Rebel Princess from Bezier Games is one of our favorite trick-taking card games. Happily Never After is the first expansion for Rebel Princess. Inside the box you’ll find two new princess abilities, six new round cards, new score sheets, and a rulebook that explains each of these new elements in the game.
In this video review, I’m taking a look at each card and how they can affect the gameplay. Note: This expansion is only compatible with the Deluxe Edition of Rebel Princess.
Destiny 2 was already in a weird spot ahead of The Edge of Fate’s release date. I had several conversations with people who don’t play recently exclaim, “I thought Destiny was over?” That response is understandable, too.
Last year, a lot of hubbub was made around the release of The Final Shape, which was set to conclude the 10-year story Bungie had been crafting. The messaging was ‘this is the end’ – and to outside observers, it‘s not a surprise that’s a sentiment that prevailed. Bungie has been more focused on Marathon, before that somewhat imploded, and the new expansion was relatively quietly announced a couple of months ahead of launch.
The Escapist recaps
Destiny 2 is entering a new story known as the Fate Saga with The Edge of Fate.
The Edge of Fate’s story is excellent and charts a compelling course for the story going forward.
Kepler is a weaker destination in the Destiny world, lacking the iconic visual clarity of other worlds.
Several big structural changes are well-intentioned, but are very roughly implemented.
One day, they could be great, as their ideas aren’t bad, but it will take a lot of tweaking by Bungie to fix.
Charting our fate
Lodi is an exceptional addition to the Destiny 2 roster, and is an immediate fan favorite. Image credit: Bungie
Of course, with its persistent audience and the size of the franchise, despite ending the Light and Dark saga, there was always going to be more Destiny. And thus, we have The Edge of Fate – the first entry into Destiny’s second narrative arc, The Fate Saga. However, while it promises a bright future, the expansion’s execution may have a few too many missteps at a time when Bungie really can’t afford them.
The Edge of Fate’s express purpose is to set up the journey that our Guardians are going to go on for years to come. However, when you’ve just had your playerbase overcome the biggest bad the universe has ever seen, the one who all other enemies ultimately bowed to, where do you go?
Bungie has smartly pivoted to The Nine. These entities have been within the Destiny lore since the start, but even with several direct encounters over the franchise’s history, their intentions and even their very nature have been unclear. However, The Edge of Fate drags these inter-dimensional beings into the spotlight.
The Guardian, Ikora, Drifter, The Nine’s previous Emissary, Orin, and a mysterious new face Lod,i are all dragged to the strange and unfamiliar planet of Keplar through ‘invitations’ that come in the way of spontaneously appearing 1960s trains. Whatever is happening, the Nine, who exist outside of time, want you and everyone else invited to be on Kepler at that exact point for… something. It’s your job to get to the bottom of what that something is.
If there are concerns around Destiny 2’s future, none of them stem from this narrative. This is one of Destiny’s best stories and a brilliant first chapter in this new saga. Destiny has had many moments where narrative missteps have not matched the title’s gameplay and loops. This is perhaps the first time that the story campaign is doing the heavy lifting.
Newcomer Lodi is an absolute joy to be around. He’s an immediate fan-favorite and will be going forward. There are some fascinating new flavors mixed into proceedings, too, with 1960s Chicago being a prominent aspect, and the expansion culminating with some awesome ideas and narrative hooks that will pull us forward in the imminent future. It’s the shining star of the expansion, and the one aspect I don’t feel obliged to mention with caveats.
The narrative team did a great job at an opening salvo, which is not usually easy to do. If you’ve ever cared about Destiny, it’s worth experiencing this campaign at some point to see if the future of the franchise is for you.
What Matters(park)
Matterspark is a strange new mechanic you’ll interact with while on your journey through Kepler. Image credit: Bungie
While the story of the campaign is great, that’s not to say playing through it is always a joy. Destiny’s campaigns have been generally pretty reliably fun, but parts of the Edge of Fate can be a slog thanks to some odd choices in its flow. Before release, Bungie touted that ‘puzzles’ would be a big part of the campaign, but what they delivered feels very wonky.
Most of this interaction is facilitated by the game’s new ‘Matterspark’ ability. Essentially, players transform into a small electric orb, allowing them to find small gaps to traverse to new areas and/or power-up small generators. Firstly, it just looks quite strange. Something about having your Guardian turn into a little ball of energy feels off. It’s a small thing, but it looks odd, and Samus-balling around is a strange vibe for Guardians.
Secondly, it’s often used in annoying ways, most prominently, to gate boss damage, meaning you have to stop the fight, go find a Dark Matter source to become a spinning Sonic the Hedgehog, find an opening to enter, and go power a generator, before you can get back to killing the boss, all without dying. Oh, and every time you enter into the form, your camera whips around to lock your perspective where Bungie thinks you want to be looking.
I don’t hate Matterspark in the way some vocal members of the community do. It’s mostly fine. A means to an end, and once it becomes castable at will while on Kepler, it’s even a decent navigation tool. However, it also doesn’t add much to proceedings, and it’s hard to get over how ‘un-Guardian’ it looks. It’s okay, but it’s a very odd idea for the developers to latch onto and commit to as fully as they do through the campaign.
