The Kejap Food Game

The Kejap Food Game is not available for sale. You can get this as a free gift if you visit Kejap Food (a Malaysian fast food chain) and buy MYR 30 or more of food. While stocks last, of course. This is a simple, real-time game that is played in five minutes. It is a cooperative game. You work together to serve as many customers as you can within the time limit. 

Before a game starts, everyone gets a character card. Your card tells you which dice you manage and what role or roles you play. Depending on the number of players, you may need to manage up to three dice colours and you may have up to two roles. Let’s talk about how you serve a customer. 

The first step is taking an order. That just means revealing a card from the deck. You can have at most four active orders. You can’t reveal a new order until an existing one is fully served. An order consists of several spaces for dice in different colours. Everyone prepares food in this game. You are in charge of rolling and placing dice assigned to you. On each order card, all dice placed must add up to 10. This is why you need to keep rolling dice. You will need dice is specific values. When all the food is ready for an order, your next step is to serve the food. Someone is in charge of moving the order card to the next column. This frees up space for that player in charge of orders to reveal a new order card. 

Next, you need someone to clean up. That means returning all the dice on a served order to their respective owners, then flipping the card and placing it in the score pile. 

Everyone has specific tasks to do, and you cannot do others’ work for them. You can scream at them to hurry up but please don’t do that. Just ask nicely. You run a timer before you start the game, and you try to serve as many customers as you can within five minutes. 

I must declare I have not visited Kejap Food before. I received this copy as a gift from the designer Qing Ye. This is a casual game and I would even call it a children’s game. However I played this with a bunch of seasoned hardcore gamers. Well, it was a good filler in between heavy games. The moment we finished, Julian asked me where he could get one. Now this is definitely not a gamer game. It is not designed or balanced for gamers. We finished the order deck in 4.5 minutes. For gamers, this is not about how many orders we can complete in five minutes. It is about how much time we need to complete all orders. We had fun with it. It’s simple and hectic, and it’s perfect for playing with our families and non gamer friends. 

Designer Qing Ye in white

Qing Ye has been more and more active in designing games, and I find that I really like many of his designs. There is one card game originally about Penang shophouses then rethemed to political ideologies which I find very clever. It’s still work in progress. I like the difficulty of needing to collect both item cards and scoring condition cards at the same time to maximise your points. And your cards are also your money to spend on bidding. I’m looking forward to more of his games from Specky Studio. 

Spots

Who else has watched the Disney cartoon 101 Dalmatians as a kid? Spots is a light dice game about dalmatians! Well, maybe not specifically dalmatians. Just dogs with spots. Many of the dogs in this game don't actually look like dalmatians. This is a game with a bit of push-your-luck, in which you race to fill six dog cards with dice of the right number of pips. 

You start with two dog cards. Each dog card has 2 to 4 spaces for dice, and they are in red. In each space you can only place a die of the specific value shown. A dog is not done when you fill all the spaces. There is one more step you need to do. You must perform an action to flip the dog card to the blue side. When a dog is still on the grey side, you may lose the dice on it, i.e. your progress can be completely undone. 

At the start of a game you will set up six action cards. The box comes with more than six action cards and you can play with different combinations. Players take turns using an action card. An action card that is used becomes temporarily unavailable. Only when five cards have been used will they all be reset and become available again. 

Every player has a backyard. Your backyard is where you get to bury dice you can't place onto your dogs. As a general rule, when you roll dice, you must place them. If you can't place them on your dogs, you will be forced to bury them in your backyard. There is a limit. Your backyard cannot have dice totalling more than 7. If that happens, you go bust and lose all dice on grey-side dogs and your backyard. This is the push-your-luck aspect of the game. The higher your backyard dice total is, the higher your risk when you roll dice. The different action cards in the game let you do different things. Some let you roll more dice than others. Rolling more dice usually entails a higher risk, even though it can help you progress more quickly. 

One action card lets you roll two dice, and then you have the option of rolling one more. One action card lets you roll three dice, and then you can keep rolling one die at a time as many more times as you wish. One action card lets you roll dice in your backyard. There is one action which lets you draw an additional dog card. 

In this screenshot above, three of my grey dogs (upper half of the screenshot) are filled, but I still need to take an action to flip them to the blue side to secure them. If I fill my sixth and last dog, I will win immediately. Flipping dogs to the blue side is not necessary for winning. It's just protection against losing progress. At this point I need exactly one die showing 4. If I go bust at this point, I will reset all four of my grey dogs. 

