(catching up with this week’s Previouslies after a short Birthday trip out of town!)

Project: The Bad Karmas and The Curse of the Zodiac

Designers: Davide Garofalo, Riccardo Landi

Artists: Andrew Baker, Hamish Fraser, Daniel J. Walsh

Publisher: Xplored

Genre/Mechanisms: action / event, cooperative game, dice rolling, electronic, fantasy, fighting, grid movement, miniatures, real-time, scenario / mission / campaign game, team-based game, variable player powers

Player Count: 1-4

Solo Mode: yes

Complexity: medium-light

Risk: HIGH

Summary: “A cooperative tactical boss-battle board game with an engaging digital dimension. Work together to defeat the 12 Zodiacs who evolve and respond in real-time to player actions, creating a tabletop experience like no other. The game comes with smart miniatures, board, dice, a free companion app, and the new Teburu game platform, which keeps tracks of everything on the smart board and enhances gameplay with artificial intelligence for the enemies, vivid visuals, exciting sounds, and dramatic storytelling. Encounter unique spectacular battles, surprising moments, and epic cinematic events all brought to life with Teburu.”

Base Pledge (w/shipping): $227

All-In (w/shipping): $360

Campaign Ends: 4/14

Game Ships: Apr. 2023

Funding Status: Currently at 80% with 25 days to go.

Project: Feuds & Favors

Designer: Brad Hiscock

Artists: Noman Afzal, Pedro Zalba

Publisher: Convivial Games

Genre/Mechanisms: action queue, card game, card play conflict resolution, fighting, hand management, medieval, player elimination, take that

Player Count: 2-4

Solo Mode: no

Complexity: light

Risk: HIGH

Summary: “A medieval-themed, turn-based, strategy card game featuring rival clans that are all competing for the title “The Paramount Legion;” the most respected title in the kingdom. Players use stacks of cards, called companies, as their legion. On their turn, players must choose a series of 2 or 3 actions to further their cause. They can make an optional opening move but must make a positioning action followed by a main action. Players can battle with each other by choosing one of their cards to bring into combat with an opponent’s. They can also gain permanent and temporary bonuses through quests and influential figures. A player may even lay cards that affect a battle when they are not a part of it. There are two ways to win: victory by collection of trophies (similar to victory points) or by survival (think last man standing).”

Base Pledge (w/shipping): $48

All-In (w/shipping): $59

Campaign Ends: 4/14

Game Ships: Mar. 2023

Funding Status: Currently at 51% with 25 days to go.

Project: Habitats, Nine Lives, and Basketboss

Designers: Taiki Shinzawa (9 Lives, American Bookshop, Ghosts of Christmas, Maskmen), Corné van Moorsel (BasketBoss, Factory Fun, Habitats, Nova Luna)

Artists: Daniel Profiri (Loot of Lima, Mountain Goats, Sequoia), Dominique Ramsey, Chris Smith, Hylton Warburton

Publisher: BG Tables (Habitas, On Tour, Q.E.)

Genre/Mechanisms: auction / bidding, auction: turn order until pass, economic, sports (BasketBoss); animals, environmental, grid movement, map addition, open drafting, pattern building, square grid, tile placement (Habitats); animals, card game, trick-taking (9 Lives)

Player Count: 2-5 (BasketBoss, Habitats); 3-4 (9 Lives)

Solo Mode: no

Complexity: medium-light (BasketBoss, Habitats); light (9 Lives)

Risk: medium-high

Summary: “Basketboss is an auction game where each season you’ll be responsible for managing all the complexities of a professional basketball team. Your principal task is to offer the best contracts to players at auction. You’ll also have to make sure you can hire the right team advisors – as they provide special powers that can dramatically improve your lineup if used properly. For example, the Physical Therapist can help you avoid crippling injuries.

In Habitats, each player builds a big wildlife park without cages or fences. The animals in your park need their natural habitats: grassland, bush, rocks or lakes. The zebra needs a big area of grass and some water adjacent, for example, while a bat needs rocks and bush and water, a hart needs bush and grass, and a crocodile needs mainly water. There is a snake, baboon, bee, elephant, otter, lizard, turtle, eagle, meerkat, scorpio, hog, catfish, rhino, etc., each with its own landscape requirements — 68 different animals in total. Each player starts their individual park with an entrance tile, and they are each represented in the marketplace of animal tiles by a ceramic figure (or a wooden ranger meeple in some editions). On a turn, a player takes the tile to their left, right or front; moves their figure to the space just vacated; then draws a tile to place where their figure started the turn. When adding an animal tile in your park, you add its main landscape — the base space for the animal — to your park, too. While placing this new animal, its own piece of landscape can help to fulfill the requirements of your other animals’ requirements, e.g., the water on a hippo tile fulfilling the adjacent otter’s need for water. Thus, fulfilling every animal’s desire for land becomes a more and more difficult task with each tile you add. Aside from expanding your park with different landscape types, flora and animals, you can improve its profitability by building extra entrance roads, trek spots, and watchtowers.