Kep on kepping on
Kepler is an interesting location, though not always memorable. Image credit: Bungie
Keplar itself is a mixed bag. Destiny’s planets are all very distinct, each with their own personality and layout. Every planet ever introduced is ingrained into my head, committed to memory quickly. Even last year’s Pale Heart, which was a very different space from other destinations, lingers in the mind. Kepler is new, but I still can’t quite map it out from memory, and I think that’s notable.
Lots of areas bleed together, and the sense of direction feels very different from most planets in Destiny’s universe. Not helping the planet’s case is that, unlike every other destination, it lacks a visual identity. Destiny has always knocked its locations out of the park, making each feel dense and instantly recognisable. From landmark features to distinctive color languages, if you showed me a screenshot of any other planet, it wouldn’t take long to identify which one it was.
Kepler, on the other hand, lacks that visual distinctiveness. It feels like the result of smashing vaulted locations Io and The Tangled Shore together, so much so, it can be hard to untangle Kepler from those visual identities. There’s nothing inherently wrong with the space.
It’s still perfectly fine to navigate, even with Matterspark being necessary to travel. It’s just that Bungie has always knocked locations out of the park, and this feels like a muddled step back for what has always been an incredible aspect of the game.
A portal to where?
The Portal is bound to be a controversial addition to the Destiny 2 experience. Image credit: Bungie
By far, the most complicated part of The Edge of Fate’s launch is its complete systems overhaul. To Bungie’s credit, it has put significant work into overthrowing much of how the game’s grind and moment-to-moment work. A lot has changed. The Portal is a new system that is designed to get players into what will improve their Power Level, and also allows players to modularly adjust difficulty.
Armor 3.0 has completely changed how buildcrafting works in the game, with further incentives to use what’s new with set bonuses. The new Tier system on both armor and weapons is about creating a reason for you to continue to chase gear far into the future, mimicking the likes of Diablo 4 and Path of Exile 2, with your ultimate chase being to perfect your build with higher-tier gear.
Hell, even the expansion itself is a new structure. Instead of one big expansion and three or four seasons a year, there will now be two expansions a year, bringing more campaigns and destinations, but with less frequent updates. The point is that a lot has changed in The Edge of Fate.
There’s good reason, too. The viability of the grind, the chase for random rolls on weapons, fatigue from the season structure, and it being hard to know what to do at any given moment – these are all long-discussed problems by the community, and these overhauls are Bungie’s answer. In a vacuum, these are well-intentioned shifts for the franchise. In practice, it’s been a mess, though.
Unclear answers
The Aionians are a mysterious people you will meet on Kepler, and you’ll have to learn about their language and goals. Image credit: Bungie
To say there are bugs in these systems would be an understatement. Destiny 2 currently feels much harder, as power deltas have been added, making your climb for power tough. The grind to get Tier 4 and 5 gear feels excessive, and also makes it so any good rolls you get that are of lesser tiers are temporary, thus disposable. The armor changes have also made ability regeneration slower, with builds feeling weak out of the gate.
The Portal is a particular issue, too. While a decent idea to get players into the action and signpost what they should do next, its current offerings are too restrictive. It’s a good way of recycling content that isn’t currently launchable in the game, but currently, the best way to get higher power is to just run the same seasonal mission over and over again.
It also lacks some of Destiny’s best content, with Raids and Dungeons not being relevant to the power grind currently. That’s coming, and The Portal can be a great way to resurface old content that players would be happy to see back.
The problem is that all of this just feels like a lot all at once, and almost none of it is in a state that feels great. Long-term, I believe all of these can be good for the game, but each system needs a lot of work, and it feels exceedingly messy.
If these structural changes were a steak, they’d currently be blue. There’s nothing wrong with the steak itself; it probably should have just used a little more time in the pan. One day, these might all sing, but right now, it’s hard to full-heartedly recommend jumping in.
Which fate will it be?
As ever, Destiny still looks stunning at times, and Edge of Fate doesn’t change that. Image credit: Bungie
Destiny 2 finds itself in a weird place heading into its newest saga. In a lot of ways, even for a decade-old franchise, it’s entering uncharted waters. We’ve never had a new saga launch, and it’s clear, through both the story and system changes introduced in The Edge of Fate, that things are going to be different. On the narrative side, the franchise has never felt better.
The direction is clear, and Destiny, for one of the first times, feels like it has a well-thought-out path, fascinating elements, and surprises ahead. The narrative team carries the Edge of Fate, which is quite a difference compared to where the franchise started in 2014.
However, it’s everything else that is currently struggling. Bungie has taken a bold step of trying to completely revamp the game’s core systems, and right now, they are not in an excellent state. The changes appear well intentioned, and there might be a future where they create an excellent harmony – but right now, there’s a lot of distance between here and there.
As it always has, Bungie will likely sand those edges down and make something of these systems, but for anyone but the most dedicated, time is probably on your side in waiting for these things to be sorted out.
It’s a shame those issues overshadow the good of this expansion and the first step into the Fate saga. This story deserves to be told at the scale Destiny 2 has always existed on. Destiny’s narrative clarity hasn’t always shone, but it’s always been backed up by the moment-to-moment gameplay. Bizarrely, the game currently finds itself flipped on its head.
