Days of Wonder Mystery of The Abbey Review

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(More customer reviews)I got this game for my birthday and have been able to play it a few times before writing this review. First, it is a very well-constructed board game with sturdy board, thick glossy cards and nice plastic pieces. Second, the playing time is COMPLETELY WRONG -- I can't imagine anyone finishing this game in 90 minutes, let alone 60. Third, If you like mystery games, then you will really like this game. If you do not like sleuth-type, figure out whodunnit games -- then give this game a pass.
For those who like this type of game, it is very entertaining and has a high replay value. I have played it three times in two months with the same set of people and no two games were the same in any way, other than setting, etc. A fun game.

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Mystery of the Abbey is a whodunit game with a twist. A monk has been murdered in a medieval French Abbey. Players maneuver their way through the Abbey trying examining clues and questioning each other to find out who is the culprit. A masterful game of deduction!

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Colosseum Board Game Review

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(More customer reviews)I'm a board game fanatic, and I love games with strategy and lots and lots of bits. This game delivers.
There are tons of tiles, cards, tokens, and colosseum parts, and a big board, all very sturdy and nice looking. There's a cloth bag to hold the tiles. The box is packaged very well and even includes a sheet to explain where all the parts go (to make sure you can get it all back in the box).
This is just a shade more complicated to learn than games like Ticket to Ride, but it's easy once you get the hang of it. There is some fairly easy strategy and decision making, and there is some auctioning and trading, but again it's very controlled (shouldn't be much bickering). Figure out how to upgrade your colosseum, gather the resources you need, and put on the best show possible to score the most points and win.
My only disappointment is its not a two player game (3 to 5 only)--sometimes I have trouble finding a group to play. Definitely recommended.

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As commanded by the Emperor, Rome is in the midst of a 100 day celebrationcommemorating the opening of the greatest public arena ever conceived by man - the Colosseum. Earn wealth and glory as one of Rome's greatest impresarios by producing grand spectacles in the hopes of attracting the most spectators to your events.

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Days of Wonder Pirate's Cove Review

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(More customer reviews)I'm surprised I'm the first to review this item: it's a very enjoyable game. Since I'm first, I'll be thorough (though I won't explain all the rules, just give a flavor of the game play).
Pirate's Cove is a game by Days of Wonder, a company that also makes Ticket to Ride (a very fun game). Pirate's Cove appears complex at first glance but actually is not. The basic idea is to try to get the most Fame points (e.g. be the most famous pirate) by balancing upgrading your ship, choosing the best moves to make and avoiding confrontation with other players. Players act together, so while there are different steps in a round, there are no "turns" per se. The game is quick, about 60 minutes with a full house of 5, and moves quickly as well (unlike, say, Risk). It is fun for all ages but probably too complex for those under 10.
The Longer Version
Each player (pirate) in this game has a ship consisting of four areas: Sails, Crew, Cannons and Hull. Sails affect who goes first in a fight (more later on this), crew and cannon determine how potent you are in a fight and hull affects how much treasure you can carry. Players travel to different "islands" on the board, fight any other players who also went to that island and then plunder whatever that island has to offer.
Each turn starts with players choosing, in secret, the island they are going to. Then everyone reveals their island choice at once using an included island-choosing cut-out. Any combat between players is resolved by playing combat cards (that have temporary effects) and the winning player reaps the benefits of that island. The benefits of each island vary and are determined by flipping over island cards (which you can see before you choose your island, thus influencing your choice). Islands grant different benefits: gold, fame points, treasure or cards (such as battle cards and other special cards), each in varying amounts depending on the island.
Players may then upgrade their ship by paying gold. Upgrading is controlled by what island you have choosen to visit (there are islands corresponding to each ship section, sails, crew, cannons and hull, and you may only upgarde that section at that island). After upgrading, the turn ends, new island cards are flipped and a new round begins (with players again choosing what island to go to).
Strategy and Challenge
The challenge of this game is figuring out what island to go to and when. If you choose an island another pirate has gone to, you have to fight or flee (and fleeing has its own risks). But if you let other players take all the best islands (as I mentioned, the island cards vary and some give much more than others) you'll fall behind in the game. You also must balance when to collect treasure (which can later be exchanged for fame points) and when to focus on upgrading, etc.
Summary
The most interesting thing about this game is that the details disappear when playing. Everything works naturally and smoothly and, after just a game or two, you'll find yourself very comfortable with the rules, upgrading, etc. The game has more flavor then I have presented here (for example, I did not discuss the Legendary Pirate that travels from island to island automatically nor did I discuss the different types of battle and special cards) and is good, clean fun. It's definitely not a game you can say to your Monopoly-loving family "hey, check out this board game" and is more suited for people who enjoy Risk, Settlers of Catan or other such games. I would rank this game higher except that some of the pieces are made of essentially laminated, glossy paper. This is very odd since the pirate ship pieces are very detailed and high-quality and the board is beautifully-made. And the names of the legendary pirates are even historically accurate! But still, the game is easily worth its 4 star rating.
This is a great game. If you're not sure this is your type of game, I suggest you try Ticket to Ride- Europe first, also made by Days of Wonder, or go to the Days of Wonder website and read more about Pirate's Cove. But if you like games like Risk 2210, or the others I mentioned above, I suspect you'll enjoy this.

