Unplugged: Monkey Business (Boardgame)
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Posted on April 23rd, 2024 by
Monkey Business is a bit of a mash-up of the classic games of charades (where you pantomime something) and werewolf (where you’re trying to discover the odd person out in the mix. All but one player (or all but two, if there’s more than 6 players) are given the same activity to perform while the odd ones out, the “scammers” have to just play it by ear to cover up the fact that they don’t know what they should be doing. After a few moments of acting, players then all must accuse a player to be the “scammer” – the one who was just copying everyone else. Players who are correct keep their card, scammers win half of the remaining cards. After six rounds of play the game ends and the player with the most cards is the winner. Monkey Business is a fun little party game that gets people moving. It won’t carry an entire evening of gaming but is good for a short distraction, perhaps to loosen up a group of people who may be taking themselves too seriously.
Monkey Business
Publisher: Add-A-Game
Players: 4-12
Ages: 8+
Time: 15 min
(review copy provided by publisher)
{Star || Hero} Realms Digital Sale!
Posted on March 27th, 2024 by
One of the earliest deckbuilding card games, Star Realms has players attacking with space ships in a head to head battle to defeat their opponent. Designed by professional Magic:the Gathering player, Robert Dougherty, the game maintains a large following and has also made the jump into digital space. Not only can one play against the AI or an online opponent, there is an excellent series of solo challenges linked together to form a bit of a story-based campaign. By now, there are oodles of expansions available and each expansion has additional campaigns to play. Expansion cards are usable in regular games too, of course. The app has been out for a long time but I wanted to mention it today as, for the next few days, almost all the content is at a 50% discount. They have also managed to set things up so that any expansion purchase on one platform (iOS, Android, Steam) unlocks the same expansion everywhere else. Something I’d love to see happen in other digital games. Wise Wizard Games also has a spin-off game called Hero Realms that uses very similar mechanics but spins it into a full on RPG-style campaign game where one’s deck and abilities change and improve from game to game. It can be played head to head or cooperatively against set encounter challenges. Most of the Hero Realms expansions are also on sale. Be sure to check them out. More details on both games below (along with a note on the deckbuilder boardgame – Robot Quest Arena…)
Unplugged: Legacy of Yu (Boardgame)
Posted on February 20th, 2024 by
While fans of wargaming have been playing both sides of a battle for decades, the idea of playing a boardgame solo has recently seen a large uptick in broader gaming circles. Many boardgames advertise a “solo mode”, allowing gamers to play even if, for whatever reason, they are unable to arrange for a meet-up to play a game. A few games, like Legacy of Yu, take things a step further and are designed solely for one player. Designed from the ground up as a solo game it has an advantage over other single-player options since it isn’t just an add-on option (perhaps an afterthought) to a multiplayer game. Legacy of Yu does a stellar job of providing an interesting solo experience that manages not to outstay its welcome through the use of an ongoing story arc that slightly adjusts the difficulty between games.
Unplugged: D&D Toys and Tabs
Posted on February 17th, 2024 by
Kid Robot has once again paired up with Dungeons and Dragons licensed Wizkids to create some stuffed toy creatures with a D&D theme. This time around they’re even smaller. You can find a 3” tall plush charm featuring a Mind Flayer, Tarrasque, Intellect Devourer, or a Flumph suitable for latching onto your backpack (or briefcase if you’re daring?) This is apparently the third wave of 3” creatures but the first set I’ve encountered (provided by the nice folks over at Wizkids.)
In terms of Tabs, Wizkids is producing a set of non-permanent sticker tabs for use with one’s main D&D books. The first set has been released with sticker tabs for the Player Handbook, Dungeon Master’s Guide, and Monster Manual. Upcoming sticker tab sets will be available for
Rulebooks Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything and Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants, as well as the beginner-adventure Phandelver and Below: The Shattered Obelisk.
