Tom: Good morning everybody, and a happy… THURSDAY? Oh no. I have overslept terribly.
Listen, I can explain my tardiness. Each limb of Shut Up & Sit Down digitally assembled earlier in the week to chat about what exciting content we’re putting out, and all we had to show for it was a big collective moan. Well, that and the productive decision to not put out a video this week; sliding our schedule back a notch to make sure everything’s looking less exhausted. It’s ‘the year’, what else can we say?
You can still expect a podcast on Friday – Quinns and I are going to have a little ramble about a smattering of solo RPGs that I’ve been playing over the past couple days and weeks. I think it’ll be a lot of fun, so keep your ears open so that one can crawl in and have itself a home.
Normal video service will resume next week – and until then, stay hydrated! xx
Days Gone occupies a weird place in gaming culture. It sold nine million copies, but barely made a dent in day-to-day culture and gaming discussions. In a strange way, that makes it perfect for a remaster. Old fans get to replay the game optimized for PS5, while new ones can discover it for the first time.
A common criticism – and one that rings true, to an extent – is that Days Gone has an identity crisis. The open world exploration brings to mind Red Dead Redemption. The focus on biking is very Sons of Anarchy. The zombie apocalypse and day/night cycle bring to mind Dying Light, while the emotional beats are reminiscent of The Last of Us. However, Days GoneRemastered manages to feel distinct from all of these.
Image Source: Sony Interactive Entertainment via The Escapist
You play as Deacon St. John – a violent but ultimately good-hearted biker whose beloved wife, Sarah, dies in the opening hours of a zombie outbreak. Two years later, Deacon ekes out an existence living in the wilderness of Oregon, doing jobs for the various survivor camps dotted around the wilderness.
A Bloody Good Time
Gameplay largely consists of travelling around the countryside and abandoned towns, fighting freakers (Zombies, in classic “Not-using-the-Z-word” fashion) and human enemies, ranging from marauders to the deadly Rippers. There’s plenty of side content to enjoy, ranging from clearing outposts to taking down hordes of up to 500 freakers.
While taking down hordes seems impossible at first, it’s a huge moment when you clear your first one. It’s always fun to race through obstacles, waiting for the perfect moment to spring a trap.
Along the way, you’ll find various encampments filled with survivors, which offer an interesting, if ultimately shallow, morality system. Most camps will offer either guns or upgrades to your bike, and early on, you’ll be forced to choose whether to send any survivors you find to a work camp or one under martial law and run by a conspiracy nut. It’s a dilemma, but one that’s instantly solved as soon as you unlock the third camp. Lost Lake offers bike upgrades and guns, and quickly cements itself as the good option. While you might need to send survivors elsewhere from time to time, sending them here just feels right.
Image Source: Sony Interactive Entertainment via The Escapist
Compared to a lot of post-apocalyptic worlds, the Farewell Wilderness feels alive. Everywhere you go, you’ll see deer darting across the path, enemy camps, or survivors to rescue. Deacon will meet plenty of people he can interact with and do missions for. While none of the bonds feel as strong as one like Joel and Ellie’s, these characters still feel important and deep. You’ll see his annoyance at a happy-go-lucky addict, or his protectiveness of a mentally broken young woman. Missions are separated not just into what they are but who they focus on, so you can see these relationships progress; however, there are no choices to make here, and many of them are story-mandated, so you’ll complete most of them as you play the game.
Blood, Bikes, and Booms
The best new addition is Horde Assault mode, an endless game mode where you’ll face progressively bigger and bigger hordes until you eventually die. There are different zones for the mode, each of which thrusts you into a different section of the map. Unlike something like The Mercenaries it’s a frankly huge chunk of the map, and there’s no time limit – you just keep going until your inevitable death.
However, Days Gone Remastered isn’t quite as beautiful or as detailed as many of its contemporaries. It’s pretty, but doesn’t look as good as the games it emulates. The remaster improves the lighting, the number of enemies on screen, and the skybox is gorgeous, but it doesn’t quite look as good as it wants to. There are a few floating textures from time to time, or somewhat cheap visual effects.
