Tile Placement

Puzzling and animal breeding: Designer Uwe Rosenberg is at his best! In New York Zoo, you are constructing an animal park. Build animal enclosures, introduce new animals and raise their offspring. The game play is straight forward as you have only two turn options: Puzzle a new enclosure tile into your zoo area or gain new animals to populate your animal encounters. But be sure to time your actions well since you want your zoo to participate in as many animal breedings as possible.

—description from the publisher

The Magnificent is a tightly designed Eurogame from the creators of Santa Maria set in a mystical world beautifully illustrated by French artist Martin Mottet.

In the game, players are competing to attract the largest audiences to their shows, featuring magnificent performers. In the process, you must expand your camp by placing Tetris-style tiles on your player board, gather elements needed for the shows, and set up performances in your tents.

On your turn, you take one die from the supply. The value of the chosen die is your strength. Add to this the value of all dice of the same color that you have already collected, then use this strength to carry out one of three main actions: build, travel or perform. The more strength you have, the better the action will be, but at the end of the round, you must pay — in coins — the total of your highest-valued dice color. Thus, taking dice of the same color makes for better actions, but will cost more coins.

After each player has taken four turns, the round ends. Each player must discard one of their ringmaster cards and score points according to its requirements. After three rounds, the game ends, and the player who has collected the most points wins.

In more detail, players start the game with four ringmaster cards and a unique trainer tile. Each ringmaster card provides a special ability (which is triggered when you place a die on it) and a unique end-of-round scoring opportunity. When you choose a ringmaster card to discard and score at the end of the round, you must therefore also take into consideration which special abilities you want to keep.

In addition to your main action, you may use trainers on your personal unique trainer tiles or on common trainer spaces on the game board for various benefits.

At the end of each round, in order of the players' highest-ranked performances, players choose a new ringmaster card and a trainer tile, providing new abilities and scoring opportunities for the next round.

Life isn't easy in the enchanted forest. Elves and gnomes each have their own network of hidden paths. They don't want to be disturbed and will move into their houses only once they're protected from outsiders. Will you find your way or be lost in the forest?

In Fairy Trails, players play cards that expand the road network. Once a road is completed, that player may place a stone on each of their houses that are bordering that road. The player who places all their houses first wins.

—description from the publisher

Winterborne is a Euro-style medium weight game with light deckbuilding and tableau building. Players will use three different characters; the Viking, the Shaman, and the Explorer to lead their clan and expand their kingdom. The game is played over the Norse calendar year and each clan is preparing for the harsh winter. Players will enjoy the light interaction by exploring for cards and conquering nearby lands. Once winter is over the game ends and the player with the most Victory Points wins the game.

Winterborne has multiple paths to victory and each player can decide the best route based on card collection, expanding and settling, or trading with allies. Each path provides a rich and enjoyable play.

—description from the publisher

King Nebuchadnezzar II has spoken: "Build me the most wondrous gardens the world has ever seen!" The gardening guilds of Babylon have answered, and it is now up to the players, as leaders of these guilds, to build one of the seven wonders of the ancient world and lead their guild to victory in the cutthroat world of competitive gardening.

Gardens of Babylon is a 1-4 player, competitive euro-style game in which players strive to earn the most points by planting flower seeds on the most valuable tiles. Taking turns, players place tiles to create a maze-like ziggurat of pathways, strategically move their gardeners to gain positional advantage, and plant seeds to claim tiles, earning victory points and triggering cascades down connected waterways to steal those of their opponents in the process!

Featuring simple rules and strategic thinking, Gardens of Babylon offers infinite replayability with 78 distinct ziggurat tiles that form a unique 2.5-dimension modular board. A novel cascade mechanism allows a well-placed seed to change the course of the game in an instant, offering emergent gameplay and keeping players on their toes until the very end.

—description from the publisher