Build a Viking Clan in Lofoten, and Run an Elven Workshop in Woodcraft

Build a Viking Clan in Lofoten, and Run an Elven Workshop in Woodcraft
I recently published BGG's Origins Game Fair 2022 Preview, which will keep growing with U.S. game releases until the show opens on June 8, but European publishers already have their eyes on SPIEL '22, which takes place October 6-9. Here are a few of the upcoming games from this show that I've come across:

Board Game: Lofoten
Non-final cover

• Belgian publisher Pearl Games will release the two-player game Lofoten from Sébastien Dujardin. Here's an overview of the setting and goal:
Quote:
Today considered one of the most beautiful archipelagos in the world, Lofoten was a important Viking land.

The Vikings have long since become legendary figures. We imagine them wearing their horned helmets, ready to leap from their longships with bellicose howls. Their warlike exploits did indeed exist — except that their helmets were not never adorned with horns. That image that we keep is quite close to reality, but it is also a caricature and incomplete. The Vikings were also, in several areas, pioneers ahead of their times that helped move the world forward. Knowing how to adapt to situations, they were, depending on the circumstances, peaceful settlers, builders, invaders, and very skilled traders. It is this last point that will be developed in Lofoten, a game for two players with innovative card hand management and a rotating board, as well as some of the low blows and other shenanigans for which Vikings are known.

Board Game: Lofoten
Prototype in the Pearl Games studio

In the game, players represent the Jarl (the leader) of a Viking clan established on an island in Lofoten. With your men, you try to be the most skillful to trade with the opposing clan and to control the four basic goods: sheep, mead, fish, and treasure. Your goal is to withstand the dreaded winters and, incidentally, enrich yourself. The Jarls lead a fleet of four longships capable of loading goods at the market before storing them in the warehouses of their village. The player who finishes with the most power points wins.
• Czech publisher Delicious Games is soliciting input on the Q3 2022 release Woodcraft from designers Ross Arnold and Vladimír Suchý:


Those eyes are rather Coraline for my tastes, looking straight through me to the back of my head. In any case, here's a teaser description from the publisher:
Quote:
In Woodcraft, you play as elves running competing workshops in the woods, with you gathering wood and crafting goods for your customers. Along the way, you hire helpers, improve your workshop, and buy different types of wood and other tools to create the best workshop you can.

Board Game: Woodcraft
Prototype

During the game, players complete their projects with wood (dice) that can be cut down to size, glued back together, and adjusted using dice manipulation to be as efficient as possible with their resources.

Whoever builds the best, most successful workshop wins.
From gallery of Photodump
• In March 2022, I wrote about two late 2022 releases coming from German publisher KOSMOS: Reiner Knizia's My Island and CATAN: Dawn of Humankind, which is presumably by Klaus Teuber. Other titles coming from KOSMOS in late 2022 include:

Machi Koro: Die neue Stadt, by Masao Suganuma, with this presumably being the German version of Machi Koro 2
Inside Job, by Tanner Simmons, with this being a semi-cooperative trick-taking game in which a hidden Insider attempts to sabotage the team and gather intel
EXIT: Das Spiel - Das Verschwinden des Sherlock Holmes, by Inka and Markus Brand, with players trying to figure out why the famous detective is the prime suspect in a murder case
EXIT Kids: Rätselspaß im Dschungel, by the Brands, with this being designed for puzzles solvers as young as six years old
Karak: Regent, by Petr Mikša, which includes new heroes and other materials for the labyrinth-crawling, treasure-grabbing game Karak

From gallery of W Eric Martin
Board Game: Inside Job
From gallery of W Eric Martin
From gallery of W Eric Martin
From gallery of Photodump

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