variable player powers

From the press release:

Betrayal at House on the Hill quickly builds suspense and excitement as players explore a haunted mansion of their own design, encountering spirits and frightening omens that foretell their fate. With an estimated one hour playing time, Betrayal at House on the Hill is ideal for parties, family gatherings or casual fun with friends.

Betrayal at House on the Hill is a tile game that allows players to build their own haunted house room by room, tile by tile, creating a new thrilling game board every time. The game is designed for three to six people, each of whom plays one of six possible characters.

Secretly, one of the characters betrays the rest of the party, and the innocent members of the party must defeat the traitor in their midst before it’s too late! Betrayal at House on the Hill will appeal to any game player who enjoys a fun, suspenseful, and strategic game.

Betrayal at House on the Hill includes detailed game pieces, including character cards, pre-painted plastic figures, and special tokens, all of which help create a spooky atmosphere and streamline game play.

An updated reprint of Betrayal at House on the Hill was released on October 5, 2010.

From the publisher:

"It is 37 AD and Caligula is the extravagant Emperor of Rome! It is a time of excesses. It is a time of intrigue. And the latest gala in Caligula’s short reign is starting tonight—Bacchus’ Banquet!"

From BoardgameNews.com:

"As a player, you are one of the nine “honored” guests—each with his or her own secret objective. You might be a glutton who is only there for the food and wine. You might be an avaricious opportunist longing for the presents that are often bestowed. You might be a conspirator in one of the many plots to kidnap or assassinate the Emperor. You might even be Caligula himself, exploiting the all-too-human foibles of his groveling subjects."

Four armies of alien micro-monstrosities clash in a challenge to the last jump!

In Micro Monsters, four races of horribly cute aliens – Autogators, Bigbears, Finbacks, and Turboturtles – face off, with each race wanting to close the rival monsters' dimensional gates. Using dexterity-based game play similar to that in MicroMutants and X-Bugs – and more commonly seen in Tiddly Winks – players in Micro Monsters "shoot" their monster tokens across the playing area by pressing on one edge of them with a "monster shooter" to send them flying. Land on an opponent, even with the tiniest bit of your monster, and you capture that opponent's token, removing it from play. Land on an opponent's gate, on the other hand, and you remove one of that opponent's energy tokens; take an opponent's final token and she must flip her gate to the damaged side. Land on a damaged gate, and that opponent is out of the game!

At the start of a player's turn, that player first rolls a die. If he rolls a monster, he takes his normal turn; if he rolls his race's special symbol, he uses his special alien power:

Autogators move two separate monsters on the same turn.
Bigbears move one monster, then place a trap on an opponent's monster to immobilize it until the next Bigbears turn.
Finbacks move the same monster twice on the same turn.
Turboturtles move one monster, then place a shield on it that prevents it from being captured until that player's next turn.

The last player to have an open gate – whether damaged or not – wins!

A description of the game from Goldsieber:

Akkon, 1189 AD. For weeks, the crusaders besieged the harbor cities in the holy land. There the death of their grandmaster shook up the knights of the Temple Order, and as the besiegers tried to find a successor for the grandmaster, a power struggle flared up among the Temple knights.

The players take on the roll of dignitaries in the Temple Order during the Third Crusade to the holy land. They strive to expand the power of their order in order to increase its gold and renown of the Temple Knights and spread belief in the holy land. This choice group in the Temple Order will determine the most capable member under them to become the new grandmaster.

Each player has 7 Temple Knights available each round. The player must use them in order to buy city cards, to finish them, and to increase gold, belief, power, and the appearance of the Temple Order. Whoever does this the best will receive additional privileges to help him realize his goals. Only the player who uses all of his possibilities and keeps his opponents in mind will be triumphant in the end.

Early in the history of the United States, slavery was an institution that seemed unmovable but with efforts of men and women across the country, it was toppled. In Freedom: The Underground Railroad, players are working to build up the strength of the Abolitionist movement through the use of notable figures and pivotal events. By raising support for the cause and moving slaves to freedom in Canada, the minds of Americans can be changed and the institution of slavery can be brought down.

Freedom is a card-driven, cooperative game for one to four players in which the group is working for the abolitionist movement to help bring an end to slavery in the United States. The players use a combination of cards, which feature figures and events spanning from Early Independence until the Civil War, along with action tokens and the benefits of their role to impact the game.

Players need to strike the right balance between freeing slaves from plantations in the south and raising funds which are desperately needed to allow the group to continue their abolitionist activities as well as strengthen the cause.

The goal is not easy and in addition to people and events that can have a negative impact on the group's progress, there are also slave catchers roaming the board, reacting to the movements of the slaves on the board and hoping to catch the runaway slaves and send them back to the plantations.

Through careful planning and working together, the group might see an end to slavery in their time.