During the medieval goings-on around Orléans, you must assemble a following of farmers, merchants, knights, monks, etc. to gain supremacy through trade, construction and science in medieval France.

In the city of Orléans and the area of the Loire, you can take trade trips to other cities to acquire coveted goods and build trading posts. You need followers and their abilities to expand your dominance by putting them to work as traders, builders, and scientists. Knights expand your scope of action and secure your mercantile expeditions. Craftsmen build trading stations and tools to facilitate work. Scholars make progress in science, and last but not least it cannot hurt to get active in monasteries since with monks on your side you are much less likely to fall prey to fate.

In Orléans, you will always want to take more actions than possible, and there are many paths to victory. The challenge is to combine all elements as best as possible with regard to your strategy.

 

Minimum Age: 13
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Orléans: Invasion, the first large expansion for the award-winning game 'Orléans', contains six scenarios, new buildings, and several new event-cards. The scenarios were designed by Reiner Stockhausen and Inka and Markus Brand: 'Prosperity': A classic expansion for 2-5 players including new buildings and introducing the carpenter, designed by Inka and Markus Brand. 'Invasion': A co-operative scenario for 2-5 players in which the players have to fend off an invasion and fulfill personal goals to win, designed by Inka and Markus Brand. 'The Duel': A scenario for two players in which both opponents have to complete four objectives to win, designed by Reiner Stockhausen. In addition, Orléans: Invasion contains three solo-challenges by Reiner Stockhausen.

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 5

 

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Pairs is a "New Classic Pub Game" designed by James Ernest and Paul Peterson. It's a simple press-your luck card game with no winner, just one loser. The deck is 55 cards, numbered 1 through 10, with 1x1, 2x2, 3x3, and so on up to 10x10. It's simple, fast, and fun. Pairs is a quick-playing and original card game, and is coming in many versions with many different alternate rules. The core deck is the "Fruit" deck.

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 8

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Paladins of the West Kingdom is set at a turbulent time of West Francia's story, circa 900 AD. Despite recent efforts to develop the city, outlying townships are still under threat from outsiders. Saracens scout the borders, while Vikings plunder wealth and livestock. Even the Byzantines from the east have shown their darker side. As noble men and women, players must gather workers from the city to defend against enemies, build fortifications and spread faith throughout the land. Fortunately you are not alone. In his great wisdom, the King has sent his finest knights to help aid in our efforts. So ready the horses and sharpen the swords. The Paladins are approaching. The aim of Paladins of the West Kingdom is to be the player with the most victory points (VP) at game's end. Points are gained by building outposts and fortifications, commissioning monks and confronting outsiders. Each round, players will enlist the help of a specific Paladin and gather workers to carry out tasks. As the game progresses, players will slowly increase their faith, strength and influence. Not only will these affect their final score, but they will also determine the significance of their actions. The game is concluded at the end of the seventh round. —description from the publisher

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In Panamax each player manages a shipping company established in the Colón Free Trade Zone. Companies accept contracts from both US coasts, China and Europe and deliver cargo in order to make money, attract investment and pay dividends. At the same time the players accumulate their own stock investments and try to make as much money as possible in an effort to have the largest personal fortune and win the game.

Panamax features several original mechanisms that blend together; an original dice (action) selection table, pickup-and-deliver along a single bi-directional route, a chain reaction movement system—“pushing” ships to make room throughout the Canal and a level of player interaction that is part self-interest, part mutual advantage and the freedom to choose how you play.

On their turn, players remove a die from the Action table to select Contracts and Load Cargo or Move ships until the pool of dice is emptied ending the Round. Over the course of three rounds these actions are blended during the turn to create a logistics network which the players use to ship their cargo, minimize transportation fees and increase the net worth of their Companies. Each Company has a limited amount of Stock that the players can purchase in exchange for investing—receiving a dividend each round. The questions for the players will be which companies are likely to yield higher dividends?

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In Pandemic, several virulent diseases have broken out simultaneously all over the world! The players are disease-fighting specialists whose mission is to treat disease hotspots while researching cures for each of four plagues before they get out of hand.

The game board depicts several major population centers on Earth. On each turn, a player can use up to four actions to travel between cities, treat infected populaces, discover a cure, or build a research station. A deck of cards provides the players with these abilities, but sprinkled throughout this deck are Epidemic cards that accelerate and intensify the diseases' activity. A second, separate deck of cards controls the "normal" spread of the infections.