There is a future where these gameplay systems are refined and the intelligent driving force of this narrative find harmony. If so, there is a timeline where Destiny’s best days are ahead of it. However, with troubled waters both in and out of the game, the path to that destination is murkier than ever.
Ask The Escapist
How much is the Edge of Fate?
The Edge of Fate price is currently $39.99/£34.99 as a standalone.
When will the next Destiny Expansion release?
The next Destiny 2 expansion will release on December 1, 2025. It’s called Renegades and will be heavily Star Wars-inspired.
Did Destiny 2 end with The Final Shape?
Despite Destiny 2: The Final Shape finishing the first major saga of the franchise, which ran for 10 years, the story continues on with The Fate Saga, focused heavily on the Nine.
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I’ve been a big proponent of print-and-play games, and over the past year or two, dozens and dozens of these titles have hit Kickstarter, PNP Arcade, DicePen, and several other sites. It’s no wonder why – many of these games offer a short, fun game experience for less than half the price of a standard title. Yes, there’s a little extra effort that might go into it, and yes you may have to supply some of your own components. But for those who prioritize the gameplay experience and don’t need all the little fancy bits and pieces, print-and-play is the way to go.
Now, there are several different kinds of print and play, but my favorites are games that take place on entire sheets of paper. I prefer not to have to do much cutting, and I certainly don’t want to spend hours trying to properly align card backs and fronts. So these are usually my game of choice. There are plenty of options out there that scratch this itch, but most fall into the category of “roll dice, do thing”. There’s certainly not a problem with that, but I will say that it’s gotten a bit stale for me lately. Lots of them also involve going out and exploring different terrain types, marking the spaces that you visit. You’re usually looking at some form of area control, a bit of set collection, maybe a few other little things thrown in here and there.
Starfront Scouting Academy is the first title from Shiny Pigeon Printables, and it contains many of these elements. Plus, it’s in space, which I’m pretty tired of as a theme. So my fear was… is this game going to be like all others, or will it have some extra fun parts that will make it ready for launch? (Don’t worry, I groaned at that sentence, too.) Let’s find out!
I Need You to Be Clever, Bean
Starfront Scouting Academy, designed by Chris Backe, puts 1-6 players in the role of cadets facing their final exams. Their challenge: explore a toxic planet remotely using a variety of equipment. Your goal is to utilize your tools and your smarts to chart the planet in the most successful way and head to the top of your class!
Play works very simply – four dice of the same color are placed on the top, bottom, and sides of a shared Equipment Selection sheet. There’s also an extra die in the middle that represents SCOUT – a robo-dog that’s here to help you out. On a turn, you’ll select one or two of these dice to explore a particular terrain area, each of which uses the dice in different ways. For the dunes, you’ll take two dice and use the difference in their values. For the mountains, you’ll add 5 to one of the die values. You can only use dice that border that terrain type on the Equipment Selection sheet, so your options are somewhat limited.
Once you’ve made your choice, you’ll go over to the shared planet map sheet (there are 4 to choose from) and mark one of the spaces based on the value from your dice. You’ll then go to your individualized player sheet to mark the value and terrain type that you visited. You reroll the dice you use, place them on the Equipment Selection sheet, and then it’s the next player’s turn.
Play continues just like that until either a row, column, or full diagonal is completed, at which point scores are tallied. Players earn points in a variety of ways. The location values are split into three groups, and the two players with the most visits in a particular group will get some points. There are also points if you manage to visit a terrain type 4 or 5 times. Other little bonuses are also present, like having connected scout boxes or having your boxes in the line that finished the game.
There are also points available for completing six different patterns with your scout boxes on the planet map. Manage to be the first one to get the pattern completed and you’ll get even more points. Once everyone’s added up all their points, whoever has the most is the big winner!
She Just Wins… Thoroughly
Now as I said, I’m a bit tired of space games, and so I was hoping that the theme wouldn’t bring this down for me. For most games like this, the theme and everything rarely impact the way the game is played, and that’s pretty much the case for SSA. That said, I do like the flavor text and the presentation, and I feel like it goes really well with the artwork we have from Parker Simpson. It’s certainly space-themed, but it has a nice little “younger” twist to where it does feel like it’s intended for students. The full-color version looks really good, though I prefer a black and white printout as it’s easier to see what the players have marked on the sheets.
I played this game with my wife, and at two players, it made for a fun time that increased in competitiveness as it went along. We both started off doing our own thing. My wife went immediately after the patterns, while I tried to connect a bunch of my squares together. There’s so much space on the board for two players that you can easily stay out of each other’s way…. but what’s the fun in that? As the game went along, my wife was quickly racking up pattern bonuses, and I was getting a whole lot of nothing. So I started trying to take boxes away from her to keep her from getting more patterns. While this was successful for a bit, it only ended up making it so that I wasn’t getting many points for myself either. In the end, I did better than her in a few areas, but her focus on patterns and those big points for being the first one to finish them led to her having a clear victory.
