At The Table with The Dice Tower - Gen Con Bound 2025

15:14Eric Summerer:Oh, boy. Are you dressing up as Shriek? I am dressing up as myself. So I am the new final promo card. Will you survive? I will because my card is OP because they let me design it myself. Never let a designer design their own card. That's nice.

15:29Tom Vasel:This is so funny. I love this situation. You were telling me about this at Dicetower East, and you just are the best character ever. Julie sort of skipped over it, but she is the promo that you can get at the Van Ryder booth. It's a little mini expansion figurine with a cat that you can get there, and it's one of my must-haves for the show. My cat Mazzy, so it's listed as Julie's Mazzy, for the record, and she is my cat, is my ultimate weapon, which usually that's a secret, but we've shared it. There's videos of her. So I feel like I'm not the cats out of the bag, as it were. Ha! I know.

16:06Eric Summerer:Oh, my word. I know. But I also got to design my own, and I'm one of two promo cards. Actually, Professor Meg is the other one, and her dog is her ultimate weapon. Fantastic. So we are a fun little set that you can get, you can purchase, and also we'll be at the room, both Meg and I and Paula, as final girls, room 134 every morning, and then games are being played for the rest of the day. Sounds like the name of a band. I know. It's the final girls. The final girls. And with you three, it could be the name of a band. It could be. and then also Cassandra who is Cassie in our series three box set she's the only final girl that actually isn't a promo card she just made it to the actual games she'll be there she's one of our biggest like our super fans on discord and so that was a contest that we got that she won so she'll be there as well we I don't know about the rest of them but I will be in cosplay as myself, meaning the dress that I gave them for the art they actually used.

17:16And now I have to wear it. I bought several similar dresses.

17:19Eric Summerer:Wow. But I will be wearing. Every night. Laundry again. I will be cosplaying myself. The necklace that I wore. Who knew? Who knew that my sense of fashion that day means I have to recreate it every single day.

17:34Tom Vasel:Whatever you were wearing to the office that day, you now have as a uniform. Got it. Sure do. And I will have a stuffed Mazzy. I'm not bringing actual Mazzy because actual Mazzy would hate that. She'll stay at my house.

17:48Eric Summerer:So, yeah, that's what's happening with me.

17:49Tom Vasel:And if you want to see all three of us, there's the Dice Tower Award show on Thursday night. If you didn't get a ticket, Tom really thinks you can sneak in with a couple of generics. He's promising.

18:00Eric Summerer:No, it's not even that I think about it. But every year there are plenty of extra seats in there because Gen Con sells less tickets than there are seats. So, yes, we've been able to get everybody in. And it's going to be a lot of fun, folks. I don't know exactly what Eric's doing. I'm singing. I'm singing. But there's also – well, I mean I know that, but I know nothing else. I try to keep – I'm very much ready to show producing everything, but I try not to look too close at the individual stuff. I've seen one of the sketches, which I found very, very amusing. But there's other sketches that I don't know about.

18:35Eric Summerer:There's other things that I don't know about and Eric doesn't know about.

18:39Tom Vasel:Yeah. I recorded some voiceover work for something, and I don't know what it's going to be used for. So that's fun, too. Chaos!

18:46Eric Summerer:But also, we're giving out the awards, and that will be a lot of fun. So come on out. We keep things moving. I hate boring award shows. We try to keep things moving as quickly as we possibly can. This ain't the Oscars, folks. So that would be fun to see us there. And then other than that, just if you see us running around, I'll be trying to get around as much as possible. I've deliberately freed up my schedule at nights so that I could just mosey around Gen Con at nights and see what it's like because I just haven't done that in years. Cool. And same with you, Eric. Or did you fill your nights already?

19:24Tom Vasel:I haven't. I usually pick up a couple of parties and publisher events and stuff, but I haven't done that partially because I haven't been on the ball. So maybe I'll do some wandering as well.

19:34Eric Summerer:I'm actually really thrown off by the fact that I believe this is the earliest Eric's ever come to Gen Con. I usually show up on Tuesday, which is when we usually start setting up.

19:46Tom Vasel:I know it's a joke, but I have shown up to Gen Con.

19:49Eric Summerer:I'm not 100 % sure on this.

19:51Tom Vasel:I was there from the beginning last year. Anyway. Since the dawn of time, Eric has been at the booth. I'm already there. Anyway, we promised we were going to talk about games. We really should do that. Let's talk about what people are excited about seeing at Gen Con. All right.

20:07Eric Summerer:All right. We're going to take a list here. We're going to go through some games. We're using Eric Martin's Gen Con 2025 preview. If you don't know about that, Board Game Geek, a big giant website about board games. for each of the major conventions. Eric Martin, a news editor there, puts together a preview list and does a really good job, despite the fact that publishers often don't send him the info he needs. To do this, publishers, it's free advertising. But anyhow, he puts it there, and so we're going to go through it based on what people are saying they want to play, and we'll mention some of these games as we go through the list.

20:42Eric Summerer:So this is in no particular order other than these are hot games, and they may or may not be hot for us, so ready? I'm ready. Ready. The number one game here is Vantage. This is from Stonemaier Games. This has just been shipping over the past week to some of the people who pre-ordered it. This is one of the few games that he announced last year, actually. He normally announces the game, pre-orders it, and you have it in three weeks. Here's the same thing. The pre-orders are up. You can get it. I'm pretty sure you can buy it at the booth there. I believe it's at the Meeplesource. MSRP of$90. So, yeah.