Taking a unique role within the team, players must plan their strategy to mesh with their specialists' strengths in order to conquer the diseases. For example, the Operations Expert can build research stations which are needed to find cures for the diseases and which allow for greater mobility between cities; the Scientist needs only four cards of a particular disease to cure it instead of the normal five—but the diseases are spreading quickly and time is running out. If one or more diseases spreads beyond recovery or if too much time elapses, the players all lose. If they cure the four diseases, they all win!

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

You are the disease. There is no cure!

For too long has the human race assaulted diseases. For too long has mankind found cures and other means to eradicate them from the planet. Now, the diseases are fighting back and humanity doesn't stand a chance! Will you be the disease that exterminates humanity? A new, non-cooperative game in the Pandemic line! Become one of the diseases in this new game that reverses the roles and where you must now try to annihilate the human race.

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In Pandemic: In the Lab, the second expansion for Pandemic, you will use a new game board that allows you to move the pawns in a laboratory. The goal of this activity is the same as in the base game – finding cures for diseases – but this time in a new way. Behind sealed bio-hazard doors, scientists race against time to sequence diseases, take samples, and test cures.

Pandemic: In the Lab includes four new roles, new Virulent Strain events, and a Worldwide Panic Mutation scenario. Players can compete individually or on rival teams (when playing with four or six players). Can your team work together in the lab to save humanity?

Pandemic: In the Lab requires the base game. Two of the 3 scenarios also require Pandemic: On the Brink to play.

Part of the Pandemic series.

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 6

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Pandemic: On the Brink includes new event cards, new role cards, rules for five players, and optional game challenges to increase the difficulty of the Pandemic base game. These new challenges, which can be used individually or combined for even more difficult play, are as follows:

• The Virulent Strain challenge makes one disease become particularly deadly in unpredictable ways.

• The Mutation challenge adds a fifth (purple) disease that behaves differently than the original four.

• The Bio-Terrorist challenge pits one player against the others!

Part of the Pandemic series.

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In the Netherlands, flooding from North sea storms and over flowing rivers are a constant threat. Join the effort to keep the country safe in Pandemic: rising tide, a tense new take on Pandemic for two to five play ERS. In every game of Pandemic: rising tide, you join a team of Dutch Civil officials striving to keep the ever-encroaching waters at bay. Sailing these water-filled regions, you need to build dikes to control water flow, ports to facilitate travel, and windmills to pump water out of flooded lands. Ultimately, only teamwork will help you keep the waters at bay long enough to build the modern hydraulic structures that will help you defend against the Flood!

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Pandemic: The Cure, a dice-based version of the popular Pandemic board game, sets up in less than a minute and plays in 30 minutes. As in the board game, four diseases threaten the world and it's up to your team to save humanity. You and your team must keep the world's hotspots in check before they break out of control, while researching cures to the four plagues.

Players roll dice each turn to determine the actions available to them. They can fly and sail between the six major population centers of the world, treat disease in their current region, collect samples for further study, and exchange knowledge to help them in their goal of discovering cures. Each player takes on a different role that has its own unique set of dice and abilities — and players must take advantage of their specializations if they are to have any hope of winning the game. The Dispatcher, for example, can spend dice to fly others around the board, while the Medic is particularly adept at treating disease. Players can roll their dice as often as they like, but the more times they re-roll for the perfect turn, the more likely the next epidemic will occur.

At the end of each turn, new "infection dice" are rolled to determine the type and location of newly infected populations. If any region on the board is infected with more than three dice of a given color, an outbreak occurs, spreading disease into an adjacent region. If too many outbreaks take…

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

The characters of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland are having a Parade!

All players are producers of this parade. Characters from Lewis Carroll's books such as Alice, The White Rabbit, and The Hatter are steadily invited to join this weird procession. On your turn, you play a card (from your hand of five) to the end of the parade. Unfortunately, that card might cause other cards to walk off the parade. These cards count as negative points in the end. The length of the parade line is important. If the number of the card you just played is less than the line length, you may receive the excess cards (counting from last played to the first of the line). But you don't take all the relevant cards, only the cards that meet one of these requirements:

1. the color is the same as color of the card just played, or
2. the number is the same or lower than the card just played

The game ends when the draw deck is exhausted or when one player has collected all six colors in their point piles. Then everyone plays one last card. From the four cards remaining in their hand, players choose two cards to add to his or her point piles. The player who has the least negative points after this is the winner.