9 Lives is a trick-taking game where players compete to earn the most points. The game uses 3-4 suits which show the color of the cards on the rear. Players make bids of if they will win 1-6 tricks, and can bid exactly or a range. Each number may only be bid up to two times. Points are earned when a player hits their bid and lost if they miss it. The game is “must follow” with a fixed trump suit. The winner of a trick also takes one of the cards played to the trick other than theirs to place in their hand. The game ends after either 4 rounds or a player has earned 100 points, and the player with the most points wins.”

Base Pledge (w/shipping): $23

All-In (w/shipping): $128

Campaign Ends: 4/7

Game Ships: Dec. 2022

Funding Status: Funded; currently at 455% with 19 days to go.

Project: Malhya, Lands of Legends

Designers: François Denis, Nicolas Fuchs, Ludovic Rivoal, Cyril Terpent

Artist: Cyril Terpent

Publisher: La Boîte de Jeu (Furnace, Neta-Tanka: Deluxe Edition, Outlive)

Genre/Mechanisms: adventure, cooperative game, deduction, dice rolling, dungeon crawler, exploration, fantasy, fighting, grid movement, miniatures, modular board, push your luck, role playing, simultaneous action selection, solo / solitaire game, storytelling, variable player powers

Player Count: 1-5

Solo Mode: yes

Complexity: heavy

Risk: medium-low

Summary: “With the balance of the planet Malhya threatened, a group of heroes awake. You are one of those heroes with extraordinary abilities. Master the power of the Aura, the energy of the planet, complete the missions one by one, and thwart the plans of your enemies while overcoming all obstacles placed in your path. In this great narrative adventure, you will be able to enjoy a complete experience, exploring regions as well as dungeons while testing your abilities on several levels. Infiltrate, fight, craft, negotiate, solve riddles… but above all live a story that will be told according to your own choices. Multiple scenarios, miniatures, high replay value, save progress without blocking your material.”

Base Pledge (w/shipping): $195

All-In (w/shipping): $195, same as above

Campaign Ends: 3/31

Game Ships: July 2023

Funding Status: Funded; currently at 342% with 12 days to go.

Project: ONUS! Traianus (ROMAN empire)

Designer: Luis Álvaro Hernández (ONUS! Rome Vs Carthage)

Artists: Paco Arenas (Sencha, Skull Tails, Skull Tails: Full Sail!), Matias Cazorla (2GM Tactics, Ratland, Tetrarchia)

Publisher: Draco Ideas (1066, Tears to Many Mothers; 2GM Tactics; 300: Earth & Water)

Genre/Mechanisms: action / event, ancient, campaign / battle card driven, command card, dice rolling, events, live of sight, movement points, simulation, solo / solitaire game, wargame

Player Count: 1-4

Solo Mode: yes

Complexity: medium-heavy

Risk: medium-high

Summary: “A historical battles wargame, similar to a miniatures game, where two sides confront each other in an Ancient battle. This game is focused on the armies of the great superpowers of the apogee of the Roman Empire, during the reign of the emperors Trajan and Hadrian, between the 1st and 2nd centuries AD. In this game, different action cards recreate varied kinds of orders and battle events, that allow every match to be unique. Units are represented by cards which have been scaled around a Centuria (also known as Century) or to a Maniple (also known as Manipulus), representing formations from 80 to 100 men for Infantry units, 20 cavalrymen for Cavalry units or 6 Elephants. Units have their own set of traits to represent permanent attributes of the unit, like Melee Combat, Range Attack, Defensive capacity, Morale and Life, and Movement capacity. This set of traits gets bonuses and penalties depending on the ongoing situation and combat engagements. Units also have their unique set of skills to represent specific abilities they can perform: from defensive formations to extremely effective techniques to attack enemies. Some of these skills need to be activated; meaning only one of them can be used in an engagement, while others are inherent to the units. Leadership is represented in the game by the figure of the General. A General’s token represent his HQ and its own escort. In addition to the leadership benefit, a General grants bonuses to nearby units, boosting the morale of the troops and providing additional benefits when they are engaged with the enemy in those bloody encounters.”