21:22Eric Summerer:Well, you know what? It feels like$90. I picked it up yesterday and I was surprised at how heavy it was. There's like a thousand cards in it and there's books. So I played it just last night and it reminds me very much of both Tales of Arabian Nights and Seventh Continent to some degree.

21:44Tom Vasel:Dag nabbit, this was already on my list and now I really need it.

21:48Eric Summerer:You're like sent to a planet. Everyone in the game lands in a different location. You can interact with these locations. You're trying to find some sort of goal to finish, whatever it might be. There's a nice little dice system. I'm not going to get into the whole game here. It's fun, but do realize it's very meandering. It's not particularly focused and it's very chill. Like, you almost could call it cozy, I suppose. I kind of liked it. I'm not kind of, I really liked it. I just was like, meh, I'll go over there and see what happens. All right. This guy, I'm going to talk to him and see what happens.

22:24Tom Vasel:I'm going to punch this guy and see what happens. It also has a play time of two to three hours.

22:29Eric Summerer:Yeah, we finished faster than that. Okay. It's also one to six players. So I'm assuming the six player is the long. Is the high point. Yeah. Yeah. Well, after playing it, I would say it's two to three players. If only because, or one to three players, because you're just going through and seeing stuff. And so if you play six players, you just got a really fake interest in what everyone else is doing. You know how that can work. Like, I can't wait to do this. Well, I got to wait five other people before I do it. Correct. I played a three-player game that bounced pretty well, and I thought it'd even be better with two.

23:04Eric Summerer:I did not for one moment think it would be better with four. Okay. Noted. Yeah, but if you like this, this is one I think I might play with my kids. We just go off adventuring and see what happens.

23:14Tom Vasel:But heavy from a weight perspective, so think about luggage. That is true. Maybe this one I need to order instead of picking up at Gen Con. We'll see. We're going to be done in a week if we go this long on all of them. I know.

23:27Eric Summerer:The next one is Forest Shuffle Dartmoor. So this is not an expansion. This is like a sequel to a game that hilariously is called Forest Shuffle and yet shows no trees on the cover. They're in the distance. You see a sheep. They've eaten all the trees.

23:44Tom Vasel:You're creating a lush moor and a hearthland landscape and attract species to it. Behind the hut.

23:48Eric Summerer:I think it's the same game system. We'll see. Forest Shuffle, of course, a lot of fun.

23:53Tom Vasel:Yep.

23:54Eric Summerer:More big games. Lost Ruins of Arnak, the adventure chest.

23:57Tom Vasel:Yeah, the storage box.

23:58Eric Summerer:The same size as Arnak, but it's twice as thick.

24:01Tom Vasel:Oh, okay. This is important because it's hard to fit all this stuff into one box.

24:07Eric Summerer:Is this on your list too, Eric? Are you going to have room in your luggage? Yeah. Are you driving?

24:10Tom Vasel:I'm not driving, no. No, you're flying. Julie's driving. Yes, I'm driving to and from home every day.

24:17Eric Summerer:You can make short trips. That's true. The convenience of living in Indianapolis. Then we have Gwent. This is one I don't know much about. Gwent, the legendary card game.

24:27Tom Vasel:But it's based on a game from The Witcher 3, right? This is a game they played in-game, and so now there's a physical version of it.

24:35Eric Summerer:Has anyone here played The Witcher 3? Yes, I have. But it's not really... Was the game fun? It's a side game. It's not anything... I feel like this is going to be much more involved as a game from what it's described as. I'm interested in it because it's listed as having deck construction, deck bag and pool building. So it has the video game theme and it's card game. But I think they made a game out of it, not just a side game. Well, this has happened before. Toc was made based on a game from the name of the Wind series. And I believe Final Fantasy has had their games made into games before.

25:25Tom Vasel:Yeah, they have, yeah. The next one is one that it's called Lightning Train.

25:30Eric Summerer:Yeah. It's from Paul Denon, Dire Wolf. So when I first went through this, I was like, why is it called Lightning Train? Now that I've played it, I still don't know why it's called Lightning Train. Well, because during the game you get lightning trains, which are basically free trains, which doesn't mean they're lightning. Anyway, I don't know. It's a bag-building game.

25:50Tom Vasel:Yes.

25:50Eric Summerer:So think if Martin Wallace designed a bag-building game, because that's how this feels. You're connecting routes, picking up goods, and delivering them. But you do all this through a bag building, but the chits are actually the trains too. So when you pull trains out of the bag, you might use those to build a route on the board, or you can spend a certain number of trains to activate different actions. So it's a really neat concept back and forth like that. This is one of those games that I read the rules and I was like, eh, it sounds overly complicated. Played it and I was like, this is pretty good.

26:22Eric Summerer:And then I said, how did I doubt Paul Denon, the designer of Dune, Imperium, and Clank?

26:27Tom Vasel:Yeah. Yeah, this is very high on my list. This might be a must pick up while I'm there.

26:31Eric Summerer:All right. Sea Salt and Pepper, Extra Pepper. That's one you can put in your pocket after you pay for it, obviously.

26:36Tom Vasel:Yes. I do like the idea of these expansions that are just little sleeves. They're basically like a booster pack. And so it easily is going to go back in the box of the original. You could pack it easily. This, you know, I could just pick them up. No problem.

