Category: Small Games

Artifacts, Inc.

| OTSG Staff

New York, 1929: A frenzy of interest in antiquity is sweeping the nation! With museums hungry for mysterious and exotic artifacts — and you hungry for adventure — you start up your own archeology company. Untold wonders await within dangerous jungles, harsh deserts, and wind-swept mountains. Will you gain a reputation as the most intrepid and famous adventurer of all time?

In Artifacts, Inc., 2-4 players compete to grow the most famous archaeology company. Players roll dice, which represent their troop of adventurers, and place them on cards in order to find artifacts, sell them to museums, and purchase new cards representing their company assets. Players can choose to focus on making lots of money by selling artifacts, having museum majorities, creating the best combination of expeditions and buildings, or searching below the waves for lost cities and hidden treasures. The first player to reach 20 reputation triggers the end of the game, and the player with the most total reputation wins!

Game Mechanics:

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.16

Arboretum

| OTSG Staff

Arboretum is a strategy card game for 2-4 players, aged 10 and up, that combines set collection, tile-laying and hand management while playing in about 25 minutes. Players try to have the most points at the end of the game by creating beautiful garden paths for their visitors.

The deck has 80 cards in ten different colors, with each color featuring a different species of tree; each color has cards numbered 1 through 8, and the number of colors used depends on the number of players. Players start with a hand of seven cards. On each turn, a player draws two cards (from the deck or one or more of the discard piles), lays a card on the table as part of her arboretum, then discards a card to her personal discard pile.

When the deck is exhausted, players compare the cards that remain in their hands to determine who can score each color. For each color, the player(s) with the highest value of cards in hand of that color scores for a path of trees in her arboretum that begins and ends with that color; a path is a orthogonally adjacent chain of cards with increasing values. For each card in a path that scores, the player earns one point; if the path consists solely of trees of the color being scored, the player scores two points per card. If a player doesn’t have the most value for a color, she scores zero points for a path that begins and ends with that color. Whoever has the most points wins.

Game Mechanics:

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.13

Aquabats!, The, Super Showdown

| OTSG Staff

In The Aquabats! Super Showdown! card game, two to four players are villains competing to capture all five members of The Aquabats, the world’s greatest superhero rock band.

The game consists of three types of cards: Monster cards, Action cards, and Aquabats cards. Monster cards have colors and power levels. Each turn, a player plays a Monster card and draws a new Monster card. If the card played is of the same color and a higher power level than the card previously played, that player may draw both a Monster card and an Action card. At the start of a player’s turn, a Battle card or Epic Battle card may be played, challenging one player or all players respectively to a showdown. Each player in the battle must play a Monster card, and the winner may take an Aquabat card from the table or, if none remain, steal one from the defeated player.

Shrink Ray cards enable a challenged player to diminish the power of an aggressor; X-Ray cards allow one to peak at another player’s hand; Antibats cards foil the winner of a battle from taking a loser’s Aquabat card; and Steal cards can be used to acquire another player’s Aquabat card without a battle.

Play continues until one player acquires all five Aquabat cards or until War is mutually declared, in which case the winner of a single round Epic Battle is declared the game’s victor.

Game Mechanics:

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 10 – 20 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.00

Antiquity Quest 🔵

| OTSG Staff

Your goal in Antiquity Quest is to have the highest score a the end of the game. You can choose to play either a single round for a quick game (20-30 min) or a complete game in which you’ll tally scores over three rounds (60-90 min)

Each player is dealt two sets of 10 cards at the start of a round. You’ll pick up one set, this is called a hand. The second set, called a cache, remains face down on the table until you’ve played all of the cards from your hand.

You’ll take turns drawing, playing, and discarding cards as you work on creating your own collections and sabotaging the collections that belong to other players.

Collections consist of Antiquity and Treasure cards. The six suits of Antiquity cards represent six ancient civilizations. Treasures are their own suit and are more rare and valuable. The more challenging a collection is to create. the more it’s worth.

A round ends once a player has completed at least five collections and played through all of the cards in their hand and cache. That player earns a bonus for going out first. Every other player takes on last turn and then scores are tallied.

Your score at the end of each round is the combination of bonus points from going out first, points for completing collections ,and points for the cards you play. The player with the highest score at the end of the game wins.

Here’s what to expect in this bold and exciting set collection game:

You’ll strive to create collections of Antiquities and Treasures.

The more challenging a collection is to create, the more it’s worth.

Beware! Your competitors can, and will seek to sabotage your efforts.

Careful planning, brilliant strategy, and a stroke of luck will bring you success!

Game Mechanics:

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 8 Players
  • 30 – 90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.20

Alice is Missing 🔴

| OTSG Staff

The game is played live and without verbal communication. Players inhabit their character for the entirety of the 90-minute play session, and instead of speaking, send text messages back and forth to the other characters in a group chat, as well as individually, as though they aren’t in the same place together.

Haunting beautiful, deeply personal, and highly innovative Alice is Missing puts a strong focus on the emotional engagement between players, immersing them in a tense, dramatic mystery that unfolds organically through the text messages they send to one another. Right at home with games like Life Is Strange, Gone Home, Oxenfree, and Firewatch, it’s designed to feel as much like an event-style experience as it does a role-playing game.

