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The Time For Fun Is Now Or Never

Now or Never tells the story of a cliffside village called The Monument, which once protected an ancient shrine. Then a crystal meteorite descended upon the village, releasing its wicked monstrosities to wreak havoc across the land. The people of the village fled and the creatures spread throughout the land like a fungus. Now, twenty years later, rumors have begun to spread of their growing weakness, causing the people to consider returning and rebuilding. But do you have what it takes to seize your chance before someone else claims your home?

Rebuilding The Monument

Now or Never allows you and up to three friends to play as four asymmetrical characters, competing to see who can best rebuild your ancestral village and guide your fellow villagers home. The first thing you’ll need to do is rebuild your village so that the other villagers have a place to live. Your advantage comes from figuring out the best locations and buildings to construct, which will earn you rewards for long-term planning. You can even interact with other players by hiring their specialists to perform special actions when needed.

You’ll also have to fight the weakened creatures to protect your fellow travelers as they journey home to the village you’ve rebuilt. Although they’re weakened, they still pose a significant threat to you and your fellows, so make sure everyone makes it back safely!

All players will use a main board, which is overlaid by a 10×4 grid that contains iconography of the land and its various terrain. The game is played in six seasons, with each turn allowing you to use one of three hero actions to move on the game board and interact with the world. Each player gets their own hero board, which is fitted with different attack and defensive slots waiting to be filled or upgraded.

Specialist Action

Players get a grid of 4×5 buildings and two specialists, one who can build and the other who can refresh your heart track. If you choose to not be a hero on your round, you can activate one of your specialists to perform a distinct task. Other specialists can be recruited from the market to do things like buy gear or other specialized tasks. However, specialists need to be paid. If you choose to use another player’s specialist, then that player will get a few coins to act as taxes for reconciliation.

One optional move you can take is to use one of your specialists in order to let them rest. This earns you either two hearts or one coin. The trick of the game is in choosing the actions in the right order that earns you enough money where you need it while also allowing you to properly spend it.

Standard Vs. Story Mode

Now or Never has two modes of play: standard mode and story mode. Story mode allows you to read from a story book while you explore, while standard mode forgoes the use of the book. For players who want to learn more about the characters and the world, story mode can help add a magical feeling to the otherwise straightforward gameplay.

Every character has their own distinct story, with each decision guiding you further along in your own unique story. If you’ve played the previous two games in the Arzium storybook series (Above and Below and Near and Far), then you’ll definitely want to break out the storybook for your gameplay.

Now Or Never: A World-Building Fantasy

Now or Never is playable by 1-4 players, so it’s a great game for single players who love fantasy as well as small groups. If you play the game solo, then you will set up the board for a two-player game while only setting up the character board for your opponent. This allows you to play against an automated opponent.

Playing time is 90-180 minutes, so be prepared to settle down for a lengthy and satisfying game. It’s suitable for ages 13 and up, which makes it fitting for high schoolers and other young adults who appreciate the fantasy genre. Buy Now or Never and dive into this fantastical and mythical world!

 

Strawberry Sunset: The Sweetest of All

Some card games are made to be fast-paced games of skill, logic, and competition. Others incorporate beautiful artwork and graphic design that make the cards feel like a collector’s item. Strawberry Sunset has the best of both worlds in a card game that’s as beautiful as it is strategic. In this dynamic card game, you’re a gardener tasked with building the most beautiful and luscious strawberry garden around. It’s time to put your green thumb to the test!

Building Your Garden

The goal of Strawberry Sunset is to earn the most points by growing strawberry plants, creating a long garden path, and adding unique features to your garden like koi ponds or gnomes. You also want to keep the number of gravel patches within your garden to a minimum. Whoever manages to earn the most points throughout the game succeeds in creating the most beautiful garden out of all their neighbors and wins the game!