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In Pirate's Cove, players take on the role of ship captains as they battle for the rights to plunder and become the most famed and feared Pirate the world has ever seen. To do so, they will need to navigate shrewdly, fight recklessly, and pillage mercilessly. Gain fame by winning battles, burying gold and treasure, and bragging about your exploits at the Tavern, and at the end of twelve months, the pirate with the most fame will be declared the most fearsome Pirate of the High Seas! A swashbuckling board game for 2-5 fortune-hunters, ages 10 and up.

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Days of Wonder Ticket To Ride - Marklin Review

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(More customer reviews)The Bavaria/Marklin edition of Ticket to Ride stands alone from the basic (United States) and Europe editions of the game, both in the narrow sense that it is not an "expansion set" to those games, but also in the broader sense that it's a lot more than just the old game with a different map. The rules are fairly similar, so learning all three games only takes a modest amount of time, but the differences across the games alter the strategies a fair bit. Each one feels like a distinct experience.
For those unfamiliar with the series, here's what they all have in common: There is a game board indicating routes among a bunch of cities. The object of the game is to amass the most points, and in one way or another those points come from collecting the routes strategically. Collecting any route between two places will generate points, but each player holds Ticket Cards indicating longer routes of special importance to that person, and stringing together little routes to make this longer connection adds to the payoff (whereas failing to do so imposes a penalty). How do the players take possession of routes? They take turns drawing cards that, when collected into sets, determine which routes they can use, and eventually they start using those cards to claim routes. The main random element is the timing of when those cards turn up in the deck.
The Bavaria/Marklin edition contains a few differences from the other two, but the main new feature is the introduction of Passengers. Each player gets three little plastic guys who can be sent for a ride along the railway, collecting points at each town/city visited. The longer a player's rail, other things equal, the more points the little fellow can collect. But the value of visiting a town/city drops each time, so there's a nice tension between wanting to send them early (while the places are more valuable) and send them late (when more places have been connected). The addition of this rule (and the large number of points associated with it) really alters the strategy from the other two editions.
I don't know that I've done the games justice. They're truly outstanding. You don't have to care a whit about trains. Even small children can enjoy these games, as long as they focus on the pleasure of successfully connecting things instead of focusing on beating the older players. (A suggestion: Keep a pad of paper in the box and track the child's points so that the competition is personal rather than with the adults.) The pace is especially fast, as each player takes turns drawing cards or claiming routes. (My family likes to play a board game while we eat but this one moves so quickly that we have a hard time doing both at the same time.) The boards are gorgeous, the pieces colorful and sturdy. We have just been thrilled with these purchases.
I guess I'll end with a single criticism, only because it's related to the hazy word choice I had to use here. For whatever reason -- I won't speculate why -- the designers pitched these games as representing some kind of competition among travelers to visit places. It feels totally artificial. (Why exactly is a railway route unavailable once someone else has traveled it?) I've used neutral language, saying that players "collect" or "take possession" of routes, which they do in the game's backstory by riding the line. But we found it much more comfortable to interpret the game in a robber baron context, with players either building or buying railway lines -- and by the second time we played we were already referring to the claiming of a route as "laying rail." The game plays the same with either interpretation.


