1960: Making of the President: One of the designers is Jason Matthews of Twilight Struggle fame. This game is obviously mechanically inspired by Twilight Struggle but looks to have some potentially important advantages:

• 90-minute playtime (vs. 180)
• Cards have a secondary value, putting a number of “rest cubes” into a Shogun-esque bag, ready to come up and be helpful later. This balances the inherently higher power of certain cards vs. others.
• A cost (political “momentum”) for your opponent to use his own event if you play the card
• Fewer “gotcha” cards that can cost you the game if you don’t know about them beforehand; important cards to know about will be explicitly mentioned in the rulebook
• Published by Z-Man vs. GMT; will probably still be overpriced, but better produced.

And the theme looks only slightly less compelling. This could be a real winner.

Cuba: A bold choice for a theme–like making a movie set in some random town in Morocco in 1944. Will it stand up to comparison with Puerto Rico? Unfortunately all the excitement and reading of the rules can’t tell us how the game will feel to play. Exciting and tense? Or like a random mashup of the mechanics of Puerto Rico and Pillars of the Earth? My unsubstantiated hunch is that this will be forgettable.

Municipium: Well, it’s Knizia, so there is cause to be hopeful. On the other hand, Dr. K is hit-and-miss even for his fans, and the publisher (Valley Games) doesn’t have a track record. Is this the next smash hit? Or is the Doctor unloading a medium title on a rookie publisher?

Valley Games is also publishing two other original games in the near future, Container (looks dull) and Supernova (looks interesting). Both seem to have gathered quite a bit of attention.

Kingsburg: Pointed out by reader Beaker–thanks! After 1960 this might be the game that looks most appealing to me of the upcoming titles. I like the mix of resource and risk management  (some will complain about luck) and important timing decisions. I may forgive it the fact that it contains yet more cathedrals to build.

Agricola: I have no idea why anyone is excited about this game. The theme–I am not making this up–is that you are a dirt farmer in 1600’s Germany who lives in a tiny shack with his wife. Your goal is to build up a prosperous farm. Are you excited yet? It’s designed by Uwe Rosenberg, the creator of Bohnanza, which I guess is in its favor.

Im Jahr des Drachen: (In the Year of the Dragon): By the designer of (awesome) Notre Dame and published by Alea. Alea is batting 8-for-11 in their big box line but 1-for-4 in the last 4. Can Notre Dame and this pull them out of the slump? I’m curious and cautiously optimistic.

Amyitis: Ystari could make the rules of Coloretto fill an eight-page rulebook. On the other hand some people seem very enthusiastic. I’ll let them try it out.