Crowdfunding Round-up: Parachuting into Europe, Hauling Goods in Mid-America & Leveling Up Online

The night before June 6th, 1944, more than ten thousand Allied paratroopers were dropped into enemy territory to prepare the Normandy landings – but the troop-carrying planes were blasted by German anti-aircraft fire, scattering their airborne troops everywhere but where they were supposed to be.

You are one of these paratroopers. And as luck turns out, the winds have blown you directly where you are needed the most! As you were descending, you discovered a terrible sight: the Germans have installed two 24.0 cm Guns in a hidden bunker. Those cannons are set to fire at the beaches of Normandy. You alone can stop them from killing the Allied troops! All you need is some explosives...

In Airborne In Your Pocket, players explore their surroundings by placing Location tiles and resolving Event cards every turn. They must find the Ammo Dump to obtain some explosives and enter the bunker to sabotage its guns. Of course, there are German soldiers everywhere, so players will have to hide or fight their way through.

AIYP can be as simple (Basic Game) or as involved (Scenarios & Campaigns) as the player wishes. The Advanced Game and Scenarios allow you to play as American, British, Canadian and French soldiers. The game comes in four different sets, and each set has enough components for one player. To add more players, add more sets (up to four can play).

In The Great Heartland Hauling Co. (originally announced as Over the Road), players take on the role of medium haul Midwest truck drivers doing their best to make a living by hauling goods for big suppliers. Players truck to various locations around America's Heartland, picking up and dropping off goods using matching cards from their hands. Most locations have native goods that require fewer cards to load; other locations may pay a premium for those goods but may also require more fuel – and time – to get there with the cargo. With limited space in each trailer and only five cards in hand at a time, players will have to expertly manage their resources, as well as play the odds and press their luck to be the best trucker on the road.

The Great Heartland Hauling Co. offers a lot of replay value through the use of cards to create a variable board set-up each game. The game includes 60 goods cubes, four thick cardboard trucks, and 46 resource cards – required for pick-up and delivery – that are drawn from a shared draft board, as well as 20 fuel cards, which are used to move about the Heartland.

Plethora is a city rich with precious gemstones. Players compete to acquire gold by collecting pearl, sapphire and amber for the city's nobles. With varying prices and a need for thrifty spending, players will find themselves scurrying across the city to out do their opponents.

On their turn players roll dice to take various actions. Their first task is to make their way to one of the three nobles (yellow pawns). Once they reach a noble, they draw two rendezvous cards, accepting one. They must then reach the rendezvous point to then draw three commission cards, keeping one. Players must then complete the commission to gain the gold and silver indicated on the card.

Commissions require players to purchase gemstones from the three locations: Harbour, Quarry and Mining Camp. As more gemstones are bought, the price increases. As commissions are completed, prices are decreased. The amount of gemstones a player can buy as one action is indicated on top of the draw pile (card's back). Upon collecting the right amount of gemstones, players must then deliver them to the marked location.

Lastly, players must return to one of the three nobles and offer their gold to receive nobility. In play there are twelve nobility cards, each offering a possibly different exchange of gold for nobility.

The game ends once all but two nobility cards have been claimed. The player with the most nobility is the winner!

SolForge takes place on a world whose sun has gone dark, transforming most of the planet into a frozen, barren wasteland. All of the world's heat and light come from the SolForge, a gargantuan spire imbued with mystic powers that protects the planet from an ancient evil. The forge also serves as a source of magical power for those who have learned to decipher its secrets. Competing factions struggle to harness the powers of the forge to advance their own agendas, but a looming threat is emerging from the planet’s melting ice that may doom them all.

SolForge will have a single-player campaign mode, in which players can explore the world and face epic challenges. The decisions you make in the campaign can have far reaching impact on the story as it unfolds!

We wanted to make the gameplay of SolForge fast and easy to play on mobile devices, so the core of the engine is very simple. Each turn, a player plays two cards out of their five card hand, and then discards all of the unplayed cards and draws five more for their next turn. That's it – no casting costs, no resources – just pick and play. Every few turns, each player re-shuffles their deck and discard pile together, giving them a chance to draw their higher level cards.

The mechanic at the core of SolForge is card transformation. Whenever you play a card, it levels up to a new, more powerful version. You might play a Dragon Egg, which turns into a Dragon Whelp, which ultimately becomes a Giant Dragon! Not only do you get to play with progressively more powerful cards, but you can watch as your creatures transform into massively powerful monsters and smash your opponents!