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 6

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Patchwork is a form of needlework that involves sewing together pieces of fabric into a larger design. In the past, it was a way to make use of leftover pieces of cloth to create clothing and quilts. Today, patchwork is a form of art, in which the designers use precious fabrics to create beautiful textiles. The use of uneven pieces of fabric in particular can result in real masterpieces and is therefore being practiced by a large number of textile artists.

To create a beautiful quilt, however, requires effort and time, but the available patches just do not want to fit together. So choose your patches carefully and keep a healthy supply of buttons to not only finish your quilt, but to make it better and more beautiful than your opponent's.

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 2

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

They called it the Great War. In over four years of titanic struggle, the ancient Europe of Kings and Emperors tore itself to pieces, giving birth to our own violent modern age. The bloody battles fought in the trenches of the Western Front, the icy plains of Poland, the mountains of the Balkans, and the deserts of Arabia, shaped the world we know today. We are all orphans of the Great War.

Paths of Glory: The First World War, designed by six-time Charles S. Roberts Award winner, Ted Raicer, allows players to step into the shoes of the monarchs and marshals who triumphed and bungled from 1914 to 1918. As the Central Powers you must use the advantage of interior lines and the fighting skill of the Imperial German Army to win your rightful ''place in the sun.'' As the Entente Powers (Allies) you must bring your greater numbers to bear to put an end to German militarism and ensure this is the war ''to end all wars.'' Both players will find their generalship and strategic abilities put to the test as Paths of Glory's innovative game systems let you recreate all the dramatic events of World War I.

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 2

 

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In Pax Pamir, players assume the role of nineteenth century Afghan leaders attempting to forge a new state after the collapse of the Durrani Empire. Western histories often call this period "The Great Game" because of the role played by the Europeans who attempted to use central Asia as a theater for their own rivalries. In this game, those empires are viewed strictly from the perspective of the Afghans who sought to manipulate the interloping ferengi (foreigners) for their own purposes.

In terms of game play, Pax Pamir is a pretty straightforward tableau builder. Players spend most of their turns purchasing cards from a central market, then playing those cards in front of them in a single row called a court. Playing cards adds units to the game's map and grants access to additional actions that can be taken to disrupt other players and influence the course of the game. That last point is worth emphasizing. Though everyone is building their own row of cards, the game offers many ways for players to interfere with each other directly and indirectly.

To survive, players will organize into coalitions. Throughout the game, the dominance of the different coalitions will be evaluated by the players when a special card, called a "Dominance Check", is resolved. If a single coalition has a commanding lead during one of these checks, those players loyal to that coalition will receive victory points based on their influence in their…

 

Minimum Age: 13
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

The Peloponnese — home of the mighty and proud city-states, the "poleis". In the Peloponnes Card Game, you lead one of them through the ages, gaining fame and prosperity while weathering disaster. Over eight rounds, you develop your civilization by claiming new territory, constructing prestigious buildings, and increasing your population. Can you balance the pursuit of glory with the needs of your people?

The Peloponnes Card Game is based on the Peloponnes board game; a few details were simplified, while the strategic projections and the feeling of the game are new!

 

Minimum Age: 10
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In Perch, players fight for control of locations by commanding birds of their own and other players' flocks. Earn points and command woodland creatures by having the most birds on a location, pushing your foes off the perch, and breaking ties to take the lead. Each round, players add their birds into a shared bag. Players then draw birds of their own, and other players take turns stacking birds on location tiles. Each location tile will award variable points for majorities and sometimes grant players a unique ability. The game ends after five rounds, and the player who has earned the most points wins. With a modular tile configuration and a variety of woodland creatures to control, each game will present a new tactical challenge.

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

The sun shines brightly on the canopy of the forest, and the trees use this wonderful energy to grow and develop their beautiful foliage. Sow your crops wisely and the shadows of your growing trees could slow your opponents down, but don't forget that the sun revolves around the forest. Welcome to the world of Photosynthesis, the green strategy board game!