Image Source: Sony Interactive Entertainment via The Escapist
As good as the story is, it does make an odd habit of cutting things out. Cutscenes will occasionally jump from Point A to Point C, going from cause to effect without showing us the action. Deacon will frequently discuss the bounties he’s picked up as if we’re supposed to know who they are.
There were also a few glitches – nothing major, but it was annoying to see an aura around a character. A few times, I saw freakers flying through the air or fighting with nothing while I took potshots at them. Most annoyingly was a recurring glitch where the music would play so loudly that it drowned out the dialogue. It only happened a few times, but it was always frustrating, despite the gorgeous soundtrack.
Overall, Days Gone Remastered is a fantastic, if flawed, game. It isn’t quite as good as the games it emulates, but if “It’s not The Last of Us” is a valid complaint, then it’s one you can throw at most titles. It’s a game that absolutely deserves your time, either as a replay or for the first time.
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I’m a sucker for a good fishing themed board game. For some reason, fishing of the cardboard variety is far better than the real-life kind. Conservas is a solo bag building game from Scott Almes, a designer that I really enjoy. Even though I’m not a fan of solo gaming, Conservas has its hooks in me and keeps reeling me in.
The Daily Catch
In this game, you’ll run a fishing and canning operation off the coast of Spain. Each season starts with a single boat, some cash in hand, and a bag of tokens that is dictated for that season. Conservas takes you through 12 months of fishing using a spiral bound book. Each month will have a unique win condition, some have special rules, and two difficulty goals to reach.
In each round of the season, you’ll draw five tokens blindly from the bag for each boat you own and the Open Water card on the table. You’ll have to assign the five tokens before drawing five more, eventually filling each available card.
Each boat in the game has a catch requirement that has to be met. You can meet this requirement with fish tokens or the worthless water tokens that are clogging up the bag. All the other tokens are placed at the bottom of the card, showing that they are still in the “open water” and not on the boat.
To Can or Not to Can
As you pull the sea life on board, you have to make decisions on how to use these tokens. Each season has spots in the book that pay cash if you choose to can your fish. Money can be tight in this game and you’ll need cash to purchase new boats to expand your saltwater empire.
The canning requirements can sometimes be a single fish type, or multiples of a specific fish in order to get paid. In some seasons, you’ll earn more money as you can specific types of fish. In other seasons, you can saturate the market, earning less money if you keep canning the same type of catch.
Your fish tokens can also be spent on Upgrade cards which give your operation some nice perks. Conservas does a great job of giving players multiple avenues to solve the puzzle. Some Upgrade cards definitely feel more powerful than others. You’ll start to look for some of these after your first couple games.
Before the end of each round, you can purchase a new boat and wipe the Upgrade and Boat cards to get a fresh set of three on the table. During the night phase of the round, you’ll spend your cash to maintain your fleet of boats as you head into the next day. By the way, the punny boat names in the game are fantastic.
Conservation is Key
The fish you catch in Conservas is almost as important as the fish you leave in the sea. During the night phase of each round, any fish that were in the Open Water (this includes the fish under the boats that were not caught) will spawn new tokens. If you leave three mussels uncaught, you’ll spawn that number of mussels minus one. This is vital to making sure that you have fish in the bag as you move from round to round.
Conservas is all about making sure that you don’t overfish the sea and long term planning to meet the goals of that season. In my first two games, I bought a fleet of boats too early and sold every fish I could. I found myself grabbing water token after water token, unable to fulfill any orders and failing pretty quickly.
Since Conservas is a bag builder, a big part of the game is keeping a mental tally of what you believe is in the bag. Unless an Upgrade card gives you the chance, you cannot look into the bag to survey what’s available.
Trial and Error
While I love the artwork and I’m a fan of the designer, I was immediately repelled because it was a solo game. I’m an extravert that loves this hobby so much because of the social atmosphere that gaming brings. I gave Conservas a try and it’s been one of my favorite gaming experiences this year.
Each game of Conservas takes around twenty minutes and there are times when you know the mistakes you made in round four are going to sink your operation. The game plays quickly and I’ve gotten into the habit of playing back to back games because of it. Also, because I’m terrible at the game.
