mythology

Lead the Tribes and Take Control of Naqala

Crossing into the Land of 1001 Nights, your caravan arrives at the fabled Sultanate of Naqala. The old sultan just died and control of Naqala is up for grabs! The oracles foretold of strangers who would maneuver the Five Tribes to gain influence over the legendary city-state. Will you fulfill the prophecy? Invoke the old Djinns and move the Tribes into position at the right time, and the Sultanate may become yours!

Designed by Bruno Cathala, Five Tribes builds on a long tradition of German-style games that feature wooden meeples. Here, in a unique twist on the now-standard “worker placement” genre, the game begins with the meeples already in place – and players must cleverly maneuver them over the villages, markets, oases, and sacred places tiles that make up Naqala. How, when, and where you dis-place these Five Tribes of Assassins, Elders, Builders, Merchants, and Viziers determine your victory or failure.

As befitting a Days of Wonder game, the rules are straightforward and easy to learn. But… devising a winning strategy will take a more calculated approach than our standard fare. You need to carefully consider what moves can score you well and put your opponents at a disadvantage. You need to weigh many different pathways to victory, including the summoning of powerful Djinns that may help your cause as you attempt to control this legendary Sultanate.

Five Tribes is for 2 to 4 players, ages 13 and older and takes approximately 40-80 minutes to play. The game is expected to be available in limited quantities at Gencon in August, and then from game retailers worldwide in September at an expected retail price of $60/€54.

Source: Days of Wonder Blog.

Colossal Arena/ Titan: the Arena is a strategic card game for 2 to 5 players with one of the best themes of any designer board game around: you play, not as combatants, but as spectators, cheering and betting on the melee ongoing in a fantasy arena/Colosseum in which eight pitting eight fantasy creatures are pitted against each other in battle!

Each round, one of the creatures will die. To decide which unlucky soul will be the victim, players put numbered power cards in front of the creatures, with the lowest one going to the graveyard. The jockeying for position and strategic diplomacy in playing the numbered power cards can be intense - but what makes this game even more interesting is that players the players' bets throughout the game which will sometimes allow them to use a creature's special power in battle!

The winner at the end of the game is bettor who's raked in the most winnings - just another day in the life of a fantasy monster gambler.

Titan: The Arena is actually a reworking of a Reiner Knizia game called Grand National Derby, but Avalon Hill's remake was quite significant from a gameplay standpoint.

The Titan: The Arena printing is often confused with its namesake, Titan. But other than the fact that they both use fantasy creatures as a general theme, there is very little that is similar between the two.

Reimplemented by: Galaxy: The Dark Ages

Online Play

Ludoholic (no longer available)

Hiding in these woods, there lies not just one Bigfoot, not a few Bigfoots, and not a gaggle of Bigfeet — but an entire community of Bigfootses. Now it's time to go in the woods with your trusty Bigfootses's call, cloak your scent with Bigfootses's urine, and get ready for adventure with aliens, yeti, the Loch Ness monster, and every other legendary creature you can think of.

Bigfootses, The Card Game consists of two decks: the Woods Deck (70 cards) and the Thingies Deck (55 cards). In the Woods Deck, you encounter Bigfootses and creatures to battle, and draw events that can dramatically change the game. You can even find your true calling and take one of six professions. The Thingies Deck is full of equipment, items, actions, and card modifiers to help you along in your quest.

Your goal? Be the first player to corral ten Bigfootses to win the game!

Game description from the publisher:

Welcome to Saqqara (Egypt), the date is about 2125 BC, just before the Heracleopolis revolt.

Set in ancient Egypt in a time of chaos and revolts, Saqqara is a game with lots of bluffing, speculation and development for 3-5 players. The players assume the role of monarch in ancient Egypt and attempt to influence the country's government and economy. They send merchants to the market to collect goods to develop their province, recruit workers to build pyramids, and claim fertile land on the banks of the Nile. The player who succeeds in developing his province best by cunningly making use of the privileges of the pyramids and claiming a large area on the banks of the Nile wins the game and becomes Egypt's new leader.

Watch out for beggars, thieves and sneaky bluffing monarchs from other provinces. They want the same as you: power over Egypt.

In Helios, players are high priests in a distant world of the sun god AHAU, and the power of the sun drives everything in the game as players try to build temples, expand cities, and make their civilization flourish.

Development can succeed, though, only if you've secured a supply of the limited raw materials available, and the more that you've built of your temple, the more expensive the remaining parts will be. Glass manastones are the game's currency, and with them you can acquire people, increase the number of points you'll score, and more.