Leaping Lions

Leaping Lions was the winner of the 2023 Button Shy Games game design competition, designed by Darryl Tan, a fellow Malaysian. It is encouraging to see my fellow countryman attain such achievements on the international stage. Leaping Lions, like most games from Button Shy, is an 18-card microgame. It uses their standard packaging too. It is a wallet game (photo above). This is a game about the traditional Chinese lion dance. So the packaging is red with golden lettering, just like the angpows (red packets) given out during Chinese New Year. 

Rulebook cover

This is what it looks like when you open the wallet

Leaping Lions is a 2-player game. You set up a high pole lion dance performance. Whoever can set up and execute the most impressive performance wins. 

Each player gets one lion

This is how the game is set up - three columns of cards and the draw deck on the right. The cards in the game are double sided, with a basic side and an upgraded side. These above are all on the basic side. Some card powers let you upgrade your cards to the other side. You take turns claiming cards from the centre of the table until all cards are taken. When a card is taken, other cards in the row are shifted left as necessary, and the space on the right is filled with the top card from the deck. 

Using the cards you claim, you form a row of cards before you. A new card is always added to the right of existing cards. You can choose to discard a card instead of adding it to your row. When you do this, you can upgrade a card or advance your lion. Your lion starts on the ground to the left of your row. When it starts advancing, it first jumps onto the first card. After that it advances towards the right. By game end, the further your lion manages to move, the more points you will score. 

Some cards have special powers. Some of these are activated when you play the card. Some can be activated every turn. There are four ways you score points. I've just talked about the lion advancement. The second way is cards in sequence. Every card is numbered, and you want your cards to be in ascending order as much as possible. Every stretch of ascending numbers with at least three poles will score points. The more poles you have in the stretch, the more points you will score. 

There are five different icons on the cards. Three of them are musical instruments - drums, gongs and cymbals. The other two are fire crackers and fans. Every completed set of musical instruments scores points. At game end, you also multiply your number of fire crackers and fans to score points. When you choose a card and decide whether to upgrade a card, you must consider all these scoring opportunities. You also need to consider the special powers offered by the cards. 

The first row shows the basic side, and the second the upgraded side. When you upgrade a card, you may get additional icons and sometimes an extra pole. 

The stars in the top right corner are used in two ways. At the end of the game, you score all the stars below and to the left of your lion. This is how the lion advancement works. Stars on your rightmost card also limit your options when you claim a card from the centre of the table. If your rightmost card has only one star, you may only pick from the first column. If it has two cards, you may pick from the first two columns, and so on. You need to consider your flexibility for your next turn when you claim a card. 

This is a game with a very simple procedure. You are just taking turns claiming cards until they run out. Yet, behind such a simple action, there is much you must consider. You must consider all four scoring opportunities. You must consider your flexibility for the next turn. You also consider what your opponent might want. The card powers must be considered too. 

I played Leaping Lions well before it was released, so I am pretty excited now to have the final product in my hand. Darryl certainly made Malaysia proud, as this is an excellent game. He continues to be active in submitting games, and there are other international publishers who are looking into his designs. This is wonderful news. As more and more Malaysian designs get released internationally, this will encourage other local creators, and this will help grow the industry in Malaysia. I am very much looking forward to that. 

Leaping Lions comes with two expansions. The first one adds scrolls, which is a new way of scoring points. Some of the new cards can only be upgraded when you fulfil certain conditions. 

The second expansion is a solo game. You play against a bot, and there are five bots to choose from. Each bot has an advanced version, so in a way you have 10 different opponents to pick from. 

Ahoy

The moment I started playing Ahoy, my first thought was this was Root at sea! However Ahoy is by a different designer. It is from the same publisher Leder Games though, and development was done by the same team which developed Root. What these two games have in common is how different the factions are. However the gameplay is very different. Ahoy is for 2 to 4 players. 

The play area is formed using square tiles, each having four spaces. The play area starts with just two tiles, but you can explore off the edges and expand the map. Every tile has a blue die, which shows its point value. This is how the Bluefin Squadron and the Mollusk Union score points. They compete for dominance at every tile and whoever is stronger scores points at the end of the round. The game is played until someone reaches 30 points. You compare points to see who wins. Tiles start with a point value of 1, but this point value can increase during the game, making some tiles more valuable than others. 

