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Welcome to Which Game First where we boldly explore the hilariously huge world of board games. Did we unearth any hidden treasures you’ve been missing out on? Let’s find out!
First up this week: We scramble to keep our dinos from departing in Tiny Epic Dinosaurs
Next up: We trade to keep our family from starving in Century: New World
And lastly: We blockade to keep our village from melting in Eruption
Tiny Epic Dinosaurs
Designed by: Scott Almes
Published by: Gamelyn Games (2014)
Players: 1 – 4
Ages: 14 & up
Playing time: 30 – 60 minutes
In Tiny Epic Dinosaurs, breakthroughs in modern science have dinosaurs and humans existing side by side. This has allowed for a lucrative industry. Dino Ranching!
Players control a team of ranchers and will be acquiring, breeding and selling dinosaurs. The game is played over 6 rounds, each round consisting of 6 phases.
- Harvest resources from your farm.
- Put your ranchers to work, ranchers can wrangle and buy new dinosaurs to farm, improve the farm’s security and supplies, secure contracts, and research technologies and unique dinosaur breeds.
- Ranchers return to finish their day’s work at the farm.
- Arrange and/or re-arrange the ranch, making sure their ranch is suitable for the types of dinosaurs they have.
- Feeding. Every dinosaur MUST be fed. Dinosaurs that don’t eat will escape
- Breeding. Pairs of the same dinosaurs will produce a new dino of that same type
At the end of the game, players will receive victory points for each dinosaur they have, public and private contracts they acquired and for their research developments. The player with the most victory points, wins the game, and will claim the title of the best Tiny Epic Dinosaur ranch in history!
Century: A New World
Designed by: Emerson Matsuuchi
Published by: Plan B Games (2019)
Players: 2 – 4
Ages: 8 & up
Playing time: 30 – 45 minutes
Century: A New World sends players to the Americas at the dawn of the 16th century.
Braving the wilderness, players are forced to explore new lands, trade with local inhabitants, journal their findings, and hunt/gather to survive!
Use your workers to gather goods, which can be traded in for scoring cards. You can also use workers to turn lower value goods into higher value goods.
Obtain enough of the right kinds of goods to visit the forts to exchange those goods for cards which yield victory points and special abilities.
Earn extra victory points by choosing tiles that complete sets of card types. Some cards can unlock new, unexplored places on the gameboard.
To win the game, have the most victory points, and this New World will belong to you!
Eruption
Designed by: Chris James
Published by: Stratus Games (2011)
Players: 2 – 6
Ages: 10 & up
Playing time: 30 – 60 minutes
Eruption is a competitive survival game in which each player struggles to save his or her own village from destruction caused by an onslaught of lava from an erupting volcano.
As lava enters a village, its temperature increases until it has burned up completely. Players can protect their own villages by placing lava tiles defensively and strategically building walls of various materials to hold back the lava. They are also rewarded with action cards for directing lava to other villages. Action cards allow players to rotate, replace, or remove the hexagonal lava tiles as well as cool down and fortify their own villages.
Once the volcano has fully unleashed its fury, the player whose village is at the lowest temperature wins.