Dice Rolling

Europe. Summer 1997. You and your most creative friends have discovered two problems with a common solution: mad cows in England and unexploded bombs in France. You've decided to bring these two powder kegs together just to see what happens – and you wouldn't say "no" to a little money on the side, so round up your herd, march them through France, and set them loose behind the Cordon Rouge. If you're lucky, you'll come home rich before Greenpeace gets hold of you.

Either way, there's something magical about blowing up cows.

Unexploded Cow is a money game in which players are trying to collect enough points to win the pot. On every turn, you will buy cows and pay for special effects by putting money in the pot, then try to discover bombs with your own cows in an effort to take money out of the pot. All along, you will be earning points from the French as you liberate town after town from the terrors of unexploded bombs, and the player who scores the most points gets whatever's left in the pot.

Unexploded Cow is best played as a series of short games, each of which takes about thirty minutes. The game is quite simple and very chaotic: You'll have a blast.

Axis & Allies (2004) aka Axis & Allies Revised Edition is the first Avalon Hill version of the classic light weight war game Axis & Allies. The game simulates the entire scope of World War II.

The game is nominally designed for five players, representing the Allies: United States of America, United Kingdom and Russia vs. the Axis: Germany and Japan. However, it is most often played as a two-player game.

Axis & Allies features a simple dice-based combat system; a small number of types of naval, air and land units; territory control; and technology research to improve unit capabilities.

Major new features of Axis & Allies (2004) include new units (e.g. destroyers, artillery), revised unit capabilities (e.g. armor defend at 3, fighters cost 10 IPCs), directed technology research, and totally new victory conditions (key territories must be controlled to win the game).

Normandy, June 6th, 1944 – as you land on the well-defended beaches, a German machine gun nest is killing your comrades like flies. You must do something!

In D-Day Dice, players are Allied soldiers trying to organize improvised units for an attack against the machine gun nest. Each player starts the game with a unit of a few soldiers and nothing else. As the game progresses, he will collect resources and advance on the beach, sector by sector, as his unit grows stronger and deadlier. He will succeed...or die trying.

D-Day Dice is a multiplayer co-op game, where all players play their turn simultaneously and must help each other in order to stay alive. It also includes solitaire optional rules. Although built around dice rolling, this game is about resource management (soldiers, specialists, items and courage) and knowing when to move your unit. Resources are kept from turn to turn, so the players can plan ahead.

Note: This listing is for the commercial version of D-Day Dice. To download and play the game now, go to D-Day Dice: Free Trial Version.

This entry covers the 2002 release of Sid Meier´s Civilization: The Boardgame by Eagle Games. This game is unrelated to the similarly named 2010 FFG game Sid Meier's Civilization: The Board Game.

A boardgame version of the award-winning PC strategy game. Create a civilization to stand the test of time! The game begins in 4000 BC where the players found a pair of villages of a fledgling people.

Each player’s civilization :

Explores the world around them, discovering resources and the native people that defend them.
Expands by sending settlers out to create new cities.
Researches new technologies to gain advantages over the other players.
Builds unique “Wonders of the World”.
Increases the size of their cities (4 sizes from village to metropolis) to increase production.
Builds military units to defend what’s theirs, and to conquer what’s not.

Features:

2 sets of rules (standard, and advanced) allow anyone to play the game.
784 plastic pieces featuring 22 different, professionally sculpted playing pieces that represent cities, settlers, armies, navies, artillery, and air units from 4 different eras.
Over 100 full color Technology and Wonder cards.
A giant 46” x 36” gameboard featuring the artwork of Paul Niemeyer.

This game has been reimplemented in 2007 as Civilization CHR ("open source" project)

Players control one of the great scientists during the 17th century Scientific Revolution in Europe. Use your limited time and energy to make discoveries, test hypotheses, publish papers, correspond with other famous scientists, hire assistants into your laboratory and network with other people who can help your progress. Discoveries follow historical tech trees in the key sciences of the age: Astronomy, Mathematics, Physics, Biology and Chemistry. The scientist who accumulates the most prestige will be appointed the first President of the Royal Society.