The red bone is a treat. Treats are a type of resource you can earn, and you spend them to reroll dice. In Spots when you reroll you must reroll all dice. You can't lock some then reroll the others. It's all or nothing. 

The game comes with many action cards, and there are many combinations you can play with. There are some suggested combinations in the rulebook. This variety provides some replayability. 

Rolling dice is exciting. There is certainly luck in this game, but there are also ways to mitigate that. You can be strategic about how you play. Making sure you have some treats ready helps. You need to balance between going fast and taking risks. I had fun with the game even when playing in async mode. I think the game will be even more fun when playing a physical copy in person. You will feel the excitement on your opponents' turns too. This is a nice light game to play with non-gamers who are dog lovers. It is a relaxing filler for gamers. 

7 Wonders Dice

7 Wonders, first published in 2010, has now become a juggernaut of a franchise. The series has multiple expansions and spin offs. Some of the spin offs have different core mechanisms. They are different games, but they use the same theme and art style. The 2 player version of 7 Wonders has now been turned into a Lord of the Rings game. For the dice game version to get released only in 2025, 15 years after the original, is a little surprising. For many other successful franchises, the dice game version or the card game version would have been out much earlier. 

7 Wonders Dice is a roll-and-write game. Multiple dice are rolled every round, and you pick one to use. Everyone does this at the same time. Your choice does not affect other players. The same die can be used by multiple players. You normally use a die to tick one box on your player sheet, which represents constructing one section of a building. The game ends after any one player completes three buildings. The player sheets are the same, with two exceptions, your wonder of the world, and your university. Your wonder is in the top left corner, and it can be completed in only three steps. It is actually pretty easy to complete. You are not relying very much on other buildings to help you complete your wonder. Instead, it is your wonder which will help you complete other buildings or gain specific benefits. 

You roll the dice in a flat and wide box with a cover on, and you shake that box in a circular motion. This is because the box is divided into four sections, and depending on where a die is, the cost to use the die differs. The cost can be between 0 to 3 gold. If you can't afford any die, or if you are not willing to spend the money on what you can afford, you can choose to not use any die and collect 3 gold instead. 

The green building is the university. All the spaces on your sheet has a number below it. This number means how many resource types your nation needs to produce for you to be able to tick the space. If your nation does not produce enough, you can make up for the shortage by paying gold. This is why you need gold. At this particular university, the first spaces of the three rows mean (from top to bottom) the blue die becomes free for you, you earn 2 gold whenever you use the red die, and you get to tick your yellow building. Every player's university is different, and this nudges players in different directions. When you reach the third spaces at the three rows, they unlock an additional die - black, purple or white. The black die has faces for multiple buildings, so it gives you more flexibility. The purple and white dice are for two specific advanced buildings. 

You have two red buildings - garrisons - on the two sides of your sheet. You tick boxes representing offence and defence. Your garrisons are compared against those of your neighbours. If you tick offence boxes before your neighbours have any defences, you score more points. So here you have some player interaction. There isn't a lot in this game. You don't steal points from your opponents. It's just that they will be letting you score more if they don't put up defences. 

I played on BGA, and the convenience of doing so is a problem. It's not the website's fault. It's mine. Every turn the system highlights all the valid spots I can tick and indicates the cost. As a result I don't think much and just click. This is not a good thing. In the first game I played, I decided to be thrifty. I mostly chose to use dice which were free. Sometimes I chose to increase resource production even when it wasn't free, because having more resource types would help reduce costs in future. I later realised that this wasn't a good policy. I was reactive and I didn't really have a clear strategy. I wasn't building up any strong advantage. 

Those coin icons along the bottom of the player sheet are for recording your gold. When you earn gold, you circle coins. When you spend gold, you fill in the circles. A game starts with 7 coins circled, which means you start with 7 gold. If you look at the screenshot above (I'm at the top), I rarely earn or spend gold, much less than all my opponents. 

Being insistent on saving money greatly constrained me. I had little consistency when constructing buildings. I had no coherent strategy. Well, other than being thrifty, which I later realised was not a good strategy. I should have been more deliberate in planning which buildings and which strengths to leverage. I needed to focus on specific areas. Only with focus you can gain a stronger advantage. 

