Episode 260 - The 2025 Blitzies
April 30, 2026
Ambie and Crystal discuss a couple games they played recently, including Lost in Adventure: The Curse of Jack Parrot and Otter Chaos. Then we reveal our top 5 games of 2025 in our annual awards show, the Blitzies!
Intro: 0:00
Recent Games: 0:44
The 2025 Blitzies: 15:15
--Top 5 Games of 2025: 16:29
--Best New to Us: 30:05
Outro: 33:51
Bloopers: 34:54
Games mentioned this episode:
Why I Otter: 09:35
An Otter Won: 09:44
Otter Chaos: 9:51
Signal: 17:10
Numberwang: 19:49
Herd: 21:02
Viva Catrina: 22:03
Workworkwork: 23:21
7 Wonders Dice: 25:11
Jisogi: Anime Studio Tycoon: 26:23
Cozy Stickerville: 30:14
Zombie Kidz Evolution: 30:37
1001 Odysseys: 32:32
This episode was sponsored by Grey Fox Games. Use the code "BLITZ2026" to get 10% off your entire cart.
Board Game Blitz's theme song was composed by Andrew Morrow.
Transcript
[00:00:06:19 - 00:00:43:05]
Crystal: Hello and welcome to Episode 260 of Board Game Blitz, a podcast about all things board games that you can listen to in less time than it takes to find the last easter egg that never got found this year's hunt. Board Game Blitz is sponsored by Grey Fox Games. This week it's time for the Blitzies! First we discuss a couple games we've played recently, Lost in Adventure: The Curse of Jack Parrot, and Otter Chaos. Then we share our favorite games of 2025 in our annual award show. And now here are your hosts...
Ambie: Ambie
Crystal: and Crystal.
[00:00:43:05 - 00:01:36:20]
Ambie: Recently I got a review copy of Lost in Adventure: The Curse of Jack Parrot from dV Games. This is an adventure, car-driven adventure game designed by Marco Pranzo, art Alberto Bontempi and Michael Menzel. For one to six players it says 90 to 120 minutes, ages 10 plus. But I played this game with my kids, I could have played it solo, I feel like I would mostly likely play it solo, but I played it with my kids because they like pirates and stuff and I figured like it's one of those types of games where I can do most of the stuff and they can just like be along for the adventure story. So yeah the way the game works is there's a bunch of decks of cards so it's all card driven. There's also like these tokens, these tokens are reputation tokens that you keep track of your score, which you can score at the end, but it's one of those games where you can also like choose your own adventure and then kind of cheat depending on how you like to play those.
[00:01:36:20 - 00:01:51:10]
Crystal: I mean that's, that's, every kid had their finger in like three different pages in a choose your own adventure book and anyone who tries to tell me that they didn't is lying because you know you were gonna go back and you got it wrong anyway so you just save yourself some time.
[00:01:51:10 - 00:01:54:15]
Ambie: Yeah especially with my kids they're like no wait I want to do this.
[00:01:55:27 - 00:06:15:03]
Ambie: But I'm not going to show you because it's kind of a one-time playthrough you can replay it and it says you can like you can make different choices but most of the story is going to be the same anyway. There are like some places that if you make the wrong decision or a different decision like you can't go that way you end up going a different way but most of it you will see no matter what so there's just like a few branches that you can see if you play again but if you're like me and don't really want to play again just for those few branches you can just like read through the cards at the end which is what I usually do in these story games.
