S.T.A.L.K.E.R , Nemesis Retaliation and Bloodborne.

I recently jumped aboard the late pledges for Stalker and Nemesis. Very much FOMO.

Stalker is the most unknown. There is no rule book available as yet, but from what I've seen, it looks to be a dungeon crawler with some decent tactical elements. The biggest risk I think, is that it could be a big old mess. The things I like the look of are modular chapters, variable upgradable, and quite personalised character builds, as well as a purpose built one shot mode made by a designer of This War of Mine.

Nemesis is because I have Lockdown and do like it, however it can be underwhelming solo. Retaliation looks to have addressed this to some extent, and it appears to reward more aggressive play. It seems to be what 'Aliens' was to Vanilla/Lockdown's 'Alien'. There's tile based exploration, more guns, and as ever, a really good, fleshed out universe (that's not at all based on existing IPs - ahem).

Both are from Awaken Realms, which imo can be a bit 'style over substance', but I do realise that, and am actually ok with it in some circumstances. I am onboard for Ameritrash!

As for what I've just started playing, well that's Bloodborne: The Board Game. This has surprised me somewhat, becuase it's actually very good. Some complain about the swinginess of the game, but thematically, this works. A couple of houserules are required if you don't want to begin an entire campaign again after losing to the luck of the draw, but otherwise there's a fair bit of tactical depth here. I plan to keep this on my table for at least one of the four included campaigns.

You know when you're unpacking a game, sorting the tokens and feel really excited because you KNOW you're going to love a game? Well this felt like that.