Puzzle

Museum: Pictura is a standalone set collection game for 2-4 players by Olivier Melison and Eric Dubus, in which you take on the role of an aspiring curator in an art museum.

Set in the roaring 20’s, the game is gorgeously illustrated in art deco style by French artist Loïc Muzy, while the 180 paintings featured in the game have been individually brought to life by Ekaterina Varlamov.

Your goal is to create collections of some of History’s most iconic works of art. To do so, you will be acquiring Painting cards and exhibiting them into your Museum, represented by your player board, to create Collections. These Collection can be based either on the painting’s Period (ranging from the Renaissance period all the way to Impressionism), or its Domain (Historical, Landscape, Mythological…). The Collections you create will earn you Prestige points, and the player with the most Prestige at the end of the game wins.

During play, you will have to deal with the changing trends of the art world, acquiring and exhibiting Paintings depending on what is currently in highest demand. Exhibiting Paintings of the types that are currently in fashion will gain you additional points!

As your Collections grow, you will be able to open them briefly to the public with a Temporary Exhibition, which allows you to immediately score that Collection’s value and obtain special bonuses for the rest of the game. But beware, your visitors will quickly grow tired of seeing the same types of Collection again and again, so timing your exhibitions correctly is essential!

Museum: Pictura brings exciting new mechanisms and strategies to the table, while maintaining a strong family connection to its predecessor.

-description from publisher

In the game Azul, players take turns drafting colored tiles from suppliers to their player board. Later in the round, players score points based on how they've placed their tiles to decorate the palace. Extra points are scored for specific patterns and completing sets; wasted supplies harm the player's score. The player with the most points at the end of the game wins.

Azul: Master Chocolatier includes double-sided factory boards, with these tiles being placed on these boards at the start of each round. One side of the factories is blank, and when using this side the game plays exactly like Azul. The other side of each factory tile has a special effect on it that modifies play in one way or another, putting a twist on the normal game. Additionally, the tiles are modeled to look like chocolates and other treats, despite remaining as inedible as the tiles in the original game.

Paint the Roses is a 2-5 player cooperative logic deduction game that automatically adapts to your skill during play.

Set in the puzzling world of Alice in Wonderland, you and your friends are the newly appointed Royal Gardeners. You are working together to finish the palace grounds according to the whims of the Queen of Hearts. Use strategy, logic, and teamwork to finish the garden whilst staying one step ahead of the Queen, otherwise, the last thing you hear will be, "Off With Their Heads!".

The Queen's whims are shared via cards, secret instructions each player is given into how the garden should be arranged. Her whims are always changing, so as soon as you solve one, a new one is in your hand.

Every turn, together as a team you must guess at least one of these secret whim cards. You can't say what your card shows, but by carefully placing a new shrub tile into the garden (taken from those available in the Greenhouse) you are able to reveal clues, tokens that will show any matches between the arrangement in the garden and the secret whims each player holds in their hands.

Although you can't discuss your own secret whim card, you can openly discuss other players'. Share your theories at the table and then make a guess. Correctly guessing a whim will move you forward on the score track, but the Queen is always following and her speed automatically adjusts based on your current score. Guess incorrectly and the Queen moves twice as fast, her axe ever closer to your neck.

—description from the publisher

Koi Garden is a tile-laying card game where you use your wildlife, with all different scoring styles and movement, to score through your ever changing pond. Your pond changes as you build and the wildlife tend to become obstacles, the more the pond is built up.

—description from the designer

Decorum is a cooperative, hidden information game where you and your partner share the same objective: decorate your home in a way that makes you both happy. The problem is, different things make each of you happy and nobody says exactly what they need. Can you find a happy compromise, or is it time to move out?!

-Play through 30 unique scenarios, each introducing new twists and challenges.
-Keep your conditions a secret, they say how you want the house decorated.
-Add, remove, and swap objects or repaint rooms to make the house look just right… for you.
-Respond with “Love it”, “Hate it”, or “Fine with it” to work together toward a perfectly decorated home.
-There is a solution for each scenario, the trick is figuring it out in time.

At its heart, Décorum is a pretty straightforward logic puzzle. There are a small number of ways to arrange the internal pieces that meet all the requirements listed on the player’s rule sheets simultaneously. The twist of Décorum is that it’s also a hidden information game. No player has all of the rules. While playing, the players will have to watch their partner’s moves just as carefully as they’re planning their own. Even more crucially, they’ll have to communicate why they’re making the moves they’re making–using the very limited means we’ve provided them.

Décorum might be about solving a puzzle, but it’s really a game about communication and compromise. The real challenge isn’t just solving the problem with the limited information you and your players have; it’s dealing with the frustrations that will inevitably occur when your partner does something that messes up your plan. In order to be successful in Décorum, there will come a point where both players will have to let go of their initial strategy for how they were going to finish the board and start paying attention to what their partner is doing instead. By introducing and providing an incentive to resolve conflict, Décorum mechanically encourages (or even requires) a positive form of compromise.

Each player draws a "Scenario" card that lists a set of criteria of what types of décor a room must have or cannot have. For example "No room may contain a lamp" or "Every room must contain a wall hanging". Players keep their criteria secret.

The play surface is a board displaying various rooms in a house. Each room has multiple items that can potentially be placed in the room. Players take turns placing, moving, or removing colored tokens on the board, where each token represents an item of home décor. Each token placed may conform with, or violate, the other players' criteria. After each token is placed, other players may state they like the item of décor, as placed, or they do not like the item of décor, as placed. Further discussion or explanation is not allowed.

The game ends when all players' criteria are satisfied.