But um there's a deck of cards that I'll show you the first one it's like it shows scenery you place them on the board and it'll tell you like put out scene cards one two and three or something. And so sometimes on the back of these cards it tells you where they match up with the scenery so like card two shows that it matches to card one so you place it here and then card three or four or something will match up and so it's you're going to be placing it out on the table in a certain orientation and then you have a little meeple that you move around on the cards and you can move to and on an unexplored place and you turn it over. And whenever you turn over a new scene card there's these interaction cards. So there's a whole deck of interaction cards that have the numbers. Like for example this number one there's three different number one cards and they'll show you like what's happening in that scene. Some of them they have to turn over immediately so like once you go to that place you turn it over and then something happens. some of them you choose to interact with it or not. And then some of them like have item things so they'll have these little question marks and that means you interact with an item to use it. So like there's like an x on the ground do you want to use a shovel or something to dig a hole because you're a pirate. So you can get items there's a whole deck of items the first item is not really a spoiler is your hand so like you can use your hand to interact with things. But basically you're using these items to interact with the interaction deck the ones that have all of the things that happen and then see what happens. The way you do that is you line up the cards and then look on the back of the card of the interaction deck it'll have the letters of the item so each letter each item has a different letter, so there's A1 A2 A3 there's B, C1 C2 so some of them have like numbers and letters and some just letters. And so the interaction will say like okay if you use item A or if you use item like A2 then read this part. Or like if you use item B then use read this part and so you match it up and then read what happened. And sometimes it won't match up and then you just like put it back down but if it does match with any of them or like sometimes it has a star which means any item that you use you read that and then like that's it for the interaction you're done with it so you discard it. So like that's where the branches can happen because like if you do a certain interaction then sometimes it will open up new scenery or not and so like you discard it you can't like go back and do it after you've done a different one.
Then I guess for the scoring and the adventure part there's these feat cards- there's 10 cards that have things that you need to do. So that's like your goal in the game and then you get your reputation points for that. At first it wasn't like super clear when you complete one of these feet like I didn't realize like how those work because it just says in the rule book like "you'll know when you complete it." But then later like in the cards it says oh complete feat one or something like oh okay okay that's what it meant by you'll know when you complete it. But I think there was one feat that did not have that I think because it was like a secret one so it didn't explicitly say when we completed it. So that was kind of weird and I wasn't really sure but otherwise it was pretty simple to play I think. Lots of reading and when I played with my kids I would like ask them where they want to go and which what they want to use to interact with them sometimes I'd be like, "hey there's a there's an x here do you want to like dig with maybe a shovel?"
Crystal: yeah
Ambie: and they're like, "oh yeah! Dig with the shovel!" So...
Crystal: Leading questions.
Ambie: Yeah. So yeah I had fun playing with them and I think they liked it but it is like a one-time playthrough. We actually did it in multiple sittings - four different sittings of around like 15 to 30 minutes each.
Crystal: So, somewhere between an hour and two hours probably?
Ambie: yeah, so and it says it takes 90 to 120 minutes total so yeah. Because there were convenience stopping points. The scenery goes out it gets big on the table but then there's a point where it's like okay now discard all the scenery cards because you're going to a different part. The story is you're a pirate, there's a legendary pirate called Jack Parrot and so like the first part is kind of like a prelude you're Jack Parrot and you bury treasure. And then the next part you're another character like trying to become a pirate too and then it's in different settings.
[00:06:15:03 - 00:06:26:05]
Crystal: We're not we're not trying to copy Pirates of the Waribbean here at all. Jack Parrot instead of Jack Sparrow. That's great.
