Abstract Strategy

Burgoo

It's autumn again and time to make the burgoo! Burgoo is a community-made stew made from savory meats and vegetables. In the game, your goal is to add all of your ingredients to the stew and be the one who sampled it the most!

Each player in Burgoo starts the game with a line of twelve ingredients (two of each of the six types) and one ingredient of each type in his hand. The object of the game is get rid of your ingredients on the table and have the most ingredients in your hand at the end. On a players turn he can "sample the stew" by taking an ingredient, split one of his ingredient lines, or cause ingredients to be added to the stew.

Crocodile Pool Party

The crocodiles are loose in the luxurious hotel swimming pool! Just seconds ago, the vacationers were enjoying the cool water of the pool, but what is that? A crocodile has just entered the pool - and now there is one less swimmer! Wow! Theres another croc - and another - and another. As the number of crocs in the water increases, the number of swimmers drops! But, the crocs hunt not only the hapless swimmers, but also other crocodiles. Thus, all in the pool strive to save themselves! The player who brings the most swimmers and crocs to the safety of the end of the pool, will win the game!

For ages 8+.

Crocodile Pool Party is part of the Kosmos two-player series.

Uptown

The goal is to have the fewest number of groups of tiles on the board at the end of the game.

The players take turns placing one of their five tiles on a 9x9 grid and then draw another tile to replace it. There are three tiles which each player can place on each space: a letter, a number, or the item which represents the 3x3 sector of the board the space is in.

If another player has placed a tile it may be captured by playing a legal tile in its place, only if removing the tile doesn't break a group of tiles belonging to the player into more than one group. If players tie for the fewest number of groups at the end of the game, then the winner is the one who captured the fewest opponents' tiles.

Logan Stones

Publisher's description of this new hex-tile game scheduled to debut at Essen 2008:

"Logan Stones is a two player strategic game that encourages memory and tactical thinking. It is played without a board, using 18 tactile pieces that are etched and painted on both sides with different symbols.

The game has simple rules that are based on the visually recognizable symbols of Rock Paper Scissors.

Logan Stones takes the simplicity of ‘Rock Paper Scissors’ and adds to it a fast paced, fun game, that can also be played with strategic precision for a much more thought provoking experience. The aim is to make a line of 4 of the same symbol, but as you and your opponent are in control of the same stones and with them constantly being flipped over to reveal new symbols, it’s not as simple as it sounds."

Army of Frogs

Description from BoardgameNews.com:

Army of Frogs is for 2-4 players and resembles Hive in that the gameboard is created while you play. The goal of the game is to create one large group of frogs—an army, if you will—through tactical manoeuvring and placement of the pieces, which are hexagonal Bakelite frogs. Each player starts with two randomly drawn frogs, and on a turn a player takes the following three actions to build and shift an island of frogs in the center of the table:

if possible, move a frog of his color that’s on the board to a new location (something that’s obviously skipped on the first turn)
add one of the frogs in his supply to the board, and
draw a new frog from the bag and add it to his supply.

The first player to link all their frogs (with at least seven in play) wins the game.