Playing Card Information

Designer Diary: Monsters Menace the World

This was an opportunity to include ideas for the playable monsters that did not make the cut, such as Pollendust or Gargantis, as well as a good way to incorporate the "military monsters" from Monsters Menace America.Originally, the idea was you would find these minions throughout the course of the game, but to ensure that we tested these minions enough, during playtests everyone started the game with a minion to give them more game time — and it quickly became apparent that the minion monsters,

Dale Yu: Review of Tussie Mussie and Dionysia

Tussie Mussie Designer: Elizabeth Hargrave Publisher: Button Shy Games Players: 2-4 Age: 8+ Time: 20 minutes Played with review copy provided by publisher Tussie mussies exemplified the Victorian custom of assigning meaning to the flowers that friends and lovers exchanged. … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/11/07/dale-yu-review-of-tussie-mussie-and-dionysia/">Continue reading →</a>

Flip Runes in Carnuta, Go All In with Predictions, and Visit a Spooky Tower

On a turn, you either draft two adjacent terrain cards from a six-card river or play cards to place your next camp on the board.To place a camp, you must discard a card that matches the terrain of your camp from which you're starting — and initially you have only one camp on the board — then a card for each terrain you pass through until you reach your final destination. (You can cross any number of water spaces for a single card, but otherwise you discard one card for each hex you cross.)Each c

Dale Yu: Review of Citizens of the Spark

Citizens of the Spark Designer: Philip duBarry Publisher: Thunderworks Players: 1-5 Age: 14+ Time: 45-60 minutes Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/41ifd4Z Played with review copy provided by publisher The fate of creatures touched by the spark of intelligence hangs in the … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/11/06/dale-yu-review-of-citizens-of-the-spark/">Continue reading →</a>

Dale Yu: Review of Ringer

Ringer Designer: David Yakos Publisher: Mindward Players: 2-5 Age: 8+ Time: 20 minutes Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4mNN3qD Played with review copy provided by publisher Play cards in numerical order or different colors to try and match the dice in the … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/11/05/dale-yu-review-of-ringer/">Continue reading →</a>

In 2026, Red Notice Pits Forger Against FBI

The forger starts the game with two of four or five identities, and after you've ditched your second identity, the next nab will be the last one, with the FBI agent putting you in jail permanently.The FBI agent has two random abilities revealed, but if the forger gains the action, they get to discard the ability of their choice before the agent uses the other one.Within a tight design, supplemented by 1970s-style art by Amélie Guinet that provides a nice atmosphere, Red Notice has a lot going on

Discover New Teams to Tag, Create a Panorama, and Spar over Oddball

Staying on theme, these sets will take a "tag team" approach when it comes to design, with the as-yet-to-be-named "Arthurian legend" set being by Benoit Turpin and Florian Sirieix, the third IP-based set by Christian Kudahl, and the fourth set by the original designers.Work-in-progress art and designThe Arthurian set will contain six characters with the same average complexity as those in the original release:• Morgan lets you see the card the opponent adds to their deck, although not where they

Dale Yu: Review of Dice Words

Dice Words Designer: Tim Phillips Publisher: Thames & Kosmos Players: 2-4 Age: 8+ Time: 30 min Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4mN6gbM Played with review copy provided by publisher In Dice Words, each player begins by choosing a set of seven letter … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/11/04/dale-yu-review-of-dice-words/">Continue reading →</a>

Got Five? I'll Give You a Clue about Blue Orange's 2026 Games

When an animal reaches a space in the finish lane, it's done moving, and once all seven spaces are filled, players tally their points, with animals that finish later being worth more points and with tortoises earning more points than hares.Non-final art and materials▪️ Other items coming from Blue Orange (EU) include new versions of Dan Levy's Ruckus in February 2026 — marking more than two decades of longevity for this frantic card game — and Ryan Wallace's What's The Point?: The Cactus Card Ga

Alison Brennan: Game Snapshots – 2025 (Part 27)

Alison Brennan: Game Snapshots – 2025 (Part 27) A while back I had a rant about the casual misogyny found in rule books in relation to using he/him (not examples, but in the actual rules and card effects) and how … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/11/03/alison-brennan-game-snapshots-2025-part-27/">Continue reading →</a>

Designer Diary: First-Class Letters, or Alphabetical Challenge, Finding Game's Home, Minimal Rules