Base Pledge (w/shipping): $75

All-In (w/shipping): $186

Campaign Ends: 4/14

Game Ships: Nov. 2022

Funding Status: Funded; currently at 868% with 25 days to go.

Project: Pathways

Designer: Frank Sarro

Artists: not credited

Publisher: Argentano

Genre/Mechanisms: 2 player only games, action / dexterity, flicking

Player Count: 2

Solo Mode: no

Complexity: light

Risk: HIGH

Summary: “A two-player flicking, dexterity game played on a uniquely crafted bamboo board with acrylic disks. The board has 46 symmetrical holes in a chessboard pattern. The goal of the game is for players to flick their 12 disks, in-turn, across the board into the opposite furthest row. As disks fall into the holes on the board, they create new flat surfaces making follow up shots easier. The player that gets most of their disks into their target row wins the game. There are specific match-game rules, where players compete to reach 11 points.”

Base Pledge (w/shipping): $74

All-In (w/shipping): $142

Campaign Ends: 4/13

Game Ships: Feb. 2023

Funding Status: Funded; currently at 118% with 25 days to go.

Project: Rad Zone Totality

Designer: Toby Lancaster (Dark Force Incursion)

Artist: Jake Abington

Publisher: DR Games (Dark Force Incursion)

Genre/Mechanisms: dice, dice rolling, horror, paper-and-pencil, print & play, roll-and-write, slide / push, solo / solitaire game

Player Count: 1-2

Solo Mode: yes

Complexity: medium-light

Risk: medium-low

Summary: “The world faces a terrible apocalypse. Without warning the sun’s radiation spiked to alarming levels and under this relentless and deadly barrage humanity succumbed. People fell ill, millions died, populations moved underground into fortified Rad Bunkers, all the time the sun pushing the people deeper into the darkness. Many plants and animals perished, and society collapsed. Food and clean water were rationed until people began to starve, and martial law was replaced by irradiated outlaws and bandits roaming the surface in their lead lined vehicles. Rad Zone is a roll and write, print and play, solo game set in a harsh future where you manage a group of survivors. They live in a Rad Bunker and strive to keep their home stocked with food, water, medical supplies, fuel, equipment and raw materials. They must go on dangerous missions, salvage these much-needed items from nearby locations and at the same time avoid raiders and outlaws that roam the land in their radiation induced crazy. On top of this they must be quick to avoid taking a dangerous dose of radiation. Rad Zone Totality is the follow up game to Rad Zone and although it incorporates the original rules it includes many new ones and players do not need the original game to play it.”

Base Pledge (w/shipping): $28

All-In (w/shipping): $92

Campaign Ends: 4/12

Game Ships: July 2022

Funding Status: Funded; currently at 328% with 24 days to go.

Project: Tamashii: Chronicle of Ascend

Designers: Kamil ‘Sanex’ Cieśla (Bees: The Secret Kingdom, The Great Wall, SiegeStorm: SiegeMode), Robert Plesowicz (The Great Wall), Łukasz Włodarczyk (Flick of Faith, The Great Wall)

Artists: not credited

Publisher: Awaken Realms Lite (Bees: The Secret Kingdom, Flick of Faith, SiegeStorm: SiegeMode)

Genre/Mechanisms: action points, adventure, cooperative game, cyberpunk, exploration, fighting, grid movement, miniatures, post-apocalyptic, science fiction, slide / push, square grid

Player Count: 1-4

Solo Mode: yes

Complexity: medium-light

Risk: medium-high

Summary: “A cyberpunk adventure board game with a post-apocalyptic vibe. Players struggle to survive and pursue their agendas in two worlds at the same time – the physical one, filled with deadly machines and merciless human survivors, and the virtual one, prowled by tracking software and vicious viruses. Players try to achieve their goals on a modular city map. They find new locations, fight against strong enemies, and search for important information and files needed to win the game. The second part of the game takes action on a virtual map. Here players try to hack their opponents, unlock special bonuses, or get one-time bonuses for completing the sequences. The game may be played in different scenarios. Players might have to cooperate with the other players, play against them, or even make alliances with their enemies. But they need to watch every step they take; every conflict, cooperation or alliance might be a double-edged sword.”

Base Pledge (w/shipping): $94

All-In (w/shipping): $135

Campaign Ends: 4/5

Game Ships: May 2023

Funding Status: Funded; currently at 1525% with 16 days to go.