I only found success after five attempts at the first season of the game. Since then, I’ve crawled my way past three more seasons. The game is tough and sometimes I’m just barely clearing the standard difficulty. Each time I fail a season, I take a look at where I went wrong. Most of the time, it’s a mix of overfishing or not using the Upgrades that were available to me.
There’s an economy to Conservas that works really well. It’s a tight game that rarely leaves you confident that you’ll succeed until the last final round of a season. This is why coming back to the game and enjoying its twenty minute playtime is so enjoyable.
Final Thoughts
Conservas is a perfect storm of theme, art, and gameplay that has me excited every time I sit down with the game. I could never see myself playing solo games on a regular basis, but Conservas has shown me how enjoyable they can be. My time with A Gentle Rain, another amazing solo game, was all about relaxing and finding a moment of peace. Conservas is all about pressing my luck, practicing moderation, and finding a delicate balance to succeed.
If you had told me a couple months ago that a solo board game would be one of my biggest surprises of the year, I would have laughed in your face. But here I am. Sitting alone at my kitchen table, smelling like an old sea captain, playing a board game by myself, and loving every minute of it.
Turbo Tina has invited your crew into the Carnival of Chaos! Players will smash, slam, and shoot their way to victory by collecting “scrap” that Turbo Tina awards each round. Carnival of Chaos is the fifth expansion for Thunder Road: Vendetta and can be played with the base game or the Maximum Chrome Edition.
Welcome to the Carnival
We’ve played a lot of Thunder Road: Vendetta in 2023 and 2024. This new expansion is essentially an arena battle that introduces new weapons and a reward system as you collect “scrap”. There are three roads that lead into the arena where the combat takes place. At the end of each round, a new Turbo Tina card is revealed.
This card will trigger Killer Pillars which will destroy any car that is parked on top of these tiles. It also adds a new immovable object that players have to avoid. Tina will award scrap to any vehicles that are on spotlight locations, and even give a new decree for the next round.
Just like in the base game, players will shoot and slam one another, with dice dictating the outcome of the combat. For players who already know Thunder Road: Vendetta, there’s not a ton of new concepts here. Movement in the arena spaces is slightly different and takes a minute to get used to. I’ve taught this game to multiple TRV veterans and the movement trips people up the first couple turns. Sprinkled around the board are Party Favor tiles and Super-Weapon tokens. These are going to give you the boost you need to win.
The selection of Super-Weapons are fantastic. These cards attach to the vehicle that picked it up, giving them a new way to eliminate their opponent. A player with a Super-Weapon attached is a force to be reckoned with. Players who can slam opponents into Killer Pillars and maneuver gracefully around the arena are going to have fun with this expansion.
Ready for Combat
Restoration Games carried through the dystopian, Mad Max feel of Thunder Road into every area of the game. The art style and board layout is excellent and even the packaging sticks with the grindhouse visuals of the base game. You can tell that this expansion is essentially Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome without the IP license.
Since players cannot leave the arena once they enter, the game keeps players in close quarters. It forces players to interact and unlike the base game, players cannot just try to outrun their opponents.
Slamming opponents at just the right time can launch an opponents vehicle out of the arena, into a Killer Pillar, or into position to get clobbered by the other players. While in the arena, rolling high numbers on the dice become less of a necessity. You’ll rely more on positioning and weapons each round.
Carnival of Chaos also adds a fifth player color to the mix. The new team comes with three purple cars, dice, chopper, and purple dashboards. This allows you to play with up to five players across all different game modes with a standard team of 3 vehicles.
The Queen of Chaos
Carnival of Chaos has a specific number of rounds. Each of the six Turbo Tina cards come out at the end of the round. The game ends when there are no more Turbo Tina cards to flip over in the deck OR when a single player has been eliminated from play. Having the Turbo Tina deck dictate the length of the game works really well. While six rounds is a great game length, it’s the start of the game that comes off a little dry.
In the first round of the game, players have to travel up the three roadways that lead into the arena. This is made up of the regular road pieces that come with the base game. In my head, I see these cars rumbling toward this arena, ready for combat. In reality, it might take you two full turns to get to the center. Bad die rolls could even put you in the role of “spectator” for a couple rounds.