Every tile has exactly one island. Islands are where you get to recruit crew. They are also where Smugglers, the other faction type, pick up and deliver goods. With 2 players, you only play the Bluefin Squadron and the Mollusk Union. With more players the 3rd and 4th players will be independent Smugglers. In addition to scoring points for completed smuggling tasks, Smugglers also secretly bid on which of the two major powers will eventually control each island type. The Smugglers will score points for correct predictions. 

Every player has his own flagship. Your player board represents your flagship. The Bluefin Squadron  is blue, and the Mollusk Union yellow. Every round you roll four dice, and on your turn you place two dice on spaces on your player board to execute actions. The type and number of actions are limited by the spaces available on your player board. Some of the spaces only allow dice of specific values, some have no such restriction. During battle you may take damage, and it comes in the form of some of these spaces being temporarily disabled. You need to do repairs to reinstate them. It is possible to modify your die rolls, but you'll need to pay, and money is not easy to come by. 

These are crew members you can recruit. You need to be at islands with the corresponding icons to recruit them. Usually you need to pay an onboarding bonus (money). Sometimes you pay by using up one die. Crew members give you all sorts of powers. Some help you fight more effectively, some help you sail better, some help you make money. These crew cards can be treated as goods by the Smugglers. The cards specify where they can be picked up (top) and where they need to be delivered (bottom). 

One advantage the Bluefin Squadron has over others is they have 5 dice instead of 4. That means they get to perform one more action every round. Every time they sail, they may deploy a patrol (those dorsal fins in the screenshot above). Patrols have a strength of 1 which contribute to controlling a tile. They can be used to explore new tiles and immediately take control of these new tiles because they are the only units there. The Mollusk Union doesn't have patrols, but they can deploy comrades on islands. Comrades cannot fight or move, but they help to control tiles. Unlike the Bluefin Squadron, the Mollusk Union has cards. This means they always have something up their sleeve which the Squadron doesn't know. 

There are many different features on the tiles. Currents force ships to move an extra step. Fogs prevent battle. Wrecks cause damage, but you can usually get money from them. Ports offer free repairs. Some spaces show a die with a specific value. One action type is to sail by tailwind. If you use a die for this, you get to sail (well, teleport) directly to a space with that specific die value. 

The Smuggler's player board is different from the others, and they have a second, smaller player board. Whenever they make a delivery, they move the white cube to an adjacent space and claim the benefit on that space. The Smuggler has one unique action - Full Sail. When placing a die on the Full Sail space, they can move as many steps as the pips on the die. This can be very powerful. The normal Sail action only allows moving up to two steps. 

I have done both a two-player game and a three-player game. The two-player game is pretty good, because there are already significant differences between the Bluefin Squadron and the Mollusk Union. The game shines when you have at least a third player, because this is when even more layers come into play. With three players, tiles which receive deliveries from the Smuggler increase in value. While the two major powers clash, they must pay attention to what the Smuggler is doing. The Smuggler doesn't compete for dominance, but I think both the major powers sometimes need to make life harder for the Smuggler, even though they don't appear threatening. In the three-player game I played, I was the Bluefin Squadron, Han the Mollusk Union and Jon the Smuggler. Jon's points lagged behind Han and I, so I didn't pay him much attention and focused on fighting Han. I didn't do well and lost many battles. I didn't have money to recruit crew. What I had underestimated was the points Jon would get by predicting eventual island control correctly. When we did final scoring, he overtook both of us and won. Lesson learnt - never underestimate the underdog! Or I should say he wasn't the underdog and I never realised so. 

There is some luck in the battles. The basic mechanism is both parties rolling one die each to compare strength. To improve your odds, you can load cannons. This needs to be done before you engage in battle. It does cost you one action to load cannons, so it can be tough decision if you don't intend to attack but you are just worried whether others will attack you. If you have a loaded cannon, when battle is joined you can spend some of your cannonballs to increase your strength. It just may turn the battle in your favour. In case of ties in battle, the attacker wins. Aggression is rewarded. 