[00:06:26:05 - 00:07:54:15]
Ambie: So yeah there's there were different settings and so like each one was a new scene and we discard everything and so that that made it easy to stop. And also it says like, even if you stop in the middle of a scene you can easily like keep track of what item cards you had put them in a bag and the scene cards you have, and they show you when you set them up, it tells you where you're putting each scene card so it's not too hard to like lay it back out because it tells you where they go. So it tells you in the rule book like how you can save your progress. So that's that was nice because like I wouldn't be playing the full game through with my kids there's not time for that. So we enjoyed it but yeah it does seem like other than playing with my kids it would probably for me be more of a solo game because it's just one character. If I'm playing this with other adults it's this one character moving around and making choices. So like you're supposed to I guess take turns with that or like decide cooperatively, but with co-op games for me I prefer having like multiple characters, so you're each controlling one character and then doing different choices. Because yeah if we're all just like controlling one character it kind of doesn't really make sense to be multiple people. So yeah for me I think this would be more of a solo game. Near the end there were a lot of decks of cards and lots of cards out like I had a bunch of items and I had to keep track of a lot of them so it took up a lot of table space and my kids like climbing on the table so- that's that's a me problem- but so it was hard to keep track of everything because they kept like moving the item cards around.. yeah so it was kind of hard to keep track of which items we-
[00:07:54:15 - 00:07:57:28]
Crystal: Okay, so don't play with cheeky monkeys got it
[00:07:57:28 - 00:08:45:01]
Ambie: Yeah, and then some of the rules weren't like super clear like I had some questions about like what happens when you cover up a scenery card and some of the things with the feats. So I wasn't sure on all the rules but like you know it's an adventure story game so if you're just there mostly for the story and the experience then like the rules don't matter as much. Especially if they're one of the people who you know read to choose your own adventure and just goes back and re chooses their adventure. So then yeah the rules don't matter as much for that. So yeah, Lost in Adventure: The Curse of Jack Parrot - it was an enjoyable choose your own adventure ish game, and for the most part it was family friendly. There was one d word that I censored when I was reading it out loud to my kids, otherwise it was family friendly. It does say ages 10 plus - that seems right I guess.
Crystal: Yeah
Ambie: Lost in Adventure: The Curse of Jack Parrot.
[00:08:45:01 - 00:14:55:15]
Crystal: I recently got a game in the mail from technically a Kickstarter or wait Gamefound campaign? Well, get those confused in my head now. But crowdfunding which I don't do a lot of nowadays like I really have scaled back the crowdfunding. But when Button Shy puts up a campaign I cannot resist, especially when the game is designed by one of my favorite designers, Aaron Andrew Wilson, who I still believe is an underrated designer and I want more people to play his game so I'm just gonna keep shouting that into the universe because his games are so good! And I digress. So, previously Aaron has released two two-player trick taking games through Button Shy prior to now and those were called Why I Otter. I am showing these off on camera. Why I Otter was the first trick taking game two-player that Aaron released through Button Shy. The second game was An Otter One. Eh, An Otter One? Yep yep.
Ambie: I get it.
Crystal: And the newest game is called Otter Chaos. I am not going to go through the rules of all three games. I've talked about some of the older ones on here before but I will do a little bit of comparison at the end so if you do want to know how the first two games work I apologize but I just don't have time to explain all three of them here.
So Otter Chaos, similarly to the other two games and to any Button Shy game consists of 18 cards and then a small rulebook in a little wallet and the artwork is very similar to the past Otter games as well. You've got some cute and fun looking otters in three different colors and with different numerical values associated with them. And in this game this interestingly from my point of view I believe is the easiest of the three otter games to learn, because the scoring is a little more straightforward and kind of a known quantity at the beginning of each round when you play. Because on the cards there are two halves that represent habitats, and there are different types of habitats that can be represented, and then there are stars on those habitats that represent points. Essentially in this game each player will be dealt cards, there will be a card flipped face up into the habitat row between the two players, and each round players will simultaneously select a card from their hand to play. That is different from the other two - in the other two games it is one player plays than the other in this one it is simultaneous selection. And whoever wins the trick either by numerical value or via the color system of red beats yellow, yellow beats blue, blue beats red. Whoever wins the trick gets to draw a card from the deck into their hand of remaining cards and then select one card from their hand to add to the habitat row between the two players. Then both players will draw back up to three cards and do it again. The cards that were played go off to the side for each player as like their personal selection of cards I don't remember the right word now. But those are they're going to be the cards they'll score essentially. And you go back and forth until there's only one card remaining in the deck and at that point you'll have a bunch of face up cards in the habitat row, each player will have a bunch of played cards face up next to them that will be how they determine who scores, and then essentially what you're trying to do is you're trying to collect stars or points. The habitat type with the highest number of stars will determine which type of habitat scores for the round. So you are just scoring points based on the most prevalent - I think is probably a good way of saying it - habitat. And you're seeing the points you're collecting throughout the round, you're seeing the stars on the habitats as they come out. All the scoring is fairly transparent in that way, whereas in the other two Otter games there are scoring conditions that are selected throughout the course of the round. So you do not know right away how things will be scored in those games.
