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GAMES NEWS! 04/04/16

did quinns go overboard on colosseum factslet us know

By Quintin Smith on April 4, 2016

Quinns: Oh, wow. Making the news bi-weekly in 2016 was a fantastic decision. We always have so many stories to choose from! Admittedly they're less new, so technically we're working with less news, but if it's new news to you then whoops can somebody get me a tissue I just got a nosebleed

FIRST UP, board games once again crept into the peripheral vision of the public eye this month as Russia banned the Polish board game Queue for its depiction of the dismal experience of shopping in USSR-era Poland, with its lengthy queues, poor stock availability and rife black market trading.

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Double Feature: Parade & Incan Gold

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By Quintin Smith on April 1, 2016

Quinns: You know double-yolk eggs? Those rarest of treasures that whisper “It’s all going to be ok” up from the pan? Well, today you get a double-review! Enclosed within the brittle shell of this article are not one, but TWO of the greatest card games we’ve ever played, full of fatty fun and caloric goodness.

Please ensure your credit card is secured in your official SU&SD fast-draw holster before continuing. We're serious. These games are very, very good.

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Clutching at Bannisters: A Heartfelt Review of Fantasy Football

slimy seedsjohnny big armtony the serviceable tight endthe idiot life

By SU&SD on March 30, 2016

[Following in the tradition of Brendan's Rooky Errors or Leigh's Month as an Assassin, it's time for another article on an unusual corner of gaming. This time, the ancient tradition of Fantasy Football.]

Gav: It's 6:45 on a Friday night, I’ve just got off a flight from Cologne to London and I'm attempting to tether the internet from my phone to my really old, really rubbish and currently really unresponsive laptop. This would be annoying enough if I wasn't also attempting to manoeuvre through some horrendous London traffic in a beaten-up old jallopy. I know even using your phone (no less a phone AND a laptop) whilst driving is reckless and stupid but there's an excuse for my idiocy: it's the evening of my NFL Fantasy Draft.

Before I lose you, let me just say I know how you're feeling, but stick with me as I explain why game fans will find a fantasy football league interesting.

I’ve been playing in a fantasy NFL league with the same 9 people for coming up to 5 years now and it’s only recently that it’s struck me how so much of the things that get me jazzed about it have in common with the things I love about games: a tight community, horrible back-stabbing, friendship-ending competitiveness, heartache-inducing waves of bad luck and a stressful meta game which I’ve genuinely lost sleep over.

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How to Play Skull!

is that a skulli bet that's a skullmaybe it's not a skulloh DAMMIT

By SU&SD on March 29, 2016

If you ask us what our favourite game is, it changes with the weather. If it's a sunny day, Cosmic Encounter. If it's wet and windswept, Consulting Detective. If it's a sleepy autumn night, Memoir '44. And so on, forever and ever, until we get tired and go to sleep.

But if you ask our team which game they've played the most, you'll only get one answer: Skull*. Arguably the best bluffing game ever made, and a glittering showcase of just how much game you can get out of a minimum of rules.

If you're still not sold, check out Matt's review and a recipe! Skull with Fresh Pizza.

*Though Quinns' Netrunner habit and Paul's Carcassonne addiction do offer some competition.

Review: Mexica

nobble traditionsa party of the futuresecret truthscrash bandicoot

By SU&SD on March 25, 2016

Quinns and Matt want you to come on holiday with them! Come along to the ancient city of Tenochtitlan. Don't worry, it'll be demolished again once we're done with it.

Mexica was a bit of a surprise for us. We hadn't heard anything about it, but this city's as simple, beautiful and solid as the stone temples that dominate it. Ooh, and the Aztec clubbing scene is killer. Tell 'em Crash Bandicoot sent you.

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Podcast #39: Dancin', Brawlin' and Burglin'

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By SU&SD on March 23, 2016

Paul, Matt and guest star Jonathan Ying currently await you in our podcast section, having recorded a cast LIVE from GDC 2016. Curl up on the sofa and listen, rapt, as they discuss the hottest new board games! And by "hottest" we mean "weirdest" (and by "new" we mean "old").

Designer Tim Fowers stopped by our lounge to demo his games to us, the sneaktacular co-op Burgle Bros and deck-building word-builder Paperback. Fantasy Flight designer and friend of the show Mr. Ying showed us Brawl, a real-time card game that just this month enjoyed a reprint. There's also Dancing Eggs, which we inflicted on GDC like a horrible rubber virus.

Enjoy, everybody!

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GAMES NEWS! 21/03/16

resting with the fishestinder for paladinsquinns and thompson sitting in a tree

By Quintin Smith on March 21, 2016

Quinns: My god! We just got back from running our board game lounge at the annual Game Developer’s Conference and it looks like someone left the news spigot flowing for the entire time.

Our biggest story is that Ra, one of Reiner Knizia’s old and therefore good games, is coming back in a pretty new print run! In a rare example of SU&SD being ahead of the curve (rather than about two months behind it) our entire team has actually played the original 1999 auction game and is in agreement that it’s well worth your money.

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Review: Arena Rex

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By SU&SD on March 11, 2016

[We were so happy with Eric Tonjes' work introducing us to miniatures games with his reviews of Infinity, Dropzone Commander, Warmachine, Malifaux and the Batman Miniatures Game that when we heard about a new, very special minis game we had to get him back.]

Eric: I've spent the last few months working those pectorals and drenching myself in olive oil. Why? So that I can now sit shirtless at my computer for a proper review of Arena Rex.

But what IS Arena Rex? It's an excellent miniatures game of gladiator combat in a semi-mythological classical world, where your tiny team of just 3-5 fighters square off with their foes in a battle TO THE DEATH! Or, at least, to the filling of the last wound box and the removing of the little resin figure.

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