And there are
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: two of them that I've enjoyed this year. One of
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: these is three Chapters. This is a little drafting game
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: where you draft a hand of cards and then you
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: play two tricks, or let's say you draft a hand
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: of cards is.
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: The first phase.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: Then you play play the hand of cards like a
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: trick taking game, and then you score the hand of
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: cards that you draft it.
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: So there's three phases.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: Pretty simple game, really interesting, nice crunchy little choices to
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: make as you draft. And then the other one is
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: up or Down. This is a sort of adaptation of
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: the game. The game you are making these stacks of
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: cards that either have to go up or they have
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: to go down, and you're trying. It's put a little
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: bit of push your luck, a little bit of gambling.
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: There is this ring of cards and there's a really
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: interesting mechanism by which you choose the cards that you get.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: The complexity of the game belies. It seems pretty simple,
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: but there's some really interesting choices there. That is up
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: or down. So two games that I award the award
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: best Little Snack. And finally, my favorite art of twenty
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: twenty four is the very simple game from All Play,
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: from designers Ben Riddle and are Matt Riddle and Ben
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: Pinchback and this is.
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: River Valley Glassworks.
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: River Valley Glassworks is a simple little set collection game
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: with a delightful mechanism of building a tableau or you're
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: collecting sets of these gems. And it's got sort of
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: horizontal and vertical scoring, so you score for getting a
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: bunch of gems of the same type, but you also
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: score for getting.
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: Sets of gems as well.
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: It's a really simple game to play, almost too simple,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: but I do like they It came with a couple
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: expansions and if you if you use all of the
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: expansion modules together, then it gets a little crunchier, gets
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: a little bit.
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: More to do.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: But the art is very nice, particularly the character design
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: is really cute. Andrew Bosley did the art design, and
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: then like the characters have names that give them just
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: a ton of flavor. So even though it's a game
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: with relatively simple experience, just the joy of having this
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: sort of dapper turtle with a with a monocle and
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: a top hat on is a delight so favorite favorite
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: art of the year for a game. River Valley Glassworks,
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: and then I have I just wanted to quickly hear
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: before the episode ends buzz through a bunch of games
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: that I played this year that I put in the
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: honorable mention category. So these games are all games that
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: I very seriously considered for my top five. And if
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: you said, Brendan, you have to kill one of your
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: top five and put one of these other ones in
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: there instead, I could happily put one of these in
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: and not be too sad about it. So here they are.
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: There's ten of them. We have Endeavor, deep Sea Bombusters, Harmonies,
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: Saltfjord Inventions, Evolution of Ideas, Castle Combo, Civolution, Cities, the
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: Wrath of Fire, Mountain, and Umbrella. Now each of those
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: has something about them. That's the reason I didn't put
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: them in the top five. But they're all very good
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: and I enjoy them all and I encourage you to
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: try them if you get a chance. Finally, I always
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: like to end with the other games I've played from
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty four so you could know what else was
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: in the mix. Here are the other twenty twenty four
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: games that I considered, and frankly, none of these games
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: go into the category of don't play it. I would
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: say there are a few. If you go listen to
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: my quick reviews. There are a few where I'm like,
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: I don't need to play that again, but none of
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: these are bad. So with that in mind, you got
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: Worm Span, Aqua, Biodiversity in the Oceans, Best of Robinhood,
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: Cafe Barras, Landmarks, Survive the Island, Nocturn, Door for Romantic Sakura,
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: Power Hungry Pets, Ziggurat, Let's Go to Japan, Chroma Mix,
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: Flip seven.
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: And Tree Society.
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: So that brings me to the end of my best
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: of twenty twenty four episode. I hope that you enjoyed it,
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: and I hope that you can let me know what
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: games you like best in twenty twenty four. Are there
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: any that I did not mention that you think I
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: should play? Head over to board game gigk Guild three
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: two sixty nine and share your thoughts there. We have
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: a guild where people chat sometimes about these sorts of things.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: You could also send me a direct message on board
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: game geek Wombat nine two nine is my username. There
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: also have an email address Brendan at rattleboxgames dot com
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: that should receive an email as.
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: Well, and I will get back to you eventually from that.
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: So with that, I want to say thanks for joining
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: me on my quick burst of episodes here at the
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: end of February. I want to say I hope your next
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: walk is as pleasant as mine.
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: Us good bye. Brought to you by rattle Box