The fun in Ahoy is how different the factions are. You must know your own strengths and utilise them well. You must also understand your opponents' abilities and how to counter them. So far I have only played the Bluefin Squadron. I really enjoy spamming the seas with my patrols, sending them out to explore new tiles and then score points with them. Due to the uniqueness of the factions, learning the game does take a bit more effort, but it is very much worth it. I consider this a heavy game. It is not as heavy as Root, and the various mechanisms when considered separately are quite simple. When put together they make a complex and interesting game. 

The Mollusk Union has cards which allow them to deploy two smaller ships. 

Cartographers

Cartographers is a popular roll-and-write game. Every round a card is drawn, and everyone must fill their own player board following the instructions on the card. You will draw a certain shape of a certain terrain type. The game is played over four seasons, and you do scoring at the end of each season. You don't know exactly how many cards will be drawn per season. It depends on the cards being drawn. The cards trigger the countdown at different rates. 

There will be four different scoring criteria every game. They are randomly set up before the game starts. You will have variability because of this. At the end of spring season, you score points based on criteria A and B. Summer is B + C, autumn is C + D, and finally winter is D + A. Let's look at these in the screenshot above. Criteria A means every row and column that has at least one forest scores 1 point. B means every isolated single blank space scores 1 point. C means every farm and lake not touching the border or one another scores 3 points. D means the second largest town scores 2 points per square. 

You have some mountain squares on your player board. Whenever you manage to surround a mountain, you will earn one gold coin. Gold coins are good. Each gold coin scores you 1 point at the end of every season. If you earn one before the end of spring, you'll eventually get 4 points out of it. Sometimes when you flip over a card, you get to choose between two shapes, and the smaller one comes with a coin or two. This is another way you earn coins. 

The ruins icons on your board doesn't stop you from using those spaces. However you probably want to save some of them. Some cards will require that the shape to be drawn on a ruins space. If you don't have any more unused ruins, you can't draw the full shape and can only draw a single square. That may not always be bad, but I think more often it is. 

Many cards dictate the exact shape you must draw, but you get to choose the terrain type between two options. 

One unusual and interesting terrain type is the monsters (purple). You don't fill these on your own board. You fill these on an opponent's board. This is unusual for roll-and-write games. You get to attack your opponents. Monsters make you lose points. Every empty space next to a monster space forces you to lose 1 point when the time comes for scoring. You want to surround the monsters as soon as possible, before the season ends. 

The play experience of Cartographers is about doing your best to fulfil the scoring criteria. You normally prioritise the criteria which will be scored soon. If a criterion has been scored twice, you will ignore it. Deciding how to fill your board, in addition to trying to fulfil the scoring criteria, is usually based on wanting to keep your options open as much as possible. You want to ensure it will continue to be easy to fill your board and to be able to score more points no matter what card is drawn next. There is no guarantee, of course, but you do your best. Usually when you decide on a particular way of drawing in a shape, you are forgoing certain opportunities and at the same time hoping for something that fits your board to turn up next. 

I did a 2-player game with Han. Although eventually our player boards turned out to look rather different, I have a feeling we were doing generally the same thing. Every season our scores were about the same. I wonder whether this is normal. Maybe it is because in this game we share the same scoring criteria, and also it is feasible to try to fulfil most if not all of them. Thus our strategies are similar. In The Guild of Merchant Explorers, there are also multiple scoring criteria, but it is impossible to try to do everything, and you must choose. Players thus tend to diverge more. 

My player board

Han's player board

This is a relaxing game. Although you do send monsters to your opponent's domain, generally this is a peaceful, solitaire-like game. You do your own thing and there is little direct competition. If you are looking for something friendly and comforting, this is a good choice. 

Wandering Towers

Wandering Towers is a family game from the magnificent duo Wolfgang Kramer and Michael Kiesling. This is a light strategy game. I would call it a race game, and it is quite an unconventional one. I played this game online, and I think it is important that I show what the physical version looks like, so I'm going to borrow a photo from BoardGameGeek. 

Photo courtesy of www.boardgamegeek.com

Every player has a team of wizards, and also a set of bottles. To win the game, you need to have filled all your bottles with magic potion, and you need to get all your wizards to the castle keep. You have a hand of three cards, and you must play a card on your turn. Some cards let you move a wizard, some let you move a tower, and some let you choose either one. Normally the cards specify exactly how many steps the wizard or tower must move. You always move clockwise. Some cards make you roll a die to determine how many steps you'll move. If you choose to play such a card, you roll the die before deciding which piece you want to move. 