One thing that makes Strawberry Sunset a particularly difficult card game is that you can only play cards vertically, with each card having to cover at least one-quarter of an existing card. Similar to the way a flower grows from the bottom up, your garden will have to be built from the bottom up. The difficulty of this, of course, is that it makes planning ahead of time more of a challenge.

Players will take turns drawing cards from either the main deck or from the discard pile, also known as the “compost” pile. Players can either draw two face-down cards from the main deck or one face-up card from the compost pile. They are allowed to play only one card at a time to their garden, discarding any other cards into the compost pile.

Sunrise, Noon, and Sunset

The cards of Strawberry Sunset are divided into three times of day: sunrise, noon, and sunset. Each of these decks of cards is shuffled and then placed in a stack, with the sunrise cards on top, the sunset cards on the bottom, and noon cards in between. Each card has an intricate design on the back, although the three types of cards each contain different things.

Sunrise cards will usually consist of root parts of the strawberry plant as well as a few garden features. They’ll also contain cards representing gravel and path sections that run at different angles, allowing you to build a winding garden path and earn points. Noon cards will contain additional sections of the strawberry plant, while sunset cards will contain the strawberry fruits.

Players will take turns drawing and discarding cards as they build their garden. When they discard cards into the compost, they’re allowed to make separate stacks for sunrise, noon, and sunset cards. Once all of the cards in the main deck have been drawn, the game ends, and players have to tally up the points.

Scoring the Game

Players earn different amounts of points for each feature of their garden. For every completed strawberry plant, you’ll earn five points, while water features will earn you three points each. Every quadrant of your longest connected path will earn you one point, while you’ll lose two points for every gravel bed. You can also play Strawberry Sunset with an advanced scoring version, making the game slightly more complex and competitive.

Strawberry Sunset: A Sweet But Competitive Card Game

Strawberry Sunset is playable by 2-4 players, making it better suited for small groups or one-on-one games than for a big family game night. It’s suitable for ages 7 and up, which makes it a great game for parents to play with their kids or for the kids to play together. Playing time lasts around 10-20 minutes, as the game tends to move pretty quickly.

Strawberry Sunset stands out from other card games with its stunning artwork and impeccable card quality. Each of these linen-finished cards will feel like another intricate piece in your beautiful garden as you lay the cards down and watch it grow. The card game also comes with a few cards that detail the rules of the game in a way that’s easy to follow.

Buy Strawberry Sunset today and enjoy the sweet taste of victory!

 

Skip-Bo: Don’t Skip this Classic Card Game

Skip-Bo is one of the great classic card games. As you draw different colored and numbered cards, you’ll have to figure out the best placement for each card in order to clear out your deck and not run yourself into a corner. Skip-Bo is a splendid mix of both strategy and fun, giving you just enough opportunity to interfere with the other players while focusing on your own agenda. Don’t miss out on the fast-paced fun of Skip-Bo!

Whittling Down Your Stock Pile

The goal of Skip-Bo is to get rid of all the cards in your stockpile. If you’re playing with 2-4 players, then each player will have 30 cards in their stockpile. With 5-6 players, the recommended stockpile is 20. Either way, players will have to put down their cards in the building piles and discard piles if they want to be the first to clear their hand and win the game.

Cards are numbered from 1 to 12, with a wild Skip-Bo card that can be used in place of any numbered card. At the beginning of each turn, players will draw cards so that they have a hand of 5. They will then play cards from either their hand, their stockpile, or the top of one of their discard piles. Players are allowed to continue their turn until they run out of cards to play, at which point they must discard onto one of their four discard piles.

Building vs. Discarding

The strategy of Skip-Bo comes from knowing where to build and how to discard. There are very specific rules as to what can be played into the building pile, as they can only be started with either a 1 or a wild Skip-Bo card. Building piles must then be played up to the number 12, at which point they can be discarded for a new pile to begin. 

