Tom: NO THANKS!

This week Matt’s here to spill the beans on a Reiner Knizia bidding game, Equinox, filled with mystical creatures and oversized cards. But does this gorgeous purple box manage to cut the mustard?

Who fancies a bit of spy-vs-spy in 1980s Zanzibar? Oh, there’s just one catch: Everybody is psychic. And four characters are immortal. And one of the teams has a dolphin. And the game has 14 expansions. This is Mind MGMT, and it’s an absolutely terrific board game.

This week’s video features Matt and Tom wrestling with a co-operative campaign of cyphers and code-cracking with The Initiative. Well, it’s mostly Matt reviewing this one if we’re honest, although Tom does a stellar job of wearing a coat and behaving like an idiot. We’re starting to creep our way back out of isolation, and you’ll be seeing more two-human videos in the future! Have a lovely week.

In this week’s video review, Tom and Matt are taking a look at Ark Nova – a game rammed to the gills with elephants, stuffed with porcupines and just barely containing a kangaroo. We had a lot of fun playing the game and making the video – and I hope that energy translates well into a ‘nice experience for you; the viewer’. But listen; I know what isn’t a ‘nice experience for you; the viewer’ and it’s the noise. It was too gross not to include – and if I’ve had to listen to it basically on loop during the editing process, you can probably manage one little slurp, right?

Ava has been a key part of the Shut Up & Sit Down podcast for quite a while now, but today is the first time you’ll have seen her in HER VERY OWN VIDEO about Songbirds! Very exciting stuff, and a lovely continuation of the story arc for those of you who remember the days in which Ava was simply someone popping up in the website comments below. Give her a hearty round of applause, and stay away from any suspicious-looking birds.

Quickly, grease your horses! Laminate your betting slips! Remove the jockeys from the steam cupboard!Look, if we’re totally honest, team Shut Up & Sit Down doesn’t know the first thing about horse racing. Fortunately, you don’t have to know the first thing about it to enjoy Long Shot: The Dice Game, which is now up there with our favourite ever roll’n’writes. This game is pretty, it’s silly, and it’s embarrassingly exciting.

In this week’s video, Tom is firing you through several different games at high speed like a dolphin-shaped bullet with a penchant for perusin’. It’s a roundup! Science said it wasn’t possible, and yet here it is – four (technically six) games stuffed into one short video. We’re getting to grips with gears in Corrosion and understanding udders in Great Western Trail: 2nd Edition! We’re rooting around in the bushes for berries and beasts in Rustling Leaves! And we’re Moving Pictures, Roving… Rove… and… Death(ing) Valley(ing) with some… wacky… wallet…(w)experiences? I lost all my energy by the end there, I’m sorry. Enjoy!

Collection Tour! Take a peek at 92ish games that Tom treasures enough to place within the waxen wooden walls of his favourite piece of furniture! We’ve got games big and small, men tall and short, and mistakes big and bigger. Enjoy!

This week Matt takes a look at the chunkier expansion of The Alchemists for one of his all-time favourites – Quacks! But do these additions sweeten or sour the cauldron? Also, how many more times is he going to use that footage of him and Quinns being hit in the face with a paint cannon? Truly, NOBODY COULD KNOW. How did you folks get on with the expansions?

In this double feature, we pay homage to humanity’s oldest art form: the board game review. Also, the art of drawing something and your friends having no idea what it is. Better yet, Quinns claims that both of the games in this video – Doodle Dash and Pictomania – are better than the classic game of Pictionary. Although the question of which one you should buy is a little bit trickier.

If you’re a fan of red and blue plastics then GOSH do we have a treat for you today – Matt has a review of a – still very large – SMALLER cousin of the behemoth that is War of the Ring, The Battle of Five Armies. Can this Hobbit-based wargame tickle the same sensations as the esoteric giant we reviewed a few years ago? Are games getting bigger generally, or are our tables shrinking? How many orcs could a wood-orc orc if a wood-orc could-orc orc? None of this, and more!

Well look at that! It’s an Ava video. This cathedral of content has been in preparation for several generations now, and it’s finally here. Biblios: Quill and Parchment is a recent release from Dr Finn’s games that I was able to pick up and try at PAX Unplugged. It was the perfect excuse to talk about one of my top card games of all time, the original Biblios! So here is a double review that definitely shows no signs of me biting off more than I can chew. A whole world of monk tracks and illuminations are right there waiting for you. Except Biblios might not entirely be in print right now, sorry! There’s suggestions for games to keep you going at the end though, I promise. Also, I realised while writing this script that I can just say ‘Matt make me a trailer for an imaginary cinematic universe’ and he just HAS to do it. And because he’s Matt he’ll also put approximately ten thousand times the required effort into it. Brilliant. Even when I’m still learning the ropes, this job is love

What’s this?! Could it be? They said it couldn’t be done… Yes, today SU&SD has released none other than a ginormous video review of a role-playing game. The award-winning game of Spire casts a party of players as members of an underground resistance cell, making small acts of rebellion in a society that will almost certainly kill them. This book is imaginative, evocative and has a marvelous sense of humour… but it turns out Quinns had a bit of a problem with it, too. Enjoy, everybody.

This week Matt discovers a latent love for trains, as he stumbles onto a lightweight co-op gem! Collisions and co-ordination aplenty in Switch & Signal. What’s your favourite flavour of train?

