Tag: Hand Management

Hand Management is a game mechanic in which players are rewarded for playing cards in a specific order. This mechanic often encourages players to hold cards for later turns.

Heat: Pedal to the Metal

Heat: Pedal to the Metal

Heat: Pedal to the Metal

Based on simple and intuitive hand management, Heat: Pedal to the Metal puts players in the driver’s seat of intense car races, jockeying for position to cross the finish line first, while managing their car’s speed if they don’t want to overheat. Selecting the right upgrades for their car will help them hug the curves and keep their engine cool enough to maintain top speeds. Ultimately, their driving skills will be the key to victory!

Drivers can compete in a single race or use the “Championship System” to play a whole season in one game night, customizing their car before each race to claim the top spot of the podium. They have to be careful as the weather, road conditions, and events will change every race to spice up their championship. Players can also enjoy a solo mode with the Legends Module or add automated drivers as additional opponents in multiplayer games.

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Racing

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 6 Players
  • 30 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.16

Guildhall: Job Faire

Guildhall: Job Faire

Guildhall: Job Faire

The not-so-Dark Ages is blowing up! Skilled workers clamor to get into your Guildhouse. Organize them into chapters and put them to work. Each additional worker you add to a chapter provides a bigger bonus to the workers you play in the future – but look out as your opponents might steal your valuable workers for their own chapters!

In Guildhall: Job Faire, 2–4 players compete to create a prosperous kingdom by recruiting skilled laborers into their guild chapters. Collect sets of cards with unique abilities. Use completed sets to claim victory cards. But will you go for points or use a special power? Which will lead to ultimate victory?

Game Mechanics:

  • Hand Management
  • Set Collection
  • Take That

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.18

Godzilla: Tokyo Clash

Godzilla: Tokyo Clash

Godzilla: Tokyo Clash

In Godzilla: Tokyo Clash, you play as the Earth’s most fearsome Kaiju — Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah, and Megalon — battling for dominance as the most terrifying monster in Japan. With detailed miniatures of the legendary monsters and a modular cityscape of 3D buildings to destroy, it’s an epic battle every time you play!

In more detail, each player has their own deck of cards unique to the kaiju they control. As you throw trains and tanks at the opponents and attack them directly to cause damage, you can burn cards out of their deck, reducing their options on future turns. As you stomp through the city, you can earn energy, which can help you lay out permanent enhancements to your abilities.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Hand Management

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.24

Gates of Delirium

Gates of Delirium

Gates of Delirium

You have finally set out to find the truth. You’ve heard the rumors of ancient runes and the lost pages of a scattered tome that tell of ancient and evil monstrosities, calling for their return. You’ve heard tales of those who came before you in this search losing grip on their sanity as they grew nearer to the truth. As you press on, you can’t help but notice that you feel less attached to reality yourself. Some days you lose track of time and can’t account for hours of the day. The whispers of secret gates to another world are growing stronger, and while no one knows who is building them, you have a dreadful hunch…

Could you be the hidden architect of the Gates of Delirium?

In Gates of Delirium, players have a hand of split action cards: one side sane, and the other insane. Every round, one player decides whether the round is sane or insane, and all players must play that side of their cards. During sane rounds, players search for maps and lost pages to a secret tome, while assigning investigators to help them in their cause. During insane rounds, players collect ancient runes and work to build gates to release the monstrosities that their sane selves have been trying so hard to understand and prevent. Earn the most victory points by the time the last monstrosity is released to win Gates of Delirium.

Game Mechanics:

  • Area Control
  • Hand Management
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.00

Funfair

Funfair

Funfair

Can you build the best theme park in town?

Choose and build an exciting mix of attractions in your very own theme park. Upgrade them to match blueprints, or just to stack up towering rides that pull in the crowds and make the most cash. Hire staff members and build super attractions to maximise your park’s strategy for the win!

Game Mechanics:

  • City Building
  • Economic
  • Hand Management
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.14

Four Gardens

Four Gardens

Four Gardens

Long ago, in a beautiful Eastern kingdom, a queen and her people pleased their Gods by building a mystical pagoda. The pagoda housed the four Gods and towered strong over the magnificent kingdom. As time passed, the queen fell ill, and she summoned her people to compete for her crown. The crown would be passed on to the person who could build the most pristine garden around the pagoda. The heir would be chosen by the four Gods themselves.