26:49Eric Summerer:I agree. I always wonder if you're a retailer and you see me, tell me how these do in a store. I've always been wondering about that. Like, are these harder to sell because they're so small?

27:00Tom Vasel:But like the last expansion for Sky Team was just an envelope.

27:05Eric Summerer:Yeah. Yeah. Maybe it must work well, I guess. I'm just curious if they sell better online or in person. Well, the very opposite of small is the next game. Luthier. Luthier. I looked it up, Eric. Yeah. You can say Luthier too.

27:22Tom Vasel:Okay, I'll let you. There's both pronunciations.

27:24Eric Summerer:I will allow it. No, I looked it up because someone went off on our comments as if we were all morons. So whenever it happens, I mean, I assume we are morons for pronunciation, but the American pronunciation has a TH sound.

27:37Tom Vasel:Okay.

27:37Eric Summerer:It is legit.

27:38Tom Vasel:I'll allow it. Go ahead. Go ahead. It's a game about making instruments. I played a very early version, I think like two years ago, and enjoyed it, and I got a glimpse at the production version. It looks very pretty. It's another Paverson delight, I think.

27:54Eric Summerer:It's very fun. I think it will be the last giant game Paverson does for a while. Yeah. All right. Do you know anything about this next one, Fliptoons?

28:03Tom Vasel:This is a must-buy for me. It's called Fliptoons. It is a deck-building game about casting animated characters for your latest production. It seems pretty straightforward deck-building. Your hand is like a tableau. You pull out like six cards at a time and those cards can interact with each other. And then you do like a casting call and eliminate some of them. Like, you're out. You're not working for the team. And then the others sort of cycle back around. The theme looks fun. It's this cute animated thing. I am going to pick it up because it's 20 bucks.

28:35Eric Summerer:Cool, cool. Ruins. Ruins is a new John DeClaire game. It was released at Dice Tower East. Basically, you are playing a card-shedding game trying to get rid of cards from your hand. but you can upgrade these cards with clear plastic sleeves and you can be a jerk to other people.

28:52Tom Vasel:You can be a jerk to other people? What?

28:54Eric Summerer:As your own. Have you not played the game?

28:57Tom Vasel:No, I haven't played it yet. It is on my interested list, but I haven't played it yet.

29:02Eric Summerer:Yeah, I'm not sure how I feel about it yet. Some people, it's a little divisive here. Some people really like other people who are okay on it. but you have to like card shedding games and like ones where you're upgrading the cards obviously too so a lot of people are going to like that it has some really wonky scoring the one part of it that's really wonky is at the very end you're getting points each hand right and if someone gets a certain amount of points they will win the game however if by round 4 I think it's round 4 if no one has won yet then the winner of round four plays whoever has the highest points just 1v1 to see who wins the game.

29:48Eric Summerer:Interesting. So if you're in second place but you don't win that final hand too bad you will sit there and watch whoever won the final hand play whoever had the most points. It's a little odd. It's very football, you know, Super Bowl rules. Football! That's right. All right. Next is nature. Nature is a reworking of evolution. Even though it doesn't say that, that's definitely what it is. I played it. I enjoy it. I found it to be a bit basic, but that's not it. I'm not saying that necessarily negative because they're trying to sell it to a wide market and there are five modules for it. And the first I'm very excited about because it's called Dinosaurs.

30:36Tom Vasel:That's quick.

30:37Eric Summerer:Yeah. Yeah, so this is a very interactive game. It's very similar to Evolution where you build these species, build them up, and eat plants or other people's species or your own sometimes. So, yeah. Cool. That's going to be there. Rebel Princess. New cards for Rebel Princess. Yes. This has shot into my top five trick-taking games. Wow. I love Rebel Princess. I love the theme, which is hilarious. You know, like you were trying to avoid Princess's office of marriage. It's like, no, no, no, no, no.

31:15Tom Vasel:And they can't show up until they sneak into the party. I mean, it's sort of ridiculous because it's all hearts, and it's just like various aspects of hearts have been translated into the language of this game. but it's still very entertaining and the special powers are cool.

31:29Eric Summerer:Yeah. Yeah, so there's just going to be more of it there, a deluxe edition, and I know there's an expansion, so this is definitely high on my list of things I want to get.

31:36Tom Vasel:Yeah. This is the expansion only works for the deluxe edition, I believe. I was talking to a retailer a few weeks ago and she said it was, you can only use this in the deluxe edition version of the game.

31:48Eric Summerer:Interesting. Yeah. I'll have to ask them. I did not know that. It says Rebel Princess deluxe edition.

31:54Tom Vasel:Yes. Right on the title. It's an expansion for Rebel Princess Deluxe Edition. Yeah. Me. Anyway.

32:00Eric Summerer:All right. Ace of Spades. This is a solo or two-player game, but it's actually solo. It's a game where you're kind of playing two-player.

32:10Tom Vasel:Okay.

32:11Eric Summerer:Have either of you played Bellatro? Oh, yes. So this is sort of a much, much, much, much simpler, Bellatro.

32:19Tom Vasel:Interesting. Okay.