If You Try and Lose, It Isn’t Your Fault
I will say that this game can be a bit more challenging for people that struggle with spatial reasoning in games. This is true for my wife, and there were times when she was taking several minutes on each turn. We quickly blew through the recommended time and got to a little over an hour, and we likely could’ve gone for 30 more minutes if my wife didn’t begin to focus on ending the game quickly before I could get more points. I’m sure as we play the game more, we’ll both go a bit quicker, but I could still see our games being closer to an hour than to 30 minutes.
In some cases, that would be a problem, as this game’s mechanics are pretty much the same from your first turn to your last. There are some bonuses you can unlock at certain levels when you visit the terrain types, and they do make for more interesting turns, but it’s still pretty much the same. That being said, I don’t think we ever got bored. As we started trying to get in each other’s way, that bit of competitiveness in us came out just the right amount, and it made for a good time.
I Will Not Be a Pawn in Your Game
I also played the game solo a few times, and I must say that I was incredibly impressed with how the rules have been manipulated to allow for this experience. When it’s just one player, they will take a turn as normal, but any dice that they do not use on a turn are utilized by a “storm simulator” to mark off spaces and make them unavailable. The use of direction and the values of the unused die is quite clever and not something I would’ve been able to envision myself.
That said, the solo mode is also REALLY hard. After playing with my wife, I thought that patterns would have to be the way to go, but that got blown up quickly. The way the simulator works, it’s always going to mark off spaces that are orthogonally adjacent to the one that you just selected. Therefore, patterns that involved having boxes in the same vertical or horizontal line led to lines that quickly filled up. My first game ended after less than 10 turns, and I had a miserable score. In my second game, I adjusted my strategy a bit, and I was certainly more successful but still fell far short of the top goal given in the manual. I do feel like there’s likely a strategy that could work, and I’m interested to keep trying it out.
Overall, I’m not sure that there’s anything about Starfront Scouting Academy that is completely unique or sets the standard for all print-and-play games going forward. However, it does what it does very well, and it’s a solid gameplay experience. This would be a very good family game for those with kids in the higher levels of elementary school, and I think it could also be good fun at the beginning of a gaming night before you get to your main gaming course. If you’ve been on the fence about backing a print-and-play campaign on Kickstarter, I would say that this is a very solid way to begin your journey into that realm.
A prototype of the game was provided for this coverage. Components and rules covered in this preview are not finalized. Read more about our preview policies at One Board Family.
Highs
Nice artwork that fits well with the theme
Fun interactivity that increases as the game progresses
When I say “trick-taking dice game”, does your brain do a double-take? Mythical Dice is a dice game where players are bidding each round as they roll to take tricks from their opponents. Players of Skull King, Spades and other trick-taking games will feel at home with this dice game that is brought to the US from Hachette Games.
For our last full controller review on TouchArcade, I’ve been using the Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition for PC and PlayStation across my Steam Deck, PS5, and PS4 Pro for over a month now. Before I interviewed PDP Victrix about the controller and arcade sticks, I was very curious about the controller for its modular nature and also because I’ve wanted to try out another “Pro” controller after adoring the Xbox Elite (1st generation) and DualSense Edge over the years.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller – what’s in the box
Usually, controllers just ship with a cable and sometimes a charging stand. In the case of the Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition, you get the controller, a braided cable, a high quality protective case to house the controller and everything else it ships with, a replacement fightpad module with a six button layout for fighting games, two gates, two replacement analog stick caps, two d-pad caps, a screwdriver for use with the controller, and a blue wireless USB dongle.
The items are all neatly placed within the case which is very good quality on its own. Unlike the normal Victrix Pro BFG controller, some of the items with this one are themed to match the new Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition aesthetic. Keep this in mind as I don’t see replacements available officially for this, but I hope they start selling them soon.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller compatibility
On paper, the Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller supports PS5, PS4, and PC. I don’t use Windows anymore, so I was curious if this would work on Steam Deck out of the box. Since I prefer the PlayStation button prompts in games, I set it to PS5 and plugged in the dongle into my Steam Deck Docking Station. It worked without issue and without needing any update.
On the console side, if you want to play wirelessly, you need the same dongle and to set the toggle to PS4 or PS5. I had no issues playing with it on my PS4 Pro in PS4 mode and on my PS5 in PS5 mode. In fact, since I don’t have any PS4 controller that works outside of arcade sticks with PS4 support, this is a very good bonus to have for when I want to test something on PS4 to compare with PS5.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller features
The big draw of the Victrix Pro BFG controller is the modular nature letting you work with a symmetric stick layout, asymmetric stick layout, change things up for fighting games with the fightpad, adjust the triggers, thumbsticks, and also the d-pads. The aim with this design was to allow you to adjust the controller depending on the game you’re playing. As an example, I’d use the symmetric stick layout when playing Katamari Damacy Reroll, but I might swap to the Xbox-style asymmetric layout while playing DOOM Eternal.
Being able to adjust the trigger stop is also great as I can change that when playing a racing game with analog trigger support and also go for the shortest stop when playing a game with digital trigger support. Beyond that, the multiple d-pad options are very nice, but I’ve been trying to stick to the default diamond shape one to get used to it, and I like it a lot. I wouldn’t use it for platformers though, but the other d-pad options work well here.
