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This is a pirate-themed tactical race game with player interaction and side goals (e.g. detouring...
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Purple Phoenix Games (2266 KP) rated You Decide in Tabletop Games
Nov 12, 2020
What game do you think of when I mention, “roll and move?” For me, it’s Candy Land. Perhaps most kids’ first foray into board games at all. To be honest, it’s not even a roll and move, it’s more a flip and move, but they are usually all the same anyway: roll/flip/spin something and then move your pawn. Sometimes there will be something on the spot to “do” and sometimes you just try to race to the finish. So when the publisher and I were chatting about You Decide and they mentioned it was a family-style roll and move game, I had my doubts, but I wanted to try it out. How does this first game from new publisher Davidson Games fare? Let’s find out and You Decide.
As mentioned in my intro, You Decide is a roll and move game for two players. More players can be added to the game with more copies of the game. In the game players are attempting to be the first to move all six of their pawns from the STARTing line to the FINISH line.
DISCLAIMER: We were provided a copy of this game for the purposes of this review. These are retail copy components, and therefore final components. Also, it is not my intention to detail every rule in the game, but give a feel for the flow of the game and how it plays. You are invited to download the rulebook, purchase the game from the publisher, or through any retailers stocking it soon. -T
To setup, lay out the board between the two players and each player will place their pawns on the six circles on the START area. Roll off to see who will start the game and you are ready to begin!
You Decide turns are simple: roll both dice and decide which pawn to move. Move it and pass the turn to the opponent. When a player rolls the 2d6 it creates two numbers. For this review we will just use the example of a 4 and a 6. With this roll the player will decide to move the pawn in the 4 spot a total of six spaces, or the pawn in the 6 spot a total of four spaces. Easy, right?
Though movement is easy to determine, deciding which to activate is the challenge, though not severe. Upon many spaces on the board are printed instructions for the player to obey when a pawn lands on it. These could include returning the pawn to the START space, or moving forward a number of spaces but also allowing the opponent to move forward, or simply staying put and moving an opponent’s pawn.
When a player lands their pawn at the FINISH area, that number is no longer able to be used in subsequent rolls, and once several dice are at the FINISH area, each die rolls becomes more and more dire as players are on a mad dash to finish first. Play continues in this fashion until a winner has reached the FINISH area with all their pawns.
Components. This is a board, 12 pawns, and 2d6. The board is fine, with legible print and art that is present but stays out of the way. The pawns are typical plastic pawns but in excellent colors: orange and black. The 2d6 are fine as well. Black plastic with white pips. For this type of game, the components are completely functional. Nothing super impressive nor too egregious.
The gameplay is exactly what you want for a family level game. It is extremely light, offers choices that are meaningful without burning little brains, and has just the right amount of take-that to wean newer gamers off the Candy Land Express.
For me, it fills an interesting niche in my collection that I really didn’t know I had: a simple game for my family that even my 4-year-old can play and do well with, as long as we read the choices to him. Now, You Decide is very light and could be considered a gateway filler, but also as an easygoing family stepping stone game to get little ones rolling dice and making choices. Candy Land does NOT allow you to do that. So if you have young ones about to embark on their board game journey, I suggest you grab a copy of You Decide instead of those beginner games at Wal-Mart or Target. That is, unless You Decide gets picked up and sold at those locations.
As mentioned in my intro, You Decide is a roll and move game for two players. More players can be added to the game with more copies of the game. In the game players are attempting to be the first to move all six of their pawns from the STARTing line to the FINISH line.
DISCLAIMER: We were provided a copy of this game for the purposes of this review. These are retail copy components, and therefore final components. Also, it is not my intention to detail every rule in the game, but give a feel for the flow of the game and how it plays. You are invited to download the rulebook, purchase the game from the publisher, or through any retailers stocking it soon. -T
To setup, lay out the board between the two players and each player will place their pawns on the six circles on the START area. Roll off to see who will start the game and you are ready to begin!
You Decide turns are simple: roll both dice and decide which pawn to move. Move it and pass the turn to the opponent. When a player rolls the 2d6 it creates two numbers. For this review we will just use the example of a 4 and a 6. With this roll the player will decide to move the pawn in the 4 spot a total of six spaces, or the pawn in the 6 spot a total of four spaces. Easy, right?