32:20Eric Summerer:You have a pile of enemies. There's 10 enemies, and you will flip an enemy over, and then you will draw a hand of eight cards, and you make the best poker hand you get to do damage to that enemy. If you defeat that enemy in a certain amount of hands and or discards, you keep that enemy and it has a one-time player power that you can use against future enemies. And some enemies have permanent powers that you get, and if you beat the final enemy, you win, I think. I got that far. I got to the final enemy once and I beat him almost down to the end. And man, I love this game. I really like it.

32:56Tom Vasel:Ooh, you just had me upgrade this. I was undecided on it. Now I'm interested.

33:00Eric Summerer:Same. You also have to like the theme, which is a hellscape Western. I mean, it's based on Lenny and Ilk. I mean, it's called Ace of Spades for a reason. So you have to like this. You know, you're fighting fiery cowboys from the pit of hell.

33:20Tom Vasel:Oh, OK. Type thing. Sure.

33:23Eric Summerer:Yeah, I knew who I was talking to. It was already upgraded. I can't go to must-have. This is as far as I go.

33:36Eric Summerer:Galactic Cruise is next on our list. This one has been out for a bit now. I mean, it was at Dice Tower West. So I wouldn't necessarily call this new per se, but it's the first big convention it's at. You need a lot of money to buy this. It's$120.

33:50Tom Vasel:Yes, and a lot of space. It's not a small box.

33:52Eric Summerer:And it's also a long game. But from what I've heard, even though it is, it says$90 to$150 on here. I'm pretty sure that's incorrect. It's closer to three hours plus. But from what I heard, even though the game is long and involved, that it's a very smooth teach.

34:08Tom Vasel:They have a lot of really nice materials for teaching the game. There's a lot of tutorial guides and how-tos and even one of those, like it says, if you need blank, if you need money, here's what you want to do. If you need resources, here's what you want to do. I really like the way that it onboards. Why can't every game do that? Yeah.

34:24Eric Summerer:How do I get pearls in this game?

34:26Tom Vasel:Yeah.

34:26Eric Summerer:Figure it out. Yes. Oh, okay.

34:29Tom Vasel:No, I love that for a tutorial guide.

34:31Eric Summerer:Then Pirates of Maracaibo, which apparently has replaced Maracaibo as an expansion. Commanders. Don't know much about that.

34:39Tom Vasel:I haven't played this, so I can't input anything on it.

34:43Eric Summerer:Soda Jerk. Chris Yee! And first game designer, Chris Yee, who I've heard that name before. I will figure it out before the end of the episode. This is a – have either of you played this?

34:58Tom Vasel:I've played once. Yeah, I played it. Dice Tower East picked up a copy. Played it on Monday.

35:03Eric Summerer:It's a very light, somewhat chaotic game where – and I was laughing at Chris. The theme is a little odd because you're making flavored drinks. But don't you dare mix strawberry with banana because nobody wants that. And you're just playing cards face down and then keeping other cards in your hand. And those cards will be worth points at the end of the game based on the cards everyone's played face down. It's a very interactive and it's called Soda Jerk. Because you will, after maybe round one, go, you know what? I hate everyone. Yeah. I'm going to ruin their drinks.

35:37Tom Vasel:Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's that. It's fun to play with because my board game group, now we've played together for a little while. So it is definitely fun when you can read when it's the bluffing piece of it. Yeah, there's a lot of bluffing. Yeah. And I highly recommend playing with the advanced rules. They have special abilities for each of the suits, basically. And you gradually add more special rules. Definitely do that. It's a lot of fun.

36:03Eric Summerer:Yep. Oh, I have not done that, actually. What? What? Well, you should. You know, here's the thing. I never let, almost ever let designers teach me their games. Yeah, I hear you. I, okay.

36:14Tom Vasel:I just imagine Chris is in the office like, hey, Tom, you got time to play? No, no, maybe later after lunch? Okay.

36:19Eric Summerer:He was actually really good about that. I didn't even know it was a game until it was signed and everything.

36:24Tom Vasel:Sweet.

36:24Eric Summerer:So next we have Point Galaxy. So this is the third iteration in the series. We had Point Salad, then Point City, then Point Galaxy. We're not going to be able to get much bigger than this.

36:36Tom Vasel:Point Universe.

36:37Eric Summerer:So I am intrigued. I hope it's... Points Out is a great game. I played Points Out 50 times or whatever. Point City is good and has actually maybe a little more game than Points Out, but I kind of preferred Points Out's simplicity. So I don't know which direction Point Galaxy will go.

36:55Tom Vasel:Yeah. I'm interested. I'm not necessarily running for this one, but I would not say no if I had the opportunity to jump in.

37:03Eric Summerer:All right. Then Compile Main 2. So this is a new version of Compile, which was originally distributed, I believe, greater than Games and Flat River Group. But now Synapsys, which has broken off from Flat River Group. They have a little small booth there, but they have a few games. And one of them is Compile. So I think this is like a new version of this. Think of a mix between Land, Air, and Sea and Smash Up.

37:33Tom Vasel:Yeah, I can see that. I got to play the first edition not too long ago. It's a beautifully produced game. The cards are really gorgeous. And I think the whole point is the wackiness of the abilities and the combination of the different powers of different factions. Yeah, Smash Up meets Land, Air, and Sea or Shot and Totten, something like that.

37:52Eric Summerer:I'd rather play Land, Air, and Sea. I think this one's fine. I love that you're both saying Land, Air, and Sea instead of Air, Land, and Sea. Is it Air, Land, and Sea? It is. Shh.

