Episode 138 - The Importance of Being Replayable
August 26, 2021
Ambie and Crystal discuss a couple games they've played recently, including Project Nos, Flapjack Flipout, and TEN. We then talk about replayability in games and what things can make a game replayable.
18xx with Ambie: 1849: The Game of Sicilian Railways
August 24, 2021
18xx with Ambie is Ambie's video series about 18xx board games featured on The Dice Tower's YouTube channel.
In this video, Ambie gives an overview of the game 1849: The Game of Sicilian Railways.
Episode 137 - Bad But Good
August 12, 2021
Ambie and Crystal discuss a couple games they've played recently, including Murder at the Motel, MicroMacro: Crime City, and Gartic Phone. We then list our top five favorite games that we're bad at but still like.
Episode 136 - Games for Non-Gamers
July 29, 2021
Ambie and Crystal discuss a couple games they've played recently, including The Game: Face to Face and Atmosfear. We then talk about some ways we can play games with people who don't usually play board games.
Episode 135 - Top 5 Polyomino Games
July 15, 2021
Ambie and Crystal discuss a couple games they've played recently, including Escape from the Science Lab of Shifting Rules, Escape from the Two Base Stations, Escape from Lockdown: The Demon Fortress, Webscapade Season 0: Welcome to Argenia, and Nidavellir. We then list off our top 5 favorite polyomino board games!
Training Games: Other Games and The Classics
July 8, 2021
This is part of a series called Training Games, where I review children's games when playing (with modified rules) with my twin toddlers. This review was written when my twins were 21 months old.
My kids are almost two years old, and I’ve gone through all the board games we have that are meant for toddlers to play in this series. So this series is coming to a close, but that’s a good thing because it means my kids will be playing games by the actual rules soon! With this final post, I wanted to talk about how my boys “play” board games now that they can go into our game room.
My boys love playing board games, and they’ll often point to the game room and ask to play games. When we go in, I let them each pick out one game to play with, and try to make sure that they put it away before picking out another game. We also made sure that our more rare/expensive games are out of reach, so we don’t mind if they mess up game components.
Episode 134 - Gaming Gatherings
July 1, 2021
Ambie and Crystal discuss a couple games they've played recently, including Escape Room: The Game - Puzzle Adventure: Secret of the Scientist, Exit: The Game + Puzzle - The Sacred Temple, and The Search for Planet X. We then talk about some tips for hosting game days and nights.
Training Games: Rhino Hero Junior
June 24, 2021
This is part of a series called Training Games, where I review children's games when playing (with modified rules) with my twin toddlers. This review was written when my twins were 21 months old.
We received a free copy of Rhino Hero Junior from HABA when my toddlers were 20 months, and I let them unbox and unpunch it. The game comes with a lot of thick cardboard pieces, which my kids loved punching out. One also enjoys putting the pieces back into the punchboard, so I’ve saved some punchboard for that.
Episode 133 - Togetherness
June 17, 2021
Ambie and Crystal discuss a couple games they've played recently, including Bilder, Cold Case: A Pinch of Murder, Cold Case: A Story to Die For, and Let's Make a Bus Route: The Dice Game. We then talk about some of our favorite games we've played together over the years.
Training Games: Click Clack Lumberjack
June 3, 2021
by Ambie Valdés
This is part of a series called Training Games, where I review children's games when playing (with modified rules) with my twin toddlers. This review was written when my twins were 20 months old.
Click Clack Lumberjack is a dexterity game where you’re trying to tap plastic tree pieces with a plastic axe in order to knock bark pieces off without knocking the cores off. It’s a game that I’ve enjoyed playing mostly with other adults before I had kids. Currently, my kids aren’t old enough to be playing a dexterity game like this (it’s for ages 5 and up), but they love playing with the pieces and it’s one of the first games that my kids pick to play when they go into the game room.