Though movement is easy to determine, deciding which to activate is the challenge, though not severe. Upon many spaces on the board are printed instructions for the player to obey when a pawn lands on it. These could include returning the pawn to the START space, or moving forward a number of spaces but also allowing the opponent to move forward, or simply staying put and moving an opponent’s pawn.
When a player lands their pawn at the FINISH area, that number is no longer able to be used in subsequent rolls, and once several dice are at the FINISH area, each die rolls becomes more and more dire as players are on a mad dash to finish first. Play continues in this fashion until a winner has reached the FINISH area with all their pawns.
Components. This is a board, 12 pawns, and 2d6. The board is fine, with legible print and art that is present but stays out of the way. The pawns are typical plastic pawns but in excellent colors: orange and black. The 2d6 are fine as well. Black plastic with white pips. For this type of game, the components are completely functional. Nothing super impressive nor too egregious.
The gameplay is exactly what you want for a family level game. It is extremely light, offers choices that are meaningful without burning little brains, and has just the right amount of take-that to wean newer gamers off the Candy Land Express.
For me, it fills an interesting niche in my collection that I really didn’t know I had: a simple game for my family that even my 4-year-old can play and do well with, as long as we read the choices to him. Now, You Decide is very light and could be considered a gateway filler, but also as an easygoing family stepping stone game to get little ones rolling dice and making choices. Candy Land does NOT allow you to do that. So if you have young ones about to embark on their board game journey, I suggest you grab a copy of You Decide instead of those beginner games at Wal-Mart or Target. That is, unless You Decide gets picked up and sold at those locations.
Purple Phoenix Games (2266 KP) rated Chronicles of Crime in Tabletop Games
Jul 1, 2021
Find the murderer, the weapon, and the location. That’s Clue/Cluedo right? Yes. Find the priceless artifact that was stolen from the museum while other complications arise is Chronicles of Crime, and specifically the Curse of the Pharaohs case. Do you have what it takes to solve this crime, and more importantly, do you have a cell phone or tablet??
Chronicles of Crime is an app-driven storytelling, deduction, adventure board game that can be played solo or cooperatively. Players will be assuming the mantles of London detectives attempting to solve difficult cases at Scotland Yard. As it is a cooperative game players will win or lose together, but the game itself will be helping players along the way.
To setup, place the Evidence Board on the table and surround it with these components: Location Boards in a stack, but Scotland Yard attached to the bottom of the Evidence Board, Character and Special Items cards in face-down stacks, Evidence Category cards face-up, and the four Forensic Contact cards nearby as well. Open the app, choose the scenario to play, and let the app guide you through the introduction to the game.
As there are no real “turns” Chronicles of Crime allows freedom for players to essentially roam around London’s sectors looking for clues to whatever crime has taken place, interrogating suspects, asking the Forensics Contacts team for support when encountering people or items, and finally attempting the solve the case. I cannot really go into much more detail in word or photo, as I wish to avoid all spoilers, but the app will guide players and assist in gentle nudges along the way. The app will be heavily used as players will need to scan the QR codes on several components in order to interact with them, and scannable components may not always be assigned the same roles in other scenarios. Once players have explored as much as they deem necessary, they may claim the group is ready to connect the dots and win the game. Players win or lose by visiting Scotland Yard to solve the case successfully or otherwise.
Components. All of the physical components included in the box are incredible. The cards feature great artwork, the components are wonderful quality, and everything has unique QR codes to scan in the app. The box insert is cleverly-designed and certainly ready to accept expansion materials. The greatest component, however, is the Chronicles of Crime companion app. This app is simply amazing. It is absolutely necessary for play, but once downloaded it requires no Internet access (unless you decide to download additional materials or scenarios). The app is so well-designed and engaging, and the music is minimal but certainly mood-setting. I can clearly see why using an app is essential here, and allows the team to add more and more content without having to alter the physical components at all. A stroke of genius, in my mind!
All in all I was, and still am, blown away by Chronicles of Crime. The marriage of board game and digital app is something I was leery of at first because I much prefer board games, but this simply works. And works quite well. I love being able to travel to a location, check it out, interrogate any persons of interest there, and try to assemble the story in my mind. I want to play all of the scenarios with different groups of people to see if that will change anything, but currently during COVID it’s a no-go.