 

Minimum Age: 10
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In Pixies, you move through the seasons to meet little creatures emerging from a flower or sheltering in the hollow of a tree. Choose one of the revealed cards, but be careful which ones you leave to your opponents! Place that card in your playing area according to its number. Cards placed one on top of another are validated and earn you points at the end of the round, as do your largest color zone and your spirals. Easy...yet you'll find that the other players won't be short of bad advice. —description from the publisher

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In Planet, spread your mountain ranges and your deserts, expand your forests, oceans and glaciers. Strategically position your continents to form hospitable environments for animal life to develop and try to create the most populated and diverse Planet!

Each Player receive a planet core without anything on it, at each turn players will chose a tile with mountain/ice/forest/desert on it and place it on the planet. Then the player who fulfill the most the condition of apparition of some animals, gain its card.

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

A fearsome dragon is threatening to burn all the villages in the kingdom! Luckily dragons are greedy, so if you can bribe him with treasures from the battlefield like a barbarian's axe or a phoenix feather, you might persuade him to spare your village. Unfortunately, other villagers in the kingdom have the same idea. Who can best time their bribes to ensure their treasures are most valued by the dragon when the game comes to an end? In Please Don't Burn My Village!, which is set in the world of Castle Panic, you want to bribe with the right treasure at the right time to keep the dragon's attention — while buying treasures at the black market and cursing the other villagers' treasures. When no treasure remains, the dragon will burn all of the villages except one. Will yours be the one that survives? In more detail, players hold a hand of treasure cards that they can use to 1) bribe the dragon, 2) buy more treasure cards from the black market, or 3) draw a treasure card. When they bribe the dragon, they place the cards in sets in front of them, move the token up in value in the dragon's favor, and deal more cards into the black market. If they instead choose to buy at the black market, they pay from their hand the number of cards indicated on a black market stall, take the cards from that stall into their hand, and move down a treasure in the dragon's favor that matches one of the cards they used to buy their cards. The number of spaces a player moves a token up (when…

 

Minimum Age: 10
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

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The name Pi mal Pflaumen is a play on the expression "Pi mal Daumen" — "rule of thumb" or "roughly" — which also originated in that period, but now instead of thumbs, players are concerned with fruit. On a turn, players play one fruit card from their hand at a time, then they each claim one of the played cards based on the strength of the card that they played. Each card depicts a fruit, and some of the cards also feature a scoring pattern (e.g., hand in three identical fruits or two pairs of matching fruits) or a special action, such as collecting an additional plum card, stealing a card from an opponent, taking the dog to protect yourself from theft, or collecting three π cards (which can be played singly or in combination with a number card to increase the value of your initial play).

After a number of turns based on the number of players, the round ends, then players receive a new hand of cards. After three rounds, players tally their points based on completed contracts and whoever has the high score wins.

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 3
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Based on the textbook example of financial scams, "Ponzi Scheme" is the term used to describe the technique Charles Ponzi employed in 1919 to operate one of the most notorious financial frauds in history.

In the game Ponzi Scheme, players are scammers trying to trick investors into funding fraudulent investments with the promise of extremely high returns. You need elaborate trading skills to keep your operation afloat as long as possible, and as time goes on the dividends you need to pay every turn will only pile higher and higher! But when someone declares bankruptcy, the remaining fraudster who forged the biggest shell corporation wins the game!

The goal of the game is simple: Don't be the first player to go bankrupt! In more detail, on each turn, players must take one new Fund card from the Funding boards along with a corresponding Industry tile and cash as indicated on the card. You need to pay the "promised reward" of each Fund card in a number of rounds. After all players have taken their Fund cards, they may choose to initiate an "inside trade" with one other player in order to buy the Industry you want with a price they can't refuse, or sell your own Industry to them with a good price.

At the end of the round, players rotate their Time Wheel 1 or 2 spaces, and pay the "promised reward" to the bank if any Fund card is due. The game continues until at least one player cannot pay the "promised reward" due and goes…

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 3
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Will you become the richest, most notorious merchant in Port Royal? Or will you end up with an empty cargo hold?

Players vie to hire the best Admirals, Sailors, Traders, and Mademoiselles to expand and fortify their vast shipping empires! On your turn, you'll push your luck to amass the most wealth or to hire the best characters ? but if you push it too far, you get nothing, so be wary.