This was something I'd noticed in my own early playtesting, which is why I'd so quickly cut the game down from ten rounds to five.Paul's suggestion was simple: At the start of the game, roll the three dice. Your second, fourth, and sixth words had to start with those three letters.The biggest difference between this and the final scoresheet was the addition of an alphabet down the sideI'm a big proponent of "every idea is worth playtesting", so even though I had a million reasons this wouldn't w

Dale Yu: Review of Waddle

Waddle Designer: Corne van Moorsel Publisher: Allplay Players: 2-5 Age: 8+ Time: 15 minutes Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4pKevrZ Played with review copy provided by publisher Strategically place your penguins to form groups and claim fish to score the most points! … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/11/02/dale-yu-review-of-waddle/">Continue reading →</a>

Dale Yu: Review of Qwirkle Flex

Qwirkle Flex Designer: Susan McKinley Ross, Reiner Knizia Publisher: MindWare Players: 2-4 Age: 8+ Time: 30 minutes Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/3IhvLUn Played with review copy provided by publisher Take your Qwirkle strategy in a whole new direction! Tiles with three … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/11/01/dale-yu-review-of-qwirkle-flex/">Continue reading →</a>

Dale Yu: Review of Spooktacular

Spooktacular Designer: D. Brad Talton, Jr Publisher: Level 99 Players: 1-5 Age: 12+ Time: 45 minutes Played with review copy provided by publisher Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4oyG99U It’s Halloween night, 1986, and the all-night Spooktacular Film Festival is running in … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/10/31/dale-yu-review-of-spooktacular/">Continue reading →</a>

Design Diary: Stitch: The Fix for 626, or A Love Letter to an Alien

by <a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/blog/1?bloggerid=15693" >Jorge Zhang</a> <div style=''><a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/image/8822732"><img src="https://cf.geekdo-images.com/C3Z-e9ZZKOpU9P5CWZWVLQ__small/img/ufWnIfT0MC4u78AH09wrCAZ_oBU=/fit-in/200x150/filters:strip_icc()/pic8822732.png" border=0></a></div>Hi there! I led the design of <a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/436219/stitch-the-fix-for-626" >Stitch! The Fix for 626</a>, which is a <a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/277085/love-letter" >Love Letter</a> system game, and I am here to share a few stories about its development. Setting the Stage Every game designer will tell you that complexity is a constant battle, and this project was no exception. It was important to me that a bright kid could follow along and still have a good time, even if they were not strategizing. It was also important to have mechanical differentiation from other Love Letter games, that is, I should tailor the mechanisms to better fit the theme and offer novelty to Love Letter fans. Lilo as the Princess Lilo felt natural to me as the Princess — the most powerful card to hold at the end of the round. In Love Letter, this strength is counterbalanced by the fact that the Princess loses you the game when played or discarded, but that's not the case in this design as our licensing partners rightfully pointed out that it would feel bad for an iconic character to not have a cool effect. I had to find a creative solution here, which is where Cobra Bubbles comes in. In the movie, Cobra Bubbles often catches Lilo and Nani causing trouble, so he made the perfect sense for this role. Cobra Bubbles' power is to look at another player's hand, and if he finds Lilo or Nani, then the player holding Lilo or Nani is out of the round! <center><div style=''><a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/image/8899678"><img src="https://cf.geekdo-images.com/rksm0rH2s6Bvj1wb1cTyZw__small/img/HezAjXc4B5xVBPKG0TR7coEj_BY=/fit-in/200x150/filters:strip_icc()/pic8899678.png" border=0></a></div></center> Representing Stitch If Lilo is the Princess, then what about Stitch? I considered making Stitch a second princess, but I felt that this made Lilo — that is, the Princess — less special...and yet it was important for Stitch to have a main role, so I didn't like the idea of putting him on a different card. At the same time, I was thinking about how to represent Stitch's chaotic nature as a character who is equally capable of destruction and of good. That's when I landed on the idea of Stitch being a token. Since tokens have two sides, Stitch could flip back and forth between his "good" side and "destructive" (Experiment 626) side, making him as chaotic and unpredictable as he is in the movies. Cut from Development A large part of managing complexity is having discipline, and this meant that I had to sacrifice some of my favorite mechanisms for the greater good of the game. I won't go too deeply into these as they could still show up in a future Love Letter product, but I'll share one of my favorites. We had a version of Jumba that let you laugh like an evil genius and instantly win the round if you had the Stitch token on the Experiment 626 side. This was a fun card, but something interesting emerged in testing — suddenly, you wanted to have Stitch on his not-good side! This created a weird meta and needed to be axed. <div style=''><a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/image/8899679"><img src="https://cf.geekdo-images.com/w01bUKDLwELcYzoeOsJIJQ__small/img/QVg9YwjEMxfW3agvFF4VV9WdUWQ=/fit-in/200x150/filters:strip_icc()/pic8899679.png" border=0></a></div>Player Count When recording data during playtests, I started noticing that the ratio of games ending with only one player standing (compared to the deck running out) was a lot higher at low player counts. This ratio also occurs in other Love Letter games, but for this particular version of the game, it was undermining the core mechanism of Stitch: a token whose effect kicks in when hands are compared at deck out. I started looking at all the ways that players could be knocked out of the round. Sparky, numbered 3, stood out as an issue. Sparky makes you compare hands with another player, and the player holding a lower number is out of the round. With two copies in the deck, a game with two or three players is nearly guaranteed to end the round with the last person standing. I looked at several possible solutions, one being to allow you to lose Good Stitch to avoid being eliminated by Sparky. While this played well, it was also complex. The Gordian Knot solution worked best: a rule that you remove the 3s from the deck at lower player counts. Another player count decision I made was limiting the game to 2-5 players. This version of the game doesn't have enough cards to support a six-player version well, and I felt that it was more important to nail down the 2-5 player experience than it was to make compromises to fit in an additional player. What's Next? <div style=''><a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/image/5187432"><img src="https://cf.geekdo-images.com/FAlbPXjS_EQu-kXbrUZ19Q__small/img/7xRarocY9O2c5rrER3C64Ga0HTQ=/fit-in/200x150/filters:strip_icc()/pic5187432.png" border=0></a></div>This game is particularly special to me as it was the last <a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgamepublisher/538/z-man-games" >Z-Man Games</a> project I fully completed before starting a new role as a developer for <a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/387866/star-wars-unlimited" >Star Wars: Unlimited</a>. I am grateful that I got the chance to work on a game line as iconic as Love Letter, and I can't wait to see players get their hands on the game! If you have any questions or want to let me know about your game experience, feel free to send me a message or leave something in the comments. Thank you for reading! <a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgamedesigner/112177/jorge-zhang" >Jorge Zhang</a>