Since this is an official PS5 and PS4 licensed controller, it is worth noting that this has no rumble, no haptic feedback, no adaptive trigger support, and no gyro/motion control support. I don’t care about gyro much, but no rumble at all is disappointing since you have sub $30 controllers now offering decent rumble, though they aren’t PS5 compatible. I’ve been informed that third party wireless controllers for PS5 might have restrictions for rumble as well, and I’ve seen more reports from folks using other third party controllers here. Either way, this is disappointing.
The Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition ships with 4 paddles or well paddle-like buttons. I wish there were proper paddles you could remove though. I mapped two of them to L3 and R3 and the ones above to L1 and R1 since I use those the most in games like Monster Hunter World and also hate pressing the sticks. Having four buttons here is very good though.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller look and feel
Visually, I love the gorgeous and bright highlights and colors used on the Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition. It isn’t as elegant as the default black model with purple highlights, but for a themed controller it looks very good with its light blue, pink, purple, and Tekken 8 branding.
The Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition feels very comfortable, but it is a bit too light for my liking. The material on the main controller body ranges from feeling premium to just fine. It is a far cry from the premium feeling DualSense Edge, but that controller has that ugly glossy front plate that ruins things. The grip on this controller makes a big difference, and I’ve had 8 hour sessions with the controller wired without getting tired of holding it. It being light pays off here.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller on PS5
On PS5, there are a few things to keep in mind. This is an officially licensed controller, but you can’t turn on your PS5 with it. This seems like a limitation for 3rd party controllers on PS5, but is an annoyance to keep in mind. Beyond that, haptic feedback, adaptive triggers, and gyro are not available here. Aside from that, it has touchpad support and all the buttons I use on a DualSense controller including the share button.
Victrix Pro BFG on Steam Deck
Like I mentioned above, the Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition works out of the box on Steam Deck with the dongle plugged into the official Docking Station I use. It even correctly is recognized as a PS5 Victrix controller with the share button working for capturing screenshots and the touchpad working as it should in PC games that have PlayStation controller support. This was great to see as some games don’t even recognize my DualSense correctly.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller battery life
The huge advantage the Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller or the normal one has over the DualSense and DualSense Edge is the battery life. It lasts multiple times longer than the DualSense and the DualSense Edge on a single charge. It also helps that the logo on the touchpad indicates when the battery is low. This is good for playing on Steam Deck as other controllers don’t really visually indicate when the battery is low.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller software
The software is something I couldn’t test as it is only available on the Microsoft Store and I don’t use Windows anymore. Thankfully, it works out of the box with Steam Deck, PS5, and PS4. The one thing I was hoping to see is if the controller would work on iOS. I tested wirelessly with the dongle on my iPad, wired on my iPhone 15 Pro, and also wired on my iPad Pro with no luck.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller negatives
Right now, it has a few big negatives. These include no rumble, the low polling rate, not shipping with the Hall Effect sensors, and it requires a dongle for wireless, at least for the model I have. The lack of rumble might not be an issue for some, but for a “Pro” controller, the polling rate is disappointing. There are multiple videos on YouTube showcasing this and why it is a problem as well. Comparatively, the DualSense Edge wired is massively better with its response.
As for the Hall Effect sensors, I’m glad Victrix now sells the new modules, but why do new purchases of the controller not just ship with those in the first place? Also if I were to buy either of the module color options available for my Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller, it wouldn’t fit with the aesthetic and will not have PS5 face buttons.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Controller Review
Having gotten well over a hundred hours of use out of the controller per platform across games like UFO 50, Street Fighter 6, Tekken 8, Persona 3 Reload, and many more, I can safely say that I love using the controller, but the few issues are annoying to see given its price point. In a lot of ways, the Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition has the potential to be one of the best controllers in years if it sees some fixes and changes for a potential successor. Right now, there are a few too many caveats involved for its high asking price that make sure it is very good, but not amazing. The big issues holding it back right now are the lack of rumble (which seems like a restriction from Sony), dongle requirement, additional cost involved for Hall Effect sticks, and the polling rate. These might not matter to some folks, but for a “Pro” controller priced at $200, I expected a bit more.
Victrix Pro BFG Tekken 8 Rage Art Edition Review Score: 4/5
Update: Added more information for the lack of a rumble feature.
Blue Archive developers, Nexon Games, have canned their “Steam Review Event”, after someone probably gave them a heads up that Valve has explicit rules about manipulating Steam reviews. Announced over on Steam itself, the gacha strategy game has “decided to terminate the event early”, as it goes expressly against Steam’s terms of service.
While Steam’s review system, despite sometimes being used maliciously by players themselves, has strict guidelines on what not to do. Valve clearly states on its support site that, alongside threats and harassment, not to “coerce” players into leaving reviews.
The event would have rewarded players with in-game rewards if it hit 10,000 reviews. Some gacha games will run events through iOS or Android versions that urge you to leave a review, complete a survey, or interact with social media for a prize. Oftentimes, you can simply hit whatever button, have the app think you’ve done it, and return without ever handing over your precious morals or data.