This card lets you move a tower 4 steps or one of your wizards 2 steps. 

When you move a tower, it may stop on top of another, combining to become a taller tower. Whenever you move a tower with multiple levels, you can move the whole stack, or only some of the highest pieces. If you only move some of the pieces, you will break that tower into two smaller towers. When a tower moves, all wizards on it (and in it) move with it. This is an efficient way to move multiple wizards. If your opponents have wizards on or in that tower, naturally they will move together. Towers are mass transportation, but when a wizard needs to get to the keep, he must walk the final leg himself. You can't use a tower to carry a wizard to the keep. No parking on top of the keep. 

Let's talk about the other objective - filling bottles with magic potion. To do this, you have to trap wizards. When you stack a tower on another which has wizards on top, you will trap those wizards. By doing so, you fill one bottle. You can even trap your own wizards, but that's usually not a good idea. Filling bottles is not only a winning condition. Filled bottles have another use. You can spend them to cast spells. Spells available in each game is randomly determined at the start of the game. Some spells let you move a wizard or a tower. On your turn you can cast one spell at any time, as long as you have the required number of filled bottles. 

One important twist in the game is that you have moving goal posts! Your destination, i.e. the keep, moves! Whenever a wizard reaches the keep, the keep moves to the next designated location. This changes the playing field significantly. The keep may have moved further away from many wizards, but it may also overtake some, and these lagging wizards will find themselves suddenly close to the finish line. The keep has designated stops, and this is information you can use when you plan your strategy. 

When moving, the keep may stop on top of a tower. If anyone moves that tower, the keep moves along with it. How's that for moving goal post?!

From how I describe the game, it may sound complex and chaotic, but in play, it runs smoothly and you don't have much down time. You only have three cards in hand, so it doesn't take long to decide what you want to do. Even considering the spells you might use, this game won't give you analysis paralysis. There is some luck. Your possible actions are subject to those three cards you have. There may be things you want to do, but without the right movement cards, you won't be able to do them. I was pretty lucky in the game I played. I often had a card which would let me trap Han's wizards. I filled my bottles quickly. He was not as lucky and wasn't able to trap my wizards as often. When wizards are trapped, you are not allowed to check the towers to see where they are. You have to remember where they are. This game has a memory element. 

One aspect which has some dependency on luck is landing precisely at the keep. When moving, you must follow the number of steps specified by the card you play, no more and no less. You don't want to overshoot, and you don't want to fall short. This is where spells can come in handy. Sometimes by combining a spell and your movement, you can get your wizard to land precisely on the keep. If you have multiple wizards near the keep, you should try to spread them out, so that there is a higher chance you will draw a card that will get one of them to the keep. Good tactics help to mitigate luck. 

One clever thing about the game is in the early game when you have more wizards, you have more options and it is easier to find something productive to do. If you do well and have more wizards reach the keep, you will have fewer remaining in play, and your options shrink. The trailing players will have more options. This is a natural balancing mechanism. 

This feels like a family or casual type game. I used to be mostly a heavy gamer, so my instinct still tells me this is not my type of game. However, I find this much more creative and refreshing than many heavy Eurogames which are mostly about resource conversion and point scoring. Now that I have learned more about game design and game publishing, I am able to better appreciate the genius in Wandering Towers. This is a gateway game which will attract new boardgamers. It showcases how innovative modern boardgames can be. 

boardgaming in photos: Axis & Allies & Zombies, Pinocchio, Money Laundering

In recent months my blog has been so full of screenshots of digital implementations of boardgames that it is looking more like a computer games blog than a boardgame blog. So I need to post some photos of physical boardgames to balance that and make me feel more like a boardgamer. 

Han was in town, and we met up to play. This time it was only the two of us. We wanted to ask Allen to join us, but he wasn't back in town that weekend. I suggested Axis & Allies & Zombies. I quite like the Axis and Allies series. It's one of my nostalgia games, and I haven't played the series for quite a while. I have only played this zombie version once, and I didn't even manage to complete the game then. This time, the first place where zombies (white) appeared was Sweden. 

