New/Current Releases Available Late June/Early July

It's been a fairly slow season for releases but things are about to heat up dramatically. Last week CLEOPATRA AND THE SOCIETY OF ARCHITECTS ($35) showed up, which should please you Days of Wonder acolytes. It looks like a fun family game with big, chunky pieces and the promise of throwing corrupted officials to the crocodiles. Speaking of DoW, the MEMOIR '44 PACIFIC THEATER ($25) expansion will be available next week so you armchair MacArthurs can do a little island hopping. Rio Grande Games has just released another batch of Queen games including Stefan Dorra's BUCCANEER ($17) and ATON ($17) along with the English edition of Leo Colovini's MAUER BAUER, MASONS ($25). SPIRITS OF NIAGARA ($17) is out and it comes with a real wooden beaver, which Face 2 Face's WINNER'S CIRCLE ($22) can not claim.

A little closer to mid-July, we should be seeing some of the more hotly anticipated games that haven't arrived yet. From Fantasy Flight Games we should be see the first ARKHAM HORROR expansion, CURSE OF THE DARK PHAROAH ($13) which will add even more variety and evil to an already great game. A GAME OF THRONES gets the expansion treatment again with A STORM OF SWORDS ($27) which probably _still_ won't convince Robert Martin that it's a great game. Rio Grande will soon be releasing FUNNY FRIENDS ($23) which is an absolutely hysterical experience with the right group- have sex, take drugs, and get crushed by a falling crucifix. Well, unless Jay cleans it up. We should also see THURN AND TAXIS ($21) soon, which seems primed to take Spiel Des Jahres this year and the new edition of EL GRANDE ($35) will be available soon for the 3 of you out there who have never played it. Z-Man Games should have THE SCEPTER OF ZANDAVOR ($35) ready soon, a game I wish I liked but I just don't- probably because my first game was a 5 hour long analysis paralysis torture session. Finally, there's reports that TEMPUS ($35) starting to appear but they're completely unsubstantiated. I love Martin Wallace's designs (usually), so out of all this it's probably what I'm the most excited about.

MB
Factory Games