Which Game First: A Board Game Podcast Which Game First

Welcome to Which Game First where we boldly explore the hilariously huge world of board games. Did we unearth any hidden treasures you’ve been missing out on? Let’s find out!







First up: We puff out our feathered chests for mating season as we scoop up seeds for the win in PiepmatzNext: We scramble for woodland resources to help our little furry friends thrive, in Tiny TownsAnd lastly: We dodge dragons and trolls to build luxe castles in forbidding territories in Kingdoms







Piepmatz – Little Songbirds







Designed by: Ben Pinchback, Matt RiddlePublished by: Lookout Games (2018)Players: 2 – 4Ages: 10 & upPlaying time: ~ 30 minutes







Piepmatz is a set collection card game where players play bird cards from their hand to collect seeds and birds at the bird feeder. Seeds and bird couples in your collection are worth points. Single birds only score if you have the most of their species.







Each turn, players add birds to the line at the bird feeder. The bird closest to the feeder is the one that is feeding. A player can collect that feeding bird by placing a card in that line, and if the value of all the birds waiting in line to feed is greater than that of the bird currently feeding, the player will collect the feeding bird, along with collecting some seed cards.







Bird cards can also be collected by playing a lower value card on the feeding line, and then taking another card from your hand and putting it into your collection.







Each bird card and each seed card have one , two, or three eggs on it, so the player who has the most eggs of a specific species of birds at the end of the game will score the victory points for that particular species. 







Mating pairs – exact matches of birds in your hand – score bonus points.  Beware squirrels and crows, you might have to pick them up along the way, and they will eat some of your seed cards.







When the seed card pile runs down, the game ends, add up your points, and the winner becomes top of the pecking order.







Tiny Towns







Designed by: Peter McPhersonPublished by: Alderac Entertainment Group (2019)Players: 1 – 6Ages: 14 & upPlaying time: 45 minutes







Tiny Town is a resource management game in which players are the mayor of a tiny town, deep in the woods, where you must collect raw materials to build specific types of buildings.







A player’s town is represented by a 4×4 grid. As you collect a resource, you must place it on one of your squares. Place your resources in certain patterns to build certain types of buildings. When you have the resources in place in the correct pattern on your card, remove the resources and erect the building on one of those squares. Keep doing this until you have no more legal moves to make. 







Each building scores victory points (VPs) in a unique way. Any squares without a building are worth -1 VP. The player with the most VP wins, and graduates from being the Mayor to the Lord and Overseer of the greatest Tiny Metropolis the forest has ever seen!







Kingdoms (Koninkrijk)







Designed by: Rogier J.C. OoijevaarPublished by: self-published – (2016)Players: 3 – 5Ages: 12 & upPlaying time: 20 – 50 minutes







Kingdoms is a card game, where you use your hand of cards to battle opponents with them to win the cards that can make your kingdom complete.







The deck contains 3 sets – red, yellow, and blue. Each set is numbered 1-9. There are also a few non-suited treasure cards.







Group your cards.

Welcome to Which Game First where we boldly explore the hilariously huge world of board games. Did we unearth any hidden treasures you’ve been missing out on? Let’s find out!







First up: It’s pesticide warnings be damned as we grow big in Mutant Crops Next: We collect the finest breeds of man’s best friend to take on a stroll through the Dog Park And lastly: We warm up and stretch as we get ready to roll and write our way to the Diceathelon







Mutant Crops







Designed by: Sebastian Koziner & Rocío OgñenovichPublished by: Atheris Games (originally by El Dragón Azul & OK Ediciones) (2016)Players: 1 – 4Ages: 14 & upPlaying time: 15 – 30 minutes







Mutant Crops is a fast and light resource management and worker placement game, where players are farmers in the near-future, where agro-toxics and contamination created some strange mutant plants.







You have 12 actions on the table (half face down, half face up) that allows you to gather resources (tokens), get plants, and nurture them. Each turn you have 2/3 actions (depending on the number of players)







Place your farmers on spaces to gain resources, such as seeds or water or food. Use your seeds to plant a type of mutant crop, and then use your water and food to unleash their potential, such as earning money or activating that tplant’s special powers.  Certain combinations of plant powers can yield greater advantages for your fields, including more money (victory points).







And it’s one worker to a space, so your farmer might be blocking your opponent from the space they need. But all’s fair in this battle of toxic farming.







Dog Park







Designed by: Lottie Hazell, Jack HazellPublished by: Birdwood Games (2022)Players: 1 – 4Ages: 10 & upPlaying time: 40 – 80 minutes







Dog Park is a competitive set-collection and point-to-point movement game in which players take on the role of dog walkers who recruit, walk, and care for their dogs over four rounds. Each round is split into four phases:







Recruitment Phase: Players compete in two rounds of offers to add dogs to their kennels. Offers are made with players’ reputation (victory points), so must be placed wisely.







Selection Phase: Players decide which dogs to place on their lead to walk this round.