As pointed out by a user on the Gacha Gaming Reddit, it would have been smarter to simply give items out as and when milestones were hit.
Unfortunately, because Nexon has scrapped the event, it won’t be distributing the rewards in any capacity. It’s an odd statement as it is, as it reads as if no one on the team over at Nexon was even aware this wasn’t allowed.
This is even though they’ve been on Steam for quite some time, with MMOs Vindictus and MapleStory in 2012. They even have a direct partnership with Valve to run Counter-Strike Nexon. Baffling, to say the least.
Nexon didn’t even need to coerce reviews out of players
Looking at the reviews themselves, it’s clear that coercion wasn’t even needed, as the game has been positively received by players. Since its launch on July 4, it has had a massive influx of 5700 reviews, which has naturally dipped to a few hundred in the following week. Reviews claim that it’s running great, and cross-saves work just fine, allowing addicts to continue their self-inflicted gacha torture.
Some negative reviews have pointed out that it is running kernel-level anti-cheat, similar to Riot Games’ Valorant. However, it sits pretty at a “Very Positive” rating on Steam as of writing and doesn’t look like that’ll change anytime soon.
Blue Archive is a multi-million-dollar gacha money generator
If you’re wondering what Blue Archive even is, it’s a 2021 gacha game that regularly brings in millions of dollars. In 2023, it was reported to have made well over $400 million in total, and presumably, that number has climbed exponentially. It also makes a lot of its money in the heartland of gacha gaming, Japan. Reports from last year pointed out that Japan provides 72% of the game’s revenue in total.
Blue Archive manages this through its various microtransactions and that key gacha system. It stems from gachapon, the little toys that you’d pop a quarter in for and get a random piece of plastic. Similarly, gacha games run “banners”, which the player “pulls” from and is awarded a random character, skin, item, or whatever else is being flogged.
When I gave it a spin on launch in 2021, I was taken for a little bit by its snappy action and tactics-lite focus. Now it’s hit Steam, maybe it’s time to dip back into it, if only those anime racing horse girls didn’t absorb so much of my time recently.
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We’ve learned over the years that a card game from Grandpa Beck’s Games is sure to be a good time around the table. 3-2-1 Countdown is a card shedding game released in early 2025 that we’re just now getting a chance to play. Will this retro rocket themed game be a crowd pleaser or will this be a failure to launch?
Countdown
3-2-1 Countdown is for two to eight players and is played over the course of 5 rounds. Each round, players are trying to shed the twelve cards from their hand or at least have the lowest valued hand when the round comes to an end. In higher player count games, you’ll only have ten cards in your hand, but the objective remains the same.
On your turn, you’ll simply discard a card or cards of all the same value to one discard pile, then draw the top card of the other discard pile. If you don’t like the card laying at the top, feel free to draw blind from the top of the deck in the center of the table. Having multiple copies of the same card is a great thing because it means that you can discard all of them at one time, inching your hand of cards closer to empty.
Drawing a new card after discarding can give you a chance of doubling or tripling another card value in your hand, making a future turn even more lucrative. Players are dropping cards and looking for chances to gain lower cards or cards that have synergy with the cards they have in their hand.
Ready to Blast Off
A round of 3-2-1 Countdown will end in one of two ways. If a player is able to discard a final card or cards on their turn, they say “Blast Off” and the round is over. For shedding all their cards, this player gets three points for emptying their hand. All other players share their numerical card totals as they share their hand of remaining cards. The player with the lowest card total gets two points and the next lowest gets one point.
A player can choose to end a round before someone has the opportunity to empty their hand. If a player has five or less points in their hand, they can place their cards face up in front of them, saying “Countdown”. This will end the round, but could be a risky move. If another player has a lower point total in their hand, they will grab the three victory points while the player who initiated this receives nothing. If the player who said “Countdown” did have the lowest total, they receive an additional bonus point, scoring four points. In either case, the next two players with the lowest point totals receive two and one point respectively.
The players that finish outside of the three lowest values don’t receive points, but there’s always next round. Most of our games, we play the full five rounds before totaling the players scores. In a game with six or seven players, we’ll sometimes play three or four rounds for a quicker game.
Mission Control
3-2-1 Countdown has great artwork from Apryl Stott that’s reminiscent of mid-1900’s science fiction. The rocket and color pallet of the game is excellent and works well as you race to shed your cards. I really enjoy the variety of rockets that appear on the eleven different cards in the game (zero to ten).
The card breakdown is weighted to the middle of the deck with the five cards showing up the most frequently. This is important to understand as you make decisions on whether or not to pick up specific numbers after discarding on your turn. Players often shoot immediately for low numbered cards in their first couple games. The problem is that the lower and higher cards in the deck are less plentiful, giving you less card matches in your hand.
While it seems counter intuitive, picking up that six or seven card makes a lot of sense. Chances are that you’ll have a couple of these cards in your hand already. Discarding a pile of cards feels so satisfying as you work to catch the other players off guard.
This game definitely flew under our radar this year. I originally didn’t dig too deep into 3-2-1 Countdown because of the shear number of card games that have shown up in our house over the past year. We had a chance to check the game out at Origins Game Fair in June and we knew this would be a hit for our family and friends.