This is World War 2 with zombies, so don't expect history accuracy. This is fantasy, not history. Germany (black) attacked Egypt. Although the battle went well for them, they decided to retreat because there were too many zombies. In this game, whenever an infantry unit dies, it turns into a zombie. This is quite a scary thing. Germany basically left the zombies for the Brits to manage. Later the zombies killed the remaining British troops, and Egypt fell to the zombies. 

This was Asia before action started. This is a low unit count version of Axis & Allies, which means it is simpler, but also the swing of luck is bigger. Things can go in many different ways after the first round. 

UK sent troops from Australia and India to capture Malaya and Indochina. Japan did not attack Pearl Harbour and instead concentrated it's fleet to destroy the UK Pacific fleet. It also did an amphibious landing to attack and eventually capture Yunnan. 

Surprisingly our game ended in Round 2. Germany blitzed into Moscow and captured it. There was one territory before Moscow, but it was occupied only by zombies and not Soviet troops. This allowed Germany to blitz through it with all the tanks it had. There was some risk, since Germany infantry could not keep up and support by being cannon fodder. It would be an expensive offensive. If this failed, Germany would lose most of its tanks and the next offensive would take many rounds to be ready. Thankfully I managed to capture Moscow. 

In this version of Axis & Allies, victory is checked at the end of each round. If you capture an opponent capital while keeping all of your own, you win. USSR had an army just next door which could have easily recaptured Moscow, but USSR had taken its turn and the recapturing would need to be next round. Its other allies were too far away to help. So this game which I had expected to take the whole evening ended much earlier than anticipated. 

The funny thing about playing this game was sometimes we felt like cooperating to push back the zombies. This is a game in which both players can lose. If zombies capture territories worth $25 in total, they win. It is quite a horrifying experience watching infantries turn into zombies. 

We played Lost Cities. This two-player card game is a classic from Reiner Knizia. It was one of the game I bought when I just got into the hobby. I hadn't played it for quite some time, and playing it again reminded me of how wonderful this design is. 

We also did another Reiner Knizia classic Lord of the Rings: The Confrontation. I played the Light side, and the game was a slaughter. I lost horribly. We were not true to original story at all. 

28 Sep 2025. There was a boardgame event at Lolla Paluza cafe. Several local designers attended, and some local gamers too. I introduced my games Pinocchio and Dancing Queen. I also played some of Jon's (King & Peasant, Furmation of Rome) prototypes. I played a newer iteration of Foundations of Rome. This has similarities to Castle Combo, and I think it is a better game. The need to plan for buildings getting built over is challenging and interesting. The other prototype I tried was Money Laundering in this photo above. 

I find the theme hilarious. This is a bad boy game. Think Breaking Bad. The core game mechanism is interesting. You run illegal business like smuggled cigarettes, drugs and weapons, and you need to launder your dirty money before they are worth points. You can tip off the police and get everyone raided. Anyone who doesn't have enough hiding places for illegal goods and dirty money will lose them. That's very painful, even when it's crime money. It's not easy being a crime lord. 

This is a mid-weight strategy game and I hope to see it published. 

30 Sep 2025. My business community the BNI Lighthouse chapter had its annual teambuilding 2D1N trip. I brought Pinocchio to teach my friends, and they had great fun with it. I am glad I had the foresight to bring two copies, because I needed both. Of the four games I have published, this was the only one suitable for this occasion. This was a casual crowd and not the boardgame special interest group subset of friends who would be mentally prepared to learn a few more rules. It made me very happy to see my friends have so much fun with the game. 

After Us

After Us is a game with The Planet of the Apes vibes. Humanity has collapsed, and now apes are starting to evolve intelligence and develop a new civilisation. 

This is a deck-building game, and the cards are used in a clever way. Every turn you draw four cards and must arrange them in a row with their sides touching. Cards have complete and incomplete boxes. Complete boxes give you resources or let you do certain things. Incomplete boxes are on the left and right sides of the cards. They give you resources or let you perform actions only if they are matched up with another incomplete box on the adjacent card. This is why the order you arrange your cards is important. You need to decide which half boxes to combine and often you need to sacrifice some of them. Some half box combinations allow you to convert one resource to another or to points. How you want to form the combinations depends on your strategy or situation. 