Gamers have loved Port Royal, or its Austrian counterpart Handler der Karibik, since the game's European release. It won the Wiener Spiele Akademie Game Designer Award for 2013, and in 2015 became the Vuoden Peli Family Game of the Year. Now it's available in the U.S.! Offer your customers this quality, formerly elusive title that offers push-your-luck decision making, resource management, and plenty of player interaction, all in one clever deck of cards.

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In POW, players need to collect both superheroes and supervillains over the course of the game, and they do this by rolling dice.

On a turn, the active player rolls five dice up to three times, setting aside at least one die after each roll. Once they stop, they can collect a hero or villain from the shared supply as long as they have the right number of symbols of the proper type (hero or villain) to match one of the tiles on display. If they do, they take this tile and add it to the top of their hero or villain stack. Heroes are worth positive points, and villains negative points.

Alternatively, if the player rolls three speech balloons of a single color, they can collect the top tile of this color from any player's stack. If they roll four or five speech balloons, they can take a specific tile from any player's stack. (They can't look through the stacks, though, so everyone needs to remember who took which tiles when.)

If a player can't take anything, they take the tile with the lowest (possibly negative) score still in the supply.

Once all the tiles have been claimed, the game ends. If someone has more heroes than villains, they must discard tiles from their hero stack until the two stacks are the same height. Players then tally their points, and whoever has the highest score wins!

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

The objective of Power Grid is to supply the most cities with power when someone's network gains a predetermined size. In this new edition, players mark pre-existing routes between cities for connection, and then bid against each other to purchase the power plants that they use to power their cities. However, as plants are purchased, newer, more efficient plants become available, so by merely purchasing, you're potentially allowing others access to superior equipment.

Additionally, players must acquire the raw materials (coal, oil, garbage, and uranium) needed to power said plants (except for the 'renewable' windfarm/ solar plants, which require no fuel), making it a constant struggle to upgrade your plants for maximum efficiency while still retaining enough wealth to quickly expand your network to get the cheapest routes.

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 6

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Every wizard in the neighborhood knows that the best spell components are grown fresh. Unfortunately, only one particular plot of fertile soil in the area is the best for growing magical plants. Everyone agrees to "share" the garden, but you have a plan: Your team of loyal sprites will use the powers of the plants to infiltrate the garden as it grows, so that when everything is in full bloom, the most potent patches will belong to you! In Power Plants, you are a wizard growing a shared garden of magical plants with your rivals. Each turn, you choose one of the patch tiles from your hand and add it to the growing garden. You can activate the added tile for its dynamic "plant" power or activate all the tiles it touches for their slightly weaker (but still very cool) "grow" powers. As the fields expand, you strategically deploy your sprites to gain control of more and more of the fantastic flora. Will your magical horticulture skills pay off? Manipulate the garden's growth, gather magical gems, and deploy your team of loyal sprites to repel your competition and be in control of the most valuable fields when the garden is complete! —description from the publisher

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Players attract artists and scholars trying to become the most prestigious family in Florence. Each player is given a palace grid and reference chart and attempts to gain the most victory points after seven rounds. Scoring victory points can be done in a variety of ways although most will be earned by playing profession cards to generate work points. There are a variety of professions such as astronomers, organists and architects. Each is attracted to a particular combination of building, landscape feature, and social freedom. The more the player can match these preferences then the more work points are generated. If a player satisfies the minimum requirement of work points, which increases each round, then the work can be created and the player can then trade the work points for cash and/or victory points.

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Two families vie for power as you settle a new provincial town. Build camps and banks, smithies and harbors and control growth as your town develops!

Province is a two-player game in which you must strategically manage your resources and workers to build, complete goals, and score the most victory points to win! The game features a communal worker pool representing the available workers in your town. Players move their workers to generate resources (Labor and Coin) that are used to build the various Structures, which in turn affect resource generation — but your opponent can also move the workers, leaving you without the resources you need!

 

Minimum Age: 13
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 2

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In Puerto Rico players assume the roles of colonial governors on the island of Puerto Rico. The aim of the game is to amass victory points by shipping goods to Europe or by constructing buildings. Each player uses a separate small board with spaces for city buildings, plantations, and resources. Shared between the players are three ships, a trading house, and a supply of resources and doubloons. The resource cycle of the game is that players grow crops which they exchange for points or doubloons. Doubloons can then be used to buy buildings, which allow players to produce more crops or give them other abilities. Buildings and plantations do not work unless they are manned by colonists.

