Mechanism: Roll-and-write

The Hobbit: There & Back Again is a competitive adventure game in which players draft dice to make pathways, collect resources, and perform actions that help them to reach their chapter goal.

In more detail, each of the players has their own adventure board book open to the same chapter of the game, and they play in turn order starting with the shortest player. That player rolls all of the dice, then selects one, then the next player selects one, and so on until all dice have been chosen, at which point the next player rolls all the dice once again.

With your chosen dice, you use a dry-erase pen to mark the current chapter of your book, drafting a path to evade trolls, battle goblins, solve riddles, and pen the best conclusion to each chapter. The game takes players through the eight most iconic challenges faced by Bilbo and the Dwarves in The Hobbit, such as overcoming trolls, goblins, wargs, and giant spiders; reclaiming the treasure of the dwarves; and defeating the dragon Smaug. In the end, you want to complete the most rewarding journey to The Lonely Mountain.

The Hobbit: There & Back Again includes a solo mode, as well as a way to increase the game's difficulty, whether for some players to balance different skills levels or for everyone to increase the challenge.

Railroad Ink Challenge is a quick-playing roll-and-write game for 1 to 4 players. Grab a board and a dry-erase marker, and get ready to reach networking nirvana! Roll the dice and draw the routes to connect the exits around your board. Expand your network with railways, highways and stations to collect points, but you will be penalized for any open connections, so plan carefully!

Railroad Ink Challenge has everything you love from the original Railroad Ink games and a lot more, with an all-new focus on player interaction thanks to in-game goals! Only those who achieve them first get the reward, so you have to keep an eye on what your opponents are doing and try to complete the goals before they do! A different set of goals is available each time, so no two games will be the same!

But wait, there's more! Draw unprecedented, mind-bending route configurations thanks to the new dice! Connect special structures to your network to trigger new effects: factories allow you to duplicate a die, villages give bonus points if they are close to a station, universities unlock extra special routes — use these effects wisely and you'll score big!

Railroad Ink Challenge comes in two versions, each one including one expansion with an additional dice set that adds new special rules to your games. Create placid forest landscapes and build into a beautiful arboreal paradise with the Lush Green Edition!

—description from publisher

Fill your house with cats, mice and dice!

Form rooms using numbers. Then use the rooms' special abilities to score the most points.

There are 4 unique levels (each with their own rules), and every time you play you use a random set of 4 out of 12 possible abilities. This ensures new challenges every game.

House of Cats is a quick and clever roll-and-write game, and the first collaborative design by veteran designers William Attia and Kristian A Østby.

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HOW TO PLAY:

Each turn, one player rolls the dice and all players use the results to fill in spaces on their individual playing sheet. Keep taking turns until one player has filled every space on their sheet.

Try to group equal numbers together. A room is formed if you make a group with size equal to the number that makes up the group (i.e. groups of two 2's, three 3's, four 4's or five 5's). Each completed room scores points and gives you access to a special ability.

Cats and mice will score depending on the level you are playing.

Each player controls a colony of ants in Marabunta. On a turn, the active player rolls the six dice, then splits them into two groups. The opponent chooses and uses the dice in one of the groups, then the active player uses the remaining dice.

In The Gig, players are members of a jazz group improvising their way through a song, vying for the spotlight, and trying to please the audience while working up mind-blowing solos!

The game takes place over six rounds, a.k.a. "songs". Each song, players count down, then roll and place dice in real time to gain symbols and create patterns. When one player has placed all four of their dice, they shout "Take it to the bridge!" and other players must stop re-rolling and place the remainder of their dice. After placing all of their dice, each player can add the shape that their dice formed to their instrument's unique solo board, each of which offers a different challenge and way of scoring. Players can use symbols gained via the song and their solo boards to quickly change their dice, keep them for endgame scoring, or spend them to buy audience cards, each of which represents a newly-gained fan who will give you another way of scoring points at game's end.

After the set list of six songs has been played, the player with the most points gained from their solo, audience cards, harmonies, and symbol sets and majorities wins.

The Gig includes a solo mode by Dávid Turczi.