As you gather resources, you can spend them to buy new cards. In game terms you are recruiting new apes to your tribe. There are four ape types and they are generally better in a specific area. Gorillas help you remove weak cards from your deck. Mandrills help you score points more efficiently. Orangutans help you collect batteries which can be used to activate human artifacts. These are special powers randomly set up for every game and they are available to all players. Chimpanzees allow you to reactive powers already used in the current round. They are flexible. 

Ultimately your goal is to reach 80 points. This is when the game ends and whoever has the most points wins. As you tune your deck, your ability to score points improves. Managing your tempo is important. You need to be watchful for when the game might end. If you take too much time perfecting your deck but someone else goes quick and dirty and barely hits 80, you will lose because your engine is not ready. If you are going for quality, you need to make sure you can hit 80 in the same round as your fastest opponent. At that point if you have developed a strong tribe, you will outscore your rivals. 

This is a mid weight strategy game. It is mostly deck-building, the twist being how you need to line up your cards. I like that it brings a new idea to the table. 

Pirates of Maracaibo

Pirates of Maracaibo (2023) is the card game version of Maracaibo (2019). I first played Maracaibo only earlier this year, and I greatly enjoyed it. Finally I found an Alexander Pfister game which I truly liked (the game is also designed by Ralph Bienert and Ryan Hendrickson). Despite being a card game version of its older brother, don't think of Pirates of Maracaibo as a simple version of the game. It is not at all simple, and I would still consider it a heavy game. Not even a mid-weight game. The main thing that's missing compared to the original is the three major powers - the English, French and Spanish - and how you need to support one of more of them. However in Pirates of Maracaibo you get to collect and bury treasures instead, which is actually a little similar mechanism-wise. The card game is just the original presented differently using different mechanisms, but most of the elements are still here. This is not a game for people who want a simpler game. It is for people who like the original, and want something "same but different". 

The board is made up of cards and the setup is random every game. You can even use different shapes for the board. The game is played over three rounds. Every round the players will sail from left to right. You are allowed to move up to a certain number of steps, and every turn you must move to a new space at least one column to the right of your current column. You may move further if you want to. When anyone reaches the shore of Maracaibo on the right, the next turn will be the last for everyone before the round ends. If you are too far behind, you might not reach Maracaibo in time to enjoy its rewards. 

On your turn, you sail to a new location and use it. Sometimes you get to buy that card, and it becomes your equipment. When you do this, a new card will be drawn to replace the one you have just bought. In some cases you can't buy the card and you just use the ability provided. Some islands let you pay a large sum to enable a game end scoring condition. At some islands you can build your own black market, which gives you a benefit the next time you visit the same island. 

This is the exploration part of the game. When you advance your pawn here, you get to enjoy the benefit on the space you land on. The further you progress, the bigger the rewards. When the game ends, you score points based on how many rivers you have crossed. 

There are many possible upgrades at your ship (i.e. player board). They are divided into four levels. You can only access Level 1 initially. Only after you have surpassed certain numbers of upgrades will you gain access to higher levels. 

During the game you may collect treasures. They can be gems, gold or pearls. Their point values can be manipulated, so you need to balance between collecting them and manipulating their values. One action you can do is to bury treasure. Doing this can give you benefits. It just feels right to be able to bury treasure in a pirate game! 

The cards you buy enhance your abilities and encourage you to specialise. You will want to plan your strategy around your strengths. During the game you get to collect mission cards too, and they also drive your strategy. Each mission card has two levels. You already score points if you achieve the first, but you will score more if you achieve the second too. How players develop their abilities and which missions they pick will drive them in different directions and give them different priorities. 

Like its predecessor, Pirates of Maracaibo offers you many opportunities to customise your abilities. You will be unrecognisable by the end of the game. You will have many tools, ship upgrades, and black markets. You will have a set of missions which will differ from your opponents. I would argue that this is actually a relatively peaceful game. Sometimes you do compete for the same things. Manipulating the values of the treasures can affect your opponents. However you will be kept pretty busy customising your own abilities and completing your own missions. If you want to play competitively, you should watch your opponents. If they are doing too well, you can take deliberate actions to disrupt their plans - going where they plan to go to force them to pay more, or buying what they need. When I played I was mostly busy with my own business and I didn't pay much attention to others. I will need to play more to get to a higher level of play. I greatly enjoy that sense of power seeing how much my humble pirate enterprise has grown throughout the game.