It’s not uncommon for a player to have only two cars in the arena even into the start of the third round. That’s half-way through the game. In my first game, I felt like it had a pretty boring start. I felt validated when everyone else at the table mentioned it during clean up of the game.
For a game mode that is called Carnival of Chaos, this is a bit of a let down. Once players have there cars in the arena, the gameplay is smooth and fun. But it honestly doesn’t feel any crazier than the base game. I think being confined to the arena is really what sets this game apart from the base game.
While I rarely “house rule” games, we did make a slight change to the start of the game. When playing at the house, only start flipping Turbo Tina cards after at least two players have entered the arena. This is usually in the second round. This helps players to feel like they get a full six rounds of combat with their opponents.
We Don’t Need Another Hero
Carnival of Chaos adds a lot of cool items to one of my absolute favorite games. When it comes to reviewing expansions, the question I usually ask myself is “Does this make the original game better?”
This is a tough one, and it depends on what you’re looking for in the game. I honestly believe that everything that comes in the Maximum Chrome edition will keep me busy for years. Carnival of Chaos offers a slightly different play mode that is interesting, but not incredibly memorable. If you’ve played through all the content in the Maximum Chrome box (or the separate expansions), you may be looking for a new mode of play. Carnival of Chaos is probably what you’re looking for.
I love the system and world that Restoration Games has created with Thunder Road: Vendetta. At this point, this is easily one of my favorite games of all time. Carnival of Chaos is a nice addition to the game, but not a necessity in my opinion.
Clans of samurai cats are in a battle for dominance in this suitless trick-taking game from Shiny Pigeon Games. Be careful though, each season ends with a peace treaty, and showing too much force will bring disgrace to your clan. Let’s dig into this card game from designer Caner Cooperrider and see what sets it apart.
Managing Your Clan
Disgraced House feels familiar because it uses a standard trick-taking mechanic. What makes it unique is that there are no suits or trumps in the game and it’s solely based on numbers. Each envoy card, which makes up the majority of your hand, has two values on the card. The standard value is in black at the top of the card while the red value at the bottom of the card can be unlocked by using a fate token. With cards having two values, players have flexibility with each card as long as they have fate tokens that they can spend.
When a player leads, they can play a single card or pair with identical numbers. Followers have to play the same quantity of cards but there are rules on what numbers you can play. Followers have to play the same number or higher. If they cannot or choose not to beat the played cards, they have to play the lowest card(s) in their hand.
Playing a high card(s) means that followers are going to be forced to play their highest cards or flush away the low cards in their hand. The twist here is that players need low cards for the final trick of the round.
The Peace Treaty
The final trick of each round is a single card trick called the Peace Treaty. Players will play the final card left in their hand but there will only be one loser in this trick. The player who played the highest card has used too much force during the Peace Treaty and becomes the disgraced house. All other players score points based on half the value of the card they played during the Peace Treaty. The Disgraced House will miss out on this bonus but is given a +1/-1 modifier card that they can use in the next round of the game.
Players score a point for each trick they won during the round plus any bonus points they received during the Peace Treaty. This final trick of each round is really creative. Players who choose not to plan for the end of the round may miss out on a significant number of points.
You also don’t want to hang on to cards that that have too low of a value. By holding on to a 0 value card, you’re guaranteed not to be the disgraced house, but you also don’t score any bonus points during the end of the round.
Samurai Legends
Disgraced House has one more trick up its sleeve in the format of Ally and Advisor cards. At the start of each round, players get one of each. The Ally card will go into your hand and gives a unique ability you can play during the round. The Advisor gives you an additional ability or scoring opportunity and this card sits on the table in front of the player for everyone to see.
Either of these cards can be discarded before the round starts to take a fate token from the supply. These fate tokens allow you to flip your envoy card during the round to the red value at the bottom of the card. More fate tokens means more flexibility during the round. These tokens roll over to future rounds so saving up over a series of rounds isn’t a bad strategy.
Honor in Battle
Disgraced House has enough twists during a round to keep everyone engaged. Players are trying to be the first to earn thirteen points. There’s even a catch up mechanic that gives players a free fate token when they are more than three points behind the lead player.