Walking Phase: Players journey through the dog park with their fellow walkers, collecting resources, earning reputation, and interacting with other walkers.







Home Time Phase: Players earn reputation for their walked dogs, and lose reputation for any unwalked dogs in their kennel.







Players must choose their routes and dogs carefully to earn the best reputation and prove they are the most accomplished walker of them all. At the end of the game, the player with the most reputation wins.







That’s a good puppy!







Diceathlon







Designed by: Chris HeaneyPublished by: Self-Published (2022)Players: 2 – 99Ages: (not provided)Playing time: ~ 10 – 20 minutes







Diceathlon is a roll and write game where players compete across 6 different sports to win the most gold medals.







The players roll the dice and, in turn, take a dice and write the number on their score sheet in one of the 6 sports. Each sport has their own specific goals for how the player can win the medal at the end of the game.









* Crew – there are 2 rows, make sure the dice you place are equal on both sides of the row

Welcome to Which Game First where we boldly explore the hilariously huge world of board games. Did we unearth any hidden treasures you’ve been missing out on? Let’s find out!







First up: We dig up the ancient past to discover long forgotten games in UnboxedNext: We chip away at an ominous cube to save the multiverse in TesseractAnd lastly: We pack our 747s with impatient travelers in Now Boarding







Unboxed







Designed by: Jordan SorensonPublished by: WizKids (2023)Players: 1 – 4Ages: 12 & upPlaying time: 30 minutes







In Unboxed, you and your friends take on the role of archeology interns under the direction of Dr. Ramos. At the dig site, the team has uncovered ten caches of ancient board games and they need your help to figure out how they were played. The centuries have not been kind to the rulebooks, so you’ll have to infer the rules based on each game’s symbology, components, and your own experience and intuition. Hopefully you’ve been attending board game night regularly…







EXAMINE







Each of the ten dig-sites will grant you a specific set of components and a few questions to help guide your “research”.







EVALUATE







Figure out how the components work together.







PLAY







Once you’ve successfully recreated the rules, you’ll have a fully functional game!







Dr. Ramos will be there to provide hints as you theorize and test your designs for all ten of the provided scenarios, and will hopefully answer the age old question … What’s in the box?







Tesseract







Designed by: James FirnhaberPublished by: Smirk & Dagger Games (2023)Players: 1 – 4Ages: 14 & upPlaying time: 60 minutes







Tesseract is a cooperative dice-manipulation game where players are scientists, trying to contain and control the reactions of an alien artifact in the form of a Tesseract cube consisting of 64 dice. 







The Tesseract, which sits at the center of the board on a raised platform, and players will remove cubes to place in their individual labs, transfer them as needed to others, adjust the cube’s values and, importantly, isolate the cubes into the containment matrix, neutralizing them.







To contain a cube a player must have in their lab three or more cubes all of one value (a set) or in sequence (a run); and either all of one color or having none of the same colors. By filling the containment matrix completely they will stop the reaction and win the game. 







But if the Tesseract has its last cube removed beforehand – or if 7 breaches occur, the game is lost and our world ceases to exist – no biggie.







Asymmetric character abilities include a passive, ‘always on’ ability and a unique action that is only available to that player. Research cards earned during play help give players an edge, as do the even more powerful Containment cards, unlocked from the matrix.







Can you and your team work together to shut down the Tesseract, or will humankind simply be a blip in the grand scheme of the universe?







Now Boarding







Designed by: Tim FowersPublished by: Fowers Games (2018)Players: 2 – 5Ages: 10 & upPlaying time: 30 – 60 minutes







Now Boarding is a real-time cooperative game in which you work together to fly a fleet of airplanes. You must deliver all the passengers to their destinations before they get too angry — and new passengers are constantly arriving! 

Welcome to Which Game First where we boldly explore the hilariously huge world of board games. Did we unearth any hidden treasures you’ve been missing out on? Let’s find out!







First up: We call on our tribesmen to settle the land in VaalbaraNext: We call forth our Shamen to shape the land in RauhaAnd lastly: We zoom towards the center of the void at a dizzying pace in Hypnosia







Vaalbara







Designed by: Olivier CipièrePublished by: Studio H (2022)Players: 2 – 5Ages: 10 & upPlaying time: 25 minutes







Vaalbara is a card game, a deck management game, in which players are clan leaders exploring uncharted lands in order to establish sedentary villages.







All players have the same deck of 12 cards representing the members of their tribe. Each turn, players secretly choose one card. Lowest number card plays first. In the order of initiative of the revealed Characters, players will be able to activate their powers and take over one of the available Territories. Each type of Territory has its own way of scoring points (collection, pair, diversity, risk…).







After 9 rounds, the player with the most points wins the game and unites the tribes of the continent under their banner!







Rauha







Designed by: Johannes Goupy, Théo RivièrePublished by: GRRRE Games (2023)Players: 2 – 5Ages: 10 & upPlaying time: 45 minutes







Rauha is a card drafting game where you are a venerable Shaman, whose divine powers allow you to shape your environment in order to turn this world into a cradle of life energy, keeper of serenity and harmony for the centuries to come.