Okay I digress again. I'm gonna not give too much more of an explanation because I actually do want to talk about the three games as a group. So I have heard from most people that they prefer, who have played the first two, that they prefer An Otter One to Why I Otter and for me that is also the case. Why I Otter is a little bit simpler and a little bit easier whereas An Otter One has a little bit more complexity to how it plays. And I actually would rank Otter Chaos as the third of that list, like the the most simple of the three games.
And I also weirdly am now mad that it's the one called Otter Chaos. I feel like in a perfect world the names would be switched around, like they the names to me don't match the game experiences. I still love the puns, I'm not mad at them like at all. I adore the otter puns but I do think that like if all three of these games were to had been designed simultaneously, Otter Chaos would be Why I Otter, Why I Otter would be An Otter One, and An Otter One would be Otter Chaos. And this is really not important for anybody to know like what I think these games should be named but like I do think it kind of reflects the experience, right? If you pick up all three of these games as a series when you see the word "chaos" to me that kind of to me at least implies like a little more complexity or at least craziness and it kind of is the most straightforward of the three games in my estimation.
So, I like it. It is my least favorite of the three but that's not saying I don't like it. Like I just, it's, I really like the other two more. An Otter One is so fabulous. It's my favorite of the three still by far but I really like the new one as well. And I'm very glad I own it and really with you know with these are three games right here that I can fit into just this little area so uh. If uh you are a person who enjoys trick taking games but you don't always have a large group to play with you can play these with just two people so I definitely recommend them if that is a genre of game you enjoy.
Ambie: Cool
[00:14:55:15 - 00:15:00:28]
Ambie: I do appreciate how the puns are like different for each one like the otter is a different thing
[00:15:00:28 - 00:15:10:15]
Crystal: Yeah. Like the games have nothing to do with otters in any meaningful way other than the artwork like it's just that there's otters on the cards but I love it anyway I don't care.
[00:15:15:16 - 00:15:34:14]
Crystal: Well, Ambie, we're coming up on almost halfway through the year so I figure we're probably due to to name our favorite games from last year what do you think?
Ambie: Yeah the Blitzies! This is the latest we've-
Crystal: It's time for the Blitzies! Officially! Finally!
Ambie: We keep doing the blitzes later and later each year I think.
Crystal: That's true
[00:15:34:14 - 00:15:57:12]
Crystal: Admittedly we had gotten into a decent rhythm of right after Dice Tower West but then because I got sick and didn't attend Dice Tower West this year that did not work out well for us. So we're finally doing it. I know you all have literally been sitting at home anxiously awaiting this episode so it is here finally. You get to hear our favorite games of 2025
Ambie: Yes.
[00:15:57:12 - 00:16:06:05]
Ambie: And neither of us played too many games from 202,5 so instead of having like a bunch of categories this year we're just gonna do a top five list.
[00:16:06:05 - 00:16:29:26]
Crystal: Yep, we're doing our top five. If you are really curious about what numbers six through ten were for each of us we mentioned those in the unedited audio of this episode so if you're not supporting us on kofi yet - kofi is similar to patreon if you've heard of patreon before - you can go support us over on kofi and listen to the unedited audio and find out what numbers six through ten were for each of us.
[00:16:29:26 - 00:17:08:16]
Ambie: Now on to number five. My number five is The Case of the Curiously Correct Blueprints which I talked about in an episode at one point. So this was a review copy that I got from Bluefish Games. They make like escape room type games but this was a audiobook puzzle game. So it was kind of like an escape room game but it was like more of a narrative experience. And there was an audiobook with it so there's like a story, and they were reading audiobook, and then stopped, and then solved puzzles. So I like escape room type things that was a unique take on it I thought. And I like their puzzles. So that was The Case of the Curiously Correct Blueprints , my number five.