I’m a little sad that we waited six months to check out this great card shedding game. The game is quick to teach and moves really fast after you get through your first round. I like that players who don’t finish in the top three of the round are locked out of earning points. While scores are pretty low numerically, the games we’ve played have been tight and competitive.
I’m positive that this is one of my top three games that Grandpa Beck’s publishes. It’s going to be tough to take the place of the incredible trick-taking classic Skull King and the ultra mean Cover Your A$$ets. 3-2-1 Countdown is a game that can hit the table after dinner or at the beginning or end of any game night. This is an easy suggestion for anyone who’s looking to introduce a new card game that the whole family can jump into.
We reach out to those games’ designers and arrange a playtest. These playtests are usually with the designer on TTS, although I have been sent physical prototypes to test on our own.
Pine Island Playtesters
A relatively new addition to our community is our Pine Island Playtesters. These are insiders from the mailing list, discord, or Kickstarter who’ve expressed an interest in being more involved with the company.
We loop in our playtesters for the handful of games that we are seriously considering signing.
We usually have specific questions for our playtesters about game mechanisms, and how they view the game versus other games in the genre.
There is still room for improvement in our process. But, it’s come a long way, and it couldn’t be what it is, and we wouldn’t have the opportunities we have, without this amazing community.
If you’d like to be Pine Island Playtester and get a front row seat as we look at games to license, shoot me an email at jasper@pineislandgames.com.
Everdell has been a huge presence in the hobby since its release in 2018. With more than half a dozen expansions and multiple editions of the game, it’s tough to know where to jump into this award winning worker placement game. Thankfully, Everdell Duo is a less intimidating 2-player game that seems to be a prefect ramp into this universe.
Woodland Communities
Everdell Duo is a 2-player focused experience where players are building their forest focused communities over the series of four seasons. One player takes the role of the tortoise while the other player plays as the hare. In the competitive play mode, players work to build out their woodland village with structures and inhabitants. You’ll have three workers to place and a variety of resources that can be earned and spent.
Cards are available from a draw deck or from the central board. These cards each have a cost that has to be paid before they are added to your tableau. Cards offer end game scoring, new worker placement spots, resources, or coins (which are your victory points). Like it’s older board game sibling, Everdell Duo is an incredibly cute game. With artwork from Andrew Bosley and Enggar Adirasa, this game draws you into its nature themed world.
The Sun and the Moon
Each round of Everdell Duo is tracked using a sun and moon token that moves through the center of the board. When players place a worker, the moon token moves along the track. When a player plays a card, the sun token moves along the track. Picking up a card from the deck or meadow (board) allows the player to advance either token, their choice. These sun and moon tokens keep the game moving and have strategic value as you try to lock out your opponent from using their final worker.
There are standard worker placement spots on the board along with two river spaces that get swapped out each round. Players are primarily collecting resources from these spots. Berries, twigs, pebble, and resin resources are used throughout the game to pay for cards and add them to your tableau. I’m a big fan of how tactile these resources are.
Cards are either categorized as creature or construction. These cards offer new worker placement locations, production bonuses, additional resources, coins (victory points), and end gaming scoring. Finding synergies across these cards is a big part of the game.
Seasons Come and Go
Across the top of the meadow is a set of locations where players can claim events that are randomly chosen at the start of the game. Players can claim these events if they meet the requirements of the tile, resulting in additional victory points. Since these are first come, first serve, players want to commit to chasing specific tiles as they build out their tableau.
At the end of the fourth season, players count their victory points, coins, bonuses, awarded events, and any end game scoring from cards.
Everdell Duo is a really straight-forward 2-player experience with great components (for the most part). While I love the high quality resources in the game, it feels like the sun and moon tokens could have been a little better. These are just cardboard trackers and pale in comparison with the resource components.
The sun and moon tracker is being moved each and every turn and is an important part of the game. It’s also the item that is forgotten about the most often. I’ve played Everdell Duo against four different people and moving these trackers are forgotten about a few times each game. It’s an upkeep step that is often tough to remember.
Cooperative Gameplay
In the cooperative game mode, both players are working together to build a single city that is flourishing with life. Players work their way through a book that has over a dozen chapters which guide the players through a story. You’ll have goals to achieve, and the setup will be slightly different each time.
Players will deal with skunk tokens that block out different locations during the course of the game. The skunks get in your way and keep you from getting exactly what you need. You can choose to take on a single chapter or work through a campaign where you name your city and track your progress over time.
This co-op experience is a great option for players who are looking for a new way to play. It works really well and is perfect for players who don’t mind working together with another person. This is also a great option for anyone who wants to play the game with a younger gamer. Some chapters allow you to share resources or cards, while other chapters are more restrictive.
Final Thoughts
Everdell Duo has quickly become part of our weekend gaming rhythm. Erin and I really enjoy playing this game over breakfast during a chill weekend. The game has enough cards that it’s impossible to see all the cards during a single game. There is a lot of replayability because event cards and the river location tiles are randomized each game.