Chronicles of Crime may never break into my Top 10 Games of All Time, but I will not be moving it out of my collection ever. Well, unless Lucky Duck Games decides to remove the app or something weird like that. I don’t have many board/digital hybrid games in my collection, and if I never add another I will still be happy with this one (ahem, keep your eyes peeled for the Chronicles of Crime: 1400 preview I will be doing soon – or will have done depending on when you read this review). Purple Phoenix Games gives Chronicles of Crime an enthusiastically shifty-eyed 11 / 12. I think you might get bonus VPs at the end of the game for putting on a British accent when you play. I’ll have to scour the rules for that one…
Chronicles of Crime is an app-driven storytelling, deduction, adventure board game that can be played solo or cooperatively. Players will be assuming the mantles of London detectives attempting to solve difficult cases at Scotland Yard. As it is a cooperative game players will win or lose together, but the game itself will be helping players along the way.
To setup, place the Evidence Board on the table and surround it with these components: Location Boards in a stack, but Scotland Yard attached to the bottom of the Evidence Board, Character and Special Items cards in face-down stacks, Evidence Category cards face-up, and the four Forensic Contact cards nearby as well. Open the app, choose the scenario to play, and let the app guide you through the introduction to the game.
As there are no real “turns” Chronicles of Crime allows freedom for players to essentially roam around London’s sectors looking for clues to whatever crime has taken place, interrogating suspects, asking the Forensics Contacts team for support when encountering people or items, and finally attempting the solve the case. I cannot really go into much more detail in word or photo, as I wish to avoid all spoilers, but the app will guide players and assist in gentle nudges along the way. The app will be heavily used as players will need to scan the QR codes on several components in order to interact with them, and scannable components may not always be assigned the same roles in other scenarios. Once players have explored as much as they deem necessary, they may claim the group is ready to connect the dots and win the game. Players win or lose by visiting Scotland Yard to solve the case successfully or otherwise.
Components. All of the physical components included in the box are incredible. The cards feature great artwork, the components are wonderful quality, and everything has unique QR codes to scan in the app. The box insert is cleverly-designed and certainly ready to accept expansion materials. The greatest component, however, is the Chronicles of Crime companion app. This app is simply amazing. It is absolutely necessary for play, but once downloaded it requires no Internet access (unless you decide to download additional materials or scenarios). The app is so well-designed and engaging, and the music is minimal but certainly mood-setting. I can clearly see why using an app is essential here, and allows the team to add more and more content without having to alter the physical components at all. A stroke of genius, in my mind!
All in all I was, and still am, blown away by Chronicles of Crime. The marriage of board game and digital app is something I was leery of at first because I much prefer board games, but this simply works. And works quite well. I love being able to travel to a location, check it out, interrogate any persons of interest there, and try to assemble the story in my mind. I want to play all of the scenarios with different groups of people to see if that will change anything, but currently during COVID it’s a no-go.
Chronicles of Crime may never break into my Top 10 Games of All Time, but I will not be moving it out of my collection ever. Well, unless Lucky Duck Games decides to remove the app or something weird like that. I don’t have many board/digital hybrid games in my collection, and if I never add another I will still be happy with this one (ahem, keep your eyes peeled for the Chronicles of Crime: 1400 preview I will be doing soon – or will have done depending on when you read this review). Purple Phoenix Games gives Chronicles of Crime an enthusiastically shifty-eyed 11 / 12. I think you might get bonus VPs at the end of the game for putting on a British accent when you play. I’ll have to scour the rules for that one…
Fireyjack (2 KP) rated Virus (2005) in Movies
Dec 11, 2017
Contains spoilers, click to show
This film is stupid Russian ship intercepts a signal from the space station which has an intelligent being in the signal then slaughters the whole crew by building robots then some fishermen find the Russian ship board it and then chaos happens as they try to survive the whole objective of this film from the alien point of view is to get the ship to port so it can spread which if the alien entity did not go around killing people in the first place it would of reached its objective anyway as the fishermen where trying to salvage the ship most of the crew die except for two
Akward (448 KP) rated The Pursuit of Happiness in Tabletop Games
Feb 6, 2019 (Updated Feb 8, 2019)
The theme is fun and nostolgic (2 more)
Gameplay is enjoyable
Difficult to master
Takes a long time (2 more)
Basically single player
Difficult to teach
Life for Adults
This is the spirtual successor to The Game of Life. Unlike Life, you have choices. You choose a career, parterner, hobbies, and interests. Your job is to manage the finite time that humans have to harness the maximum possible happiness. Maybe you do that with a parter, who makes you happy, but takes your time? Maybe you forget about friends and family and pursue the maximum possible posessions.