38:01Tom Vasel:Well, you would know. I would. No one will find out we said it wrong. Mm-hmm. No. Mm-hmm.

38:06Eric Summerer:All right. Next is a game that I honestly thought would be one of the hottest games there, and it's not necessarily, but we'll see. Star Wars Battle Hoth. This is Star Wars Memoir 44. Yes. You already know if you want it or not.

38:19Tom Vasel:Yep.

38:20Eric Summerer:You get to move AT-ATs around and blow up the Rebel, the shield generators. Come on now. Come on now.

38:27Tom Vasel:I would say Memoir 44 isn't as hot a commodity as it used to be, but certainly for fans of that system, If you like that and you like Star Wars, here you go. They are re-releasing Memoir 44, so we'll see.

38:39Eric Summerer:That's interesting. Galileo Galilei. This is from Tomas Halec, who is on a roll these days between this, SETI, and the Garden game. Garden City, Garden Palace, I don't know. Something Garden. I don't know. I don't either. Tea Garden. Ah, yes. Anyway. Okay. This is a fun game about discovering planets while avoiding the Inquisition, who shows every once in a while to be like, hey, stop looking into the sky. Nobody expects that. A very strong Euro-style game. It's been out since Essen, but now we have the U.S. release with Capstone Games.

39:18Tom Vasel:Yeah, it's sort of the big U.S. debut, I think. How do you say this next game, Eric? I would say Propolis or Propolis. See, that's two different ways.

39:30Eric Summerer:Anyway, this is also from Flat Out Games, the folks we just talked about with Point Galaxy. And it has something to do with bees, which I don't know that I would know from the cover. I don't see any bees. Well, I think there's little dots on the cover.

39:42Tom Vasel:Oh. They're in the sky? Well, that's where bees go. Oh. Anyway, I don't know anything about it.

39:48Eric Summerer:Hey, look, Julie, it's Final Girl Shriek. Look at that. There it is. Wait, you have to defeat a masked killer at a convention. Yes, so. I didn't know that. that's actually really interesting yes we went full meta we specifically made this a gen con release uh you are at the mega board game convention the location for this so every every game has every film has a killer and a location the location is the mega board game convention and it has uh booths like hat rock games and fortunate foul games oh boy And you are trying to get the potential victims crowd in for events and have no self-preservation skills where normally if somebody is killed around them, they panic and run away.

40:41Nope, they don't because they're trying to get the hot new game and they don't pay any attention.

40:45Tom Vasel:That's hilarious. It's like the fire alarm going off at Origins and no one leaves. And then the killer is Mort, the teenage dirtbag, and he's walking around goofing on everybody by cosplaying as other killers while actually being a killer. So you're also having to weed out the killer from the people who are just simply in cosplay.

41:08Eric Summerer:Oh, wow. I hate this guy so much. So that's our newest. It's specifically for Gen Con release. And it's a special feature, which means all the miniatures come in the box instead of having to buy them separately.

41:22Tom Vasel:Oh, boy. And it will be in room 134. Where you will play the game for real. Where you can see Julie. Where you can see me. And stuffed Mazzy.

41:32Eric Summerer:All right. Next, we have another game from All Play. Vivo is a trick-taking game where puppies sing and follow format changes every trick. a sentence never said before.

41:43Tom Vasel:Yeah, I like the idea of singing puppies. The format changing of every trick, I don't know. That sort of kept me away a little bit.

41:50Eric Summerer:I don't know. I have not played it yet. I must get to it. I don't either because it's three to four players, so I have to demo it there.

41:56Tom Vasel:There are so many trick takers in this batch. There is a lot of trick-taking games. I think I had to weed some of them out and be like, I can't be interested in all the trick-taking games. I have to say that one. Yeah, that's how it works.

42:07Eric Summerer:Sometimes. it's definitely horrific the convention again here's another horror theme game spooktacular it's from level 99 this game's fun yeah oh if you like theme so in this game you're in a movie theater and a silver screen multiplex and monsters all start bursting out except you are the monster so you pick you want to be a killer car or an evil rock band or you know some evil robots whatever it might be, and you're just going around and slicing and dicing. And it's not as gross, though, as you might think. It's very, very gamified, the actual getting rid of the patrons in the theater and all.

42:48Eric Summerer:But the theme is still kind of fun. Like one person's a telephone. Don't answer that telephone. And they get telephones all over the place.

42:54Tom Vasel:Yes.

42:56Eric Summerer:And I feel like it's a pretty good price. It's not like a super deluxe-looking game, per se, but I think the theme comes out pretty well.

43:04Tom Vasel:Right. Now, this was on display at Dice Tower West, and was that the...

43:07Eric Summerer:We had it in the hot games room.

43:08Tom Vasel:That was the retail version of this, because there were a lot of characters in that box, and I didn't see any expansions on the list from level 99.

43:17Eric Summerer:Nope. Yeah, that was it. I just got the game's Kickstarter a couple days ago, and it was almost the same thing. There might be one, or there might be an exclusive monster or something. Okay. There's like 15 in the box.

43:30Tom Vasel:Yeah, there's a lot of options in there. A lot of fun, if you like, the schlock horror sort of, and also the unequal abilities. Everybody's got sort of different rules that they're working with and then trying to figure out how you combat the other players based on the way they work. A lot of fun. It was already on my list, guys. I'm sold. Okay. That's a lot of fun.