You want to play the cards from your stockpile as quickly as possible, but you don’t want to set the next player in the line up for success. You also want to discard in the best possible order so that you have access to your cards when you need them. The best strategy is to have a discard pile of the same cards so that you can access the card whenever you need it. You may not be able to keep this going as the game goes on, however.

The next best strategy is to create piles in descending order, putting the smallest number on top. This means that if you have a discard pile that goes from 2-6 and you need a 2, you can go ahead and play your way through the discard pile. Just make sure you don’t find yourself in dire need of one of the cards in the middle, otherwise, you’ll be out of luck!

Skip-Bo Alternate Versions

Skip-Bo is a classic card game that has been released in many different forms over the years. The Skip-Bo Dice Game turns the luck of the draw into the luck of the dice. This portable dice game sets players on a mission to collect the most stars by rolling dice to fill in their build piles. It comes with dry-erase boards that players can use to record their rolls and collect stars.

There’s also Skip-Bo Junior, which reduces the stockpile to only 10-15 cards and the draw pile to only 3 cards. This simplifies the game for younger players and reduces the playing time to only 10-15 minutes. Pocket Skip-Bo is a travel version of the card game that also reduces the number of overall cards to make the game more portable.

Skipping Along with Skip-Bo

Skip-Bo is playable by 2-6 players, which makes it best suited for smaller groups or one-on-one games. It’s suitable for ages 8 and up, so it’s a good game to play with younger players to introduce them to the mechanics of card games. Playing time lasts around 20 minutes, although you’ll definitely want to play several rounds once you get going.

Skip-Bo is a perfect card game to play on family vacations or lazy Saturday mornings. Buy Skip-Bo today and enjoy the fast-paced fun of this classic card game!

 

Tiny Towns: A Small Den of Paradise

Modern life has become so chaotic. Have you ever wished you could get away to a sleepy little town in the woods, away from the hubbub and the chaos of the city?  In Tiny Towns, your wish becomes reality. This board game makes you the mayor of your own tiny town in the forest. Tiny Towns combines abstract strategy with city building to give you a game that’s both easy to learn and fun to play.

The creatures of the forest have decided to find their own little safe haven hidden away from predators and the woes of civilization. Because the land is so small and resources are few and far between, you’ll need to do the best with what you have to build a town that you can be proud of. Collect resources, construct buildings, and watch as your tiny town becomes its own little civilization.

Creating Buildings Out of Resources

In Tiny Towns, each player is given their own little 4×4 grid that represents their tiny town. Players will collect resource cubes to lay out on the board in order to construct buildings. At the beginning of the game, players get to choose one of two monument cards with which to begin building. Everyone will also be able to share from seven randomly drawn building cards, which are public buildings that any player can build.

The board game is played in turns, with each player beginning their turn by calling out one of five resources for all of the players to collect. If any player has collected the right kind of resources to match a pattern on one of their building cards, then they can choose to construct a building on their grid in the place of one of the resources. However, they must discard all of the used resources from their board.

Earning Victory Points

As the turns roll along and players begin to add new buildings to their grids, tiny towns do indeed begin to form. These buildings are for more than just show, however, as players will earn Victory Points for each building they create. Players will want to try to collect the right kinds of resources in order to construct buildings on their grid without filling it up with needless materials.

Once every player has filled their board with buildings and resources, then the game ends. Players will then tally their scores, adding up their Victory Points and subtracting one Victory Point for every square without a building on it. Whichever player has the most Victory Points wins the game and the title of most prosperous mayor!

Tiny Towns Expansions

Tiny Towns has released a couple of expansion board games that expand the mechanics of the original game and make it even more complex. In Tiny Towns: Fortune, the creatures of the forest who populate your little town have added a new element to the game: money. These shiny bits of metal have the power to radically alter the gameplay, giving you a new way of gaining resources from other players and building your town.

Tiny Towns: Villagers opens the world of Tiny Towns up just a little bit bigger. New and talented creatures have come to your tiny little town in order to earn a place and use their powerful skills. These engineers and merchants can transform buildings, revolutionize the influx of resources, and perform other impressive feats that make the game much more dynamic.