In my second game, I chose to focus first on completing my wonder. My wonder helped me with resource production, and when I completed my wonder (which was also considered a building), I gained the bonus for a completed building. I realise that there is a sense of urgency in this game. You really should not waste any turn. You want to watch your opponents' progress so that you don't get caught unprepared when the game ends. Or look at it this way, if you are quicker in completing buildings, you have the advantage of being able to end the game when the time best fits you. That's a powerful thing. The decision you make every turn looks simple, but you actually need to put some thought into it if you want to play well and play more strategically. 

Player interaction is low in 7 Wonders Dice. It almost feels like a solo game. Among roll-and-write games, it's about mid-weight. Although the player sheets do differ, so far it doesn't seem to make a huge difference. Maybe I have not grasped this aspect well yet. For me the game is decent but not spectacular. However there is something instinctive that I enjoy about it which I can't fully explain. I think I enjoy the options I am given, and I enjoy the sense of progress. 

Miams

In Miams (I think it means yummy in French) you roll five dice and try to get combinations which will score you points. Normally you get one reroll, and you get to choose which dice to reroll. Throughout the game you gain abilities which let you manipulate the dice and do other things which help you score points. The game ends when anyone reaches 50 points. 

The die faces are different types of fruits, and one cross. That cross helps your opponents. You always have at least one reroll. Which dice to reroll depends on what you are aiming for. Sometimes you take risks. When you already have a pair, you may choose to reroll one of them to attempt to make five different fruits. You might fail and get nothing. Or you may choose to sacrifice a full house to attempt a four of a kind or five of a kind. When you reroll a fruit die, you are also taking the risk of rolling a cross which will help your opponents. 

On the player sheet you can see all the combinations you can attempt. Most of them are simply rolling multiple dice of the same fruit. Then there's a full house, and 5 different fruits. Whenever you manage to make a combo, you score the next available number in the row by drawing a heart around it. If an opponent rolls a cross, you get to cross off a number on your sheet. You don't score it, but crossing a number makes the next one available, so you will potentially score more points on your turn later. 

At some positions you earn stars. This is a currency for you to buy those power cards on the right. That column of power cards work like a sushi belt, always moving downwards. The bottom card is always free, so you can always take one card on your turn even if you have no star. These powers are important in helping you make good combos. They can also help you score points in other ways too. Some of these are ongoing abilities, like being able to treat one fruit as another type. Some are single use, for example scoring 3 points per orange rolled. 

Sometimes you get extra rerolls. Sometimes you get to roll an additional die. All these help towards making better combos. Sometimes combinations of powers can be particularly potent. 

The game is quick and easy. There is certainly some luck. However there are interesting decisions you need to make along the way. You want to make good use of the power cards. Stars are worth points when the game ends. Sometimes it's not easy to decide whether to spend them to help you cross the finish line faster, or to keep them for points. Which combo to go for is not always easy to decide. The game is a race to 50. It's exciting to watch what your opponents roll. 

King of Tokyo Duel

The Game

King of Tokyo is a highly popular game by Richard Garfield, designer of the even more popular Magic: The Gathering. These two are very different games. I have read about King of Tokyo but have not actually tried it. Now I have tried the two-player version. 

King of Tokyo Duel is a kaiju (monster) game. You are the monster. You fight the other monster while rampaging the city. This is a dice game. You roll dice to see what you get to do. You can reroll up to twice, and each time you can decide which dice to reroll and which not to. After rolling, you use your dice to perform actions. 

The different icons on the die faces mean different things. There is an icon for smacking your opponent. If you reduce your opponent's health points to zero, you win. There is an icon for healing. You can recover from your injuries. Two icons are for a tug on war on the game board. You compete to see who is causing more damage to the city and to the (human) army. This is translated to two tracks on the game board. You try to pull the marker to your end of the track. If you manage that with either one of the tracks, you win. Alternatively, if you manage to get both markers to move to about the mid point on your side, you also win. 

The other two icons are lightning bolt and exclamation mark. The bolt is money. You get to buy power cards, some of which are single-use, others give you a permanent ability. Exclamation marks are used for activating your monster's unique ability. The game comes with many different monsters, and every game you can pick a different one to play. They have different health values and unique abilities. 

The shop offers three cards. 

Some power cards come with tiles you can add to the tracks on the game board. They augment the tracks, possibly extending or shortening them, and creating new functions on some of the spaces. 

