Happy new year!!
We hope everyone had a fantastic end of the year with lots of holidays to celebrate with family and friends.
In our family we celebrate Christmas. And we had a wonderful couple of weeks with many meetings where we could all be together. We visited a lot, laughed a lot, and watched a couple of fun movies. We also enjoyed time with extended family eating lots of food and catching up on all the happenings.
And between the celebrations, we were able to play a handful of games.
- Reference points
- Silver – Collector’s Edition
- The Lord of the Rings: Duel for Middle Earth
- 7 wonders
- between two cities
- dice forging
Reference points
The game we played the most was Reference points. We got a copy of the game in November and played it for the first time in December. And boy did we play it.
Over the course of two weeks, we played Landmarks 15 times!
Waypoints can be played cooperatively or competitively in teams. We played both ways a lot of times because we couldn’t stop at one play. Ask them to play it over and over again.
The game involves exploring an island in search of treasure while staying away from curses and traps. But the way to explore the island is through single word clues. One player writes a word on a tile and the other players have to determine where they think that player is trying to direct their path on the island.
Since the new word must be placed next to words already on the island, they must decide whether the new word should be placed next to a single word token or among several. It’s about discovering what the clue giver has in mind.
In a way, it’s like code names: you give your teammates a one-word clue. But because of the premise, everything plays out very differently. And we really enjoy playing with family and friends.
Silver collector’s edition
The next most played game over the holidays was the new Silver Collector’s Edition. We review Silver and a couple of expansions in 2022. So if you want to know more about how to play, check out our full review.
Since I love playing Silver, I joined the Kickstarter campaign for the new Silver Collector’s Edition of the game. And we had a great time playing it!
The Silver Collector’s Edition includes 2 new expansions, Silver Eye and Silver Fang, as well as a complete Collector’s Edition deck of cards. Plus, it includes additional cards for existing sets to now allow 5 and 6 players to join in the fun.
Additionally, this edition comes with neoprene playmats for each player’s village that feature artwork and characters found in the various play sets.
We first played each Silver set separately and then started mixing them. And once you start randomly selecting which cards you play with from different decks, the possibilities are endless!
I am very happy that I took the step and got this Silver conglomerate.
The Lord of the Rings: Duel for Middle Earth
Another new game that we played for the first time during the holidays is The Lord of the Rings: Duel for Middle Earth. It’s a new game based on the gameplay of another game we really enjoyed, 7 Wonders Duel.
For 3 rounds, players take turns selecting cards from the center screen. Some of the cards start face down and others face up. Players can only claim face-up cards if they can pay the appropriate resources for them. As they reveal face-down cards, those cards are turned face up. So at first you can see some of what’s to come, but the rest is unknown until it’s revealed.
In this version of the Lord of the Rings game, there is also a territory board where players compete for control of different regions, as well as a Ring track, where the Fellowship player attempts to take the ring to Mordor while the player of Sauron tries to catch them. Therefore, there are multiple ways to win and the first player to achieve one of those conditions will win the game.
It’s a great implementation and fits the theme very well.
old and good
The other three games we pulled out and played over the break were three games we enjoyed but haven’t played together in a long time: 7 Wonders, Between Two Cities, and Dice Forge.
Mom loved to play 7 wonders again and was reminded why he has it on your list of the 12 best games. Since up to 7 players can join, it is great to play with our family. And since players select cards simultaneously, it plays pretty quickly. And the best thing was that even though some time passed, we were able to remember the iconography at a glance.
between two cities It is another game that plays quickly due to simultaneous play. There is no downtime in this tile drawing game as you work with the people to your left and right to build a combined city that will score the most points. But the real caveat is that your final score will be the lowest score of your two cities (to your left and right). Therefore, one cannot be neglected in favor of the other. You should try to get a big score with your two cities.
We dust ourselves off dice forging in early December for my friends’ monthly game night. And teaching it again to new players reminded me how fun it is. So I left it to play during the break too. It is a game in which players have two dice that they can change the faces of. You roll dice to collect different resources and then spend those resources for additional benefits. Some of those benefits include purchasing new die faces that grant better or more resources. Removing the face of a die to replace it with a better one is very satisfying. Then you just have to wait for the new die face to appear when you roll the die in the future.
We hope you had a great time with your family too!
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