43:54Eric Summerer:Well, if it's horror, it's on your list, so we know that. Speaking of horror, we have horrified Dungeons and Dragons. Now, the Horrified series has been getting increasingly lower rated as each set comes out.

44:06Tom Vasel:See my rant from last time, yes. But I'm like Lucy with the football. I'm still going to try the Dungeons & Dragons Horrified. I'm out.

44:13Eric Summerer:You let me know. You're out? You let me know. I think I'm out too. We got the new one in. Joey has played it twice. The first time he was ready to throw it across the room because he said the map was too complicated. Really? Then last night, I said, he played it again, and I said, okay, what do you think now? And he said, it's better. But that is not a ringing endorsement to me, saying, it's better. You know, he's like, these monsters were not as problematic with the map and all. I'm like, well, we'll see. He wants to like it, too.

44:44Tom Vasel:Yeah.

44:45Eric Summerer:Right? I'm okay. I still love the horrified first one. I love the Universal Studio Monsters so much. You know, this Dungeons & Dragons, yeah, it's okay. I'm not opposed to it, but.

44:57Tom Vasel:Thematically, I know I could play this with my kids, especially my youngest, who's a D &D fan. So, yeah, that might do it, but I'm going to have to talk to Joey. This is also one that has hit wide release now, and I think you can get it at Target stores. So this might be one I don't get at Gen Con and wait and pick up at another store.

45:16Eric Summerer:Evergreen has an expansion, Cherry Blossoms and Bamboo. Cherry Blossoms, of course, make everything better. Exit the game, Advent Calendar, the Intergalactic Race. I will get this as a matter of course because this is now an annual tradition for me and my kids to go through the Advent calendar. In fact, my daughter told me, she's like, that's why I come home. She's like, no, that's a terrible reason to come home. What do you talk about? She was laughing, but she really – she's like that's one of the things she looks forward to is doing the Advent calendar. It is. It's one of the nice. That's nice.

45:45I enjoy it because, of course, the original Advent calendars are mostly like chocolate and things like that. And I've loved finding alternative advent calendars in general over the years. And I love that Exit did this because it's one of my favorite traditions now as well.

46:03Tom Vasel:Absolutely. I actually had this in hand already because Exit was on the ball and got copies ready for Gen Con and sent some out. So I'm waiting for October. That's because last year they didn't get there in time. Ah, so they're a little more speedy this time.

46:17Eric Summerer:You have it in hand, so you're going to be sitting at it for five months.

46:20Tom Vasel:I know. It's on display, like waiting till October 1st, because that's when I usually do it so I can talk about it.

46:25Eric Summerer:Fair enough. All right. Then we have Suna Valo. This is from Capstone Games. I don't know much about it, but the designer, Andreas Odindal, is a designer of La Graña and Cooper Island, which are both very well-recognized Euro-style games. I think Capstone's on fire this year for me. This is the first on the list. They really are. I'm very excited to spend time in the Capstone booth on Sunday when I won't blow my budget.

46:54Tom Vasel:Yeah, we've talked about your plan where you don't actually get to go shopping until the end of the con. And then the things that are going to sell out anyway. Capstone is a better business for me going there on Sunday and then being like, we're sold out of everything. So I'm good. One of them will be fine. But this is the top one.

47:12Eric Summerer:I am super hyped about the next game, Chronologic. Yes. Let's go 1450. This is the second in a trilogy of these chronologic games, which are a lighter, but not too light, deduction-style games that are just amazing.

47:25Tom Vasel:They're really, really cool. Although I'm most excited about the third of the trilogy, which is like a sci-fi space one. So, yeah, I'm interested, but I really want to see the third one. It is weird thinking about, like, you know, whodunit in the Incan Empire, but who knows? You know, there's probably a lot of intrigue back then. I would think so, yeah.

47:45Eric Summerer:Sorry, card sleavers, but if you buy a wine cellar, you're going to hate that because the cards are twice the length of an ordinary card. Oh, no. Yeah, they're like the size of a wine bottle. Well, a small wine bottle, I guess. Yeah, so this is a game in which you are – everyone plays a card at the same time and then the number on the card determines who picks cards from the middle. And then you pick them from the middle and then you stack them on top of each other to make a diagonal line of point scoring. but also you get points for what vintage they are and or what country they're from based on a secret gold card.

48:19Eric Summerer:It can play up to eight players. Eight's a bit. Eight's a bit. And you definitely should play a variant that the rule book has where you split the numbers in half and give people cards from each pile. Because I played a game with seven, and one guy didn't win anything because he got all low numbers. I hear what you're saying. But there's a variant in there. That makes sense. because so whatever bottles you bid on and you take the bottle that you use to bid also is the next one for the center so you're also planning on what you're putting out for uh you know how much it's going to score you're trying to do quick math in your head for bidding do i want it or do i want it for the next round and planning accordingly and if you only have low numbers you're never going to win a bid anyway which would stink i have bad news folks we have so many games we're not going to make it through all of them.

49:11Tom Vasel:Yeah, we should look for an exit soon because I wanted to circle back on the ones we didn't get to that are like top of our lists.

