Countdown to Gen Con Online: 60-51
We're continuing to feature digital versions for board games in our countdown. We've been platform agnostic, playing games on Tabletopia, Tabletop Simulator, and from app stores. We've dabbled a bit in Board Game Arena, but haven't featured any games from there. There's also a newer contender called Tabletop Playground. As much as we like board games, it's hard to justify buying yet another digital board game platform.Games Featured:
Day 60: Quartz
Day 59: Are You A Human?
Day 58: Thanos Rising
Day 57: Scythe
Day 56: Star Wars: Rebellion
Day 55: Splendor
Day 54: 6 Nimmit!
Day 53: Onirim
Day 52: Cat Lady
Day 51: Explorers of the North Sea
Sometimes in Tabletop Simulator after playing a game, we load mods just to see how the game and components look. Both Thanos Rising and Star Wars Rebellion were impressive, though we have yet to play either one. We haven't played Are You A Human? either. The presentation on Tabletopia is excellent, but we are unlikely to play a memory game.
6 Nimmit!, Onirim, Cat Lady and Splendor are all apps that we own, though the Tabletop versions of the latter two were used for the countdown. We'd recommend any and all of these, as they are easy to learn and a great way to get familiar with playing analog games in digital form.
If you're new to playing online, tacking something like Scythe can be a bit intimidating (but certainly worth the challenge). That leave us with Quartz and Explorers of the North Sea, two games that we hope will become standalone apps in the future. There is already a Raiders of the North Sea app by Dire wolf Digital, and we hope they continue making digital version of the North Sea Trilogy.
Explorers of the North Sea is available on both Tabletopia and Tabletop Simulator, but each one is less than perfect. Even though we struggled a bit with the pieces staying where they should, we had a great time playing and think that it could be quite fast in person. We didn't all love Quartz, but it's a fun push-your-luck game. We think we'd like the game a bit better with some balancing elements, and may try to create some sort of variant if we play again.