I think the only thing that I’m lukewarm on is the cat theme of the game. The samurai cat artwork from Parker Simpson is gorgeous in every way. But, it’s not a theme that really drew me into the game. I’ve taught this game to dozens of people and the theme wasn’t a huge selling factor for them. Players really loved how rounds shifted as players utilize Ally and Advisor abilities and force cards from their opponents hands.
As each game advances, the hand sizes of the players decrease based on how close a player is to thirteen points. Rounds become faster with less cards in hand. Leading with a pair of cards will also limit the number of tricks that can be won which is another satisfying strategy.
My very first game was at just 2-players and my expectations were low. Trick-taking games at just two is usually a bust. Disgraced House played really well at 2-players and can be played with up to six.
At the five and six player counts, you play a variant of the game called “Crowded Court”. Players always receive six cards in the round and have a new option to “bow out” during the trick. The first player to do this can play any card(s) they want, intentionally losing the trick and playing their card(s) facedown, ignoring the high/low rules. Bowing out locks other players who play after you from doing this which can be really strategic. There’s even a team play variant in the game that we’ve not played yet, but I’m sure that we’ll dig into that one soon.
Final Thoughts
Disgraced House does just enough to set itself apart from other trick-taking games in our collection. With each card having two values, fate tokens are incredibly important if you want options in your card play. This makes for dynamic gameplay and fun surprises during the game. In a year that was filled with trick-taking games, this one has flown under the radar because of its small print run. Thankfully, Shiny Pigeon Games is bringing this game to a broader audience with a larger print run through Kickstarter.
I really enjoy Disgraced House and it’s a game that I love to teach. It hits the table more often because of how smooth it plays at just two players which has been a huge plus. Don’t miss out on this card game has it hits a broader audience in 2025!
I’m a big fan of spatial reasoning games. Over the years, games like Patchwork and Isle of Cats have always brought me joy. I don’t know if it’s something left over from all the Tetris I played as a child, but figuring out little puzzles to get everything to fit just right is just… fun!
So when I was first introduced to Tiny Towns, I was immediately intrigued. I loved the idea of having to put your resources on the board just right, but adding in different scoring elements? Oh yeah, this one’s gonna hit the spot…
We Built This… Town…
Each player is the mayor of their own… well, tiny town. There’s a back story about creatures and predators and all that, but it’s not really that important.
What is important is that the game tasks you with building structures in the 4×4 grid on your player board. This construction happens by placing resources in the patterns specified by the available buildings. A tavern, for instance, requires two bricks and a glass resource to be placed all in a single line, while the cloister requires four resources in a very particular L-shaped arrangement.
On a turn, one player is designated as the “master builder”. That player announces one resource type, and all players have to add a cube matching that resource to their player board. If anyone has resources in an arrangement that matches a building, they may remove the matching cubes from their player board and place a building token. The building has to be placed on a site where one of the resources was that built the structure.
Watch Where You’re Going
Placement is important for a few reasons. For some of the buildings, you get points based on location. The inn, for example, gets points if it’s not in a row or column with another inn. The bakery gets points if it’s next to buildings of a particular type. You’ll also have to be careful to keep your board open for future buildings. If you don’t leave enough room for the pattern needed for a particular building – well, tough. You won’t be able to create that building for the rest of the game.
If you ever reach a point where you can’t build anything else, then your game is done and your town is complete. You’ll wait for everyone to finish their building, then calculate your points. And, as per usual, the player with the most points at the end of the game wins!
Lookin’ Good
When Tiny Towns hits the table, its charm is immediately evident. The box art is great, and all of the little building meeples are great. The artwork on the different building cards is also wonderful, and it all comes together to create a really attractive look.
The game is also very creative in how it adds variety. Each building meeple is associated with four different building types, and you randomly choose which building for each type at the beginning of the game. It’s a small thing, but it allows for increased replayability without having to have a bunch of components that are only used for certain setups.
Monuments are another element of the game that add a little spice. Each player is dealt two Monument cards at the beginning of the game and select one to keep. These special buildings are unique to each player, and they can provide some major scoring opportunities if used correctly. This small wrinkle ensures that everyone will have their own strategies and approaches as they move through the game.
