Crusaders Games

Family Games

These family orientated competitive or co-operative games are in my collection for their overall gameplay, theme and presentation, and for not being overly complex or time consuming to complete.

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1. Everdell (2018) – Starling

A worker placement game set in the valley of Everdell, this is the most beautiful game around. You assign your critters into the meadow or forest to gather resources, or collect and play cards to build yourself a woodland city. There are three seasons to play through and the cards you choose to build your village will cleverly interact to set up combinations or score victory points. Each game some of the forest locations and special events will change to keep you on your toes so you will end up building your city in a different way each time. Not only is this game amazing to look at, but it delivers on its simple mechanics to provide a deeper level of strategy than you would initially think, while never being overly complex. A superbly balanced and extremely fun game which is playable solo too. My more detailed overview > Everdell

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2. Tidal Blades (2020) – Druid City

This is a worker placement game set in a beautiful world on an island resort and uses dice as an important mechanic. The game is strikingly stunning with the artwork and components arguably some of the best you will see. Your young hero in this game will undertake stunt challenges during the game to impress the judges, progress up the champions board and earn victory points. Alongside this you will need to defend your island home from the monster creatures that are trying to destroy it. Undertaking these tasks will reward you with trait upgrades, which translate into stronger dice to roll as the game progresses. This is a great game that just looks so amazing, and there is even a solo variant included too. I own the deluxe edition and my pride of ownership is sky high. My more detailed overview > Tidal Blades

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3. Edge of Darkness (2019) – Alderac

A competitive card drafting and sleeving game, a mechanism that remains fairly unique in board gaming. You will run a city guild, using a set of ten locations to build your empire focusing on increasing your agents, gaining wealth and attacking or defending the monsters which emerge from the tower. You will be building an engine and using agents to trigger city bonus effects, and each round you also get to draft and sleeve a new action into one of your cards, which can be used immediately and remains in the game for future turns. This game has eight turns that run pretty smoothly and are reasonably quick to execute. Games can be set up with a different combinations of city locations and structures which then change the available cards and actions that can be played, and as such it is extremely versatile. My more detailed overview > Edge of Darkness
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4. Nemesis (2018) – Awaken Realms

This is a co-operative and optionally competitive survival game set on a dark space ship, with a strong aliens theme and amazing production quality and excellent alien miniatures. Each of the characters have unique skills and strengths in their card deck, and you will play to survive and escape from the ship, but with your own secret agendas and objectives to complete, some of which can be traitor style if selected. Playing Nemesis produces tension and atmosphere and you will soon be needing multiple rooms or items to survive or remove contamination, as well as ensuring the ship is not destroyed by fire or mechanical breakdown. The game is geared more towards one shot game sessions, and is very close to being a dungeon crawler with its room reveals, events and encounters, and there is a short campaign story book and an aftermath follow on story box > Nemesis
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5. Vindication (2018) – Orange Nebula

An island exploration game with a cube resource management mechanic, each player starts as a wretch washed up on a beach, looking to redeem their honour by interacting with the world they are uncovering. Using cubes you can recruit companions and mounts, take control of locations you find, fight monsters, gain traits and collect relics. Every game throws up a different mix of island lay out, encounters and available items which creates a new story and strategy each time you play.  At its heart you are managing limited resources, moving cubes between potential, influence and the more potent conviction, then using them on the island board. There is so much you can do each game, and many different ways to win and selecting your best options is the key. It has great theme and artwork too and many modules you can add or remove to change up the gameplay. My more detailed overview > Vindication
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6. Eleven (2022) – Portal

Eleven is a football manager board game where you take over the running of a club, supported by three directors. While predominantly a solo game, it can also be played competitively where victory points determine the winner. You will be given an objective scenario, and you will balance the building of your team with employing staff, developing trainees and building your stadium infrastructure. Match days are a great mix of using limited scouting information to set up your tactics, defending opposition shots while trying to create your own chances. The game is a mix of euro mechanics, engine building but remains predominantly card based drafting from a random and limited pool of those available each time. It is great fun and the best simulation of football management found in board format. My more detailed overview > Eleven 
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7. Heat (2022) – Days of Wonder / Flamme Rouge (2016) – Stronghold

Heat is a card driven racing game using standard decks of cards to optimise racing tactics around a race track. This is a family friendly easy game to teach and one that all ages can play, containing some basic strategic choices, but one that really keeps you interested. Modular add on options exist in the core box, such as garage upgrades and weather, which change up the gameplay and add extra variety, plus there is a campaign and a solo mode too. It is the best racing game around. An alternative card hand management racing game, and slightly more straightforward is Flamme Rouge where each player competes as a team of two riders within a peloton, using a jigsaw of double sided track tiles. You have a sprinter who can break away at speed, and rouleur who is more steady and consistent.
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8. Dice Throne Adventures (2021) – Roxley

Dice Throne was originally a competitive dice battling game based on the yahtzee three roll mechanism to activate character abilities and wear down your opponent. The adventures box is a co-operative expansion upgrade that turns it into a light dungeon crawl experience with minions and boss battles, wrapped together by a simple campaign to beat four bosses. This game is now a real mix of dice rolling, dungeon crawling and light deck building, as after each stage of the adventure you will obtain loot to improve your deck of cards, which you play to boost or tweak your dice rolling. The artwork and production of all elements of this game are amazing and its easy mechanics and really fun dice rolling make it family friendly, where learning and building up a character is a neat experience. My more detailed overview > Dice Throne Adventures
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9. Abyss (2014) – Bombyx

