Tabletopia News

Every video game has its main character, its hero, its legend. These...these are not those characters.

These failed heroes, these undeveloped avatars, never saw their own games come to fruition. But now they have one last hope!



Choose your team of Sprite Fighters, enter the arena, and win them the only chance at pixelated glory they will ever know. Will you defeat your enemies, or will you succumb to the ultimate terror of the video game world...

The Chicken Hordes!!

Pakal is a real-time sliding-puzzle game in which each player has a 4x4 grid filled with 15 blocks, some of which have a solid color on them and some of which are clear.

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Each round, an objective card is revealed, then players slide their blocks in their grid, trying to show only the symbols on that card in their grid and hiding any other symbols from view. If you do this before time runs out, you can grab one of the available scoring blocks, then move your token on the scoring track to the next such symbol on the track. Thus, the quicker you solve the puzzle, the more likely you are to grab a block that advances you the farthest.

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Whenever you cross a red line on the scoring track, you must replace a colored block in your grid with a clear one, thereby making it more difficult for you to solve objective cards in future rounds.

In the center of a vast, but secret forest stands the Arch-Oak — a majestic tree that was already a sapling when the world was still young. It is even said that from its wood, the Gods crafted the first humans and animals.

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Druidic orders from far and wide flock together around its roots to bathe in its glory. Arch-druids sanctify sacred places and erect rune-etched monoliths, while bards tell the tallest tales to recruit a greater following. Ovates read the omens to gain a glimpse of the things to come, while sacrificers use force to defend their Order's beliefs.

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Oak puts you in the role of the leader of one of four different druid orders, with you attempting to establish that your order deserves to be chosen by the Arch-Oak's spirit to stay and learn its secrets. Your order starts out small and insignificant, but if you choose your actions wisely and use your druids efficiently, you will see it grow in power and stature. You will gain the friendship and help of otherworldly creatures like the mischievous brownie, the terrible merrow, and the magical pixies. You will learn powerful spells of the wild and uncover mighty artifacts. You might even risk upsetting the natural balance by creating new sacred places in the forest to house your growing flock of druids.



Will you be able to prove to the Arch-Oak that your order is worthy? Will you be able to unlock the secrets of the ancients?

In Frantic, you start with seven cards and try to get rid of your cards as quickly as possible. If a player has discarded all their cards, the remaining players count the points in their hand. When a player reaches the agreed maximum score, the player with the lowest score wins.

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If you can't or don't want to play a card, you draw one from the deck. There are four colors with numbers from 1 to 9. You can either play color on color or number on number. Sounds boring so far, doesn't it? Well, that's why we have the special cards. For example, have someone draw four cards from the deck, or give a fellow player two cards out of your hand. And the fun part: You always get to choose who gets these cards!



But wait, there's more: We come to the black cards, also numbered from 1 to 9. You can play these only on a number, not on the same color, and every time a black card is played, it activates an event card. These event cards go from Friday, the Thirteenth — where nothing happens – to Tornado, where all hand cards get shuffled together and handed out again.

You are the mayor of one borough of Small City, and you have eight turns to secure enough votes to be re-elected. To do this, you have to attract more citizens, encourage the growth of residential areas for them to live in, and aid the expansion of both the commercial and industrial sectors – though the latter sector also brings pollution with it, and you need to deal with that, too, as high pollution levels will have a negative effect on your score at the end of the game.



If you build suitable infrastructure, your citizens will undoubtedly vote for your re-election, but beware of false promises! Votes can be earned over the course of the game by placing citizens in the residential spaces, by erecting cultural buildings, by keeping commercial buildings in suitable areas, and also by making good on the promises that you made to the citizens at the beginning of the game.



The player with the most votes (i.e., victory points) after eight turns wins.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]Video of 1st edition - includes old artwork

The new & revised Small City: Deluxe Edition includes:

• a new revised book of rules
  
• new illustrations from Kwanchai Moriya!
  
• new variants that keep the best of the rules of the old edition
  
• a revised version of the solo game