With two different ways to play, Everdell Duo is a great option for players looking to change things up after a couple of games. While jumping into Everdell feels a little intimidating, Everdell Duo is a fantastic way to experience this world as a newcomer.
If you already own Everdell (along with some of the expansions), I’m not entirely sure Everdell Duo is a must buy. This new game does a great job of removing some of the “fluff” of the original and streamlines the game in plenty of ways. The setup and speed of play is the biggest selling point when compared to the original. If these aspects are important to you, you should check out this release.
For gamers who play games at the 2-player count often, Everdell Duo is an excellent purchase. The setup is quick, the mechanics are clean, and the game is one that we’re going to enjoy for a long time.
Parks was a monumental hit for Keymaster Games when it was released in 2019. We backed the original printing while on Kickstarter and it quickly became a game night staple. Parks is still one of my wife’s favorite games of all time.
The second edition of Parks was released this Spring and this box contains more than a minor facelift for this modern classic. In this review, I’ll cover some of the changes to the game and hopefully help you decide if this new edition should hike its way into your collection.
A Hike in the Woods
Throughout a game of Parks, players are hiking trails, collecting tokens that can be turned in to experience National Parks that roll out during the game. There are gear cards that help you along the way. Players can take photos that are worth victory points at the end of the game. In the original game, you would hike the trail a total of four times, with each trail being slightly longer than the last.
In Parks Second Edition, you can tell that time and experience has led to a tighter and more refined game. First off, the rulebook has been tweaked, refined and structured in a way that is easy to digest. Instead of taking four hikes on trails that grow throughout the game, players now hike three times on a trail that has a set number of spaces. The overall playtime doesn’t seem to be impacted and we never felt like we were missing out on the fourth hike of the game.
The trail is now built into the central board and the perks at each trail site are tied to tokens that are distributed before each round. You still get the variability, it just happens differently. Players are still given two hikers to walk the trail, with the ability to extinguish their campfire if you want to share a space with another hiker. Landing on a trail site lets you take the action on the token and collect any weather tokens that are available from the trails setup at the start of the round.
As you reach the trail’s end, you’ll get to determine what final action your hiker takes and gain a bonus if you’re the first to take that action. Once there is only a single player left on the trail, they proceed to the trail’s end to take their final action(s).
New Additions
In the six years since Parks original release, we’ve seen two different expansions that add new mechanics and depth to the game. Inside this second edition is a good chunk of the content from those two expansion. Some of the cards from the Wildlife expansion is present in the game as well as the camping mechanic from the Nightfall expansion. Keymaster Games has also included a specialty die that was part of the Trails game published in 2021.
Not every element from these expansions came over and I think this is a good thing. It feels like the best parts from each of these properties made the final cut. The Camping Mode is something that you can add into your game or leave out entirely. Your choice.
When your hiker lands on a trail site with a tent token, you can take the normal resources on the site or utilize the tent to take the resources on any open Campsite. Adding in this bonus content and rebalancing the game feels really good.
Players will notice a new Passions card in this new edition of the game. This replaces the goal cards from the previous edition and is given to players at the start of the game. Completing a Passions card allows the player to earn a gear effect or earn an end game bonus.
The Upgrades
Let’s talk about some of the upgrades that Parks Second Edition brings. First off, I really love the player boards that come with this new edition. These boards show a backpack representing the number of tokens you can carry along with your canteen on the left side of the board. Visually, these are excellent and the canteen mechanic has been revamped.
When gaining a canteen, players now add a token from the central board onto their player board. When you add water to your canteen, you can trigger the tokens in that row, earning those bonuses. This gives players more control and agency as they plan for future rounds. Each canteen has three rows, allowing for three different combinations of tokens that can be paired up.
The camera from the original Parks has been replaced with the Shutterbug token. This token gives the player holding it the ability to take a second photo each time they are given this opportunity.
Probably the most divisive change in this new edition has to be the art and illustrations on each of the sixty-three parks cards. The original game was built off of the Fifty-Nine Parks series. This series of art prints brought together some incredible artists that has raised more than $225,000 for National Parks since 2016. This artwork is beautiful, inspiring, and at times, inconsistent.
This artwork was part of a licensing deal that made Parks stand out within our hobby. While I loved the original art direction, I think that the artwork from Josh Emrich and Lisk Feng is stunning. As a package, the artwork and design works together so well. Each National Park card feels unique but there is a cohesiveness that wasn’t their in the original game.
Art is so subjective and every person will have an opinion on which version they prefer. I personally feel that this game is more consistent throughout because of the focused work of the two illustrators who worked on Parks Second Edition.
Final Thoughts
As a fan of the original Parks, this is an easy game to suggest for nature loving board gamers. I think the changes inside this box make sense as Keymaster Games moves away from licensing agreements that could challenge future printings and expansions of the Parks game line.
Parks Second Edition is a streamlined, well built, and cohesive game that improves on the original. The MSRP of $50 to $59 for this new edition may feel like a lot for a person who owns the original. The first edition of Parks is not broken and is still a fantastic game. More than anything, this new edition feels like an upgrade that is preparing for more Parks content in the future. That’s something I’m excited about.
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Published: Jul 12, 2025 03:12 am