During each round, players take turns selecting a role card from those on the table (such as "Trader" or "Builder"). When a role is chosen, every player gets to take the action appropriate to that role. The player that selected the role also receives a small privilege for doing so - for example, choosing the "Builder" role allows all players to construct a building, but the player who chose the role may do so at a discount on that turn. Unused roles gain a doubloon bonus at the end of each turn, so the next player who chooses that role gets to keep any doubloon bonus associated with it. This encourages players to make use of all the roles throughout a typical course of a game.

Puerto Rico uses a variable phase order mechanic, where a "governor" token is passed clockwise to…

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In Push Push Penguin, you will compete in a race filled with slides, snacks, and seals. But there is a catch! An Orca approaches, and it will chase away the first penguin to cross paths with it – so the Penguin who finishes second in this race is the winner! To play, all players roll their Penguin Dice. Players use their Penguin Cup to shake their dice and hide them. They secretly select which of their dice they want to use for movement then reveal the dice at the same time. Starting with whoever has the Orca Die, each player takes a turn gobbling up fish and moving their penguin. They push any penguins they land on or interact with special spaces. After all players have taken their turn, the player with the Orca Die rolls it and moves the Orca. The game ends when the Orca moves onto a Penguin’s space and the Penguin is not able to gobble up fish tokens to keep from being scared away by the Orca. The player with the penguin in second place wins! —description from the designer

 

Minimum Age: 6
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 6

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

You are garbage collectors whose task is to place recycled goods in their proper waste disposal facility. But you have to watch how much garbage you carry or you will overload your truck and then have to dump the excess materials illegally - not a good thing if you want to become the only authorized garbage collector in the city.

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Ra is an auction and set-collection game with an Ancient Egyptian theme. Each turn players are able to purchase lots of tiles with their bidding tiles (suns). Once a player has used up his or her suns, the other players continue until they do likewise, which may set up a situation with a single uncontested player bidding on tiles before the end of the round occurs. Tension builds because the round may end before all players have had a chance to win their three lots for the epoch. The various tiles either give immediate points, prevent negative points for not having certain types at the end of the round (epoch), or give points after the final round. The game lasts for three "epochs" (rounds). The game offers a short learning curve, and experienced players find it both fast-moving and a quick play.

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Radlands is a competitive, dueling card game about identifying fiercely powerful card synergies.

Act as the leader of your post apocalyptic group of survivors in a tooth-and-nail fight to protect your three camps from a vicious rival tribe. If all of them are destroyed, you lose the game.

The main resource in the game is water. You will spend it to play people and events, and to use the abilities of cards you already have on the table. People protect your camps and provide useful abilities, while events are powerful effects that take time to pay off.

Both players draw cards from the same deck. All cards can either be played to the table or discarded for quick “junk” effects. To win, you will need to manage your cards and water wisely.

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 2

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Do you have what it takes to be a Viking? There's only one way to find out in ... Raiders of the North Sea. Your rewards await you as you assemble a crew, grab a ship and set out to claim victory in this fun game for 2-4 players!

Your choices lie before you - work or raid? The key to any Vikings' successful attack on a harbor or fortress, is making sure you have enough provisions and crew. Place workers throughout the town to collect supplies and build your crew. And of course, what's more fun than raiding, pillaging and stealing plunder? Throughout the game, you'll be immersed in the Viking age with beautiful artwork and amazing quality components. Win the game through military strength, plunder and Valkyrie (victory points).

Will the Chieftain be impressed with your conquest? Grab your war ax and put on your helmet, the North Sea awaits! Raiders of the North Sea uses hand management, set collection and worker placement mechanics in this great Garphill Games, 2-4 player game.

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In Red Peak, the players are daring adventurers who have discovered a new volcanic island — but then "Red Peak" on the north of the island decides to live up to its name and starts rumbling. An eruption seems imminent! Salvation is possibly only by returning to the beach as quickly as possible where — fingers crossed — a boat awaits the group. Players will be fighting using every means possible to make their way through the jungle, with the lava ready to spill onto their necks at any moment. Will the group reach the boat in time before lava engulfs their camp on the beach?

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 6

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Enter the futuristic universe of Red Rising, based on the book series by Pierce Brown featuring a dystopian society divided into fourteen castes. You represent a house attempting to rise to power as you piece together an assortment of followers (represented by your hand of cards). Will you break the chains of the Society or embrace the dominance of the Golds?

