Build Barony Anew in the Middle Ages, and Rediscover a Dungeon Twister in Indonesia

by W. Eric Martin

• As Candice mentioned in December 2023, Marc André's 2017 game Majesty: For the Realm has been overhauled by French publisher Studio H and has hit the market again in Europe as Middle Ages. The gist of the game remains the same as before, as summarized in this publisher description:

You are the head of a fiefdom and its future is in your hands. Will you develop agriculture with fields and mills? Or will you become a pious church-builder or prefer to feast in your sumptuous palaces? Develop your lands in your image and become the most influential lord in the kingdom.

In Middle Ages, you explore the essence of medieval urban life through eight distinct tiles: fields, farms, villages, forts, markets, barracks, churches, and palaces. Each tile features its own scoring system, yet it's linked to others, offering a rich and immersive gaming experience. Unleash strategic maneuvers, from daring assaults on rival fiefdoms to reserving tiles for future use. Harness the power of tactical combinations to amplify your income and pave your way to triumph!

In short, each player has eight locations in front of them, and whenever they draft an item associated with that location, they take that location's action. In Majesty, players drafted people cards and stacked them below location cards, whereas in Middle Ages, you draft building tiles with funky edges and create a tile tableau that more visibly represents what you're focusing on during play.

Mock-up at SPIEL Essen 23
In Majesty, you draft cards Small World-style, that is, paying a cost of 0, 1, 2, etc. workers for the first, second, third, etc. card in the draft line, with a worker being placed on each card you skip and becoming a bonus item for whoever later claims that card. In Middle Ages, you instead draft Kingdomino-style, with rows of building tiles laid out in value from low to high; whoever chooses the lowest-valued tile in a round chooses first in the next round. (Four rows of tiles are always visible, giving you the chance to plan now for future choices.)

Ye olde Majesty
Other changes include the length of the game — in Majesty you draft twelve times; in Middle Ages sixteen times — and incentives for what you're drafting. In Majesty, for example, you receive an endgame bonus for diversity, squaring the number of buildings where you have a person and earning that many points, e.g. 36 points for people at six buildings; in Middle Ages, you lose 10 coins for any location that lacks at least one tile. Since gameplay works differently, the building powers differ in Middle Ages, as you might expect, and four event cards from a deck of fifteen are revealed at random each game, giving everyone additional incentives for drafting one tile over another.

Middle Ages is due out in North America on June 5, 2024.

• Speaking of Marc André, Grail Games is working on a new edition of his 2015 game Barony that will feature new art and include the 2016 expansion Sorcery, with a crowdfunding campaign scheduled for mid-2024 ahead of a Q4 2024 delivery.

Barony was André's first release after Splendor, and it features similar minimalistic gameplay, as is also true of Majesty: For the Realm. On a turn, take one of six actions — recruitment, movement, construction, new city, expedition, or noble title — with those small actions adding up over time as you attempt to dominate the unique landscape of each game. Unlike those other two titles, in Barony you share the same playing area with others and can affect them directly.

• A transformation along the lines of Middle Ages has also taken place on 2023's flip-and-write game Scribbly Gum, which Phil Walker-Harding published through his own Joey Games.

The new design, co-published with Postmark Games, has been released as...Scribbly Gum. Yes, the design has the same name, which might be confusing, but the latter is subtitled "Play at Home Edition" because it matches the style of other Postmark releases. Instead of needing a set of unique tiles as in the original game, now you need only a pair of normal d6 dice, with you printing as many game sheets as needed.

In a press release for this new edition, Walker-Harding writes, "We are so glad to be partnering with Postmark Games on this new release of Scribbly Gum! The boxed edition of the game has been well received here in Australia, but working with Postmark's unique form of distribution is a natural next step. We are excited for a new audience to discover Scribbly Gum and get to know some of Australia's most fascinating trees!”

Additionally, Joey Games and Postmark Games will crowdfund a new Walker-Harding design in mid-2024.

• Dutch publisher Splotter Spellen plans to release a third edition of its 2005 release Indonesia from company founders Jeroen Doumen and Joris Wiersinga. For those not familiar with this nearly-two-decade-old game, here's an overview:

Indonesia is a game in which two to five players build up an economy, trying to acquire the most money. Players acquire production companies, which produce goods (rice, spices, microwaveable meals, rubber, and oil), and shipping companies, which deliver goods to cities. As cities receive goods, they grow, increasing their demands. Production companies earn money for each good delivered to a city, up to the city's capacity, but they must pay shipping companies for the distance traveled, even if they end up losing money. Players can research advantages, like greater shipping capacity or the ability to merge companies, possibly stealing ownership of lucrative plantations or shipping routes by buying out other players.

Players keep their money hidden, trying to accumulate the most by the end of the third era. When only one type of a company is left, an era ends. New eras bring new cities, companies, and types of goods. At the end of the third era, the player with the most money wins. However, money earned from the last round of operations (selling/shipping goods) counts double, so it can be important to control the timing.

For the third edition of this game, Splotter has worked with artist Jan Lipiński to overhaul the game's graphics and components following suggestions from Joshua Starr of Grand Trunk Games, with the game board now featuring better defined areas and icons indicating what will appear in those areas, with the wooden ships and goods tokens being redesigned, and with other changes detailed on the pre-order page.

The third edition of Indonesia will be released in Q4 2024.

• Another game from the same era as Indonesia that's being delivered anew is Christophe Boelinger's Dungeon Twister, first released in 2004 by Asmodee when it was still only a publisher.

Ludically plans to release an updated version of the game in 2025 under the title Dungeon Twister: 20th Anniversary Edition. For those not familiar with the game, here's a summary:

In Dungeon Twister, 2 to 4 players take on the role of a team of heroes imprisoned by the Mad Archmage in an ever-changing dungeon riddled with deadly traps. Will you be up to the challenge of surviving and entertaining your jailer?

Players compete by strategically exploiting their adventurers' skills and the opportunities created by the maze's ever-changing shape. To win the game, eliminate your opponents by magic, force or cunning, and activate the mechanisms that will make them fall into a trap. Bring back precious treasures or escape alive to earn victory points.

The Paladins & Dragons expansion will be included in this new edition, along with the 3/4 Players Expansion. (The original base game was for two players only.) This edition will feature new art and miniatures, as well as larger tiles.

I could have sworn that I wrote about this new edition previously, but apparently I did only on social media, if that. Honestly I take so many pictures at every convention that's nearly impossible to get to all of them...

Demo at SPIEL Essen 23