The Play

This is a simple and quick game. To win, you either knock out your opponent, or cause massive destruction. You are at the mercy of the dice. This is a game with some luck. Collecting lightning bolts to buy power cards is long-term investment. This can be risky if your opponent is going for speed. By the time you build up your abilities, you might be near defeat. So the tempo of the game is something you need to be alert about and respond to. 

Both the blue and red markers are in the lighted region on the right, which means game over. 

The Thoughts

This is a short and speedy game. It is fast and furious. There is some strategy so it is certainly not brainless. At the same time there is a fair bit of luck in the die rolls. The game is so-so for me, because I feel I don't have a lot of control. 

Dungeon Roll

The Game

Dungeon Roll is fantasy dungeon crawling designed as a dice game. You play three rounds, in which everyone takes a turn to explore and plunder a dungeon. After three rounds, you compare points to see who wins. 

White dice are the player dice. They represent the party of adventurers you explore the dungeon with. Black dice are the dungeon dice. They represent the monsters and also the treasures you encounter. Most faces of a white die are different adventurer types, like fighter, cleric and thief. They have different abilities. They are used to defeat black dice. Treasures and potions on the black dice need to be "defeated" too. You need to spend white dice to open treasures and to quaff potions. However you do get something in return. 

Exploring a dungeon means fighting through it level by level until you are defeated or decide to retreat. There are 10 levels, and every level is harder than the previous one. You only roll one black die for the first level, two for the second level, three for the third, and so on. Every time you clear one level, you have to decide whether to retreat and keep the score you have so far, or to attempt the next level and hope to score more. In case you fail to fight through a level you are attempting, you won't score points for the whole adventure. The next level will have more black dice. You will gradually use up your white dice. Some abilities let you restore some of them. At the moment I can't imagine how you can get to Level 10. By around Level 5 it already feels like the max. Maybe I need to learn to play better. 

The different types of adventurer have different abilities. By default they can always defeat one monster. However they specialise in certain monster types. E.g. a single cleric can defeat any number of skeletons. So if you roll many skeletons, and you have one cleric, you're in luck! 

When you use white dice to open treasure chests, you get all sorts of treasures and equipment. A thief can open any number of chests. Some items behave like a specific adventurer type. You keep them for future use. Some items have point values. Potions you quaff let you restore white dice. One of the black die faces is the dragon. Rolling a dragon means you are starting to disturb it. Dragon die faces are set aside. Once you reach three dragons, you wake the dragon and must fight it in order to complete the current level. Defeating the dragon requires three different adventurer types, so it's not easy. If you manage it, you score points and gain a treasure. 

Scrolls, which appear on white dice, let you reroll. Sometimes this can be a life saver. Sometimes it makes things worse. 

Every player gets a character card. You have one ongoing ability, and one once-per-excursion ability. When you reach a certain experience level (which is also your victory points), your character upgrades and both your abilities change. 

The Play

This is mostly a solo game. Only one player is actually playing at any one time. The others spectate. The only player interaction is thinking about well your opponents are doing and deciding how much risk you want to take in order to catch up to them or stay ahead of them. Rolling dice is exciting. There's an element of surprise and uncertainty. The game is tactical in nature. You do your best with what you roll. Overall it's pretty straight-forward. Still, the dungeon crawling theme comes out pretty well. You do feel like you're fighting your way through monsters and traps. The fact that you need to roll dice makes the experience one of risk-taking. 

The character card being tilted 90 degrees means you've used your single-use power.

The Thoughts

Dungeon Roll is a light and brisk dice game, and it's flavourful as a fantasy adventure game despite the simplicity. 

Sky Team

The Game

Sky Team is the 2024 Spiel des Jahres winner. It was already getting many positive reviews before it was nominated. What surprised many people was it went on to win. This is a strictly two-player game, and the SdJ has never been awarded to such games. Sky Team is a cooperative dice game about landing a plane. You are pilot and copilot of a plane, and you must collaborate to do your job while under communication restrictions. There is a time limit. Within this time you must complete all landing preparations and in the final round you must land the plane right on the dot to win the game. 

There is a fixed number of rounds. By the final round you must advance the plane to precisely arrive at the runway and land it. No earlier, no later. The basic structure of a round is each player rolling four dice, and then taking turns to place them on the board. The dice are rolled behind player screens, so you don't know what numbers your partner has, and you can't discuss the numbers or where to place them. You can discuss strategy before the dice are rolled, but once rolled, zip. 

