Happy anniversary, Asmodee! We noticed how multiple publishers were celebrating anniversaries (Happy Anniversary, AEG and Lookout!) when Asmodee announced their 30th birthday in combination with their new branding, and we couldn’t resist creating a comic about it. We love the fact that Asmodee was named after a demon king who runs all the gambling dens in hell, and how nobody in the hobby ever talks about it. Honestly, Asmodee has so many strange little personality quirks, we could probably start a little side comics about him and annoy a demon king and one of the most powerful board game publishers in the world… 😋

But enough about making fun of powers we probably shouldn’t be messing with, let’s talk about some games! This week we played only games we already knew, which seems to be the theme for these past weeks, but we enjoyed them all.

First up is Roll for the Galaxy. It has been three years since we last played, but luckily we played enough of it previously that we rolled right back in (pun intended). Roll, and Race for the Galaxy are both games you need to learn how to play because of its iconography and how you should form a game plan isn’t super obvious the first few times. Once you’ve got those two down, they are very rewarding and well worth playing over and over again.

Next up, I introduced a friend to Sky Team. He enjoyed it but got a bit annoyed when I showed him afterwards, it comes with a “campaign”, which is understandable, but I do think the game needs it after playing the introduction scenario five times. The added tension during the harder scenarios is really fun, and you form some unspoken signals between you and the other player about when they should caution a bit when placing dice.

We also played a game of Onitama, which is so elegant and good. It’s the sort of elegant design that, if I were into game design, I would try to achieve. The limited move set that rotates between players and the simple rules create such an interesting dynamic between players and even though it’s a fully open information game, I think 99% of the games I’ve played ended in somebody (often me) making a very big mistake. If you never played Onitama, Board Game Arena has a tutorial that will let you learn the game quickly and will make you understand it much quicker than me trying to explain it to you.

Lastly, we played Sagrada,  which is a short and fun drafting game, but I forgot how hard it is to play because of my color blindness. I remember something about new dice coming out that would be easier to read, but I can’t seem to find it anywhere online. If there is an upgrade pack, I would gladly pick it up as I would love to enjoy it without having to ask Rachel every three minutes if the dice I’m pointing to are purple or pink…

That was it for this week. I promise we will play at least one new game this week, so we have a bit more to talk about. 😉