In 2026, IELLO Invites You to Grow Veggies, Fight Rats, Collect Two Tricks, and Build with Bunnies

Eric Martin French publisher IELLO is another company that previews its release line-up for the next year at SPIEL Essen, so let's get a taste for what's coming — and thanks to a distribution deal with Blue Orange Games, IELLO titles will be available in North America once again starting in November 2025 with Little Soldiers, King of Tokyo: Luchador, King of Tokyo: Mindbug, and Popcorn, among other titles.▪️ Speaking of Little Soldiers, a wargame/party game combo from Florent Baudry and Adrien F

Opinionated Gamers Review: Wordsy (2025, Allplay)

Wordsy Designer: Gil Hova Publisher: Allplay Players: 1 – 6 Ages: 10+ Time: 20 Minutes Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4gCOSoC Wordsy is a streamlined re-implementation of Prolix. Each round, players study the 8 letters (always consonants) on the board in real … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/10/30/opinionated-gamers-review-wordsy-2025-allplay/">Continue reading →</a>

Dale Yu: Review of Fliptoons

Fliptoons Designers: Jordy Adan and Renato Simoes Publisher: Thunderworks Players: 1-4 Age: 10+ Time: 20 minutes Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/45HYoSt Played with review copy provided by publisher It’s time to cast the next great animated show! A top talent agent … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/10/29/dale-yu-review-of-fliptoons/">Continue reading →</a>

Take a Trip to Buttonville, Peek Inside Labyrinth: Chronicles, and Get a Vision of alea's Future

While the deck has four suits, you're free to play any card on your turn, and once all players have played a card, you resolve the turn, with the highest-played card being discarded from play and all other cards returning to their player's hand...except that each card has a special effect — some instant, some at turn's end — and those effects have a huge impact on the game.Calm, for example, is a green 4 that's discarded if any red card is played, so if your teammate plays Calm, you want to make

SETI’s Search Ends With Two More Game Awards

In addition to everything else associated with it, Essen represents the unofficial end of the annual game award season. We’ve already mentioned the a la carte results which were announced there. A newer tradition is the revelation of which of … <a href="https://opinionatedgamers.com/2025/10/28/setis-search-ends-with-two-more-game-awards/">Continue reading →</a>