It’s a big one! In this lengthy videofilm, Tom takes a look at the work of Project NISEI and their version of Android: Netrunner! Is it good? Is it GREAT? Does it stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the original? Find out the answers to some of these questions for the low low cost of just 32 minutes of your life. This one was a bit of beast, took me forever, and I don’t know what to do with myself now. Enjoy!

This week, Tom takes on the chips in a review of burncycle – the big-box heist-em-up from Chip Theory games! Robots, Corporations, and Stealth; ‘Oh My!’. This is a big one; with more components than a thousand-piece jigsaw (false) and more neoprene than most board games (true)! But is it… any good? Find out in this video! Right here!

This week’s video has Tom evolving into his final form: BAD WIZARD. It also features a sentient vegetable, and murders with a hammer – so there’s a chance that broadly speaking, things “started to get away from us” a little. This All-vs-1 game of Real-Time Rollin’ game Rush Out! is a treat that surprised us, and it might surprise you!

Here’s a brain-teaser for you. What do the games Imperial Steam, Space Station Phoenix, Air, Land & Sea: Spies, Lies & Supplies, Akropolis, Guild of Merchant Explorers, Wormholes and Village Rails have in common? They were all too boring for us to review on their own Why, they’re all reviewed in this video, of course! Enjoy, everybody.

It’s taken us SO LONG to make a Spirit Island video that it’s only appropriate that somebody is PUNISHED. It’s true that back in the day we covered it a bit, but it’s fair to say that this co-op classic had yet to get the love from us that it deserved. But is all well on our precious little island, or do we detect the vile tendrils of HATRED? Does someone HATE this game?? Oh my!

Root has gathered an impressive number of expansions over the years, so we sent our resident woodland expert, Tom, out to investigate. Surely this piece will feature critical rigour, copious research and an easily understandable format? What’s that? He made another Tier List? Oh dear. The Marauder Expansion The Riverfolk Expansion The Underworld Expansion The Clockwork Expansion

What’s that hiding in the undergrowth? Why it’s another Ava review! She’s been working on this so long that Living Forest has gone from under-rated gem to Kennerspiel Des Jahres, and I’m so miffed I didn’t beat the German jury to the punch. This lovely deckbuilding push your luck ecosystem has magic, woods, cute art and an appealing pricetag. Do you want to get lost in the woods with me? Don’t answer that, just watch the video.

This week on Shut Up & Sit Down, Matt is providing everyone with a public service – reviewing maybe the driest game we have received this year. An absolutely delirious mix of currency, tracks, and ‘playing cards’, Khora: Rise of an Empire seems a typical eurogame on the surface, but what lies… underneath?! Enjoy!

Well, here’s a first! The first ever Shut Up & Sit Down segment inspired by a letter from a medical doctor. Huge thanks to Chicago’s “Dr. Randall” for giving Quinns the nudge to create this video, which is a lengthy guide to getting into RPGs. Are you intimidated? Lost? Confused? We’re here to make you marginally less of all of those things.

What’s up YouTube – Thomas Boardgames has made another video! It’s about SCOUT – a card game! (with tokens!). Excuse the extremely hungover energy in this one; I was, in fact, hungover. Enjoy!

Quinns and Tom have made a huge mistake. Somehow, the two of them both unanimously decided that they were excited about the new City Series from Queen Games and decided to cover FOUR COMPLICATED GAMES in ONE VIDEO. What is the City Series, you ask? Why, it’s none other than two beloved games, one adequate game and one /new/ game, all by legendary German designer Stefan Feld. And why have they all been returned around cities? Well, as you’ll soon see, we have absolutely no idea.

This is a review of Turncoats! Is this the first presenter-less episode of Shut Up & Sit Down? Who knows? But it’s a fun little experiment and I hope you enjoy it. Turncoats is just cracking – a sumptuous little puzzle in a pouch, and one of the most gorgeous games I’ve played all year. It’s the kind of game that has people at the pub stopping by to ask about the weird little tablecloth you’re all poking, and simple enough that those people could probably come and poke it too. Enjoy!

It’s the medical special! Tom is taking a look at two odd dexterity games that have temporarily captured his heart, Rush M.D and For Science! Both involve doing things very fast, often with some jazz fusion in the background (not provided with either game) This episode also has Meat Boy. Enjoy!

Dark times await for the board game hobby. Is that because Undaunted: Stalingrad wants to transport us all to the ugliest battle of the ugliest front of one of the ugliest wars in human history? No, it’s because some of the scenario design made Quinns REAL mad and he’s going to make that ALL of our problem. It’s time for our Undaunted: Stalingrad review.

Matt: Hello! Merry Christmas slash Holidays slash December internet folks and gentle folks! Today we’ve got a little treat for you! It’s our wrap-up of Christmas gifts that you might consider buying for people in your life, of the board game variety. We’ve got a whole bunch of different categories here, and the whole team giving their recommendations of the things that they think are going to be absolutely cracking gifts. Without further ado, “games that you’ll play with a family” – maybe your family, maybe not. It’s not for us to judge.

This week’s review is a very special game indeed. Heat: Pedal to the Metal is one of those rare boxes that just sings from the moment you open it – a snappy, kinetic racing game that I am just absolutely in love with. I hope the motion of this video does a lot to sell the speed of the game, and doesn’t just make you feel violently ill. Enjoy!