Political

The king lies weakened on his deathbed. His Majesty has but days to live, and has failed to produce an heir. Any of the local dukes or duchesses could be next in line, as long as they are able to gain the approval of the people. Each has set off on a heroic campaign. They vie for fame, for glory, for crown and kingdom!

In For Crown & Kingdom, players must use their teams of specialized emissaries to travel the kingdom, raise funds, obstruct opponents, and gain the support of the people. The first duke or duchess to gain support in every region will become the new monarch!

This game is based on the TV show of the same name. The setting is a desert island. First as teams, then as individuals, players engage in a number of activities, including answering riddles, guessing items from a series of clues, guessing teammates' answers to Scruples-style questions, and Pictionary-like drawing competitions. Winners obtain tokens representing survival items such as food and matches, which are useful for other challenges.

During successive turns in the end game, players vote together on who should be expelled from the island. When only two people are left, all the other players vote together on who should be the sole Survivor.

City Hall sees players competing to become Mayor of New York City. They do this by attempting to be the most successful at both bringing people into the city as well as campaigning for the citizens' approval. Whoever best balances these two goals will win the election.

There are seven offices within City Hall. These offices deal with a different aspect of building the city or campaigning, such as the Tax Assessor, Surveyor, or Zoning Board. In a round, each player will get to activate one of these offices. However, just because you activate an office doesn't mean you will get to use it. The other players will have an opportunity to use their influence to steal control of the office away from you. Keeping it will require countering with your own influence. However, you can instead let another player control that office this round and add their influence to your own, giving you a leg up on controlling things later on.

In using these offices, players will buy land and build properties to create attractive neighborhoods that will bring the most people into the city – or they might place a factory next to an opponent's housing complex to drive people out. They will also tax their constituents to raise funds (with the option of sacrificing popularity to tax at higher rates), buy and sell influence to the Lobbyist, and campaign to increase their approval level.

At the end of the game, the citizens of the city will vote based on which player brought them in and that player's approval level. Special interest groups will also collect votes for players based on certain goals, such as Wall Street backing the player with the most money. Whichever player has the most votes on election day will become Mayor of New York and appoint his or her opponents to the Sanitation Department.

This light strategy game is divided into two Epochs, ancient and modern. At the start, the board consists of only five areas (the Mediterranean, Africa, Middle East, India and China), after all areas have been evaluated, four more territories become accessible (Russia, Europe, Southeast Asia, America).

Players choose historical "Heroes" such as Julius Cesar, Nebuchadnezzar, Lao-Tse, Shakespeare or Mozart and use their special abilities; the first is to grow the population in one or more of the nine areas of the map (depending on the hero, only certain areas of the map can be used). The second action is to randomly draw cultural advancement tokens and place them on the map. The third action allows the players to attack other players' pieces, and the fourth action is taking money.

With money, "wonders of the world", such as the Hanging Gardens, the Great Wall etc., can be purchased, and migrations of peoples are possible.

Victory points are awarded for building civilization tokens; after three (or four, depending on the territory) placements, the player with the most pieces gets additional points, the player with second most armies half of that, while the third player only gets victory points equal to the lowest token.

Campaign Manager 2008 challenges players to develop a winning political strategy within the tumultuous context of the 2008 presidential campaign. Employing a new take on card driven game systems, each player will create a unique deck that represents their advice to their candidate. The players will struggle to influence voters in the critical swing states from this election, while targeting key constituencies that just might put them over the top. Players will try to define the key issue in the states. Will McCain dominate the national security debate, or can Obama play on people's fears over the economy? As the campaign manager of a national presidential campaign, you will either identify the road to the White House, or the road to irrelevance.

User review: The object of the game (and it is a game, not a simulation) is to lead your candidate, John McCain or Barack Obama, to victory by getting 270 electoral votes. Twenty battleground states are up for grabs in this game of cardplay.

Each player has a deck of forty five Campaign Strategy cards; only fifteen can be used in the game. (The rules suggest a selected fifteen cards for novices.) Each player also has a deck of ten battleground state tiles. Each player will select two of their states to put into play. (again, the rules make a suggestion for novices.)
In turn, a player either plays a card from one's own hand and follows the instructions on it or draws a card if fewer than five are already held.

To win a state, a player must get complete support from the state's voters in the issue which has more support of the people. Each state also has two key demographics. A shift in which demographic takes precidence also may affect the effect of a player's cards.

Some cards require players to go "negative." These cards require the opponent to roll a die and the result may give the opponent an unintended benefit.

Whenever a player wins a state, the electoral votes are added to that candidate's tally. A state is brought into play by the winning manager and chance card is put into effect.

The game is over when one manager scores 270 electoral votes. That player is the winner. A tie, resulting in winner, is possible.