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Ticket to Ride: Marklin Edition by Days of Wonder is the third installment in Days of Wonder's best-selling Ticket to Ride Series.The board for the M?rklin Edition is based on a map of Germany and each individual card in the deck depicts a different M?rklin Trains model. A DVD introducing players to the M?rklin line of model trains is included. Passenger figures are used to pick up merchandise tokens worth different numbers of points along the routes that they claim. The player who completes the most destination tickets receives a 10 point bonus (instead of the base game's longest route bonus).

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Days of Wonder Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries Board Game Review

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(More customer reviews)Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries is the same fun boardgame as the others in this series (don't bother with the dice or card version, however). What makes Nordic Countries different is that it combines and revises some of the more advanced rules from both Ticket to Ride Europe and Ticket to Ride Switzerland Map Expansion. You get ferry and tunnel routes like Europe and the locomotives are only usable on them from Switzerland. Ferry routes all require one or two locomotives to build. Unlike Europe or Switzerland, you can "crush cards" when building ferries by "crushing" 3 of any single color card into a locomotive and some of the ferries require you to use cards of a specific color. Tunnels operate the same as Europe; when you try to build one, flip the top 3 cards from the draw pile over; if any of them are the same color as the route you are trying to build or are locomotives, then you need that many extra cards of that same color and/or locomotives in order to build the tunnel. You also get a new vertical game board and ticket cards, of course, depicting Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland (plus a bit of Russia), as well as a bonus 10 point Globetrotter ticket awarded to the player with the most tickets completed at the end of the game. There is no longest route bonus as in the original game or Europe. The new map has a lot of short routes in the south and long routes in the north (including a 9 train route that is incredibly tough to build since locomotives do not act as wild cards on normal routes in this version). There are several diabolical choke-points up north where you can screw over the other players by cutting them off while other areas in the south (the big cities) have a ton of ways into them. You can expect a real challenge from this map and its new rule tweaks.
Like the out-of-print Switzerland, Nordic Countries is only playable by 2-3 players; if you are playing with 3 people then you can use the double routes just as in 4-5 player versions of the other games in this series. Once again, Days of Wonder delivers a deceptively simple, fun but challenging game sure to provide years of entertainment. Production values are durable, beautiful and excellent as usual except well over half of the tickets are confusing. Many of the vertical destination tickets have names of the cities listed in order of south to north or right to left, which is the reverse of how one would expect to read them, and this takes quite a bit of getting used to (note that the Marklin edition of Ticket to Ride, which also uses a vertical map, does not seem to have this problem with its destination tickets). I suppose the logic behind the decision is that the south is the heavily populated region with more available routes but it comes across to me as an incredibly bad design choice. Usually, big cities are listed first on a ticket so maybe that is part of the logic but it took actively staring at the cards and comparing them to the map to finally see some method to the madness. And it is madness, because every single player I've gamed with was totally confused by the tickets that had the aforementioned issues in game after game. Okay, so maybe Days of Wonder can say it's not a screw-up but a design choice, except the rule is not even applied consistently. A few tickets do not follow it. Another problem, which cannot be played off as a design choice, is that all seven of the tickets leading to Finland's capital of Helsinki erroneously point inland to Lahti, the city directly above it. I'm not happy with the destination tickets; they cause unnecessary confusion and time-wasting in what is otherwise an excellent game. It does does get a little bit easier once you play enough games and familiarize yourself with the foreign names and locations of the cities. Days of Wonder customer service didn't seem to care or even consider the tickets an issue when I contacted them.
Nordic Countries is especially handy for when I can't get 4-5 people to play (so we can use the double routes), but I am taking off one star from my review for the ridiculous ticket confusion. Regardless of the problem, after playing several games of it, I still prefer Ticket to Ride Europe (with the Days of Wonder Ticket to Ride 1912 Expansion) because the locomotives are true wild cards and it adds three stations per player you can place to avoid being cut-off by your opponents. However, there is nothing to stop you from adding the station rules to Nordic Countries or any other edition. In fact, I recommend it if you like your games a bit less cut-throat, although the station colors may not match up depending on which edition you are trying to integrate them into; different editions of the game use different colors for their trains (Nordic uses black, purple and white, for example). I also like the variety of Days of Wonder Ticket To Ride - Marklin which adds passengers for an extra layer of crazy bonus point scoring strategy, although this edition can be a bit fiddly due to the extra rules and probably shouldn't be your introduction to the Ticket To Ride series. The original Ticket to Ride is the simplest version but also the most frustratingly cut-throat unless you also get the Days of Wonder Ticket to Ride 1910 Expansion which gives you a lot more choices on tickets and customizing the rules to suit your group's play style (but it's still probably the most cut-throat edition even with the expansion).