A card drafting game where your aim is to gain influence and rule the undersea world by recruiting various sea lords to your cause. This has some of the best artwork of any game and a really lovely theme, and has a simple set of actions, as you decide whether to buy minion cards using pearls or potentially allow other players to get them. The main strategy comes through using the minions to recruit the undersea lords to help you, and each will bring you different abilities for either instant or future use. You then choose to take over undersea locations to enhance your victory points position. Elements of pushing your luck on card drafting combine with recruiting the best lords to make an excellent family game, and expansions really do improve the gameplay. My more detailed overview > Abyss

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10. Kingsburg (2007) – Z-Man

Kingsburg is a great worker placement game using dice rolling and allocation. You are the lords of the realm, aiming to build the best part of the kingdom, gather resources from the kings council, and building structures. Each winter an enemy invasion will remain something you need to defend, but how much resource will you allocate to it. This is relatively low complexity for a worker placement game, with enough choices to keep engagement for all player levels, and has been one of my favourites for a long time. The second edition of the game wrapped up various expansion into one box and added some extra adviser changes, but largely did not change the game much at all. My more detailed overview > Kingsburg
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11. Champions of Midgard (2015) – Grey Fox

A worker placement game, where each player is a viking tribe looking to defend the village and conquer new monsters to obtain the most glory over 8 rounds. Your workers will obtain gold, food and wood and also recruit axemen, swordsmen and spearmen who will then go out each round to fight trolls, draugr and other larger creatures found across the seas. Battles are dice based which adds a nice change in mechanic alongside worker placement. The artwork is great, and there is plenty to think about, from buying ships to seeking advice from the runemaster or taking new objectives from the seer. New expansions added extra leaders, archer dice, more monsters and deepened the game with new mechanics. My more detailed overview > Champions of Midguard
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12. Ticket To Ride (2004) – Days Of Wonder

The classic train route building game, with a simple concept to learn and so enjoyable to play. Build your railway routes connecting cities across America, deciding how many routes you will take on, or maybe go for the longest overall route. Collecting different coloured carriages to form your train connections, you can never really tell who has won the game until all the completed routes are revealed right at the end. It is so easy to teach and the replay value is extremely high. A top class family game which is my wife’s favourite. Many expansions are available covering maps of different countries and adding in some minor extra rules variations. My more detailed overview > Ticket to Ride
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13. Dungeonquest (2014) – Fantasy Flight

This dungeon adventure game has been around since 1985, now updated with improved artwork and components. This is a push your luck style adventure where you gradually lay small tiles on a board as you progress towards the central treasure chamber where a dragon in sleeping and you must try to steal treasure before he awakens. This game is largely about unfortunate events and survival, and once you know this, it becomes a fun game, as you laugh at terrible things that happen to your heroes. With a time track counting down before the dungeon traps you all in, the play time is consistent and not overly long. This game is extremely luck based, but is a fun and dangerous adventure where the chances of survival are very low indeed. My more detailed overview > Dungeonquest
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14. Forest Shuffle (2023) – Lookout

A card combination game where each player builds their own forest, adding in creatures and animals to their ecosystem around their trees. The mechanics of the game are really simple, each turn either playing a card paying its cost, or pick up two cards from either the clearing or blind from the deck. The trick of the game is the acorn points you score via the combinations that build from your various tree types and the forest denizens. As an eco friendly game that fits it’s theme well and has great artwork and a simple structure that anyone can play. If you enjoy nature and want to play at building an eco system, this game is a straightforward option, with only the final scoring feeling complex in any way. My more detailed overview > Forest Shuffle
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15. Smallworld (2009) – Days Of Wonder

A territory game where you try to conquer a small world using various fantasy races each with differing special abilities, and rack up victory points as you progress. These races wont last long in dominance so you need to make the most of their time on the board before it goes into decline. As the special abilities and armies are separate, each game will bring different army combinations and abilities into play which keeps the game fresh. The artwork is lovely and the gameplay is quite simple and yet very fun. Expansion armies and a stand alone Underworld version are also available to add additional replay value. This game works brilliantly with all ages, and as such has seen more family play than any other game, but is more fun than strategically deep. My more detailed overview > Smallworld
Previously Owned Family Games …due to space and funding restrictions i regularly trade out games to fund and try newer ones, producing an ever changing favourites list, but one of these games may be right for you.

Spirit Island (2017) – co-operative game which pits players as spirits helping to defend an island from an invading force. Has light deckbuilding and is a puzze style game similar to Pandemic. I really enjoy this game, but a close friend has a copy which i play often

Battlelore Second Edition (2013) – two player fantasy miniatures strategic battle that has a boardgame feel and an accessible play style, with a hex based landscape board. Great game, sold once my son grew up and stopped playing > Battlelore 2nd Edition

Space Hulk (2014) / Claustrophobia (2009) / Tannhauser (2007) / Hybrid (2003)– all great model based two player competitive campaign battles in varying themes, but were replaced to invest in more co-operative style games and dungeon crawlers

Other family style games i used to own and sold include : Lords of Waterdeep, Spirit Island, Blood Rage, Cyclades, Mechs vs Minions, Undaunted Normandy, King of Tokyo, Caverna, Jamaica, Elder Sign, Dungeon Petz, 7 Wonders, Forbidden Island, Bruges, Fresco, Legends of Andor, Heroquest, Shadows over Camelot, Temple of Chac, Arcadia Quest, Carcassonne, Android Netrunner, Subbuteo, Formula 1