New Game Round-up: Preparing Time of Empires, Making Sauce That Buurns, and Welcoming More Couples to the Fog of Love

The story takes place during the "Día de muertos" in Mexico City in the Las Piquantes neighborhood, in El Señor district, with this industrialist having inherited an import-export business of...goods. Mr. Señor, close to retirement, satisfies himself with the bare minimum, surrounded only by his family, bodyguards, accountants, drivers, cooks, gym teachers, and a caretaker for his private zoo.

Once a year, to break the boredom, he organizes a special event to celebrate his prolific family tree: a contest for all the apprentice cooks of his country to cook the strongest and the most intense sauce possible. But the competition is tough and the participants have to get their hands dirty to get the best ingredients in bidding auctions, the "Descentadas".

Each round in BUURN, players try to recover ingredient cards, with the sales taking place in top-down auctions. On top of that, players can attract the good graces of the cartel or pick up ingredients that have fallen from the truck. After drawing the end-of-game card, players make a final bid, then they count their ingredient collection points to see who wins.

We wanted to make the original game as inclusive as possible. However, I'm a heterosexual male and no matter how much I tried, there were a few details I was bound to miss or be inadvertently blind to. When we launched the game last year, people loved that we'd made queer relationships possible in the game through the gender neutrality of characters, but feedback suggested that some elements felt awkward. When we initiated the reprint, we saw a chance improve on this...

Getting Nikki on board was a huge learning experience for me. Initially it was challenging to see our work dissected in such a way, but then, as we worked together to resolve the issues, I could clearly feel how the game improved due to the subtle changes we introduced. I'm thankful for the constructive criticism Nikki gave us and am confident the end result is a truly inclusive tabletop gaming experience for everyone.