[00:17:08:16 - 00:18:15:01]
Crystal: My number five is Signal. Signal was published in 2025 by DVC games designed by Jasper Beatrix and it is a spiritual successor to a game that Ambie and I both love and have talked about a lot, Rosetta: the Lost Language. Only this time it's aliens and they don't know how to communicate. It's really the gist of it, you and the other players... One player is the alien trying to be understood and everyone else is trying to understand them and you're using tokens and placing them on a map or like mat in specific locations and then waiting for the alien to respond with other tokens. And if that sounds like it makes zero sense don't feel bad it kind of does it first until you get into it and then it's really fun. I loved Signal so much I was very happy with it. Any type of weird communication game I'm down for and this one is definitely one of my favorites, which is why Signal is my number five.
Ambie: I still need to play that one more
Crystal: Yeah it's so good I just love it like it's frustrating but in a fun way.
[00:18:15:01 - 00:19:41:20]
Ambie: All right, my number four is MicroMacro: Kids – Crazy City Park, which was another review copy from Hachette Board Games. We've talked about MicroMacro a lot on the podcast. I don't know if I mentioned MicroMacro: Kids. It might have been like I think it was one of my most looking forward to last year. Yeah. So yeah, it's MicroMacro but for kids. So MicroMacro is kind of like a Where's Waldo meets murder mystery thing. There's a big big map that's all black and white but it has like repeating people so you see all moments of time at once. And you can like kind of see a person and then you kind of follow where he went and then see them over here, and like oh look they were... they came from here and they were doing this. So MicroMacro: Kids is like that but there's no like murder. It's like, it's like kid crimes like, oh they stole, oh like a cat stole some fish or something. Or like someone got lost. So it's kid-rated crimes that you're looking for. It also I think it has an upgrade from the regular one. It has like these clear big tiddly winks that you can put on the map when you find something so you don't have to like remember where each part was that you're trying to remember. And then-
Crystal: That's such an improvement.
Ambie: Yeah. And instead of like a deck of cards with the cases and the questions you're answering it's a book that has spiral bounds so you can like open it up ask the question, and then turn the page and see. And then you can kind of like just leave it open for the next case because then you kind of remember where you are. That's nice too. So yeah. MicroMacro: Kids – Crazy City Park is my number four. Like it's a children's game but I like it too.
[00:19:42:28 - 00:21:00:28]
Crystal: My number four is the only trick taking game on my top five this year and that is Numberwang. I talked about this game at length after I played it the first time last year and I am still completely in love with it. It's a trick taking game where you get to see everybody's hands before the round starts and then you pass a couple of cards. But at that point you've already bet how many tricks you think every single playe,r including yourself, is going to take. And then you just play a trick taking game kind of like normal except you have very specific goals in mind for everybody. So Ambie if I bid like four tricks on you, and you've only taken one so far, I am like, "Ambie, get it together" Take some tricks, come on man! You can do this!" And it's very, very weirdly funny for a trick taking game because you are now invested in the outcomes of everybody. And I loved it so so so much. This is one of those games that was kind of published by a small publisher, self-published you can buy it directly from their website so I don't think a lot of people know about this one yet still and I'm gonna keep shouting about it because I love Numberwang. That's Numberwang. And that's my number four designed by Cardner Babakitis and published by Odd Candy games.
[00:21:00:28 - 00:22:01:00]
Ambie: All right, my number three is Herd which is actually like a puzzle game like a single player puzzle book game.
Crystal: if you want to spell Herd so people know what-
Ambie: Oh, H E R D. So like a herd of sheep and that's like the theme- you have these little shepherd pieces and sheep pieces and you're sliding around on a grid, and there's a book of the puzzle. So you open up the book and it has the board layout kind of of a grid board, and the setup. And there's a bunch of different puzzles in the book and so you're setting it up and trying to slide and move the pieces to the goal. That's like the basic but there's like secrets and stuff. I haven't finished playing it. I started playing it on stream. This is from Letibus Design. We actually interviewed the designer Blaž a bit ago. I've played a lot of his games and so like I was really excited about Herd and I've played like two sessions so far, I think. So there's still a lot more to it that I haven't gotten to, but I'm enjoying it a lot. It's a sliding puzzle with physical pieces that stack which is really neat so that's Herd. H E R D.
