Tafl Champions: Ancient Chess

Tafl Champions: Ancient Chess

This is a fine game, and a free one on top of that.

There’s a surprising amount of tactics behind a very simple core concept.

Played with my friend, enjoyed it quite a bit!

Thought the attacker has a huge advantage by not being too greedy and encircling the field, as well as engaging in fair warrior trades, but defender can do quite a lot with his throne and a retinue of fighters preventing the enemy from capturing too many nearby squares.

Main cons would be unclear rules with the throne - it would be better if UI would suggest what will be captured by each move and King / Throne would be highlighted somehow whenever the Throne is left. This would help recognise that the King can be captured like a normal warrior now and the throne is hostile to defenders too - otherwise too easy to forget it and lose on the spot.

Real player with 2.0 hrs in game


Read More: Best Tutorial Tabletop Games.


Bannerlord brought me here, have a review dev, ya deserve it lad

Real player with 1.2 hrs in game

Tafl Champions: Ancient Chess on Steam

Good puzzle

Good puzzle

Pazzle

Real player with 3.4 hrs in game


Read More: Best Tutorial Education Games.


Great puzzle game, cool soundtrack

Real player with 3.1 hrs in game

Good puzzle on Steam

Labirinto 3

Labirinto 3

Labirinto this is a simple 2D game in which you need to get square to the other end of the maze.

  • 30 levels.

  • Different complexity.

  • Сlassical music soundtrack


Read More: Best Tutorial Puzzle Games.


Labirinto 3 on Steam

Good puzzle: Music

Good puzzle: Music

Good game, simple puzzles, cool soundtrack.

Real player with 3.3 hrs in game

The music is nice, albeit a little repetitive. The game itself is fast to complete. Would only recommend if you get it on sale and want to waste a small amount of time. It’s an easy 12 achievements (1 for each level) and that’s about it.

Real player with 0.7 hrs in game

Good puzzle: Music on Steam

Gaia Project

Gaia Project

I had zero Gaia Project experience before booting this up. I think there’s a marginal learning curve to the UI, but after you run through the tutorial and get a game or so in, it’s totally reasonable.

The AI is also fantastic, really an exceptionally well done AI for a game of this complexity. I have about 15 games under my belt, all on 3-player 8-sector, and Hard AI continues to offer a real challenge (winning scores tend to be in the 160-170 range, whether it’s me or the AI pulling it off). The paths taken to victory also seem quite varied, so it’s not like it’s just programmed to spam Econ4 or something dumb; there’s real complexity going on under the hood. It’s not like every decision is perfect, but I seriously think it’d be difficult to find a better done digital board game AI for a game of this sheer scale.

Real player with 88.7 hrs in game

Honestly I’ve played countless games of Gaia Project IRL, it’s absolutely my favorite TTG, and this digital adaptation is perfectly fine. Yes, there are grammatical errors, but how many of us actually read the EULA to begin with? Oh noes, they forgot the C in Bescods in the achievements! Time to review bomb the game, amirite?

And sure, the UI is “clunky” compared to in-person, but let’s be real here - Gaia Project is probably one of the most complex games most people will ever learn. If you’re taking the time to learn it, you probably have enough smarts in you to get through some menu screens. Upgrade your cognitive navigation track past 1 before you throw your hands up in defeat.

Real player with 49.5 hrs in game

Gaia Project on Steam

Brain Games

Brain Games

This is not an ordinary game, this is a whole complex for the development of a megamind. such games are not enough for the modern generation!

Real player with 13.6 hrs in game

Perfect for playing on my laptop while flying on an airplane, since the game doesn’t require good system resources and is quite suitable for weak PCs or laptops.

Real player with 4.0 hrs in game

Brain Games on Steam

Shisensho Solitaire

Shisensho Solitaire

I received a free key for this game but I wasn’t expecting much and was blown away by the game.

This is not the usual type of Mahjong. Rather it uses Mahjong tiles to create a puzzle. The player needs to remove tiles in pairs, but only if they are on the same side or next to each other. These are randomly created puzzles that you can choose “solvable” or “random” depending on your style of play. Also there are 3 different sizes of boards from small to large. And different modes of play: Casual (includes hints), Regular (no hints), Time Attack, Mini-Game. There are Leaderboards to encourage you to try to beat your last best time and inch up the boards.