The game plays in 2 Ages: In Age 1, vegetation, terrain, and wildlife will appear. In Age 2, civilizations will thrive. Each age has 4 rounds, divided into 3 turns followed by a scoring phase. Each turn, there are 5 steps which are:







1. Simultaneously take all Biome cards from the satellite whose symbol matches the one beneath your Avatar on your Player board (moon or star).







2. Choose one card to place on any square of your Player board or discard to the Black Hole.







3. Receive a Divine Entity if you create a row or column of matching symbols on your Player board.







4. Activate your Avatar, plus any Divine Entities in the same row or column as your Avatar.







5. Finally move your Avatar one notch clockwise along the edge of your Player board, changing the row or column that will be activated on the next turn.







During the Scoring Phase, you will activate all your Biomes with Spore tokens and any Divine Entities you may have, gaining crystals and points as shown on the components.







Obtain the most Life Energy, to win the game, while all other players must tremble in fear of your immense shamantic powers!







Hypnosia







Designed by: Renaud Joseph, Adam NovotnyPublished by: Self-published (2018)Players: 2 – 6Ages: (not listed)Playing time: 20 minutes







Hypnosia is a ludo style race game, with no theme whatsoever. Get as many of your 4 pawns to the center of the board without being captured in the process.







On a turn, a player will roll 2d6. Move 1 or 2 of their pawns the number of spaces indicated by each die. Important: a player must “burn” all the points of a die, so a pawn cannot stop short.







Pawns move in a counter-clockwise direction. 







Some locations are special (double-colored). They permit a pawn to enter the next inner circle by crossing a “bridge”.

Evan hosts Alexander, Christian and Tatsiana from the iDventure Team for an interview about their upcoming board game called Cryptic Nature.   







Check out the Kickstarter at: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/idventure-games/cryptic-nature

Welcome to Which Game First where we boldly explore the hilariously huge world of board games. Did we unearth any hidden treasures you’ve been missing out on? Let’s find out!







First up: We try to outserve our fellow coffee shop owners one delicious cup and treat at a time in FikaNext:  We partner up aiming for smooth take offs, and soft landings, in Sky Team!And lastly: Friends become enemies as we face off for control of ancient magic in Wizards of the Grimoire







Fika







Designed by: Kwibus GamedesignPublished by: Board Game Circus & 25th Century Games (2022)Players: 2Ages: 10 & upPlaying time: 20 minutes







Fika is a card game where players are street café owners trying to outearn your competitor, by skillfully arranging the cards in your own café and manipulating those of your opponent. “fika” is an integral part of Swedish life and is much more than just a coffee break. It’s about making space in your daily life to chat over a hot drink, as you nibble delicious pastries.







Each round is made up of two phases: You first determine the primary and secondary suit colors for the round, and then you start playing your cards. To play, choose one card from your hand simultaneously and put it face down in front of you. Reveal your chosen card simultaneously. Place cards into your café, respecting the order of initiative, and choose whether to resolve their effects.







At the end of the round, review your café from left to right to see which objectives have been fulfilled. Each card has one objective, which earns you coins if you have that card in your café and you fulfill its requirements. If a Group card has been placed in front of a card, that card’s coin reward is either doubled or tripled, depending on which half of the Group points towards you. Add up all the coins you have earned from your objectives. 







If you have earned the most coins, you win the round and receive one Tip card. First player to receive two Tip cards, the game ends and you win! Congratulations winner, your cafe is the Fika-est cafe in town! 







Sky Team







Designed by: Luc RémondPublished by: Scorpion Masqué (2023)Players: 2Ages: 14 & upPlaying time: 15 minutes







Sky Team is a co-operative game, exclusively for two players, in which you play a pilot and co-pilot at the controls of an airliner. Your goal is to work together as a team to land your airplane in different airports around the world.







To land your plane, you secretly roll 4 dice and then place them one at a time. The players must assign the dice to the best possible spaces in your cockpit to balance the axis of your plane, control its speed, deploy the flaps, extend the landing gear, contact the control tower to clear your path, and even have a little coffee to improve your concentration enough to change the value of your dice.







If the aircraft tilts too much and stalls, overshoots the airport, or collides with another aircraft, you lose the game…and your pilot’s license…and probably your life.







From Montreal to Tokyo, each airport offers its own set of challenges. Watch out for the turbulence as this could end up being a bumpy ride!







Wizards of the Grimoire







Designed by: Cole Banning, Joe BanningPublished by: Grimoire Games (2022)Players: 2Ages: 10 & upPlaying time: 20 – 40 minutes







Wizards of Grimoire is a two player strategy card game, where each player is an apprentice with Years of tutelage under the late Archmage Andor. It has come to this: Andor’s two protégés must now become rivals and battle to determine who will become the next ...