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Please Note: This special edition version of Nordic Countries is available for only a limited time and in limited quantities. It is already sold out at Days of Wonder. There are no current plans for a second printing.World-wide fan demand prompts release of English, French and German language editions of TtR: Nordic Countries. This 2-3 player version in the award winning Ticket to Ride board game series was previously available only in Swedish, Norwegian, Danish and Finnish languages.Ticket to Ride Nordic Countries takes you on a Nordic adventure through Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden as you travel to the great northern cities of Copenhagen, Oslo, Helsinki and Stockholm. Visit Norway's beautiful fjords and the magnificent mountain scenery on the Rauma Railway. Breathe in the salt air of the busy Swedish ports on the Baltic Sea. Ride through the Danish countryside where Vikings once walked. Hop-on the Finnish railway and travel across the Arctic Circle to the land of the Midnight Sun.Players collect cards of various types of train cars that enable them to claim railway routes and pass through tunnels and onto ferries, as they connect cities throughout the Nordic Countries.As with previous versions, the game remains elegant, can be learned in 5 minutes and provides hours of fun for families and experienced gamers alike.Ticket to Ride Nordic Countries is a complete board game designed specifically for 2 or 3 players.

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BattleLore: Call to Arms Review

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(More customer reviews)Because of the longevity that this add-on gives the core game of Battlelore, I would say that any fan of the original game should purchase it. That being said, it simply replaces a point-buy system for a random card deployment system (which can be random and not so balanced) and does not add any new units (do not expect to get any more armies in this one). Also, a tad pricey.


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Call to Arms offers you a new method to deploy custom troops and armies onto the fields of battle.

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Cleopatra And The Society of Architects Review

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(More customer reviews)Cleopatra is, in a quick overview, a game that focusing on trying to acquire enough good points to win without acquiring enough bad points (which may cause you to lose even if you had the most good points). It's for 3 or more people, but there is a variation on the Days of Wonder website for 2 people.
In Cleopatra, you draw cards from a marketplace and use them as resources, much like Settlers of Catan or railcards in Ticket to Ride. With the resources, you can build several different portions of Cleopatra's Temple. For building the pieces, you get various amounts of good points (called Talents). At the end of the game the person with the most Talents wins. Unless...
The "unless" is if you have the most bad points (called corruption amulets) then you lose. You gain these amulets by taking various shortcuts. The number of amulets you have is also secret, so the game is a balancing act of taking shortcuts to get ahead, but not taking too many such that you end up being the person with the most amulets.
The game also involves other various strategic elements. Of the different Temple pieces you can build, there are bonuses that allow for some strategy in choosing what to build and when. There are also a few cards mixed in with the resources that allow you to do something special (lost amulets, take a discarded card, charge other players resources, etc.) at some cost (usually you gain amulets). There is also an event that may occur at some point in the game in which all players bid their talons (good points) secretly, and whoever bids the most loses several amulets while everyone else gains amulets (whoever bid the second-most talons gains one or two, the next gains two or three, the next three or four, etc.). And of course whatever you bid in talons you lose even if you were not the highest bidder, so this adds a good burst of strategy.
The game is made mostly of plastic pieces that are pretty durable, though there are some cardboard pieces that I wonder if will go the distance. Because it is Days of Wonder, and prior similar cardboard-based games have done fine, I'm not lowering their score for this.
In short, this is not my favorite Days of Wonder game, but it is a clever addition that is fun and pretty easy to learn. It would appeal to people of all ages and, assuming they can grasp the rules above, they should have no trouble playing it. It well-deserves a rating of 4 stars, and I'm sure some will think it deserves even a 5.