Game Mechanics:

Game Specifications:

  • 3 – 5 Players
  • 120 – 180 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.50

AFFLICTION: Salem 1692 🟡

| kithorning

The hysteria over witches among the people of Salem swept the region like a disease in 1692. As is the case in any tragic event, there are those whom will use the circumstances to their advantage. Under the veil of the witch-hunt lie other motivations; power, greed, revenge and righteousness.

AFFLICTION: Salem 1692 is a game set in the hysteria of a witch-hunt. Use your influence to whisper in the ear of the magistrate, judge, governor or minister to protect some and have others arrested. Salem was a chance to gain property, exact revenge and prove one’s righteousness.

The characters in the game were actual residents of the Salem region. This is the closest possible simulation of actual events in a game to date.

GAMEPLAY: Players will take turns placing a “messenger” (worker) to select actions. After all workers are placed, actions will be resolved in the order they appear on the main board.

EXONERATE – Take 2 Accusation Tokens off of any Colonist.
FIRST PLAYER TOKEN/PROTECTION – Use a letter from the Governor to prevent one Colonist from being arrested and take the First turn, next turn.
GAIN INFLUENCE/USE COLONIST ABILITY – Generate Influence and use the abilities of Colonists that you have in your Circle.
ARREST – Spend Influence equal to a Colonist’s adjusted Reputation to Arrest.
SPECTRAL EVIDENCE – Use this token to prevent a Colonist from Generating Influence and using their Colonist ability.
ACCUSE – Place accusation tokens to reduce Colonist’s Reputations to make them easier to arrest.
GAIN/REMOVE FEAR – Gain Fear Tokens or remove a fear token from another player (used to weaken Colonists)
BRING COLONIST INTO CIRCLE – Spend Influence equal to a Colonists Base Reputation and bring them into your Circle.

Play will cycle between accusing, arresting and protecting your interests. Fear provides an alternative way to function when necessary.

END GAME: Increase Mather and Mary Spencer Hill are shuffled in with the bottom 6 cards of the Colonist deck. When either of them appears in the play area, the game immediately ends.

VICTORY CONDITIONS: All players will receive victory points for the Reputation value of each Colonist that have arrested or brought into their circle, victory points for the property of those they have had arrested and for the number of influence tokens they have at the end of the game. Each player will also receive points for having specific families arrested or protected, depending on the player tile they are given.

Game Mechanics:

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.75

1961 🟢

| OTSG Staff

In 1961, you can invest in your space program, establish diplomatic relationships, and, most importantly, launch missiles as you and your components strive to win the Cold War. You can play cards in three different ways – as an action, a building, or a supply. But in a Cold War world, nothing is safe for long, and you have to balance internal development with defensive (and offensive) strategies.

There are three ways to win the game: win the Space Race, achieve diplomatic world peace, or be the sole survivor in a nuclear Armageddon. Do you have what it takes to come out on top in 1961?

Game Mechanics:

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 6 Players
  • 5 – 20 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.67

Broken and Beautiful: A Game About Kintsugi

| OTSG Staff

“Kintsugi” is the Japanese art of using golden lacquer to repair broken pottery.

In Broken and Beautiful, players draft cards like bowls, cups, and tea jars to create high-scoring sets. As some pieces inevitably break, players must judiciously repair what has been shattered.

Whole pottery is valuable. Broken dishes are worthless. That which has broken and been repaired is uniquely precious.

Game Mechanics:

  • Open Drafting
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~15 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.36

Biblios TAGS

| OTSG Staff

THE GAME CONCEPT
You are an abbot of a medieval monastery competing with other abbots to amass the greatest library of sacred books. To do so, you need to have both the workers and resources to run a well-functioning scriptorium. To acquire workers and resources, you use a limited supply of donated gold. In addition, you must be on good terms with the powerful bishop, who can help you in your quest.

OUTLINE OF GAME PLAY
The object of the game is to score the most Victory Points. You win Victory Points by winning any of the 5 categories: Illuminators, Scribes, Manuscripts, Scrolls, and Supplies. You win a category by having the highest total number of workers (Scribes, Illuminators) or resources (Manuscripts, Scrolls, Supplies) in that category. This is determined by the numbers in the upper left corner on the cards. At the start of the game, each category is worth 3 Victory Points. As the game progresses, the values on the Value Board will change and some categories will become worth more or fewer Victory Points than others. The game is divided into 2 stages: a Donation stage and an Auction stage. During the Donation stage, players acquire free cards according to an established plan. In the Auction stage, players purchase cards in auction rounds. After the two stages, winners of each category are determined and Victory Points awarded. The player with the most Victory Points wins.

GAME CHARACTERISTICS
The game involves a good deal of strategic planning, some bluffing, and a little bit of luck. The rules are easy to understand, but you have to play it a few times to develop a playing strategy. It plays differently from 2-4 players, but each game is equally fun and challenging.

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.69

Bananagrams

| OTSG Staff

Bananagrams is a fast and fun word game that requires no pencil, paper or board, and the tiles come in a fabric banana-shaped carrying pouch. One hand can be played in as little as five minutes. Much like Pick Two!, but without the letter values.

Using a selection of 144 plastic letter tiles in the English edition, each player works independently to create their own ‘crossword’ faster than one’s opponents. When a player uses up all their letters, all players take a new tile from the pool. The object of the game is to be the first to complete a word grid after the “bunch” of tiles has been depleted.

There are variants included in the instructions, such as Banana Smoothie and Banana Cafe for limited set skills or space-deprived places, and the game is suitable for solo play.

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 8 Players
  • ~15 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.30