This week, I got to play Heat: Pedal to the Metal, Red7, Captain Sonar, and Sagrada.

Heat, at least the base game, felt too balanced. Every time there was a turn with a speed limit, everybody would bunch up one after the other. We added the car customization module, which helped a lot with letting players get ahead, but then also made the game feel like it was stacked from the start. I don’t know if I would play this again.

Red7 and Carl Chudyk games in general are great. I love the multi-use card design in all his games, and it really makes me want to play Innovation/Mottainai again!

Captain Sonar has been a perennial favourite of mine, but it’s hard to find eight people willing to play it. After one game, two people said “never again” and four people really enjoyed it. Too stressful for some, probably?

Finally, Sagrada. I love how pretty the game is - those dice look delicious - but the gameplay personally feels a bit flat. Our group is too nice to deny others in the dice drafting. :)

Sushi Go, Decrypto, and Dune Imperium.

My group has basically fully converted from Codenames to Decrypto now that everybody’s familiar with the rules. They’re terrible at arriving on time, so it’s great that the game supports a ton of people, and they can join halfway through without much hassle.

Sushi Go is still great - at this point I should probably try the Party version since I’ve played it so much. Liked Coup Rebellion G54 less than the original, and that game has the same concept of “add more cards to a good base game”, so I’m hesitating…

Dune Imperium is as good as ever.

Dune Imperium. Worker placement, (minor) deck building, and PvP combat — mashing the three together shouldn’t work this well together but it does.

I really like that the core loop of the game is easy enough to pick up. Makes it easier to introduce new people to the game. Design is oozing with theme and text/iconography is really clear (looking at you, Race for the Galaxy). Plus the expansions are all great! After two years of playing, it’s definitely one of my all-time favourites.