The goal of Four Gardens is to accumulate the most points on the score board by completing landscape cards and finishing sets. Each finished set creates a panoramic view of a garden, and these sets are called (no surprise) “panoramas”.

Players can finish panoramas by first laying groundwork cards, acquiring resources by turning the 3D pagoda, and allocating those resources to satisfy the requirements of each groundwork card. Once satisfied, a groundwork card becomes a landscape card. Multiple landscape cards laid in the correct order create a panorama. Each God has their own satisfaction meter which expresses their goodwill towards the gardens and their builders. Players try to please the Gods by completing landscape cards and finishing panoramas.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Hand Management
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.42

Forgotten Depths

Forgotten Depths

Forgotten Depths

Forgotten Depths is a 1-3 player co-op dungeon adventure game that combines unique tile laying and hand management mechanics to deliver a substantial experience of exploration and combat.

The goal of the game is to get to the bottom of the dungeon and destroy the powerful entity that resides there. To make it, you’ll need to improve your heroes by finding items and buying new abilities with experience points you gain by exploring. Those experience points are in scarce supply and you’ll need to balance between saving them for abilities and spending them on the healing and keys you’ll also need.

The game is played by alternating between two main activities, Exploring and Encountering. You’ll start by Exploring, creating the layout of the level as you play, and discovering Ecology Elements. You choose when and where to Encounter the Elements you discover, and you go back to Exploring after each Encounter.

Game Mechanics:

  • Cooperative
  • Hand Management
  • Tile Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 3 Players
  • 45 – 135 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.20

Forbidden Desert

Forbidden Desert

Forbidden Desert

Gear up for a thrilling adventure to recover a legendary flying machine buried deep in the ruins of an ancient desert city. You’ll need to coordinate with your teammates and use every available resource if you hope to survive the scorching heat and relentless sandstorm. Find the flying machine and escape before you all become permanent artifacts of the forbidden desert!

In Forbidden Desert, a thematic sequel to Forbidden Island, players take on the roles of brave adventurers who must throw caution to the wind and survive both blistering heat and blustering sand in order to recover a legendary flying machine buried under an ancient desert city. While featuring cooperative gameplay similar to Forbidden IslandForbidden Desert is a fresh, new game based around an innovative set of mechanisms such as an ever-shifting board, individual resource management, and a unique method for locating the flying machine parts.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Cooperative
  • Grid Movement
  • Hand Management
  • Pick-Up and Deliver
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • ~45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.05

Football Highlights 2052

Football Highlights 2052

Football Highlights 2052

Welcome to Football Highlights 2052!

Football Highlights 2052 is like watching TV highlights of early 21st-century football games, with the game play being full of theme but with no time-outs or commercial breaks and all without bogging down in a play-by-play football simulation.

In this quick and interactive game, two players manage their teams, combining both strategy (building your team) and tactics (playing the game) without any downtime. During each half, players alternate playing ten cards to simulate a full game’s highlights. Each card represents both an offensive and a defensive play, both of which will be used to resolve your opponent’s and your own offensive plays.

Do you try to thwart your opponent’s threatened offense, or put up a strong offense of your own? The player who makes the best use of their plays will score the most points through touchdowns, field goals, and even safeties to win the game!

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 4 Players
  • 45 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.36

Fog of Love

Fog of Love

Fog of Love

Fog of Love is a game for two players. You will create and play two vivid characters who meet, fall in love and face the challenge of making an unusual relationship work.

Playing Fog of Love is like being in a romantic comedy: roller-coaster rides, awkward situations, lots of laughs and plenty of difficult compromises to make.

Much as in a real relationship, goals might be at odds. You can try to change, keep being relentless or even secretly decide to be a Heartbreaker. It’s your choice.

The happily ever after won’t be certain, but whatever way your zigzag romance unfolds, you’ll always end up with a story full of surprises – guaranteed to raise a smile!

Game Mechanics:

  • Bluffing
  • Cooperative
  • Deduction
  • Hand Management
  • Limited Communication
  • Role Playing
  • Storytelling

Game Specifications:

  • 2 Players
  • 60 – 120 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.25