The board looks a little intimidating the first time you learn the game, as if you need to learn how to fly a real plane. However once the rules are explained to you, you will realise how well the board is designed. The icons and colours all make perfect sense and there are plenty of visual cues to remind you of how things work. You don't need to memorise the rules. The board is as good as a reference sheet.  The square indentations are where you can place dice. The pilot uses the blue spots, and the copilot the orange spots. Spots with both blue and orange can be used by either player. There are four spots which must be filled every round, two for each player. These are the spots near the centre of the board, controlling the wings and the engine. 

Let's talk about the wings first. The dice you place determine how the wings tilt. The difference between the two dice tilts the plane. You need to be careful not to tilt it too far in either direction, because you'll lose control and crash (and lose). Since you don't know what numbers your partner has, controlling the tilt can be tricky. 

Next, the engines. The semi circle above the two engine spots has two marks. If the dice total exceeds the first mark, the plane advances one step. If it exceeds the second mark, the plane advances two steps. The plane may advance one or two steps, or none at all, depending on the dice total. You need to remember that by the final round, the plane needs to reach the runway. If you fall short, or overshoot, you lose. 

There are columns of dice spots along the left and right edges. These spots only allow dice of specific values. These are tasks that must be completed before the plane lands. There is no hurry, but you do have to remember to do them. Every round, two of your dice must go to those mandatory spots, so you only have two dice that can go to other spots. It's not a lot. 

The dice spots at the bottom are for making coffee. Coffee gives you energy. In game terms, each cup of coffee you have can be used to adjust a die value by one. This can sometimes be a life saver. It's something worth spending a die on, as a form of insurance. You can use two or more coffee at the same time, for example drinking two cups of coffee allows you to change a 1 to a 3. 

That long board on the left represents your distance to the airport runway. Every time the plane advances, this distance is shortened. Notice those plane icons on this board. These are other planes which are in your flight path. If you advance into them, you crash and lose the game. You need to use the radio to tell them to get out of your way. Both pilot and copilot can radio these other planes. The pilot can do it once per round, the copilot twice. When you place a die on a radio spot, the die value determines which plane you can send away. The die value is your distance to that plane.  

The long board on the right is your altitude. It is effectively your countdown mechanism. By the time the altitude reduces to 0, you'd better be fully ready to land. This is a natural and thematic build-up to a climax. You need to time everything perfectly for that final round in order to win. 

The Play

I played Sky Team on BoardGameArena.com with my Hong Kong friend Jetta. We are separated by a 4-hour flight. We, okay I should say I, crashed rather spectacularly in our first game. I advanced our plane too fast and crashed into a Japan Airlines plane. I had misunderstood the rule about the engines. I didn't realise that the moment I placed the second die, the plane would start moving. I had thought the moving was done at the end of the round, and I still had time to radio the JAL plane to ask them to duck. 

We quickly made a fresh attempt. This time I was much more careful. If you play this game properly, you are not supposed to be communicating at specific times. You will have to learn to communicate through your plays. Figuring out how to communicate this way is interesting. You need to think why your partner is making this move. You have to think about how you should place your die in order to give specific hints to your partner. This little dance of trying to think what your opponent is thinking and how they will interpret your actions is fun. When my partner places a 5 on his wing, I will be able to calculate the range of numbers I can safely place on my wing so that the plane doesn't tip over. By placing a die, my opponent is helping me plan my play. Your play provides information to your partner. 

The game requires some long-term planning and prioritisation. With only two dice that you can choose to place in spots other than wing and engine, many of the tasks you need to complete can only be done across multiple rounds. There is quite a lot on your plate. You need to use you dice wisely. 

I was the copilot (orange). I placed two 2's on the radios, getting two planes a short distance in front of us out of the way. Now I had a 6 and a 1, and these must be placed on wing and engine. This was a tough situation, because 6's and 1's are extreme numbers. Putting either one on the wing was risky. If Jetta didn't have a number near mine, the plane might tilt out of control. It would be safer to place a 6, because the plane was currently tilting towards his side. If his highest die was a 3 and he placed it, the plane would tilt right by 3 steps and would still remain in control. If he only had 1's and 2's we would be doomed. Unless we still had coffee. 

The game comes with different variants, presented as different airports around the world you can land in. That's nice. Different airports come with different challenges. The basic rules remain. 

