New Game Round-up: Monks Brewing, Detectives Chasing, and Devil Pigs Teasing

New Game Round-up: Monks Brewing, Detectives Chasing, and Devil Pigs Teasing
Board Game: Heaven & Ale
• Apparently it's time to start covering titles that will debut at SPIEL 2017 in October as eggertspiele has revealed the final cover for Heaven & Ale, a design by Michael Kiesling and Andreas Schmidt that puts you in charge of monks in a brewery. In more detail:

Quote:
You have been assigned to lead an ancient monastery and its brewery. Now it's your time to brew the best beer under God's blue sky!

The fine art of brewing beer demands your best timing. In order to get the best results of your production, you have to provide your cloister's garden with fertile resources and the right number of monks helping with the harvest — but keep your brewmaster in mind as he is ready and eager to refine each and every one of your barrels!

In Heaven & Ale, you have to overcome the harsh competition of your fellow players. There is a fine balance between upgrading your cloister's garden and harvesting the resources you need to fill your barrels. Only those who manage to keep a cool head are able to win the race for the best beer!
Board Game: Destination X
• Norwegian publisher Aporta Games will debut Destination X from Bård Tuseth and Kristian Amundsen Østby, with the name calling to mind the hunt for Mr. X in Scotland Yard, although in this game it's enough to peg the country in which the spy is located in order to rack up a victory. Here's an overview:

Quote:
Destination X is a game of one-against-many: One player takes the moderator role as a spy on the run, while the remaining players are detectives who must cooperate and use their deductive skills and geographical knowledge to track down the spy and identify their secret destination.

At the beginning of each round, six destination cards are placed face up on the table. The spy secretly chooses one of the destinations, and flips to the chosen country's page in the handbook. Each detective is given three informant cards, and in turn each detective must play an informant to get information about the spy's secret destination. The spy must find the relevant information in the handbook and answer truthfully. The informants may provide information on various aspects such as population, industry, religion, history, economy, and so on. After a detective has played an informant, the detective must also eliminate one of the destinations on the table.

At any time, the detectives can decide to guess on the spy's destination. If they guess correctly, the detectives win the round; otherwise the spy wins. The spy also wins if the detectives run out of informant cards, so the detectives must manage their resources well and not spend too much time or else the spy will manage to get away. The first side to win three rounds wins the game.
Board Game: Atlas: Enchanted Lands
• Designer J. Alex Kevern is becoming a regular with Renegade Game Studios, with his Sentient due out in Q3 2017 and the freshly announced Atlas: Enchanted Lands coming in Q4 2017. Here's an overview of that latter game:

Quote:
Atlas: Enchanted Lands is an elegant card game set in a world of fairies and magic. Play cards to reveal a certain place and time — and place your stake in one of the two. Explore a location at dawn, day, sunset, and night, or see what the whole land looks like in the dark. Each card offers two choices, and it's up to you to uncover the world that awaits.

In more detail, players are challenged to predict the time or place that will be uncovered first. Cards laid on the board will complete sets. Depending on the cards chosen by the players, sets of similar cards or numerically ascending cards will be revealed, granting points to the players that deduced the correct combination.
Fully Baked Ideas, the adults-only imprint of Looney Labs, will release Adult Mad Libs: The Game on June 22, 2017, with this design featuring the same gameplay as Andy Looney's Mad Libs: The Game but with racier or more suggestive words. Adult party games are a thing, yo!

• On Facebook, Yann and Clem from Devil Pig Games have posted the following image with no comment other than "GRUIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIK!", which is precisely the sound made by a devil pig and not at all helpful in terms of enlightening others as to precisely what deal has been made between DPG and Games Workshop. Questions have been asked; I'll let you know if responses come, but in all likelihood something will be announced during Warhammer Fest 2017, which takes place May 27-28.

From gallery of W Eric Martin


Update, May 24: Devil Pig Games has now posted an overview page for Heroes of Black Reach, which bears this description:

Quote:
On June 19, prepare for war! The Heroes System Tactical Scale expands beyond the Norman bocages to the very stars into the universe of Warhammer 40,000!

On the world-hive of Black Reach, an Ork Waaagh! breaks, jeopardizing this sector of the galaxy!

You will soon be able to help the Ultramarines in their merciless fight against the Warlord Zanzag and relive the grim adventures of Captain Cato Sicarius and Sergeant Scout Marines Torias Telion!
From gallery of W Eric Martin

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