Unplugged: GamerDad Holiday Guide 2023
Posted on December 9th, 2023 by
Happy Holidays! Boardgaming continues to make inroads to wider audiences, and there’s no better time to get (or get your friends and family) into the hobby than an extended holiday break. There are boardgames out there to meet up with almost any taste.Boardgames are timeless, just as good today as they will be years in the future, so a purchase today will still be serving you well after the lockdowns go away. As we at GamerDad have done for the past 20-odd years, it’s time for an annual rundown of recent boardgames well worth your time. Feel free to delve into some past year’s guides for 2022, 2020, or older as they’re still great candidates for your consideration. You might not find all these titles at your local mega-mart but many can be found online or in a friendly local game store. Some may argue $60+ boardgames (or more) are expensive, but compare that to video gaming (and where multiple copies are required for multiplayer play) and the economics of boardgaming shows their true value. For each game, I’ve provided the publisher (to help you find it), an approximate MSRP (you can probably find it lower), the number of players, the expected time for one game, and the manufacturer’s recommended ages. These age listings are often set for legal reasons and I would say most could easily be skewed lower for experienced younger gamers.
On with the show!
D&D Plushies – The Return of Plush
Posted on October 7th, 2023 by
Last winter, I was sent some Dungeons and Dragons figurines http://www.gamerdad.com/blog/2021/12/04/dd-plushies-cuddly-deadly/ from Wizkids with one key component: they weren’t plastic miniatures, they were stuffed “animals.” A year later and the stuffed line of toys/collectibles (Phunny Plush by Kid Robot) continues, expanding into the Pathfinder and Critical Role brands.
Unplugged: Number Drop
Posted on September 19th, 2023 by
In the past few years, the boardgame world has seen a huge number of Roll and Write games where dice are rolled (or cards drawn) and then players simultaneously use the results to check off boxes or fill in a paper handout to score points. Number Drop has players filling in a sheet of paper Tetris-style with the pieces made of numbers. Place numbers adjacent to each other in sets or sequences to score points. The game ends and scores are tallied when one player “overflows” their game board.
Number Drop
Publisher: AEG
Ages: 10+
Players: 1-6
Time: 20 minutes
(Review copy provided by publisher)
Unplugged: XCrawl Classics RPG
Posted on August 10th, 2023 by
In the early heydays of role playing games it was all about surviving near impossible odds to acquire loot and fame. Over time, RPGs started getting kinder, more gentle sort of story based game. Enter Dungeon Crawl Classics… around a decade ago Goodman Games put together a mix of rules that greatly streamlined (then current) 3rd edition Dungeons and Dragons and mixed it with old school fast and deadly gameplay. One of the lines spawned from that mix became XCrawl, Adventures in the Xtreme Dungeon League – a game based around surviving a lethal maze of monsters and traps in order to cash and fame in the fantasy equivalent of Pay-per-View. Goodman games is in the final Kickstarter hours of a reboot of that classic series, complete with a set of follow-up modules.
Unplugged: Wreckland Run (Boardgame)
Posted on March 9th, 2023 by
The age of solo boardgaming is among us. With the business of everyday life, there will always be boardgamers who simply can’t get free on a regular basis to play with their friends. For years, one’s only option was to take a boardgame and play against oneself. With the rise of cooperative games, it was possible to take on a game without having to be your own enemy. Unsurprisingly, solo boardgaming received a big bump during the pandemic. While digital implementations of boardgames are available, sometimes it is nice to lay everything out on the table and play the game with easy access to the entire game state at once. Wreckland Run is a recent solo boardgame entry by Scott Almes (designer of another good solo game, Warp’s Edge.) Wreckland Run has you driving your armed-to-the-teeth, tricked-out car through a post-apocalyptic gauntlet of enemy vehicles. If you manage to drive and shoot your way successfully to the end, another six adventures await.
Wreckland Run
Publisher: Renegade Game Studios
Designer: Scott Almes
Ages: 10+
Players: 1
Time: 30-45 mins
(Review copy provided by publisher)
Epic Encounters (Tabletop RPG)
Posted on February 9th, 2023 by
Tabletop role playing is at an all time high, as one can see by the major kerfuffle over the Dungeons and Dragons brand last month. (The publisher was going to restrict 3rd party content creators but then had to backtrack due to fierce protest.) Where there are players, there are opportunities to jazz up one’s game. The folks over at Steamforged Games decided to use their experience in producing miniatures-heavy boardgames and apply it to the tabletop role playing experience. The result is Epic Encounters, a line of ready-to-play encounters containing everything needed for a great in-person gaming experience. Each box contains figurines, a double-sided fold-out map, and a booklet that gives suggestions for setting up and running the encounter.