Like Coming Home
Tiny Towns is a game that strikes a perfect balance for me. It’s simple enough to teach in just a few minutes, but it’s complex enough that I have to weigh my options on each turn to decide what I should do. It’s not so complicated that I will sit for several minutes trying to decide what to do, but it also has enough going on that I feel that my choices are important.
People that don’t like spatial reasoning games are probably going to get a bit frustrated with this title. However, given that you’re not putting down polyominoes or anything like that, maybe it’s easier? I’m not sure.
What I do know is that Tiny Towns is a game that I really enjoy. It’s one that I could play with almost any group, and each time it’s going to be a solid experience. With the addition of a few expansions over the past few years, there’s a ton of variety that can keep people coming back for more. Tiny Towns is a game that I’d recommend for any hobby gamer to add to their collection. It’s certainly one that I’ll be keeping on my shelf for a very long time.
The original game of Scoville was published in 2014 by Tasty Minstrel Games (R.I.P.). This auction and set collecting game has been out of print for a while but is highly regarded by friends who have played it.
For years, I’ve wanted to add this game to our collection but wasn’t ready to spend the money for a used copy. Trick or Treat Games picked up the license and recently published Scoville Second Edition. Now that I’ve played this modern classic from Ed Marriott, does it live up to the hype that was in my head?
Mornings on the Farm
In Scoville, players are pepper farmers who are planting, harvesting, fulfilling pepper orders, and making chili. Each round starts with an auction where players will bid for their turn order in the round. The turn order allows players to choose a pepper card from the auction display, earning the pepper(s) on the card. Choosing your position matters because planting and order fulfillment takes place in turn order, but harvesting takes place in reverse turn order.
Each round follows this order:
Planting: In turn order, players will place a single pepper from their supply into the central board. Peppers will cross-breed with the peppers next to them. Each player has a player aid showing the color pepper that is created between two pepper colors.
Harvest: In reverse turn order, players will move their farmer up to three steps in the garden. The player will harvest a new pepper(s) from the supply based on the two peppers they are between on the board. For example, being between a blue pepper and a yellow pepper will produce a purple pepper.
Fulfillment: In turn order, players can turn in peppers to fulfill cards in the farmers market and/or fulfill a chili recipe card. This is how you earn more money and victory points. Players can also earn money by selling a single color of pepper, earning $1 for every two peppers of that color in the field.
Each game is broken into two halves, the morning and afternoon. Once players trigger the start of the afternoon phase, the auction block will gain better cards and the Farmers Market cards become tougher to fulfill but earn much better rewards.
Players also have three one time use actions that allow them to double-back with their movement, plant an additional pepper, and move an extra step. If you don’t use these special actions, they are worth four victory points each at the end of the game.
A Slow Burn
The gameplay is Scoville is a bit of a slow burn as you increase your pepper supply, gain new pepper colors, and move your way into the outer edges of the field. In your first couple turns, you’ll plant and harvest some of the same peppers. Players can choose to be selfish with their new cross breeds by planting a new pepper color out of reach of the other players.
Once players unlock the coal and white colored peppers, things really open up to fulfill high point chili recipes. Players are always looking to gain white and ghost peppers since they are present on the highest value cards in the game.
Scoville plays up to six players but I would rarely suggest playing with the max number of players. Often, players are referencing the cross-breed player aid and looking at what chili recipes they are close to fulfilling. This can make rounds drag out at the highest player count. If everyone knew how to play the game and had some experience with Scoville, I think playing with six players could be smooth. I would never play with new players at this player count.
When you get into the five and six player count, the pepper field begins to have hot spots where all the best peppers are located. We’ve seen two players break away from the center, dropping important pepper colors as far away as they can in order to limit access to other players. It’s important to watch what other players are doing during the planting phase and anticipate where the best peppers are being placed.
This second edition printing has a lot of upgrades that players should know about. The original printing came with wooden peppers, and colorblind players had big issues with the color choices. Trick or Treat Studios fixed this with new plastic peppers that have a very clear letter embossed on each pepper that helps players to know what color they have. I love the rounded, plastic peppers in the game and think it’s an absolute upgrade from the original wooden ones.
