Modular Board

Your small island is peaceful and prosperous – so prosperous that your tribe has grown beyond its ability to sustain you! Fortunately, being a peaceful people you have chosen not to fight over what little there is. Instead, you set out in your seagoing Wa’a (canoe) to fish and gather crops from the many nearby islands. The fertility goddess Haumea has blessed these islands, and they are rich with fruits, vegetables, and spices. It is a matter of pride to collect the finest harvest for the village. Can you win the race against time and the sea, and prove that you are the best gatherer of all?

In Tahiti the goal is to collect crops (coconuts, taro, bananas, spice) and fish from the surrounding islands to score points with bonuses for making full sets and acquiring the most of their family favorites which are hidden from the other players.

The game starts off with just your home island and its immediate neighboring islands. Players build up the archipelago of fertile islands with the guidance of Haumea for the first part of the game until all islands are in play. Players seed the islands each turn giving them some control over where crops replenish. Once the archipelago is formed, the late season is triggered when crops start becoming scarce, with players occasionally stopping an island from producing altogether. Although the late season may not be as good for crops, fishing becomes easier with bonuses given to the waters around some of the islands.
During all this the players travel by Wa’a from island to island using action points to collect the crops they want or can get to before the others take them. As the Wa’a fills, it becomes slower limiting the number of actions they have. There are also treacherous reefs around the islands that require you go around them or risk losing some of the crops aboard your Wa’a. At the end of the year, the one who most efficiently gathers food for their family wins.

In Deus, players work to develop their own civilizations in a shared environment. Each player starts the game with five building cards, and on a turn a player either uses one of these cards to construct a building or discard one or more cards to make an offering to a god. Cards come in six colors: red for military, green for resource production, blue for trade, brown for scoring, purple for temples, and yellow for a variety of effects.

When you construct a building, you build it in the appropriate location on the modular game board — which is sized based on the number of players with the hexagonal tiles composed of seven landscape "circles" — then you place the card in your personal tableau in the appropriate stack of colored cards and activate the power of all of those cards already in your tableau, starting with the card at the bottom of the stack.

When you make an offering, you discard cards, then receive the help of a god associated with one of the cards that you discarded, with the number of cards determining the strength of the associated action. You then refill your hand to five cards.

The game ends either when all the barbarian villages on the game board have been surrounded and attacked or when all the temples have been constructed. Whoever has the most points wins.

P.I. is a pure deduction game, with players competing in three consecutive mini-games in order to see who's got the best chops in terms of solving their cases.

Each mini-game plays out the same way. To start, you receive in secret one suspect card (out of 12), one crime card (out of 10), and one location card (out of 14); this set of information represents the case that the player to your left must solve. The game board shows fourteen locations arranged so that each location touches a few others; each location has space for a suspect and crime tile. Shuffle the suspect tiles (12, plus two "no suspect") and the crime tiles (10, plus four "no crime"), then place one face up in each location. Each suspect, crime and location is included in a deck of evidence cards, and nine evidence cards are revealed.

On a turn, a player either places an investigator, chooses an evidence card, or attempts to solve her case. When you place an investigator in a location, the player to your right looks at his case cards, then places a disc on this space for each case card he holds that matches the suspect, crime or location in this space. Additionally, he places a cube on this space for each suspect, crime or location that's adjacent to this space.

When you choose an evidence card, the player to your right places a disc on the matching tile if the card matches one of the case cards he holds, places a cube on the matching tile if this tile is adjacent to a tile matching one of the case cards he holds, or places nothing if you've made a wild-eyed guess and the tile isn't adjacent to anything.

To attempt to solve the case, you place a black token on your guesses. If wrong, you're penalized two points and continue play next turn. If right, you receive 7, 5, 3 or 1 points depending on how many others have solved their cases in earlier rounds.

The mini-game ends once everyone has solved their case or only one case remains unsolved. All used investigators are removed from play, then the board and cards are reset for the next mini-case. Each player has only five investigators total, so use them wisely!

Whoever has the most points after three mini-cases wins.

Space Cadets: Resistance Is Mostly Futile is the first expansion for the original Space Cadets game.

A variety of new missions, map obstacles, and enemies are included to challenge both novice and veteran crews. Even missions for just two players! Blast parasites, save a space station and stop the mighty Star Kraken, an enemy unlike any you have faced before.

Also Cadets, be sure to welcome your new crew mate, the Science Officer! Any difficulty can be bested with one of his helpful inventions... If only they weren't made of parts of the ship.

Survive lasers and tentacles and the well-meaning Science Officer tearing apart your ship and prove that you deserve the title of a true Space Cadet!

In an age when poetry and the arts reigned supreme, the nights of Kyoto were filled with romance. Gentlemen of the Imperial court, ordinary clerks and functionaries by day, went out at night to meet their secret lovers in furtive trysts. Writing by the light of the moon, each tried to craft the finest and most moving poetry in the form of the Tanka, a short verse composed of only five lines. The best poems evoked the scene, the season, and represented the depth of the courtier's knowledge of the fashionable themes at court. By far, the most successful such lover was a fictional one named Hikaru Genji, the Shining Prince. Genji was, for the ladies of the court, the symbol of the perfect lover. For the men of the court, he was the perfect example to emulate.
In GENJI, players take the roles of courtiers out to woo fair princesses. Players score points for writing the finest poetry, or winning the most hearts. But beware: other courtiers will be waiting in the wings to steal those hearts away! Take your brush in hand, and set out on the night streets of Kyoto. The romance of the height of the Heian Period awaits you in GENJI.

Home Page: http://www.zmangames.com/cardgames/genji.htm

From BoardgameNews.com:

"Players in Genji try to learn from the historical figure of Genji and woo the ladies of the Imperial Court with their poetry. Twelve ladies, each bearing a symbol of one of the four seasons as well as one of three fashions – melancholy, nature, romance – are laid out in a circle, with a fashion card chosen at random to show players what type of poetry is in style.

"In each of the four seasons, each player will travel from his “home” – a lady chosen at the start of the game that bears his marker – around the circle in either direction. A player moves 1-3 spaces each turn, then either studies new material (discards poetry cards and draws new ones) or woos the lady he is currently visiting. If he has no rivals who have previously presented her with poems, he can present her with a poem on one or two cards. “Each poem card has the top or the bottom of a classic Tanka poem (5 lines, 5,7,5,7,7 syllables each, respectively),” says Kirk. “A poem can be considered either a top, a bottom, or a match of the two cards.”

"If another player has already presented a poem, then he can either complete the poem (assuming only a single card was played) or challenge it (by playing a poem card that increases the beauty of the poem, thus revealing the other player for the poser he is). In the latter case, you discard your contribution and the matching half, then add the remaining half poem to your hand to be used later.
...
"The round ends once a player returns home and makes a final study or woo action. Players then score points if they have the most poems on the board for that season, have presented the most beautiful poem of the season, or pitched woo at the home of another player. Yes, being a scoundrel can pay off."