[00:22:01:00 - 00:23:12:06]
Crystal: My number three is Viva Catrina the tile laying game published by The Flying Games designed by Fred Boulle and Grégory Grard, Grard? Apologies I'm not certain how his last name is pronounced. This tile-laying game is like if you ever played Carcassone and you were like, "I wish four times as many things were going on, the game was a lot more colorful, and the theme was more exciting" that's what this game is. Like it's instead of one type of path that you're connecting on tiles there are multiple types of paths that you're connecting on your tiles. And there's people on those paths, and there's balloons, and buildings, and little pieces that you can connect to attract chimera to your Día de ?Los Muertos party. Balloons abound, and there's just like a whole bunch of different ways to score points which makes this game so satisfying because you don't have to work toward one singular thing. You can diversify if you want but you can focus. And the way you draft tiles is great. I love this one and I don't hear enough people talking about it so that is why Viva Catrina is my number three.
[00:23:12:06 - 00:25:07:28]
Ambie: My number two is also by Letibus Design also by Blaž. He's, that's, just like a, it's his company it's just him and this is a puzzle book called Workworkwork. This one is just a pen and paper puzzle book. It's kind of small but it comes with a dry erase thing so you can like use dry erase markers too to work. Do your work on Workworkwork. Anyway, it's kind of like a pen and paper puzzle like if you've done grid pen and paper line drawing puzzles... like there's ones where I forget what they're called right now, but there's ones that have rules like you draw... have to draw a path or a loop that touches all the squares in the grid, or like goes through the dots and has to go like straight through the white dots and turn on the black dots... there's like a lot of different types of puzzles that have rules like that. And so it has a feeling of that but also mixed with jigsaw puzzles because you're drawing a path between these two little blob workers. They're cute. And then it's on a grid and then when you pass through a polyomino piece - there's different polyomino shapes on there - it will like join them. So you imagine the line kind of like joining the pieces as it passes through. So it exits the polyomino piece on one edge, and enters another one and then it'll like kind of join those. So you're kind of imagining snapping those together and you're trying to make a certain polyomino shape by doing this. So you're doing a path and joining these and making this shape so it's like a jigsaw mixed with line drawing. And so, I like both of those. And like this like really works with my brain. Workworkwork really works- workworkworks with my brain. Yeah, so I've been enjoying that too. I was also streaming that on my twitch channel like at the same time as streaming Herd because they're both physical puzzles and I need the overhead camera to stream both. So I would, I do like, I play some Herd and then I play some Workworkwork. And I wasn't expecting to like Workworkwork that much but yeah, I'm really, I'm really liking it a lot. I think it's my favorite of his games.
Crystal: That's awesome.
[00:25:07:28 - 00:26:22:16]
Crystal: All right my number two is 7 Wonders Dice which honestly like it does not need more recognition, I'm sure. Because the 7 Wonders name is just, it is what it is at this point. And designed by Antoine Bauza, very famous and prolific designer. Published by Repos Productions. But I had to put this one as my number two because I over the years have really enjoyed playing the other 7 Wonders games, and I've come to appreciate them more over time. And when this one came out I was like really? Dice with 7 Wonders? ?ike is it gonna work? I love it. I really love it. Every time I play it, I'm excited about the choices that I have to make. The system where you're rolling dice into like the box lid, and it has four quadrants in it, and those determine the prices of certain things. Each roll it's interesting, and it mixes things up, and it makes it so it doesn't feel samey. Every time you play each of the player boards are a little bit different as well, so kind of like regular 7 Wonders you know you're working towards slightly different things, or you have slightly different things you can do. I just, I really, really adore it and I... it can't be my number one but it's my number two. 7 Wonders Dice.
