Hey there gang,
Thanks to those of you who have sent over their collection photos, I’ve filmed a video with some of them in, and it’s currently being edited - I’m excited to share it with you.
In the meantime, let’s have a newsletter. Today, we’re talking about two new Knizia games - Silos and Orbit, plus a rare game that’s designed by a completely different human - Kinfire Council.
Actual Life
It’s been a challenging month - I started and cancelled three different video ideas that weren’t working. The pressure to get something out means I’ve pushed back bigger ideas because I know I can’t finish them in time. A couples game video is definitely in the pipeline, somewhere. And amongst other difficulties, it’s been a month of terrible sleep for my daughter, which is some free torture - living like James Bond but without the good stuff.
In better news, I hosted my first game night since moving out of London, with people I’ve met since moving! I almost ruined it by making them play Kinfire Council (more on that later), but they claim to have forgiven me. I better buy chocolate next time, to be sure.
And a couple of weeks ago, I attended Norwich Games Con, and met up with patrons Austin and Oliver, which was really nice - but I failed to get a photo. Imagine three strikingly handsome people, and you’re basically there.
Actual Games
Orbit is an innovative race game. You play as a spaceship trying to visit all the planets before the other players.
And you play cards to fly through space - trying to get to your next planet. But flying through Space space by space is slow progress (think swimming in Survive The Island!), and instead you can catch a ride on a planet, as they move on their orbital path.
Because your cards also let you move certain coloured planets to the next stop on their line (this game should really have had an underground train lines theme). So you will move planets closer to you, and further away from your opponents. And by the time your turn comes around, the map has changed so much you have to completely change your plans.
That’s an important point - you can’t plan ahead in Orbit. You have to wait until your turn and see what your options are. It’s fast and light enough to accept that, but it makes it feel a bit thin. You rarely make a clever move. And the chaos can leave you in the middle of deep space, having missed the last train with no way of getting home tonight.
I enjoyed my first game of Orbit, but by my second I was feeling that I’d seen it all before. It’s an okay game, but we can do better than that.
Silos is a reprint of Municipium, an area control game from Reiner Knizia. It has a silly theme of aliens abducting humans (and cows), which I simultaneously don’t mind and don’t like.
In essence, you are moving your aliens around the locations in the city - trying to have the majority in a location when it scores. Each turn a card is flipped from the deck - and some will advance the UFO one space, scoring the space it moves to. The winner gets a cow, the runner up - a human. So you’re trying to be in the right place at the right time.
To win the game, you’re trying to collect sets of the four types of human (cows are wild) - which converts to a VP. The first to 5VP wins the game.
But the locations also have focus groups of humans - another way of getting them, if you have control when they're filled up. And actions - which you can use when the right card comes out, and - you guessed it - you have control.
It's all about timing, trying to anticipate what card is going to come out, and are you in the right place to benefit from it.
It's a very streamlined area control game, and doesn't feel like any other Reiner Knizia game I've played. I'm enjoying this one so far, and it may appear on the channel if that continues.
Kinfire Council is a worker placement game, set in the world of Kinfire Chronicles. It claims to have a political theme, but not an ounce of it comes through. You are simply collecting resources and finding ways to convert them into points. The board is a mess of tiny icons and options that is really difficult to parse.
Meanwhile, there are cultists blocking worker placement spots and damaging the lighthouse. You must collectively try to hold them back, by arresting them and rebuilding the lighthouse, so they don’t get too many points, because the cult can win. And if you have the most influence with the cult, you will steal that win.
As an overview, it sounds interesting, but I promise you it is not. Kinfire Council borrows many solid ideas from former worker placement games - you can own worker spots to claim bonuses, you can upgrade your workers with skills, you each have asymmetric powers. But it all comes together to produce a terrible game. It’s a messy, unfocused experience, that I would not recommend.
Games I’ve Been Enjoying Lately:
Rival Cities
Gatsby
Song of the Month - “Expert in a Dying Field” by The Beths
Have a better month than the last one,
Actually yours,
Jon