Hot Game Magnet: Board game reviews

It's time to get into the fish displaying business. Aqua Garden By Uchibacoya is a cute and surprisingly cut throat game about building the most lovely (and profitable) aquarium. Fill your Aquarium with clown fish, sea turtles, and even whale sharks. Enjoy the beautifully crafted fish meeples but make sure that other aquariums don't get all the best displays before you do.

Dinosaur Island is one of our all time favorite games. It's not perfect but it perfectly captures the fun and imagination that dinosaurs inspire. A big part of that fun was the excessive amount of blingy components and available dinos to play with, or so I thought. Dinosaur Island Rawr 'n Write replaces all the meeples, and coins and literal stacks of dinos with not much more than a couple pads of...

This week we had the opportunity to speak with Jacek of Gindi games about Goldenstar: The Galactic Tournament. Goldenstar will be launching on October 5th on Gamefound. It was really interesting to talk about what goes into developing such a big game and a bit about all the new options available to creators for funding.

It took us 25 minutes to talk about a game that takes 5 minutes to play. Five Minute Marvel is a super quick game but oh my goodness, it's so fun. I did not expect this game to be such a hit, but it is already one of our top 5 games for the game group.

game preview. This week we got the chance to play a preview of Battle For Goldenstar, an area movement and hand management game, with a pretty cool conflict resolution mechanic. This game has a ton of the stuff I like to have in a good sci-fi space game. It's got space planets, it's got space pirates, but it's only got one Goldenstar. Which is the point. Battle for Goldenstar! * A few notes from t...

This week we have a talk with Jason Washburn of Talon Strikes Studios about their new game "Top Pop". It's a fun chat about what makes Talon Strikes Studios unique, and why Top Pop might be the perfect game to add to your collection.

June came and went pretty fast. As have a lot of great looking games on Kickstarter. This week we have a look at a few of those games that are still going and that you may want to back. There's something for everyone. Honestly, I'm tempted to back all five games, but I probably wont. Maybe. I shouldn't. LOL!

I'm a sucker for bright colors and gonzoid themes. Crash Octopus from Itten Games does not disappoint. It's a light-hearted dexterity game that is just challenging enough. Set up is easy and game play has a built-in time limit using a round tracker. Oh man! I just love that giant pink octopus.

This week I got to speak with the designer of one of our all time favorite games. Actually, we talk about this game all the time and use it as a bench mark when discussing other games. If you haven't guessed already the game is Feudum, and the designer is Mark Swanson. I got to find out about how Mark goes about creating a game, and why he decided to do game design. We also got to talk a little ab...

I don't think there are any games that we have played too much, but there are definitely games that we haven't played enough. Hellboy was one of our favorite games from 2019 but surprisingly we haven't played it at all since the first month we got it. This week we revisited Hellboy to see what we've been missing out on, and perhaps figure out why we've been missing out.

There is something magical about the boardwalk beach fronts and developments of coastal cities. Santa Monica is one of those iconic locations, and Santa Monica the board game with art by Jeremy Nguyen captures that magic on appearances alone. The game itself is a lovely lower medium weight tableau builder, that is adequately crunchy and plays very well with two players.

Is Zombicide the perfect board game? Well, they made a second edition so maybe it had some room for improvement. Is it now better than ever, or is it not worth the upgrade? What do I do with all my old Zombicide mini's? Today we talk all about Zombicide 2nd Edition and why we think it's the best Zombicide yet!

It's time for another round up of what's cool on kickstarter. This month we found a few big miniature driven games, on which you can spend all of your money (or maybe just a lot of your money). There are also a few very interesting mechanic driven games to talk about. I think perhaps there's something for everyone.

Travis and Holly Hancock launched Facade Games in 2015 with the kickstarter release of their first game, Salem. They never thought it would be anything more than a fun side project. However, it was a huge success and has lead to the creation of their dark cities game series. 6 years and five games later, I talk with Travis about his adventures in game design and what the future holds for Facade ga...

This week I had the pleasure of interviewing Pete Walsh of Pigeon games. I talk with Pete about his games past present and future, and about how his love of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles lead into a career in Boardgame design!

Some games are an absolute must have, but for some reason I keep not having them. today we talk about one of those games that is so good there really is no reason for it not to be in my collection. Yet, for some reason I keep not getting it. Everdell.

What a magnificent haul of new games on kickstarter! I wish I could back all of them but I guess I'll just have to be happy to talk about them... and also back a few. LOL!

Have you ever had a great idea and then doubted yourself to much to try putting it out there? Creating something great can be a lot of work, but the hardest part is probably just taking the first steps. Today we talk to Jeff Pearce who almost on a whim entered a game into a game design contest. A few years later that game has developed into the hit game Silverwood Grove which is currently doing fa...

Some games just have legs! Today we talk about a simple game that we can't seem to stop bringing back to the table. The surprisingly re-playable Love letter! http://kck.st/3kw2iWD

It's time to round up all our favorite games coming out on kickstarter! This month we talk about cowboy Zombies, warring factions of woodland critters, a monster cafe, aliens invading mars, and a game about racing up a mountain to get to a public toilet! (we're a little partial to that last one. LOL!)

Ah Raiders of Scythia. Who knew that doing math and learning about history could be so much fun? I guess everyone that already played Raiders of the North Sea knew. Are we late to the party, or is Raiders of Scythia the perfect game to jump onto the renegade game studios with? I certainly do like all the eagles and horses and blood lusting ladies with bows, and such lovely art.

This week is a huge episode! We talk about our Game BushPoo! It will be launching on kickstarter on March 1st. Click the link below to be notified on launch! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/hotgamemagnet/bush-poo?ref=clipboard-prelaunch

This week we review a game that is completely different from any game we played before. Sonora is a "Flick and Write" game from Pandasaurus games. Is it a dexterity game or a puzzle game or both? is Fun? What's a Flick and Write? Where is the Sonora desert anyway?

In today's episode we talk about Wayfinders by Pandasaurus games. In this game you get a to pilot a seaplane and set up hangars on remote islands. It's a game of strategy and can be quite crunchy and yet is still whimsical and simple. Listen to our full review, and check out the game here https://pandasaurusgames.com/products/wayfinders

is there anything more fun than building a fort with your friends in that golden era between being a kid and being not a kid? Maybe not, but Fort by Leder games comes close