Ride Through Poland, Roll Through Twilight Imperium, and Protect Yourself from Stranger Things

Ride Through Poland, Roll Through Twilight Imperium, and Protect Yourself from Stranger Things
Board Game: Ticket to Ride Map Collection: Volume 6½ – Poland
Board Game: Ticket to Ride Map Collection: Volume 6½ – Poland
• In 2019, Days of Wonder released Wsiąść do Pociągu: Polska, a Ticket to Ride expansion map from Alan R. Moon for the Polish market.

At the time, I had asked Days of Wonder about the general availability of this expansion and was told, "This expansion has been made for the Polish market, like Ticket to Ride: Germany back in the day" — and by Ticket to Ride: Germany, the representative actually means Zug um Zug: Deutschland, which was released solely for the German and Austrian market in 2012. That title was modified, internationalized, and released as Ticket to Ride: Germany in 2017, so I expected this Poland map to show up everywhere at some point, and yes, Days of Wonder has now announced that Ticket to Ride Map Collection: Volume 6½ – Poland will be available in Europe in July 2022 and in North America in September 2022.

Here's an overview of this design:
Quote:
From the sea to the Tatras, as wide as Poland is long, there are beautiful areas just waiting to be discovered. Do you want to observe the bison in the shadow of the Bialowieza Forest? Or maybe you prefer to take a walk through the charming streets of Wroclaw?

Board Game: Ticket to Ride Map Collection: Volume 6½ – Poland
Game board

Ticket to Ride: Poland challenges players to create connections between Poland's neighboring countries, such as Germany, Ukraine, and the Czech Republic. In addition to connecting cities and completing tickets in the usual way of other Ticket to Ride games, your routes can reach border crossings and thus connect neighboring countries. If you manage to create such a connection on your turn, say, building a track so that you have a connected line from Ukraine to Germany, you draw the top point card from the stack for each of these two countries. Their point value is arranged in descending order, which means that the players who are the first to draw cards receive more points.

If you later connect this network to the Czech Republic, then you'd draw the top card from each of the three countries' card stacks — assuming that a country's cards haven't all been claimed, of course.
Board Game: GROWL
Joey Vigour's hidden identity game GROWL, published in 2019 through his own Vigour Games, has been picked up by Belgian publisher Repos Production and will be released as Stranger Things: Attack of the Mind Flayer, with the game debuting on May 13, 2022 in Europe and on August 1, 2022 in North America.

Here's an overview of this 4-10 player game:
Quote:
In Hawkins, Indiana, the Mind Flayer has created an army of possessed people to invade Earth. Some of you are already under its control...

At the start of Stranger Things: Attack of the Mind Flayer, each players takes a character tile representing someone from the Stranger Things Netflix series. You will also receive a card that tells you whether you are a Sane hero or Possessed by the Mind Flayer.

Board Game: Stranger Things: Attack of the Mind Flayer

A game plays out over a series of turns and pits two teams against each other: Sane versus Possessed. As a Sane character, you must resist the Mind Flayer's attacks to win the game. As a Possessed character, you try to convert all Sane characters to Possessed or knock them out before the end of the game. On your turn, draw a card and give it to another player to help them, remove them, or make them change teams.

At the end of the game, if at least one Sane character is still in play, all Sane characters win the game. Otherwise, the Possessed characters win!
Board Game: Twilight Imperium: Fourth Edition
• During a livestream focusing on the 25th anniversary of Twilight Imperium, Fantasy Flight Games teased the release of Twilight Inscription, an "epic" roll-and-write game set in the TI universe from James Kniffen that aims to bring the 4X experience to a very different style of game.

Kniffen didn't give details about the design, other than saying you will explore the galaxy, develop planets, create trade and industry on them, and defend your holdings while trying to wreck other players' stuff. You can watch the announcement yourself here.

Board Game: Twilight Inscription

Board Game: Twilight Inscription

Board Game: Twilight Inscription
Screenshots from the YouTube broadcast; hands included for scale

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