82) Samurai

This is a quick game thats easy to learn and fun to play. Essentially you're playing a tile and drawing a new tile in an attempt to collect the three different black pieces on the board.

Which tile to play?

Samurai

The coveted three-piece spot

I like this game because its not super heavy, but still allows for some strategical thinking. It's great to pull out if you want to introduce people who don't normally play strategy games to the genre without overwhelming them.

81) Shadow Hunters

In this game each player has a secret identity. The goal is to eliminate players that are not on your team or complete the mission on your card. Throughout the game you'll be collecting equipment, attacking other players, and gaining information on other players.

Ready to start

Blindly killing each other

I'm dead

I had a lot of fun playing this game despite a number of parts of the game that I didn't enjoy. I'm not a fan of dice and in this game you roll to determine which action you can do. This often removes a lot of strategy from the game. Also, I found that with so many players you tend to get bored waiting for your next turn. The last thing I didn't enjoy was that players can be eliminated from the game and then must wait for everyone else to finish playing. Despite that it does accommodate a large group and everyone had fun. I do enjoy the challenge of trying to figure out who is on what team. I think for me this was fun to play a few times, but I can see myself getting tired of this more quickly then other games.

80) Glen More

In this game players are acquiring buildings from a shared area and building up their own city. Each time a building is added to your play area that building and all buildings next to it have their special actions activated to generate resources or convert resources to points.

Just getting started

Available buildings

Humble beginnings

Final board

I really enjoy this game. There are so many small mechanics that I love and to put them all together in one game is great. I enjoy the challenge of building your own village and trying to optimize which buildings you build and where you place them. I like the in-game scoring that awards points in three areas based on how much better you did then the lowest score. I also like the tension of selecting which building to purchase and the impacts that has on what other players will get. All in all a great game and I would recommend giving it a try.

79) Risk Legacy (caution - contains picture spoilers)

Please Note: The pictures in this post contain spoilers that may negatively effect your experience of the game. I will not put any spoilers in the text.

I'm so glad I got to play this game in its entirety. When you sit down to start this game you're actually agreeing to play 15 games and whomever wins the most games after that is the winner. As you play the game certain things will happen that cause the game to evolve with new rules, different components, and the naming of different parts of the board. Who doesn't love adding stickers to things! Thus, while you are still playing the same game; the strategy will change from game to game based on these changes.

This game has many of the same mechanics of risk that still make me groan (endless dice rolling, the australian turtle maneuver, and the swingy nature of failed attempts to win), but the one big difference that sets this game apart is that you're racing to get 4 points (NOT take over the world). It took a game or two to learn the strategy implications of racing to 4 points, but it can make for some sudden game endings.

If you're able to find four other people willing to commit to 15 games of risk then I would highly recommend playing this game. Do make sure that the people you play with understand this is just a game (some backstabbing may occur and you do have to sit down with these same people for the next game and the game after that). And, if you do plan on playing, don't look at the pictures below. A huge part of the enjoyment for me was opening up new things and I would hate for you to see something below that would spoil that.

My faction for the last game

Bonus cards

The board in all its glory

Memories of past conquests

78) Valdora

In this game you're collecting gems distributed on the board and bringing them to various cities to fulfill contracts. Players are also competing for which contracts they get and which type (color) of gem they can carry. The player who optimizes all these factors will most likely be victorious.

Set-up for a four player game

Currently available for purchase

My final score

I'm glad I got to play this game, but wouldn't necessarily recommend it. I enjoy the mechanics and the race to be the first to complete different tasks, but as a whole the game feels too linear and became a bit repetitive after a while.

77) Harbour

This is a fun game of managing and optimizing resources. There are four resources that you're collecting and then selling based on market prices. The trick is every time someone uses the market the value of the goods change. Game play consists of placing your one worker on an available card and doing the action on the card. You start by collecting the goods and soon you can sell your goods to purchase one of the cards, which gives you end game points and some other bonuses.

Player board

The ever changing market

Four player game

My final board

As a whole I enjoyed this game. The one difficult part was that the market pricing felt random in the sense that if multiple people sell goods before you then the value of goods would be completely different then expected on your turn. This got much better as you start to anticipate when other players will sell goods and planning ahead became easier. This game has tons of replayability as the action cards of each game will be completely different and require a different approach to the game to be successful.

76) Star Realms

This game is very similar to other deck building games. Each player has a start deck with money to buy new cards and attack cards to deal damage to the other player. Once one players life total hits zero the other player wins.

Space themed deck builder

Just getting started

My board

The big strength of this game is the number of different cards. You always get a new mix of what's available to purchase throughout the game, which makes the strategy of each game slightly different. If you enjoy deck builders this would be a fun one to include in your collection.