[00:26:22:16 - 00:27:39:07]
Ambie: All right, and then my number one is Jisogi: Anime Studio Tycoon, which I talked about on the podcast. I got this on Kickstarter, published by Esper Game Studio designed by Rodrigo Esper. This is a anime themed game. You're making anime. So it's a worker placement strategy game. I've only played it a couple times and there is an upgrade like a new version on kickstarter. I backed the upgrade pack because they like updated some rules which I like the new version of the rules too. We played that like because the new rule book was online. But yeah, it's very thematic feeling for me which, I like the theme a lot. Like making an anime, you're hiring workers, and you go to different worker spots, you pay money to do things, and you need to get art, you need to get a story, and you're putting together these story thing,s and you need to get your anime out. And then you want to be like the first ones to get the anime out because then you get bonus. And there's all these other things you're doing going forward too. So yeah I enjoyed it a lot, and so this was also like the heaviest game that I've played in a while probably. Like I haven't played as many like strategy euro type games since having kids. And so yeah I really enjoyed Jisogi: Anime Studio Tycoon because like thematic and strategy, like that's the type of game I used to love and I still do apparently. So that's my number one.
Crystal: Some things never change, I suppose.
[00:27:39:07 - 00:29:57:20]
Crystal: My number one, I think at one point I thought this was going to be my number one last year, because it shipped to me in December of 2024, but then we realized that its official publish date was 2025, and so I held off. And I will now shout to the heavens about how wonderful Wandering Galaxy is from Plaid Hat Games. Y'all, I know I talked about it when I played it, but the Crossroads game series from Plaid Hat has definitely evolved a lot over its existence. All the way back in 2014 when Dead of Winter first came out, which I was like holy moly how is that 12 years ago now? Like wild to me. But for those of you who are unfamiliar the crossroads series of games that Plaid Hat has developed vary from game to game in a number of different ways. But kind of the connective tissue is usually that you are going on an adventure kind of, of some kind, or you're trying to accomplish a big goal or something, or a really difficult task depending on which game you're doing. There's a lot of story baked in and that story in the early games was on cards, and in later games has been in a digital app, a browser-based app. And the app for this one works great, just like Forgotten Waters it works great and it's super fun and I really loved it. And I just can't speak more highly of this series of games from Plaid Hat. Like if you want to go on a freaking adventure, like if you just want to get into it like and have some fun with your friends and make some questionable decisions... Freelancers was definitely dirtier and a little more adult themed. Wandering Galaxy doesn't push the envelope quite as much as Freelancers did and I think that that's a good thing. Not that... I loved Freelancers, but I think Wandering Galaxy became a little bit more... it's not necessarily family friendly, the content. You're kind of like space pirates basically. But you know, going on jobs for your boss to pay off your spaceship is essentially what you're doing. But it's so fun. I love it. Yeah, just buy all of Plaid Hat's games. They're wonderful. And uh I cannot. Yeah. Just that's... that's why Wandering Galaxy, designed by Jerry Hawthorne, as all of those games are, is my number one.
[00:29:57:20 - 00:30:23:28]
Ambie: All right so that was our top five of 2025. But those were the games that were released in 2025. So we also usually do our favorite new to us game that was not released in 2025. So I actually have a couple because there are different categories... First there's Cozy Stickerville which is in 2026 so that's kind of lik,e not the spirit of the category... and I talked about Cozy Stickerville on the podcast before so you can listen to that, but-
[00:30:23:28 - 00:30:30:19]
Crystal: Yeah you played... We usually play older games but you played a game that, a future.. You wouldn't, you, you're like a time traveler, Ambie.
