In Sleeping Gods: Distant Skies, the new stand-alone of Sleeping Gods, you dive back into the world created by Ryan Laukat. However, you do not do that in a boat now, but in a plane. Fights work differently and also the way totems work is different. You do not have to have played Sleeping Gods to enjoy Distant Skies, you can play them in any order.
And Sleeping Gods: Primeval Peril is also new this year. This is a much smaller adventure, also a stand-alone game in the Sleeping Gods world. Mainly intended for 1-2 players, but playable up to 4 players, you dive into the jungle where you have a completely different goal this time. But the stories, monsters and other mechanics will be familiar to you from Sleeping Gods. Primeval Peril is fun to start the series quietly, and also particularly suitable if you are interested in the Sleeping Gods series, but the price of Sleeping Gods and Distant Skies scares you off.
In the Unconscious, an expert game, you step into the shoes of a colleague of Freud, and you try to cure your patients. You do this by building an engine on your personal board, providing insights of various types and sizes, making a few visits to the city of Vienna, and you will also occasionally enjoy a cup of coffee. The Unconscious is a crunchy game, executed with special artwork and with a lot of attention paid to the game components such as the inkwells, the silkscreen-printed wooden tokens and the double-layer player boards. Also available are the expansions ‘Nightmares’, ‘Free Associations’, and various deluxe upgrades.
Finally, Amritsar is also new. This is an expert game that only just falls into that category, and is therefore a lot lighter than games such as Sabika and the Unconscious. According to the mancala effect, you move workers, whereby you want the color of the last worker you place to match the color of the action present there. If your elephant is there, you can even perform 3 actions. So you try to optimize this as much as possible. By collecting raw materials, going up the tracks of your board, upgrading your storage, actions and end-game scoring tiles, the goal is to build the temple of Amritsar together with your fellow players. However, this game is not co-op, it is a strategic game with beautiful large wooden elephants that immediately attract attention. And once you understand the mancala mechanism and the relatively simple game rules, this game plays wonderfully.
Furthermore, Keep Exploring Games also includes: Sabika, Bitoku, Caldera Park, Nu of Nooit, Perfect Shot and Ice Floes & Foes. In short, something for everyone!
Information from BoardGameGeek.