This was the final round. We were at ground level, and we were precisely approaching the runway. Now we must have the wings perfectly balanced. The landing gear also needed to be fully extended. We had done our preparation well and we had coffee on the ready. Our final round was a breeze. Everybody went home safe and sound. We had the kind of perfect landing where passengers applauded. 

The Thoughts

I fully appreciate why Sky Team won the SdJ. It is an excellent light strategy game. It is not too heavy so it works for families and couples. The setting is novel. I absolutely love the component design. It creates an immersive experience. At the same time, it is highly practical. The game board is also your reference sheet. 

That process of working out how to communicate with your partner through actions is fun. When you manage to achieve understanding and complete your mission together successfully, it is highly satisfying. This aspect makes the game a nice couple game. You feel the connection. 

Yamslam

 

The Game

Yamslam is an easy-to-learn and smooth-playing dice game which works well with non-gamers and casual gamers. The core mechanism is commonly seen in many other dice games. You get to roll dice three times on your turn, and after every roll, you may set aside and lock some of the dice. After the third roll, you score points based on the combination you achieve. 

You have 5 dice in Yamslam, and they are just simple dice with faces numbered 1 to 6. Odd numbers are black and even numbers are red. There are 7 types of poker chips in the game, corresponding to 7 different combination you can make with your dice. The point values of the chips range from 5 to 50. 

On your turn you get three chances to roll dice, and you try to make a combination which will earn you a chip. Every chip value is associated with a particular dice combination. There are only four chips in each value. Once all four are claimed, you won't be able to get any more even if you make that particular combination. In the photo above you can see a Large Straight, one of the highest valued combinations, worth 50pts. The highest combination in the game is Five of a Kind. If you manage that, you may pick any chip in the game.  

If the dice are passed around the table one full round without anyone claiming any chip, you will remove one highest unclaimed chip from the game. Once all the chips have been claimed by players or removed this way, the game ends. Whoever scores the most wins. 

These are all the combinations you can make in the game. 

In addition to the point values on the chips, there are a few other ways to score bonus points. At the end of the game, if you have 6 or 7 different types of chips, you score a bonus. If you monopolise all four chips of a particular value, you also score a bonus. If you happen to be the one to claim the last remaining chip in the game, you score a bonus too. The last remaining chip is not easy to claim because by then there is only one valid combination. 

When new to the game, it is difficult to remember which combinations score how many points. Thankfully the combination names are written on the chips, which makes things much easier. When you win chips, you should organise them neatly like in this photo above, so that it's easy for others to see what you have. This is important. 

The Play

Yamslam uses a commonly used mechanic, so people who have played similar dice games will feel right at home with it. It does take a short while to be familiar with the the combinations, but they are mostly straight-forward. In the early game, most people will be greedy and try to go for the high-value combinations, especially the Large Straight. Since all 7 combinations are still available, odds are good that you'll be able to make at least one of them. If you fail to make a high-value combination, you may be able to fall back to a similar but lower-valued combination. If the Large Straight doesn't work out, maybe you can still get the Small Straight (four numbers in sequence). If the the Full House doesn't work out, maybe you can still make Three of a Kind or Two Pairs. 

Things get more exciting when some of the chips run out. There will be fewer and fewer combinations available, and the risk of failing escalates. 

The bonus points are well designed. They make you want to both go wide and go deep. You want to collect many different types of chips, and you may also want to monopolise a particular chip type if the opportunity arises. It's not just about going for the highest valued chip on the table. 

Decision-making is fast. From your first roll, you can mostly decide which one or two combinations you want to attempt. It's not a difficult decision. Sometimes the best decision is obvious. However making the logically best decision does not always give you the expected results. This is still a dice game with a luck element. What the game does well is it makes you feel you have made clever decisions. When you win, you feel it is because of your smart choices. When you lose, it's just bad luck. This is what good user experience is. 

The combinations are shown on the sides of the game box. 

The recesses are numbered so you know exactly where to store which chips. 

I took this photo above to discuss how well the game components are designed. The game box is metal and has an unusual shape. These make the game stand out. The shape is not just any random shape. It fits the purpose of storing the 7 stacks of chips. When you pack up the game, the chips should all go back to their designated recesses. By doing this, the next time you play you don't need to set up at all. The game is already set up. This is brilliant! The game box has a felt bottom, and serves as a dice tray. You don't have to worry about dice rolling off the table. This photo above likely triggers all serious gamers. No proper gamer will store the game away in this messy state. It was downright painful for me to stage this photo. If you do this with this game, sorry we can't be friends anymore. 