Tiny Towns: One Building at a Time

Tiny Towns is playable by 1-6 players, so it can just as easily fit both small and large groups of friends or family members. You can even enjoy building a tiny town all on your own! This board game is suitable for ages 14 and up, although some kids as young as 10 may be able to pick up the mechanics without difficulty. Playing time lasts around 45 minutes to an hour, so you can easily fit in a game on a weeknight or a Saturday morning.

Tiny Towns is a fun little game that celebrates the simplicity of small-town life without sacrificing any of the fun of big city living. Buy Tiny Towns today and enjoy the simple life!

 

Catan: Explore a Whole New World

Have you ever wondered what it was like to be Christopher Columbus and discover a new land full of untapped potential?  While there may not be much of the Earth we have yet to discover, that doesn’t mean that you can’t enjoy the experience of the early settlers.  If you’re an explorer at heart, you’ll love the exciting setup of Catan, a board game that pits players against each other in the race to build a lasting society.  

Formerly known as The Settlers of Catan, this board game uses dice, cards, and strategy to provide you with up to two hours of fun.  The game begins with your ship washing ashore a brand new land, brimming with unspoiled possibility.  But not so fast—you’re not the only one to land on Catan’s shores!  Several other seafarers have arrived at the same time with the exact same desire to colonize.  You’ll have to battle the other players in order to gain dominance and win the game.

 

Building Settlements

Catan uses a game board that is set up with hexagonal terrain tiles.  Each player begins their settlement with two small houses on the spaces where three of these terrain hexes meet.  Then, by rolling the dice, players accumulate different resources and barter with each other in order to turn their settlement into a prosperous city.  The more settlements and cities you build, the more victory points you accumulate.  Once you reach 10 victory points, you are officially the winner of Catan.

But how do you go about bartering resources and building settlements?  This is where Catan gets interesting.  Strategy is a huge part of the game as you trade your resources at ports and with other players to give away what you have too much of in order to collect what you need.  But be sure to trade smartly, as you don’t want to give away something that will give the other player the upper hand.  Sometimes theft is necessary, as rolling a 7 on the dice can allow you to steal the resource card you need from other players.

Catan Expansion Packs

Catan has been around for decades, as it was originally released in 1995.  Catan is suitable for ages 10 and up, and gameplay usually lasts between one and two hours.  While the base game serves 3-4 players, the extension allows you to incorporate 5-6 players.  With so many people vying to win, you can fill an entire evening with a game of Catan!

Catan also comes with several expansion packs, which allows you to enjoy a whole new chapter.  The Seafarers expansion adds ships that serve as roads over the water, allowing you to explore the sea and settle on an uninhabited archipelago of islands.  In addition to ships, the Seafarers expansion also includes pirates, which will steal resources from ships and even prevent them from being built in the first place.

Catan: Cities and Knights adds new Knights that can be used to attack other players as well as defend Catan from barbarian invaders.  These barbarian invaders will occasionally attack Catan, forcing the warring settlements to work together to fend them off and continue the game.  This expansion also includes additional resources to be produced and traded, which include paper, cloth, and coin.  Catan: Cities and Knights can be combined with the Seafarers expansion for an even more complex game.

Build A New World With Catan

Catan is arguably one of the most popular board games ever invented, with countless spin-offs, film/television adaptations, and even tournaments.  Its popularity is likely due to the fact that this game appeals to almost everyone.  Whether you’re a family looking for a casual game to add into the mix or you’re a hard-core gamer looking to relive the nostalgia of a classic, Catan has something for everyone.

While the base game is simple enough for children to enjoy, it’s the expansions that really make Catan a versatile game.  You won’t ever get bored of Catan, and no collection of board games will ever be complete without this classic multiplayer board game.  Indulge your imagination and get in touch with your inner settler with Catan!

 

 

How to Play Catan

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