Flippin’ Mickey
FlipToons was designed by Renato Simões and Jordy Adan, the latter of whom gave us Stonespine Architects and Cartographers, but the real star of the show is Diego Sá, whose animated characters make me want to rate the game significantly higher than I would otherwise. Just look at those little dudes! The camel is two seconds away from winding up a punch. The rabbit wouldn’t feel out of place leaning in for a kiss, only to be rebuffed when the ostrich hides her head in the sand. The sheep is just is out there boppin’ to her tunes.
As a game? Oh, it’s pretty good. Clever at points, nice to play, the usual. My larger reservation is the way it makes me feel during and after a play.
Brine & Origami
Sea Salt & Paper sure was hot a couple years back, huh? I didn’t think much of this thing the first time I encountered it, perhaps a symptom of having only played it with a single partner; in contrast to some, I find it needs room to stretch out. Perhaps it helps, too, that the expansions, More Salt and More Pepper, both give the game a small kick in its folded shorts.
Sejm As It Ever Was
Here’s a situation for you. It’s the last decade of the 1700s. Far across the sea, a rebellion has ousted the British from thirteen of their prize colonies, leading to the adoption of a new constitution. Revolutionary fervor is sweeping the continent, throwing France into turmoil and the old regimes into paranoia. Your union, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, has seen its star faded by entrenched nobility and foreign partition.
And now there’s an opportunity to draft a constitution of your own.
That document — historically the Constitution of 3 May 1791, although you might instead draft any number of parallel constitutions in its place — is the topic of Rex Regnat, Edward Damon’s sharp-as-a-tack title about uncomfortable politics and doomed alliances. Part trick-taker, part parliamentary simulation, and part rumination on a union whose constitution would only last 19 months before it was divided out of existence until the First World War, Rex Regnat is one of the finest political games I’ve played all year.
Wagering Everything on Bronto
Are wacky races the new zombies of board games? Probably not, but it strikes me as wild that I’ve played four distinct wacky race games within the span of a single year, yet nobody within my circle agrees on which one is the forerunner. Dino Racer, the third of those four, was designed by Marceline Leiman, who gave us the lovely High Tide and Nebular Colors (née Heavenly Bodies). This time, the racers aren’t hot dog mascots or magical athletes. I think you can guess what they are.
(They’re dinosaurs.)
Business Bazongas
I like weird games (derogatory) almost as much as I like weird games (complimentary).
Belinda’s Big Bonus is a weird game (weird).
Having your game designed by Amabel Holland sets certain expectations, despite any difficulties in pinning her down to a single genre or register. Similarly, basing a game on an erotic novel series, in this case Belinda Blinked by Rocky Flintstone, also sets certain expectations. Yet Belinda’s Big Bonus isn’t especially erotic. I wouldn’t call it funny, either, although it’s possible I’m just not in on the joke. Neither does it strike me as “so bad it’s good.” Mostly, it’s twice as complicated as one would expect from a licensed game. It reminds me of nothing so much as one of those business guys whose entire life is conducted through Google Calendar invites.
Silver & Gold & Cinnabar & Verdigris
When I play Inkwell, I think about other games. That isn’t a slight on Inkwell’s quality, necessarily, nor a reflection on my fidelity to whichever title happens to be on the table at the moment. It’s just the sort of game that sets the mind to wandering. I have yet to play it without somebody mentioning Azul, for instance, and Sagrada isn’t a distant touchstone either.
The big one, though, is Alf Seegert’s Illumination, an overlooked quip from five years back that also dressed up its players as monks illuminating manuscripts under the stern eye of a passing abbot. And while it might seem like the parallel is entirely in the setting, it’s really the gentleness that does it, the warmth, the do-no-harm-ness of the whole thing. As a game, Inkwell isn’t only about monks; it’s downright monkish.
How to Hide Your Board Game Purchases
So you want a board game but there just isn’t room in your budget. I hear it all the time. “How can I hide this purchase from my wife?” the refrain goes. “If she finds out that I splurged another $199 on a box of miniatures that we can’t afford right now, she, my life partner, to whom I swore vows of faithfulness, is gonna murder me. That’s a week of groceries! LOL.”
Don’t worry, fam. I got you. Click here to learn how to conceal your illicit board game purchases from your spouse.
Job in Sparta
Gods & Mortals, designed by William Borg Barthet and Artyom Nichipurov — the latter of whom brought us the excellent Trick Shot and even excellenter Guards of Atlantis II — happens to be one of my favorite things: a total theological dumpster fire. There’s a purity to Graeco-Roman Polytheism, with its wild gods that are best placated or avoided. It isn’t until Hebrew and Christian religion start bellyaching about God’s goodness that the pantheon’s previous badness became — clap your hands between each letter — P R O B L E M A T I C. What does it mean when the Creator places a wager with his court prosecutor for a man’s soul? It means a problem for how we understand the universe. A big spoiled amphora of a problem.
In other words, Gods & Mortals is Greek myth by way of the Book of Job. As you might expect, it’s incredible.
Fry n’ Write
Food trucks, like roll-and-write games, went from unknowns circa 2013 to oversaturated by 2021 to fresh all over again in this the year 2026. At least that’s the hope behind Chicken Fried Dice, a chuck-and-scrawler and food truck simulator from Ashwin Kamath and Rob Newton.
How does it perform? We’ll wait in line together.
Burned Notice
There’s a problem with most hidden movement games, and I say that as the mechanism’s greatest devotee. Namely, they’re slow. So slow. Maybe it would be kinder to call them “deliberate,” but even that doesn’t quite transform the ding into a compliment. Stealth, in theory, can be deliberate. Stick insects are deliberate. But it can also be harried, adrenal, instinctual. Like a panther. Like an owl. Like me ducking out of a Super Bowl party before the uncles start complaining about the halftime show.
Burned occupies the untapped middle ground between those two poles. Designed by Jon Moffat, who gave us last year’s top game about poop carts, Burned is neither Mind MGMT nor Captain Sonar. Instead, it’s the closest a board game has ever gotten to making me feel like a highly-trained secret agent picking off mooks in broad daylight. Usually right before they tackle me to the ground and stomp me to death.
SPACE-BIFF! 