Red Rising is a hand-management, combo-building game for 1-6 players (45-60 minute playing time). You start with a hand of five cards, and on your turn you deploy one of those cards to a location on the board, activating that location's benefit. You then gain the top card from another location (face up) or the deck (face down), adding it to your hand as you enhance your end-game point total.

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 6

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Reforest is a medium-complexity card game with light engine-building elements. Players compete to grow the healthiest forest ecosystem by arranging a synergistic tableau of plants, each with their own unique traits and abilities. On your turn, you'll choose one of two actions: Gather. Draw two cards from the deck or the nursery of face up plants. Play a plant. Add a plant card to your forest tableau in one of its allowed elevation rows (low, middle or high elevation). The cost of cards is payed by discarding other plants from your hand as nutrients. Given space is limited, taller plants can be grown over pioneer species at a reduced cost. Each introduced plant earns you points and contributes to a growing ecosystem of interconnected abilities. At the end of each round (when the plant deck is emptied), an animal visitor card will be earned by the player who's plants best matched the visitor's habitat preferences (most flowers / fruit / etc). The game ends when all visitors have found a home. Each player's forest is scored for the value of their plants and for the visitors they host. —description from designer

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Your walk is made up of tiles drawn from your bag and placed in front of you. Choose the tiles you add to your bag carefully for the best chance of earning points. But keep a close eye on the weather to make sure you get back to the refuge before the storm bursts! —description from the publisher

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

The final days of the Lazax Empire began in the seventy-third year of the Twilight Wars, when without warning, the Federation of Sol led a deadly assault directly on Mecatol Rex, the capital planet the empire itself. A climactic struggle for control of the imperial city followed, fought as much with diplomacy and deception as with troops and starships. This is the story of that struggle.

Rex: Final Days of an Empire is a board game of negotiation, betrayal, and warfare in which 3-6 players take control of great interstellar civilizations, competing for dominance of the galaxy's crumbling imperial city. Set 3,000 years before the events of Twilight Imperium, Rex tells the story of the last days of the Lazax empire, while presenting players with compelling asymmetrical racial abilities and exciting opportunities for diplomacy, deception, and tactical mastery.

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 3
Maximum Players: 6

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Welcome to Arzium, land of ancient civilizations, bizarre creatures, unexplained wonders, and vibrant characters.

A great sleeping sickness has spread across the land, sending every type of creature to roam for hundreds of miles in a dazed, incoherent march. It's your job to seek them out and wake them from their sleepwalk, recruiting them to help you find even more lost souls!

In Roam, you and up to three friends compete to find lost adventurers. The game includes more than fifty unique, tarot-sized adventurer cards, which feature characters from Near and Far, Above and Below, and Islebound. The opposite side of each card depicts a landscape split into six squares, and two rows of three of these cards are placed in the center of the playing area to make the board.

Each turn, you may activate one of the adventurer cards in your party by flipping the card face down. Activating an adventurer allows you to place search tokens on the board in the shape depicted on your adventurer card. When every square on a landscape card has been searched, the player who did the most claims the card, finding the lost adventurer and adding them to their party. Each adventurer you add to your party gives you points and a new search pattern that you can use.

When searching, you also claim coins, which can be spent to use special actions or purchase artifacts with useful powers. When one player has ten…

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

In the wilds of Africa, lion prides rule over all beasts, but only one pride can rule over all the lions! In Roar: King of the Pride, 3-6 players compete to become the dominant pride of Africa. Managing your food supply, while expanding your territory and growing your pride size with cubs, will take strategic planning and key wits. Even the best-laid plans, however, can be interrupted by other prides' secret objectives, or worse...the encroachment of a new, and deadly, threat.

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 3
Maximum Players: 6

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

ROBOTS! is a casual strategy card game where players try to collect robots—consisting of runs like 2,3,4 or sets like "three of a kind" in poker—while defending collections from the onslaught of robot violence. It's a race to collect as many points as possible while dodging freakin' laser beams and avoiding short circuits. It can be played with 2-5 players ages 12+ with a single game consisting of multiple hands, lasting about 60-120 minutes total.

Gameplay

ROBOTS! is a take on Rummy meaning it's a "draw and discard" card game, but with a Take That mechanic.