Vincent Dutrait also did a complete overhaul of the artwork which looks fantastic. His signature style is present on the board, cards, game box and even player screens. The board pieces together like a puzzle and is double-sided with the solo player experience on the back.
The game also comes with a brand-new solo experience for players to check out. At the time of this review, I’ve not played it yet, but I’ve been enjoying the game enough that I will absolutely check it out. Also in Scoville Second Edition is the Scoville Labs expansion that many struggled to find for the original game.
Players are given a lab board where they can plant additional peppers, immediately gaining the cross-bred peppers that are created based on adjacency. This expansion also adds a few new cards and will speed up the access to more rare peppers for individual players.
On top of all this, there are new fulfillment cards that haven’t been seen before. The number of chili recipe cards is impressive and no two games will have the same cards. This is nice for replayability.
Final Thoughts
Did Scoville live up to the hype that I had in my head? For the most part, yes.
Scoville has been a “grail game” for me for a long time. It connects with my love of spicy food, gardening, and includes some of my favorite mechanics. I’m a big fan of this game and I think the upgrades that were made in this second edition are fantastic.
I started to appreciate the slow burn of the game in those first few rounds after a couple games. Scoville is a game that is going to take every bit of 60 to 90 minutes but I really enjoy everything it does. Players are always working to fulfill orders, with their turn order in the round playing a very important part. The bidding and turn order felt less important at three players but is absolutely vital at four to six players.
If you missed out on owning the original printing of this game or just want the upgrade, Scoville Second Edition is a great addition to your game collection. This is one that I’m proud to finally have in our collection.
Scoville Second Edition is now available at your local game store, or on the Trick or Treat webstore.
This game was provided to us by the publisher for review. Read more about our review policies at One Board Family.
Highs
Big fan of the updated visuals from Vincent Dutrait
New edition includes new solo experience and Labs expansion
Loads of chili recipes and Farmers Market orders
Bidding mechanic really shines at the higher player counts
Cleariosity is a new title that might tickle the fancy of gamers looking to add a small box word-based game to their collection. The game features dozens of small, square transparent cards that feature a few opaque letters, taking up spaces in a 3×3 grid. Each player is given a stack of these cards that they will all flip simultaneously to begin the game.
Three Letters at a Time
The goal here is to figure out a configuration of cards that can stack on top of each other and spell a three-letter word in one column, row, or diagonal. There are a few rules that apply:
vertical words must start at the top and end at the bottom
words cannot contain any letters that overlap letters from other cards
When a player finds a word, they shout it out and point out their word, then take the cards they used and add them to their scoring pile. Play continues until all combinations of words have been exhausted, at which points players count how many cards are in their scoring pile. Whoever has the most cards wins!
When we played this game, it brought up a lot of memories of the game SET, which I played a ton as a student and later on as a teacher. If you don’t know that one, it involves laying out cards, then trying to find three cards whose shapes meet patterns. While Cleariosity involves letters, you’re still having to use your brain in a similar way.
You have to keep certain things in mind about some cards while you look around at the others. You’re also trying to move quickly, hoping to shout out your word before any other players. It’s the kind of mental gymnastics that can get some players standing, jumping up and down, and shouting out words at the top of their lungs.
Final Thoughts
Cleariosity is quite simple, and it only takes a few minutes, so you can probably sneak it in between your “main” games. Word games don’t always hit with every audience, and there are some who will hate the real-time aspect of the game, so there may be some people who won’t really enjoy this title. For those looking for a new letter-based challenge, though, this could be a good portable game that is worth adding to your collection.
Tier lists are everywhere, because everyone needs to know our opinion. Top Tier is a party game from Indie Boards & Cards where players build rankings in some ridiculous categories.
In this video review, I share how to play Top Tier and talk about the best setting for this tier-making party experience.
I’m a big fan of games that have a nice table presence, so I was excited when we received HUTAN: Life in the Rainforest from The Op and Sidekick Games. This puzzley, nature themed game is for 1 to 4 players and plays in around 45 minutes. HUTAN was created by the design team of Asger Granerud and Daniel Pedersen who are known for Heat, Flamme Rouge, and Copenhagen. Let’s dig in and see what this game is all about.