49:16Eric Summerer:Well, yeah, so let's start going through the list and when you see one you'd like to mention, go for it. I know that one that's really hot is Shackleton Base. This already came out at Essen, but now it's getting the release from Pandasaurus and this is a good crunchy Euro style game with modules. Like you'll play with different modules, each one, which will change the game up. And so that's, I think, one people are going to, especially if you like the heavier Euro games, you'll enjoy that.

49:47Tom Vasel:I agree. It's a really solid game, and those modules make it pretty cool and variable. I'd say similar weight to Galactic Cruise, but one that is a rewarding, lengthy experience. Gotcha. Knitting a circle, which is also in the same area here.

50:02Eric Summerer:I'm glad you mentioned that. I'm pleased as punch about that. I like flat out a lot. Designed by Emily Vincent. And so that's going to be a lighter game experience. But it's and it's a cozy theme. You're knitting and collecting buttons and everything. But I'm very excited for that coming out. Yeah, I looked her up to see what other game she's done. And her next game that she's done is Pirates of the High Tees. Which is amazing for the record. That was on Kickstarter last winter. And it was at PAX Unplugged. And I got to play that. So, yes.

50:35Tom Vasel:Okay.

50:36Eric Summerer:You know something I'm not looking forward to, but I'm going to play anyway out of morbid curiosity, is the expansion to Ra. Ra Traders. Because I feel like Ra is a nigh-perfect game.

50:47Tom Vasel:Yeah, what do you do to it?

50:49Eric Summerer:I wasn't going to touch it. I couldn't.

50:51Tom Vasel:Yeah. I mean, Canizia did do the expansion. It's not like somebody swooped in. Swept in, Eric. To add to Canizia's design, but what do you do to Raw to make it bigger? I don't know. And staying with the Canizia theme, the Iliad from Bitewing Games is coming out, and I'm excited about that.

51:18Eric Summerer:Yeah, I need to play that one. It's a cool-looking two-player game, and Bitewing is on fire these days. Their games are so cool. Did you guys see this one in here that's called Gibberers, the word game of language invention and civilization development? I have. I read a new language to communicate from the Stone Age into the Futuristic Age. This sounds awful, and I'm going to play it. So I don't know if it's awful. I do know that there's a role-playing game that does a similar kind of thing, not a board game. So I'm curious to play it. That much I know. We must mention, for Robert's sake, Cat Tower, or Cat and the Tower, sorry.

51:54Eric Summerer:I know he's going to have a giant display of that there. I saw him building it.

51:59Tom Vasel:You'll be able to spot him from across the hall. Yes. Yes, you will. And it's delightful. It is the most bizarrely sweet and such a thematically beautiful, poignant theme. And so stressful. So stressful to play in the best way possible. because you're building like a card tower, but with uneven cards and putting meeples on them to try to get to the top. And lovely and fun. And you feel like you've accomplished something if you actually managed to build the tower, especially if you're not dexterity friendly like me.

52:42Eric Summerer:One booth to go by and check out is Fireside Games because they had the Please Don't Burn My Village game, which I like a lot. but also ham helsing yes i won ham helsing yes monster i wavered on this one and i eventually

52:58Tom Vasel:went on like i don't really need this but really it seems like it was made for you eric convince me

53:04Eric Summerer:uh it it's about a pig who's fighting vampires i don't know what else to tell you okay the artwork looks cool it's a cooperative i think it's a cooperative game right yeah i think it is it's cooperative. The tagline, two pigs, a werewolf, and a vampiric boar team up to save Mud Canyon. That is all I need, Eric. Honestly.

53:25Tom Vasel:So, I was looking at a couple of family-weight cooperative games, and I went instead with the Matt Leacock, Ben Pinchback, Matt Riddle design, The Four Doors from Happy Camper, which is sort of a fantasy. Ham housing. See, it was a yes and for me.

53:41Eric Summerer:Oh, actually, I shouldn't snore there, because Happy Camper is also on fire these days. Good grief there making great introductory games. But Four Doors was another one that I was, it definitely is on my list. There are so many games on this list. We could talk about this forever.

53:59Tom Vasel:There's certainly a couple that I know were super high on my list that aren't showing up on the list. We'll just say them, Eric. Yeah, I need to hang on a second. Raising Chicago, again, Capstone Games.

54:11Eric Summerer:That one, so I have that one, Julie and I looked at the back of the box and I was like, woof, it looks like a very involved game. That might be fun to play, but it looks like a spreadsheet to some degree. Fair enough. I'm hoping it's good. Fair enough. On the other end of the spectrum would be High Tide, which Underdog Games is doing, which is a two player game that's five to 15 minutes. So you play one and then you palate cleanse with the other. Yeah, that's true.

54:39Tom Vasel:A number game from Arcane Wonders called If Then from Scott Brady. Oh, it's so good. I got sort of the rundown at Dice Tower East, and it sounds like this is totally my jam, and this is one that I am absolutely going to seek out. A lot of the ones that are really high on my list are small little$10 to$20 games, which is great for my budget. I like that. Buttonshy has a game from Scott Alms. It's a solo game called Hyperstar Run, which is like a roguelike video game simulator, and you get like four turns to make it as far as you can through this video game level and trying to defeat the boss. And so Scott Holmes, I'm already excited about.

55:18Tom Vasel:And again,$10 for a Buttonshy game, I'm in.