If you can handle the steep learning curve and long game times, this is a fun deviation from the standard board game theme.
If you can handle the steep learning curve and long game times, this is a fun deviation from the standard board game theme.
Dean (6927 KP) rated Murder Mystery Mansion in Tabletop Games
Mar 29, 2018 (Updated Mar 29, 2018)
Guess Who the Murderer is?
I stumbled across this board game in the pub and had high hopes of some sort of Cluedo with a twist type game. Unfortunately it's pretty much like Guess Who. One player picks a suspect, method, location and a motive card at random and hides them behind the Mansion art work.
The other player has so many steps to guess all four right. There are only about 6 choices for each category to choose from. For a longer game I think you can say the person has so many of the 4 guesses right without saying which. Given the title I hoped for more than a guessing game.
The other player has so many steps to guess all four right. There are only about 6 choices for each category to choose from. For a longer game I think you can say the person has so many of the 4 guesses right without saying which. Given the title I hoped for more than a guessing game.
Nicole Hadley (380 KP) rated Where Is My Coat? Farm Animals in Books
Jun 18, 2018
Where Is My Coat? Farm Animals by Anita Bijsterbosch is a cute board book for very young children who like to play fun and simple guessing games with pictures of cozy-colored animals at play. It is a a pleasant and easy read.
Animal shapes are shown and you are asked what they are. It is very interactive. Kids will need to use their visual skills to figure out what type of animal is depicted. The illustrations are super cute and the colors draw you in. This is a good book to use for teaching animals to small children.
I received this ARC from Clavis Publishing via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Animal shapes are shown and you are asked what they are. It is very interactive. Kids will need to use their visual skills to figure out what type of animal is depicted. The illustrations are super cute and the colors draw you in. This is a good book to use for teaching animals to small children.
I received this ARC from Clavis Publishing via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Erika (17789 KP) rated How to Stop Time in Books
Jul 26, 2018
How to Stop Time wasn't released in the US until February of this year, but I had been reading on websites since the previous year that this was a must read, and amazing. Well... I think it suffered from too much hype, and I'm glad I borrowed it from the library instead of buying it full price.
The story was a perfectly good premise, however, none of it was really fleshed out. And then, out of nowhere, bam, it ended. I liked it, but I wish it was so much better than it was.
On a side note, this would definitely make a good movie, so I'm all on board with that.
The story was a perfectly good premise, however, none of it was really fleshed out. And then, out of nowhere, bam, it ended. I liked it, but I wish it was so much better than it was.
On a side note, this would definitely make a good movie, so I'm all on board with that.
Great potential (3 more)
Friendly user base
lots of varieties of things to review
a good database of items
needs a bit of updating (thats where we come in) (2 more)
Needs a few more reviewers.
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Smashbomb is the only reviewing app I look forward to using. I could spend hours on it, which is why I have to limit the time I spend on here. It has so many things, I have used peoples reviews here to help me pick the next board game/ book I will read. It helps me be more analytical on what makes something good by asking me to supply good and bad points to everything. I can't wait to see how it grows
Kevin Phillipson (10072 KP) rated Terminator: Dark Fate (2019) in Movies
Nov 7, 2019
Linda Hamilton (4 more)
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Natalie Reyes
Gabriel Luna
Mackenzie Davis
Finally a terminator sequel that's actually a good movie up there with T2 and the original after bad sequels I actually loved this movie the effects the stunts everything about this movie was what I wanted out of terminator movie with James Cameron on board I knew we would get a better sequel as T2 will always be my favourite of all the movies this one is really close to that one. Gabriel Luna as the new terminator is amazing shouldn't mention I've met him twice in the last two year's at conventions. Anyway good movie recommend to anyone to see the movie