The Thoughts

Yamslam is a simple game with wide appeal. It is easy to teach and engaging to play. It works well with non-gamers and you can bring it out at (non-boardgame) parties and gatherings. You can even use it to teach maths - high school probability. Despite being a light game, there are many design elements in Yamslam that I admire. A complex game doesn't mean it is a good game. Sometimes seasoned gamers equate complexity with quality. Conciseness and compelling experiences are more important than complexity for the sake of itself. 

Dice Forge

Plays: 3Px1.

The Game

The main selling point of Dice Forge is the fact that you get to modify your dice as you play. Everyone has two dice, and at the start of the game they are all the same. During play, you may spend gold to upgrade your die faces to better versions. Players' dice will gradually diverge. This is a little like deck-building games. Players start on equal footing but gradually augment their individual abilities.

This is the player board. You use it for recording your resource levels. The yellow row is for gold, the red row for sun shards and the blue row for moon shards. Your storage space is limited for each resource type. If it is full you can't collect more. You may expand your storage during the game. The green rows are for score keeping. Highest scorer after the last round wins the game.

The game is played over a fixed number of rounds, depending on the number of players. At the start of each player's turn, everyone including the active player rolls his dice and collects resources accordingly. The die faces mostly depict various resources in different quantities. Some die faces let you pick from two or more resource types. Some die faces grant special abilities, e.g. tripling the production of the other die.

The main board consists of seven islands floating in the sky. Each island has 2 or 3 small piles of cards. On your turn, one of your two options is to visit an island to buy a card (in the game this is called performing a heroic feat), paying sun shards or moon shards. Some cards give you special abilities, some give you points, and some give both. The number of cards available depends on the number of players. Sometimes you need to compete if others want the same cards. If you visit an island which is currently occupied, you bump the incumbent away. This costs you nothing, but the player being bumped gets a free die roll, i.e. he will gain some resources.

The other option on your turn is to visit the temple to make an offering to the gods, i.e. to upgrade your dice. You pay gold to make one or more upgrades to your die faces. The quantities of upgrades are limited, so sometimes you will need to compete too.

The game is beautifully illustrated and the production value is top notch.

The costs of cards are listed on the cards themselves as well as on the board. The game comes with variants. You can mix and match the cards available as well as the die upgrades available.

Some card powers are single-use while others are permanent. These here are all single-use. The card on the left gives me two extra rolls. The card in the middle lets me change one die face to "x3". The card on the right expands my resource storage capacity.

The Play

The gameplay is simple and smooth. You roll dice, collect resources, upgrade your dice, and ultimately your goal is to score points. The early game is mostly about upgrading your dice, and the late game is all about scoring as many points as you can before time runs out. The tricky part is balancing the transition from improving your scoring ability to using that ability to actually score points. If you only think of upgrading your dice, you will miss out on actual scoring, which is what matters in the end. If you start focusing on scoring too early, you will likely be doing it less efficiently because you have not built up your strength.

The die upgrades and the cards do have some synergy. There are combos you can make, which can help you create something which is greater than the sum of its parts.

Sun and moon shards behave a little differently - the kind of cards they let you buy are different in nature. You may spend two sun shards to take an extra action. This can be valuable in the early game. The earlier you improve your abilities, the more you will get to utilise them throughout the game.

The Thoughts

Dice Forge didn't work for me. It felt soulless. I only see the unique selling point - that you get to change your die faces. The rest of the game are common mechanisms pieced together to flesh out the game which is built around this single selling point. I can't say there is any major flaw or imbalance. I have only played one game. I do see there is some strategy in picking die upgrades and cards, and in finding synergies. I can't feel the story and the emotions. I only see an exercise in making upgrades and scoring points efficiently.

Player interaction exists but is limited. Die upgrades and cards are limited, so you may need to rush before some of them run out. If you can anticipate where your opponents want to go, getting there just before they do will give you a bonus because you force them to bump you off. Most of the time you are focused on upgrading your own dice efficiently, and then using them efficiently to score points.

One possible problem is your die upgrades may not always give you good returns. Even if you upgrade a die face to an exceptionally good one, there is only a 1 in 6 chance of activating that face. If you are unlucky, you never activate it, thus wasting your gold and your effort. Bad luck is very real. The fact that you get to roll dice on everyone's turn somewhat mitigates this. Since you do roll dice a lot, luck somewhat evens out.