New Game Round-up: Draw Sunflowers, Steal Eggs, Then Race for a Crown

Every hundred years, the King organizes a race between the different clans living in the Kingdom of Ewala. The reward for the winners? The throne! The winner's clan will rule the country for a whole century!

In Kingdom Run, four athletes from each clan are ready to use their legs and…your brain! Strangely enough, the faster you are, the faster your opponent can be. More specifically, each step forward that you take means two steps forward for them…unless the gap between you is too big. Who will be smart enough to become the next king of Ewala?

In more detail, on their turn, a player rolls four dice that give actions they can do. (One reroll is possible for some of the dice.) You can chose to move your athletes forward, but you can also decide to move the other athletes instead so that you can go farther yourself! When a cell contains four people, it is full and the athletes that should have ended there will go one cell farther. That would be a convenient way to avoid the lake, wouldn't it, by placing only opposing athletes in the water...?

Once an age, a mythic wind lifts the veil between the spirit world and ours. Whimsical seraphs, drawn to the vigor of an ancient forest, descend through clouds to once again take up their centennial game. You are one of these seraphs – a being of great power and curiosity. The life of the forest fascinates you, and you eagerly gather plant, animal, and sprite alike to add to your mystical menagerie. But beware, for you are not alone. Other beings just like yourself contest to collect the life of the forest as well!

In Spirits of the Forest, players represent the four elements that nourish the forces of nature. Up to four players compete to acquire the most (of nine different) spirit symbols which are bound to a different element of nature. Each turn, a player drafts up to two spirit tiles from the forest (a common pool of 48 spirit tiles), collects favor tokens and moves, places, or recovers gemstones. Players continue taking turns until all tiles have been collected from the forest. At the end of the game, players score nature points for each spirit (augmented by favor tokens) of which they have a majority. Whoever has the most nature points at the end of the game wins.

In Sunflower Valley, you draw your own mountain valley based on the tactical use of a shared pool of dice. Spread your villages throughout the valley and connect them with railways to earn points. Meanwhile, gain extra rewards for cheering up your villagers by cleverly planting sunflowers around the mountains. Remember that your villagers need enough sheep, too! And there are other players out there competing for the most valuable dice, so grab a pen and start drawing your valley in this creative strategy game!

Score points by drawing icons in the colored regions on your drawing map by cleverly using the dice. The game ends when no free spots remain on any player's drawing map. The player with the highest score at the end of the game wins!