[00:30:30:19 - 00:31:40:13]
Ambie: So for older games that I played in 2025 for the first time... One is a children's game. So like my favorite children's game that I played is Zombie Kidz Evolution. So this is a legacy children's game, and so like, it's fun for playing with your five year olds. It's a well-known children's game. So yeah Zombie Kids Evolution, I had fun too. And then for me, the Mystery Puzzle or Puzzle X Crime Kids series. On BGG it's called Puzzle X Crime. The Lost Fire is the one that I played first. This is a jigsaw puzzle mixed with a murder mystery slash like Pnlock type game where there's cards you're combining them. But in order to see the cards you solve this jigsaw puzzle, and you're looking... You're like, "okay I want to inspect this part of the jigsaw puzzle," so then you take that piece and look behind it and it has a number and that's the card you get. I feel like it was made for me because I like jigsaw puzzles, I like escape room type things, and murder mystery things, and so it was like all of those combined in one. So I like that series. It's called Puzzle X Crime in other countries. I don't.. I'm not sure like which countries exactly, but in the U.S. it's called Mystery Puzzles. And I have a few more that I haven't done yet. So yeah that was my best new to me game series I guess.
[00:31:40:13 - 00:32:47:16]
Crystal: I would say that my best new to me for 2025 absolutely has to be Clank! Legacy. A lot of people had named it as their favorite legacy game over the years since it came ou,t and I had always been very curious about it because I really love Clank! And everybody was right. It's awesome. And we're now playing Clank! Legacy 2, so who knows maybe that would... could that be this year's new... not like the new to me, because it didn't come out yeah.. I don't I don't know... we're, I'm confusing myself. But Clank! Legacy is great and so far Clank! Legacy 2 also great. Although I'm playing that in 2026.
So we're not going to dive into all of the other categories that we typically would in a Blitzies episode but I do have to give a shout out to one game and only our very, very long time listeners who have listened to past Blitzy episodes will understand how funny this is, but 1001 Odysseys from Asmadi Games still has not released, and I am still looking forward to it. So I, I'm still providing no judgment over how long it is taking this game to come to me, and uh I love you Asmadi Games
[00:32:47:16 - 00:32:56:18]
Ambie: This is the fourth Blitzy of looking forward to the year
Crystal: Is this the fourth?
Ambie: Yeah, I was just looking at it I think in 2023 was the first time you, it was looking forward to.
[00:32:56:18 - 00:33:51:04]
Crystal: that it was supposed to be released. Like it's not like I was saying things you know multiple years before this game was supposed to come out. Every time I've mentioned it in theory it was supposed to release that year and we've done that for four years now. So again I weirdly don't care. I know that I'm gonna get that game someday, and I'm gonna love it. So I am just gonna keep talking about it and I hope that Chris and the other folks at Asmadi Games if they happen to listen to this know that their fans love them and trust them and are very excited for that game to actually come to our houses at some point.
All right, well that's the Blitzies y'all! What were your favorite games from 2025? Did you miss all of our fun categories or was the top five fine? I bet it was fine, wasn't it? Well, let us know what your favorite games from last year were on social media or in the Blitz discord and we'll see if we matched up on any of them.
[00:33:51:04 - 00:34:54:16]
Ambie:And that’s it for this week’s Board Game Blitz. Visit our website, boardgameblitz.com for more content and links.
This episode was sponsored by Grey Fox Games. The first expansion to Reavers of Midgard, Gods & Prophets is coming to Kickstarter soon along with a reprint of the deluxe edition of the base game! Visit GreyFoxGames.com to find out how you can get a free dice tray when you back the upcoming campaign! And while you’re on Grey Fox’s website, don’t forget to do a little shopping! Blitzketeers get 10% off their entire order (including exclusives) with the checkout code BLITZ2026!
Join the blitzketeer community on discord for game nights, discussions and more by following the link in the show notes.
Support the show by leaving us a rating and review on your podcast provider or by getting some official Blitz swag at merch.boardgameblitz.com
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Our theme song was composed by Andrew Morrow.
Until next time,
Got that new board game, I see
It looks like a special one
Open up that cardboard box
Let’s go have some fun
Bye everyone!
Crystal: Bye
[00:34:54:16 - 00:35:15:10]
Ambie: This is a board game. I don't need to say that.
Crystal: I don't think you do. I mean if somebody stumbles across this podcast randomly and doesn't know what it's about by the time we get past the intro,
Ambie: By the title
Crystal: I think we have bigger problems.
Ambie: Okay
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