Top board games of the week: Cheese Factory, Globetrotting, and Tsuro: Luxury Limited Edition
In this week's Top Board Games Roundup, we've got some pretty immersive games for you. Whether you're a travel enthusiast or a die-hard card game fan, there's a game that'll transport you here.
Immersive board games always amaze us with their attention to detail. Whether it’s through intricate game pieces, an engaging storyline, or intense play, these components create depth. It’s what draws players in and keeps them playing for hours.
In this week’s Top Board Games roundup, we feature immersive board games that have everything from creative cheese factories all the way to a 3D globes. So let’s go ahead and check them out.
Cheese Factory
Love cheese? Check out Cheese Factory. It’s an engine-building game where you craft weird varieties of cheese in a custom factory. You’ll follow unique recipes and select 1 of 4 main chefs to help you, each with a unique ability. And sometimes, you’ll even start cheese fires!
The game’s object is to win 20 points, which you earn by concocting strange cheeses. On each turn, you get 3 actions. You can use any combination of actions to make your point-earning cheese.
Meanwhile, you can build machines that give you stackable powers throughout the game. To get ahead, you can even start fires that destroy your opponents’ machines. It’s a game of strategy, luck, and creative recipes that anyone 14 and older will love.
You can preorder Cheese Factory for about $25 on Kickstarter.
Skyrise
A game all about artistic egos and auctioning, Skyrise tasks you with creating a magnificent city in the sky inspired by science, art, and beauty. You’re a creative visionary, constructing buildings of your own design in addition to ones inspired by art from your homeland.
While the gameplay is simple and easy to understand, it’s actually pretty complex since you make difficult decisions throughout the game. To start, you’ll participate in an auction to win your building rights using a limited supply of structures.
Then, when you construct a building, you earn a faction disk in that neighborhood. Each disk increases the value of your structures with the Philosophers, Artists, Naturalists, or Inventors. As your structures gain prestige, you can win the title of the city’s greatest visionary. It’s one of our favorite immersive board games this week.
Want to see this game come to life? Pledge about $49 toward its Kickstarter campaign.
Globetrotting
If you love Canvas and Crypt, check out Globetrotting. It’s from the same publishers and lets you plan epic vacations by drawing routes on your globe. The game comes with everything you need for planning an unforgettable trip, including 36 beautifully illustrated destination cards, 4 passports, and 10 travel rewards cards.
Throughout the game, you’ll plan 3 trips in spring, fall, and summer. At each round, you add trips to your itineraries and log the airfare cost in your passport. The idea is to score points by crossing destinations off your bucket list and meet up with friends while planning a cost-effective trip.
Like real-life vacations, this is no easy feat, but therein lies the fun. Globetrotting has won awards for the best replay value, theme, marketability, and more. If you love travel and board games, this one’s for you.
Want to try out the fun? Pledge $53 toward its Kickstarter campaign.
Deathly Thrones
For those afternoons when your friends’ schedules don’t align with yours, reach for Deathly Thrones. It’s a print-it-yourself, single-player game that uses cards and a story booklet. It takes less than a minute to set up and 15–20 minutes to play.
You need a standard deck of 52 playing cards. It gets split in a new way to help you through a quest. Choose your Hero and then select from the Quests which throne you want for yourself. Each quest is comprised of 40 steps.
The game relies on card battles, trickery, and self-chosen adventure. Beat the boss at the 40th step to win the game. Overall, if you love playing card games, this is a great one for beating boredom.
Back this game starting at about $1 on Kickstarter.
Tsuro: Luxury Limited Edition
If you’ve played Tsuro, the game of the path, you know that it’s easy to learn but challenging to master. You can learn the rules in less than a minute, but gameplay requires practice.
This luxury limited edition improves your game experience. It starts with the beautifully designed wooden game box with carved scenes from Tsuro’s past. Then, the game’s plastic pawns are replaced by 8 intricate metal dragons.
There are other cool details, too, like the rules sheet written on a bamboo scroll and the stone-textured resin tiles with their path configurations. To top it all off, a hemmed fabric playing surface echoes the box design. These details make it one of the most immersive board games we’ve seen this week.
Want to take your Tsuro game to the next level? Support the luxury limited edition for $350 on Kickstarter.
Transport yourself this summer
Games like Cheese Factory, Globetrotter, and Skyrise transport you to new worlds and competitive situations. These immersive board games are great ways of getting everyone off their devices and playing with each other this summer.
Is there a game you’d like to see on this weekly roundup? Let us know in the comments.
