Tag: Grid Movement

Grid Movement is a game mechanic where game pieces move on a predetermined grid in various patterns.

Adventure Land 🟢

| OTSG Staff

In Adventure Land, King Agamis rules from his castle. Rich cities, vast forests and rugged mountain ranges dominate the country. The large river is known to be lined with gold and the forests filled with medicinal herbs, but dangers lurk beneath the fog! Only the bravest adventurers dare to face the challenges. When you move your adventurer tactically and bravely fight the fog creatures, you’ll win the favor of the king. Illustrated by Franz Vohwinkel and designed by acclaimed duo Wolfgang Kramer and Michael Kiesling who between them have won the highly coveted Spiel des Jahres award 5 times.

Game Mechanics:

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.84

Thrive

| OTSG Staff
Thrive

Thrive

Thrive is a two-player abstract strategy game with incredibly simple rules that grows in complexity as you play.

You play as one of two lotus flowers, competing to control the pond. Be the first to capture all but one of your opponent’s seed pods and win this game of tactical decision making!

Each turn you move a piece, then add two additional pegs to any of your pieces, giving them more possibilities for movement on future turns.

Game Mechanics:

  • Abstract Strategy
  • Grid Movement

Game Specifications:

  • 2 Players
  • 20 – 30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.56

Survive: Escape from Atlantis!

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Survive: Escape from Atlantis!

Survive: Escape from Atlantis!

Survive is a cutthroat game where players seek to evacuate their pieces from an island that is breaking up, while remembering where their highest-valued pieces are located to maximize their score.

An island made up of 40 hex-tiles is slowly sinking into the ocean (as the tiles are removed from the board). Each player controls ten people (valued from 1 to 6) that they try and move towards the safety of the surrounding islands before the main island finally blows up. Players can either swim or use boats to travel but must avoid sea serpents, whales and sharks on their way to safety.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Bluffing
  • Dice Rolling
  • Grid Movement
  • Memory
  • Take That

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 45 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.70

Scooby Doo! Betrayal at Mystery Mansion

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Scooby Doo! Betrayal at Mystery Mansion

Scooby Doo! Betrayal at Mystery Mansion

Based on the award-winning Betrayal at House on the Hill board game, Betrayal at Mystery Mansion is the mash-up fans have been clamoring for!

Play as Scooby-Doo, Shaggy, Velma, Daphne, or Fred as you explore the mansion and its grounds, finding clues, encountering strange occurrences, and maybe even catching sight of a monster! When you find enough clues to learn what’s really going on, that’s when the haunt starts, and one player will switch sides to play the role of the monster! Will you be able to stop them before they carry out their sinister plan?

Betrayal at Mystery Mansion contains 25 new haunts based on popular episodes and movies from the Scooby-Doo oeuvre, with different monsters, items, events, and locations each time you play.

Game Mechanics:

  • Dice Rolling
  • Grid Movement
  • Role Playing
  • Storytelling
  • Team Based
  • Tile Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 3 – 5 Players
  • 25 – 50 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.80

Santorini

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Santorini

Santorini

Santorini is a re-imagining of the purely abstract 2004 edition. Since its original inception over 30 years ago, Santorini has been continually developed, enhanced and refined by designer Gordon Hamilton.

Santorini is an accessible strategy game, simple enough for an elementary school classroom while aiming to provide gameplay depth and content for hardcore gamers to explore, The rules are simple. Each turn consists of 2 steps:

1. Move – move one of your builders into a neighboring space. You may move your Builder Pawn on the same level, step-up one level, or step down any number of levels.

2. Build – Then construct a building level adjacent to the builder you moved. When building on top of the third level, place a dome instead, removing that space from play.

Winning the game – If either of your builders reaches the third level, you win.

Variable player powers – Santorini features variable player powers layered over an otherwise abstract game, with 40 thematic god and hero powers that fundamentally change the way the game is played.

Game Mechanics:

  • Abstract Strategy
  • Grid Movement
  • Racing
  • Team Based

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~20 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.73

Mountains out of Molehills

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Mountains out of Molehills

Mountains out of Molehills

Moles have traveled from all over to compete in the annual Mountain Maker tournament. In this light strategy game, competitors show their skill based on how high they can pile their Molehills, and by how many Mountains they control. The Mole that can build and control the most Mountains out of Molehills over 6 rounds will be declared the “Top Tunneler” and win the game. Features a two-level game board and full-color acrylic standees for each Mole!

Game Mechanics:

  • Area Control
  • Grid Movement
  • Open Drafting
  • Programmed Movement
  • Puzzle

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 45 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.50

Karuba

| OTSG Staff
Karuba

Karuba

Many moons have come and gone since your boats departed on the journey to Karuba. Once you arrive on the island, each player will lead an expedition team of four adventurers. Now you just have to navigate your way through the dense jungle to make it to the temples. “Just” may be something of an understatement; the ancient jungle trails have to be found and uncovered first! Hurry up and be the first to reach the temples to collect the most valuable treasures. Many paths have dead ends and you need to be patient to find the right/best way (through the jungle). Look! A gold nugget! You can pick it up and collect it, same applies to the shiny crystals along the paths.

Game Mechanics:

  • Bingo
  • Grid Movement
  • Network Building
  • Puzzle
  • Tile Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 40 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.45

Clue: the Simpsons

| OTSG Staff

Chief Wiggum finds wealthy industrialist Charles Montgomery Burns dead, and it looks like foul play. Wiggum rounds up six likely suspects: Homer, Marge, Lisa and Bart Simpson, Krusty the clown and Waylon Smithers. The fingered suspects, dressed up as their favorite Clue character, try to figure out who bumped off Mr. Burns. To win, you must determine the answers to these three questions: Who did it? Where? and with what weapon?

Game Mechanics:

  • Deduction
  • Paper and Pencil

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 6 Players
  • ~45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.65

boop.

| OTSG Staff

A deceptively cute, deceivingly challenging abstract strategy game for two players.

Every time you place a kitten on the bed, it goes “boop.” Which is to say that it pushes every other kitten on the board one space away. Line up three kittens in a row to graduate them into cats… and then, get three cats in a row to win.

But that isn’t easy with both you AND your opponent constantly “booping” kittens around. It’s like… herding cats!
Can you “boop” your cats into position to win?
Or will you just get “booped” right off the bed?

  • Approachable but challenging abstract game. Plays in 20 to 30 minutes.
  • Features a quilted, fabric board that lays over the back of the box, completing the miniature bed playing surface. 8 wood kittens and cats per player – 32 adorable cat pieces in all!

Game Mechanics:

  • Grid Movement
  • Pattern Building

Game Specifications:

  • 2 Players
  • 20 – 30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.39