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"The pyramids are crumbling, the temples are in ruins and even the nose of the Great Sphinx looks like it might fall off any day now. Cleopatra is one unhappy queen. Now she has called on the members of the Society of Architects to build her a magnificent new palace in Alexandria - with a Pharaohs ransom to the design that pleases her most. Cleopatra & the Society of Architects is the newest big-box board game from Days of Wonder. This fun and engaging family game includes a true, three-dimensional palace that players compete to build. Players strive to become the wealthiest of Cleopatra's architects by constructing the most magnificent and valuable parts of her palace. The twist however is that players will be tempted to deal with shady characters and trade in materials of dubious origins in order to help them build faster. Players- 3-5 Ages 10 and up Playing Time- 60 minutes FUN"

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Days of Wonder Ticket to Ride 1910 Expansion Review

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(More customer reviews)The Ticket to Ride 1910 Expansion (TTR 1910) is an expansion for the basic Ticket to Ride game only. The expansion is great in that it adds game play options as well as improves the basic comfort of the game itself. Some game expansions are just a way to get you to spend more money on a game you already own without adding a lot to game play. TTR 1910 is worth the investment. It adds fun and convenience to an already great game.
TTR 1910 significantly increases the number of destination tickets available adding 35 new long and short haul routes to the game. The new routes are fun and varied, and allow each player to customize his or her strategy around certain city connections.
Also included are four cards from the out of print "Mystery Train Expansion." These cards are for very short routes and are low scoring. They don't add much to the game play.
The expanded rules offer instructions for different game variations that focus on big cities, the new 1910 destinations, or the Mega Game featuring all 65 destination tickets in the box. We tend to stick with the Mega Game for large groups, but for games with fewer players the other variations make for new and fun experiences. We really enjoy the opportunity to develop new game play strategies.
There's also a new 15 point bonus card to reward the player who completes the most routes. This is a nice addition to the game.
In addition to improved game play, the expansion cards are now the same size as regulation playing cards making them significantly easier to hold and play. You get reprints of all of the cards included with the original game so you don't have to mix the cards or choose between the original set or the expansion. For my friends and I, this was a significant improvement over the tiny set that came with the original game.
You might also consider picking up a GLD Pitboss 55-0112 Four Deck Card Shuffler. You'll go through the cards pretty quickly and the shuffler keeps things moving.

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A new train is coming into town! Two and a half years after the release of the best-selling Ticket to Ride boardgame, which introduced millions of players worldwide to the joy of boardgaming euro-style, Days of Wonder is pleased to introduce you to Ticket to Ride - USA 1910, a new expansion that will keep you playing well into the next decade!Regardless of the version you opt to play, the Ticket to Ride - USA 1910 deck will force even long time Ticket to Ride veterans to reconsider their well mapped-out strategies, and develop fresh tactics. It is sure to bring your family and friends hundreds of hours of further enjoyment, riding the rails across a new America!

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Days of Wonder Memoir, 44' Review

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(More customer reviews)I've been playing hundreds of wargames for over 35 years and this game is one of the best I've come across. My 13-year old daughter likes it too (she beats me regularly), and even my 20-something sons enjoyed playing. Memoir'44 has some subtle but effective wargaming tactics to it in the card play and movement of the units. The terrain pieces determine "kill zones" for units in overwatch and "sanctuaries" for spent units. My daughter caught on very fast and this is a wargame for people that would never play a complicated wargame like "Command Decision", but it still gives the grognard the "feel" of a real wargame. The games play out quickly also for time-contrained individuals. Up to 4 can play with one game, but for 4-6 players on two teams, buy 2 games and put them together for real command and control experiences. The game comes with over a dozen historical scenarios and many more are avaailable on the "Days of Wonder" website. The Memoir '44 website supports additional scenarios, FAQ, and player interaction. Highly Recommended. High replay value. There are many small plastic pieces and cardboard terrain pieces so small children should be monitored (as always).

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Memoir '44 is a unique historical game from Days of Wonder where players command a horde of little plastic Army men facing-off in dozens of WWII battles on an oversize hex game board. Each battle scenario mimics the historical terrain, troop placements and objectives of each army. Deploying forces through a variety of Command cards, the smart commander uses the unique skills of his units to their greatest strength. Easy to learn and fast-paced, Memoir '44 requites strategic card play, timely dice rolling and an aggressive, yet flexible battle plan to achieve victory. There are 17 unique historical scenarios, including a monster-size double-board version of Omaha Beach. The game has a double-sided, three section board map of the battlefield, featuring beach landings and countryside terrain. There are 44 lavishly painted double-sided terrain hexes, along with the 3D miniatures and obstacles to go on them. Also included are 60 Command cards, including 20 WWII Tactics cards and 40 troop movement Section cards, and two Army bags of incredibly detailed miniatures. You also get a cardholder to share with your "command staff" and some time-saving Terrain summary cards.

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