Flora and Fauna
Players will have a board made up of four rainforest segments. The first player will decide the board layout that each player has to follow. In each of the nine rounds of the game, players will take two turns as they build up their unique rainforest board.
Your turn starts by drafting a flower card from the market. There are five different flower types/colors represented on the cards. Once you draft one of these cards, you’ll add the new flowers onto your board, obeying a couple of rules:
The first new flower has to be placed next to a previously placed flower (except for the first round).
The flower(s) on the card have to be placed adjacent to one another (not diagonal).
Flowers can be placed on top of flowers of the same color.
Your rainforest board is broken into areas of two to five blocks that are separated by waterways. Ideally, players want to fill these sections with a single flower color to score the points listed on the area. Players want to pay attention to the three water spaces on their rainforest board since flowers cannot be placed in these locations.
After adding the flowers from the card you drafted, you’ll move onto checking for the growth of trees. When you place a second identical flower color on a place, a tree grows on that space. HUTAN comes with four unique tree types which are different sizes and shapes to give player boards some variety. Each tree on a player board will be worth two victory points at the end of the game.
A Perfect Habitat
The final phase of your turn is checking to see if you’ve created the perfect habitat. Players earn big points by filling an area with a single flower color and having trees on each block in the area. When you place the last tree in an area, you can attract an animal of the same color on the space. Having a wildlife token in an area will earn you the points shown on that space at the end of the game.
The wildlife tokens in HUTAN are limited to only three in each flower color. Once a token is exhausted from the supply, they’re unavailable for the rest of the game. Even though you earned a wildlife token, you don’t have to place one. On occasion, players will create two perfect habitats in a single turn. You’re limited to earning one token per turn, so players have to decide on which area receives this token.
Another perk of earning a wildlife token is that they can fertilize the spaces orthogonally adjacent to their location. You can place any color flower in the spaces around the wildlife token. This is an optional perk but is almost always worth taking.
One player will take the start player token during the round which comes with a single flower of your chose. HUTAN is a game where being the start player can be incredibly useful.
Advanced Gameplay
In the early rounds of HUTAN, gameplay is pretty simple and the options are plentiful. It’s in the later rounds where players will start to feel the complexity of optimizing points and trying not to earn negative points.
At the end of the game, areas that have a mixture of flower colors are called mixed areas. Players score negative points for each mixed area and each incomplete areas. Strategically keeping away from some areas can be helpful. An area that doesn’t have any flowers will be zero points, keeping players from incurring negative effects.
Once players get the basics down, players can introduce Ecosystem cards into the game. Pull five Ecosystem goal cards that will award points to each player who completes these goals by the end of the game.
Final Thoughts
HUTAN is a beautiful and puzzley game that draws you in with its table presence. The game has a nice flow to it and keeping your negative points to a minimum is a challenge. After your first game, adding in the advanced scoring of the Ecosystem cards is a must for most gamers.
This game has the same publishing duo as Aqua, a 2024 release that we really enjoy. Not only did Vincent Dutrait do the artwork, but it also includes a couple extras that I love. There’s a family variant that adjusts a couple rules and removes the negative scoring.
In the back of the rulebook, you’ll find scenarios that have preset board layouts and Ecosystem cards. You are working toward hitting a specific score to accomplish the goal. There are also challenges and game modifications that you can tackle at any player count. Having these achievements adds a lot to the replayability of the game.
HUTAN: Life in the Rainforest is a great addition to our game library. If you enjoy games like Life of the Amazonia and Harmonies, two of our absolute favorites, HUTAN is a game that you have to check out.
HUTAN: Life in the Rainforest is available at your local game store, from The Op webstore, or online through Amazon today.
This game was provided to us by the publisher for review. Read more about our review policies at One Board Family.
Highs
Excellent table presence and box organization
Puzzley gameplay that gets more challenging each round
Achievements and scenarios adds to the replayability
Drafting the first player token in the late game is key
Lows
Negative points can be a turn off to some (family variant removes this)
Published: Apr 30, 2025 12:01 pm