Digital Implementations: Board Game Arena

In Patchwork, two players compete to build the most aesthetic (and high-scoring) patchwork quilt on a personal 9x9 game board. To start play, lay out all of the patches at random in a circle and place a marker directly clockwise of the 2-1 patch. Each player takes five buttons — the currency/points in the game — and someone is chosen as the start player.

On a turn, a player either purchases one of the three patches standing clockwise of the spool or passes. To purchase a patch, you pay the cost in buttons shown on the patch, move the spool to that patch's location in the circle, add the patch to your game board, then advance your time token on the time track a number of spaces equal to the time shown on the patch. You're free to place the patch anywhere on your board that doesn't overlap other patches, but you probably want to fit things together as tightly as possible. If your time token is behind or on top of the other player's time token, then you take another turn; otherwise the opponent now goes. Instead of purchasing a patch, you can choose to pass; to do this, you move your time token to the space immediately in front of the opponent's time token, then take one button from the bank for each space you moved.

In addition to a button cost and time cost, each patch also features 0-3 buttons, and when you move your time token past a button on the time track, you earn "button income": sum the number of buttons depicted on your personal game board, then take this many buttons from the bank.

What's more, the time track depicts five 1x1 patches on it, and during set-up you place five actual 1x1 patches on these spaces. Whoever first passes a patch on the time track claims this patch and immediately places it on his game board.

Additionally, the first player to completely fill in a 7x7 square on his game board earns a bonus tile worth 7 extra points at the end of the game. (Of course, this doesn't happen in every game.)

When a player takes an action that moves his time token to the central square of the time track, he takes one final button income from the bank. Once both players are in the center, the game ends and scoring takes place. Each player scores one point per button in his possession, then loses two points for each empty square on his game board. Scores can be negative. The player with the most points wins.

In Crafting the Cosmos, you are interstellar architects, competing to build the galaxy – one star at a time. Manipulate the laws of the universe to your advantage, shifting gravity or the flow of time to activate useful power cards, and even spawn advanced life that can earn you extra victory points at the end of the game. Use your resources wisely as you craft your cosmic creation.

Each round consists of each player taking a turn, which then is followed by shared end phase. A player's turn consists of two phases: energy and craft. Players takes their turns moving energy on the main board and gaining resources. They then spend their resources to craft their galaxy.

During the energy phase, you move energy tokens around the controls on the main board to gain resources for crafting your cosmos. Then during the collect resources phase, you gain the resources from the one active control space with your energy token, then from all four of the passive control spaces.

Once a player has collected all of their resources, they spend them during the craft phase in any order to craft their galaxy. You may take placement actions, scoring actions, energy card actions, and slider actions in any order. You may place the four standard kinds of stars: hydrogen (H), helium (He), carbon (C), and oxygen (O), place proto life, or even nebulae.

Players can spend energy cards to gain power cards to help them craft their cosmos more effectively, and they compete to complete universal goals.

20 Strong is a new deck-based game system from Chip Theory Games, capable of being played in about 30 minutes or less. We say “game system” because the idea behind 20 Strong is a small nucleus of simple, adaptable rules that can then be applied to a variety of unique decks, each with their own set of mechanics. We are launching 20 Strong with three such decks – one set in the world of Too Many Bones, one set in Hoplomachus: Victorum, and one in the new universe of the space-faring Solar Sentinels. We have more decks in development and plan to release them regularly if our customers are excited by them. For now, 20 Strong is a solo-only game, but even that could differ in future decks using the ruleset.

The object of a game of 20 Strong is to progress through a shuffled deck of cards, each card bearing a unique challenge. This challenge could be in the form of an enemy, a unique scenario, or some other requirement (for example, players of the Too Many Bones deck might expect to see a Lockpicking challenge or two). Challenges usually require a certain number of successes to complete, which you earn by rolling a set of 17 dice with different odds for a hit (these dice, along with three adjustable stat dice, make up the “20” in 20 Strong).

If you roll enough successes, you complete a card’s challenge and gain its rewards. If you don’t, you take damage and move on to the next card – unless, of course, your HP stat is reduced to 0, costing you the game. If you manage to make it through an entire deck, you take on one of the deck’s final bosses, attempting to score enough hits against this powerful enemy to claim ultimate victory.

Of course, it’s never so easy that you’d want to spend all of your dice on a single card. In addition to your HP Stat, you’re also keeping track of your Strategy (which controls how many rerolls and items you have) and your Recovery, which controls how many dice return to your pool after taking on a challenge. If you roll more dice than your Recovery, those dice are exhausted, lowering your pool for your subsequent challenges. It’s a game of pressing your luck, strategic decision-making, and resource management. We think you’re going to love it!

Beasts is a co-operative card game in which players work together to climb ever higher through a series of three-digit numbers, transforming the current number by strategically covering one digit at a time. Each player plays all cards of a single suit from their hand on their turn, always aiming to create a new number that's higher than the last.

But things get wild when the beasts arrive. These mischievous creatures correspond to specific card types — like Whole Hearts or Broken Spades — and once they show up, they restrict where those card types can be played on the board. Beasts are startled when placed above matching cards, which makes them move (or even flee), and part of your team's challenge is luring and managing these creatures so that they don't block your most valuable options.

Each player has limited information they can communicate, so the game hinges on clever planning, interpreting your teammates' cues, and maximizing every turn. With just a few shared discard tokens and an ever-growing number, your group will need to work in perfect sync to survive all the beasts and play every card in the deck.

Complete the deck, tame the chaos, and claim victory with the highest number possible — if you can outwit the beasts.

In Naishi, you will seek to improve your Japanese state as efficiently as possible. However, you will not be free to change the positioning of your cards at will. You must replace the cards in your hand and in your tableau with cards from the central river while respecting their positioning. You will also have the possibility to send your emissaries to reorganise states, create new opportunities or force your opponent into a trade