Real player with 388.2 hrs in game

Simple, pleasant and fun, a darn good casual game.

It comes with several modes of play, standard, casual, timed and quick I believe, and all are fun to accomplish.

The game offers night mode, with a dimmer screen, and two sets of pieces for those who would prefer something other than the mah jong symbols.

There are plenty of achievements for those who like them, as well.

Perhaps most notable is the music, seven delightful tunes that float in the background nicely.

No hesitation of giving this one two thumbs up. It’s simple fun, but sometimes that is what I am looking for. This one does that perfectly.

Real player with 255.7 hrs in game

Shisensho Solitaire on Steam

Super Kakuro - Cross Sums

Super Kakuro - Cross Sums

Even with the in-game help, the larger puzzles are impossible because there are just too many combinations.

Kakuro should offer different levels of difficulty.

Even with the update, most grids have large open spaces.

There are still multiple solutions to puzzles.

Kakuro should only have one unique solution.

There is no ability to save your puzzle and come back to it later.

There’s no option to Undo your last move.

The puzzles do not use the available screen space.

The update introduced a new problem where the restart takes a long time to work on larger puzzles, or locks the game up, where you cannot not exit.

Real player with 9.6 hrs in game

Super Kakuro - Cross Sums on Steam

Dominion

Dominion

Always heard about the boardgame but never had the chance to play it and now that i did I can see why it’s so popular!

The DA is very well done: plays smooth, good sfx, AI feels solid (haven’t tried Hard yet though). The game has already -I think?- all of the the expansions available that can be played in a 1v1 against AI or with another player online.

I must say this is very polished already for being EA for less than two weeks!

As per how stability goes, ​I played 3 games with a friend yesterday and we only got two freezes/crashes but we could keep playing by simply restarting the game: no game-breaking bugs found yet.

Real player with 33.0 hrs in game

A very faithful adaptation of the famous evolutionary card game. The first one that found the concept of deckbuilding during the game. Many other games followed this inspiration, such as Star Realms, Ascension, War of Omens, for the main ones. If you know of any others, please respond.

This is a concept not to be confused with these two:

  • Deckbuilding before the game, the player builds a deck (example: Magic the Gathering).

  • Deckbuilding during the game, without being able to swap cards, during a quest (example: Slay the spire).

Real player with 14.6 hrs in game

Dominion on Steam

Kings of Israel

Kings of Israel

Great PC adaptation of the board game. Set up works for multiple players only if sharing the same device; play can be split between two players (1 prophet per player) from what I can tell. So far I’ve only played solo. Love the Bible study/trivia option!

EDIT: On the standard play mode, I have now reached level 5 (Saul), which increases the number of prophets involved to three. I personally take about 20-30 minutes per game (unless I lose in the first ten). Based on the settings available for the Custom game option, it looks like there may be as many as four prophets in play at once. In Custom mode, you can also choose which prophets are in play, whereas the standard play-by-ranking mode assigns prophets at random. Definitely recommend playing in Custom or Bible Study mode if you don’t want to affect your level ranking status! Bible Study mode provides both good and bad consequences to your multiple-choice response, making it worth cracking open your Bible (or clicking the online Bible links provided) for the right answer. Highly recommended to you if you like turn-based games, strategy, and fun ways to engage with the Holy Bible!

Real player with 56.0 hrs in game

From a secular perspective, it really depends on what you are looking for in a game. This game is rich in its representation of historical content, if you accept that it is based entirely on the Bible. It makes extensive use of RNG, which I understand is not popular among many gamers, but is a very appropriate way to represent human behavior. Not that it is random per-se, but in life humans will often either surprise you, or at the very least the number of things they might do is so varied that trying to make a specific prediction in a moral-political context is not likely going to be accurate. It really feels appropriate to have so much RNG in this context, but there is a little you can do to maximize your output. In short, this game uses mechanics that are generally not very popular, but in a highly appropriate manner for the subject matter.

Real player with 40.1 hrs in game

Kings of Israel on Steam