55:21Eric Summerer:Well, if you like small games, we mentioned Happy Camp earlier, Jungo is what many people, by many people I mean me, are calling the Scout Killer. I really like it. Okay. I also don't like Scout, so that doesn't really help. But I'm happy campers on fire, man.

55:39Tom Vasel:Well, maybe I'll check that one out when I'm looking at the four doors. Grand Gamers Guild's releasing five of their mini escape room games at once. So I'm just going to be spending a lot of time there. Like the three of their holiday ones. Then there's one based on Endangered and one based on Tirnanog that are all little 18 card escape games. Fair enough. um speaking of my thematic journey uh above and below has haunted has a haunted version uh from red raven games which i'm definitely going to check out because i love above and below and i love a spooky theme so i think the last one for me on my list is called the peak team it's another scott alms design cooperative you're rangers that are trying to safeguard animals in a wildlife park.

56:32Tom Vasel:It's from Matago. And that one caught my interest as well and sort of won out amongst some of the other cooperative family adventure games. Fair enough.

56:42Eric Summerer:There's so many games here. People have been like, well, this year Gen Con's not going to have as much good stuff. Maybe there are fewer good games. I don't know. All I can say is there's a gazillion good ones. So how am I supposed to... How many are on this list here?

56:58Tom Vasel:For sale? it's like 430.

57:01Eric Summerer:And that's what that's... That's 430 new different games. Yeah.

57:05Tom Vasel:Yeah.

57:06Eric Summerer:Send them to Eric Martin. Yeah. So there's probably another 40. Probably. And then also, all the other games in the world haven't disappeared. So there's more games to play.

57:17Tom Vasel:That is true. All right. So to wrap things up, we should give some quick advice. If you are heading to Gen Con, what is the biggest thing that you can do to make sure you make it to the other end in good shape?

57:28Eric Summerer:Well, I always say wear comfortable shoes. Schedule some stuff, but not too much stuff. Leave yourself some free time. There's a lot of things to see and do all over the place. Go to the stadium if you can. Wander. If you see some entertainers, stop for a minute and watch them. Take some time to just breathe. Be pleasant to other people there. Be nice. Be forgiving. From when Julie hits you with her backpack.

58:00Tom Vasel:Yep.

58:01Eric Summerer:And really just kind of pace yourself. It's a good time. Last Gen Con was one of the worst Gen Cons I've ever had. But that's mostly because at the end, we had half our booth get sick a hurricane came we'd jump in a van drive back and miss the hurricane and it was just a gazillion things and also i really overscheduled last gen con so this gen con can only go up for me i'm taking my own advice and underscheduling a little julie apparently is not doing that but i didn't this was put upon me um although i'm still going to be in a room the entire time so it's not that I'm the walking piece of it I will be talking to the people in the room so I have a little bit of doubt I think you know not downtime per se but at least like not as overwhelming as seeing everything and feeling the need to be everywhere type of thing uh so I do have that going for me which is nice I always tell people so if you're driving stop at a grocery store before you get here If not, there's DoorDash, there's Uber Eats.

59:11Order groceries, order non-perishable snacks so that you're not hangry, which is a very big thing. Because even with the food trucks and the food court and restaurants in the area, there's a lot of people. And also you're going to be tempted to sit there and play a game or sign up for a game that's going to be four hours or whatever. so bring your non-perishable snacks granola bars dried fruit i like the little squeezers that are for toddlers so that i get a fruit and vegetable in there nice so you bring non-perishable snacks and then you like you know tom said he does a big breakfast in the morning big breakfast a big dinner at night if you can do that great if you can't and you think oh i'm gonna get to it you won't get to it because there's so many things.

1:00:02Have snacks. Also, remember to sleep.

1:00:06Tom Vasel:Amen. Sleep is a big one and go to sleep at a good hour. Hydrate. Don't forget you're going to be in sort of a heavy talking environment. And on that front, I know it's noisy. I know you want to be heard. I know you're excited, but don't push your voice. Make people lean in to hear you because that's how you lose your voice is pushing too hard to be heard in a noisy environment. Eric would know.

1:00:31Eric Summerer:All right, we hope to see you there. And if you're not there, don't worry. We just talked about all these games. They're all going to be available outside of Gen Con also. And we'll be back with tales of what happened, but also mostly tales of board games to tell you about. We hope you're having a fantastic day. It is summer, so stay cool. Stay dry, because it seems to be raining everywhere. And we'll see you in a couple weeks. Until then, though, I'm Tom Vassell. I'm Julie Ahern.

1:00:59Tom Vasel:And I'm Eric Sommerer. And you've been listening to At the Table. Thanks for listening. At the Table is produced by Tom, Julie, and Eric with assistance from the team at Dice Tower Studios. You can find us online on Facebook or on BoardGameGeek in the Dice Tower Guild. Promotional consideration has been provided by publishers in the form of review copies of games. Dave Culling arranged our theme based on themes by Timothy Pinkham, and the reason why the numbers 1 through 20 can never take a group photo at family gatherings is brought to you by 13 Leaves. Until next time, from all of us at the table.

1:01:29Tom Vasel:Have fun gaming.

1:01:36Eric Summerer:All right, let's put an over under on how many games Eric and Julie get. I say Julie will get 13 because she likes that number. And Eric will go in planning to get around eight and go home with 20. I'm in. Sure. I'm good. I will take those odds. You're not wrong.