Category: Board Games

Geekway 2024: Day 2

laurainlowLeave a comment

Today was my short day. We got a late start getting the girls to my parents’ and I had to get home early to pick them up and bring them home. Our group indulged me and played all my picks from the Play and Win room.

Pollen (2023)
2-4 players, 11+, 30-45 minutes

This beautiful nature-themed game (surprise, I have a type) is all about tile laying and area control. It’s pretty simple, really. Players “plant flowers,” “attract pollinators” and “pollinate flowers” for points by matching colors and pollinator symbols. The player who collects the most of two types of pollinators wins.

It’s a quick play that’s challenging enough to be entertaining, but still delightfully light. And those components! The wooden pollinator meeples are some of the most gorgeous game components I’ve come across in more than a decade of gaming. The foil details mimic the iridescence found on some real life beetles, and they’re really a joy to look at while collecting them throughout the game.

Trailblazer: The John Muir Trail (2023)
1-4 players, 14+, 30-120 minutes

Trailblazer was my favorite game of the day. In this worker placement/adventure game, players collect resources to move along the John Muir Trail and complete side quests along the way for victory points and other resources. As players progress down the trail, it becomes more difficult to move. Unpredictable weather tiles can also take its toll.

The theme is *chef’s kiss* – it makes the game play logical and easy to understand, which is good because there’s often a lot going on and the rulebook isn’t the best (check the rule clarification section for need-to-know info).

Lots of events tend to chain together on turns, making them oftentimes more eventful than “just buying a card” or “just collecting resources.” I really enjoyed that. Also, I know I sound like a broken record – but the game is just GORGEOUS.

Life in Reterra (2024)
2-4 players, 10+, +/-35 minutes

In this game, set far into the future, players work to rebuild their communities, which have become overgrown and reclaimed by nature. To do so, they lay tiles to create their own 4×4 grid “community.” Within that community, players raise buildings (each with a special power or function) and add inhabitants to maximize their score by the time all players have completed their grid.

The game itself is colorful and the art is amusing. The components are, blah. Nothing to write home about. It was easy to set up, and a quick play – we finished in about 35 minutes with three players.

Although I didn’t finish last (nor did I win), this was probably my least favorite of the day. Still, I’d play it again just to check out the other two ready-to-play building sets that come in the box.

Stay tuned for Day 3 tomorrow.

It’s my way or… Geekway

laurainlowLeave a comment

Today was Day 1 of 2024’s Geekway to the West, an annual board gaming convention in St. Louis. We’ve been going for more than a decade, and I still lose most of the games I play — but I find ways to have fun anyway. Here’s a rundown of today’s plays and my initial reactions to the games.

Faraway (2023)

This is a cute little adventure card came in which players explore a “mysterious continent” and battle to earn more “fame” than their opponents. To do that, they build a row of eight cards in front of them, left to right, then they move back through the path they created, collecting resources and scoring points on their cards.

There is a little bit of card drafting at play. A little wagering (when it comes to determining play order). The art on the cards is colorful and creative. The adventure theme is on point. It’s pretty light, which I tend to like.

I didn’t play well at all this first time. As soon as I started to understand all the mechanics, I realized I’d built my chain of cards in the wrong direction. Guess there’s always next time 😉

Junk Drawer (2023)

This is a short and sweet Tetris-like, tile-placing game that’s easy to learn and quick to play – even by yourself. It also really appealed to my love of (attempted) organization.

Players earn points by drawing and placing item tiles of different shapes on their player boards. The placement of the shapes in each section of the player board corresponds to a one (of a set of four) community goal cards ranging from easy to hard. In group play, the highest score wins.

I grabbed this from the “Play and Win” room and took it to a quiet spot in the convention center while I waited on hold for a telehealth appointment. I was able to teach myself fairly easily and play through at least once, but I didn’t keep score so I’m not even sure how I did.

I enjoyed the theme. The components aren’t anything amazing, but they’re solid. I know this would be fun with my kids, but it might not appeal to my usual gaming group. Still, I might see if they’ll indulge me sometime this weekend so I can see how it plays with others.

Harmonies (2024)

Harmonies is about landscape & animal habitat building, and I’m a sucker for nature games. Of today’s plays, I think this one was my favorite.

Players draft landscape tokens and play them on their board to create a habitat, then use tokens (resources) to play animals on their board for points.

The landscapes themselves were pretty and the components were nice as well. The token drafting reminded me of games like “Azul.”

As usual, I didn’t win – but I didn’t lose horribly, either. The theme was really immersive – everything from the way the resources functioned to how they scored points were logical and meaningful. I often find I understand games more easily when the theme is functional. It’s a huge pet peeve of mine when the theme is sloppily applied and not actually relevant to game play.

Apiary (2023)

It’s bees in space, basically. This worker placement game was definitely the heaviest of the day (but not the heaviest of this type of game I’ve played before).

Players move little worker bees representing their faction around a board to essentially build out a spaceship/colony that generates resources and scores points. It’s a machine-builder, and the different factions have their own superpowers/strengths. One player’s faction seemed to overpower the others today, and he totally creamed the rest of us.

Again, the theme was creative and immersive, but this time around there was too much going on for me to be effective on my first play through. I spent far too much time trying different actions around the board and never did settle into a strategy. I’d play this again, but it wasn’t my favorite today.

The Bears and the Bees (2018)

We closed out the day with this quick and easy nature game, which has some similarities with the card game Uno, in that you’re trying to be the first to play all your tiles. Players build out a hive around the Queen bee by matching colors on the side of the tiles.

The play is simple but fun. I actually won the two rounds we were able to play before we had to leave for the day.

Bonus points for how wholesome this game and its creators are. Each of Grandpa Beck’s Games comes with one of Grandma Beck’s recipes – this one a whole wheat pancake/waffle recipe. I might have to try it.

Definitely looking forward to playing this one with my girls. 🙂

Looking forward to day 2…