The "Constructed Robot" cards are removed from the deck and each player is given an "Attack Card" to help remember the rules. The most technically inclined player is selected to deal first (this is ROBOTS! after all). The dealer shuffles the deck and deals each player seven cards, clockwise starting to the dealer's left. The remaining cards are placed face-down in the center of play and the top card is turned face-up. The face-down cards become the "Robot Factory" and the face-up cards form the "Scrap Heap" (also known as the discard pile). The first player is the person to the dealer's left.

 

Minimum Age: 12
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Roll for the Galaxy is a dice game of building space empires for 2-5 players. Your dice represent your populace, whom you direct to develop new technologies, settle worlds, and ship goods. The player who best manages his workers and builds the most prosperous empire wins!

This dice version of Race for the Galaxy takes players on a new journey through the Galaxy, but with the the feel of the original game.

 

Minimum Age: 13
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Mighty heroes don't just appear out of thin air -- you must create them! Race, class, alignment, skills, traits, and equipment are all elements of the perfect hero, who is ready to take on all opposition in the quest for glory and riches.

In Roll Player, you will compete to create the greatest fantasy adventurer who has ever lived, preparing your character to embark on an epic quest. Roll and draft dice to build up your character's attributes. Purchase weapons and armor to outfit your hero.

Train to gain skills and discover your hero's traits to prepare them for their journey. Earn Reputation Stars by constructing the perfect character. The player with the greatest Reputation wins the game and will surely triumph over whatever nefarious plot lies ahead!

 

Minimum Age: 10
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age, a sequel to the highly-awarded Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age, lets you build an Iron Age civilization in under an hour! Do you build provinces, raise armies, and conquer barbarians or build ports and ships to gain trade goods? Explore the strategies of Greece, Phoenicia, and Rome as you erect monuments, fend off disasters, and strive to feed your people.

Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age gives players different ways to build their empires: the Trade and Naval strategies of the Phoenicians, the conquests of Alexander the Great, and the engineering prowess and gradual absorption of new provinces by the Roman Republic.

Grab those dice — including the Fate die — and prepare to build the greatest empire as you continue to roll through the ages!

 

Minimum Age: 10
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Roll'n Bump is a dice-rolling game of set collection that’s fun for young and old.

Players take turns rolling their dice to try to match hands shown on the nine available cards on the table. Players can place their dice on matching cards in the hopes of claiming them.

Watch out – if someone beats your roll, they’ll bump your dice off and have the chance to claim the card for themselves!

At the end of the game players score points as well as extra points for collecting cards in each of the four distinctive patterns.

 

Minimum Age: 8
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 5

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

Find adventure in this marvelous asymmetric game. Root provides limitless replay value as you and your friends explore the unique factions all wanting to rule a fantastic forest kingdom. Play as the Marquise de Cat and dominate the woods, extracting its riches and policing its inhabitants, as the Woodland Alliance, gathering supporters and coordinate revolts against the ruling regime, the Eyrie Dynasties, regaining control of the woods while keeping your squabbling court at bay, or as the Vagabond, seeking fame and fortune as you forge alliances and rivalries with the other players. Each faction has its own play style and paths to victory, providing an immersive game experience you will want to play again and again.

 

Minimum Age: 10
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

The Riverfolk Expansion adds two new actions, new vagabonds, and exciting new game modes.

Play as the:
• Lizard Cult - Indoctrinate the dispossessed creatures of the woods and spread your creed far and wide.
• Riverfolk Company - Capitalize on crisis. Offer services and expand your trade operations to secure your status as a merchant king.
• Second Vagabond - Compete with a rival Vagabond to gain fame and fortune while the other factions attempt to secure their rule.

Play against the:
• Mechanical Marquise - Wage war against the Mechanical Marquise in competitive or cooperative modes!

 

 

Minimum Age: 10
Minimum Players: 1
Maximum Players: 6

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link

New factions and battlefields join the world of Root!

The Underworld Expansion includes:

• The Great Underground Duchy: an imperial faction that mixes the flexibility of the Marquise with the escalating Eyrie Dynasties.
• The Corvid Conspiracy: a secretive faction that hatches plots directly into the hands of their opponents.
• Two new maps: dig tunnels on the mountain map or fight to control the ferry on the lake map.

 

Minimum Age: 14
Minimum Players: 2
Maximum Players: 4

 

Boardgame Atlas: Link