On display by Games Workshop at New York Toy Fair were two new board games representing an effort by the company to provide a fresh point of entry for “the hobby”. The games, which feature less violent language and imagery and somewhat simplified rules, are being promoted to specialty toy retailers and mid-tier mass-market sellers as a way to expose new players to Games Workshop’s most popular IPs.

Both are planned for release later this year at a price point of around $40-50.

Blitz Bowl is the no-death version of Blood Bowl. It’s still a fantasy, full-contact version of American football, just with less blood and players being “taken out” instead of killed. The concept behind this version is monsters playing a scrimmage game while trying out for the main team.

Blitz Bowl’s rules are streamlined from the original (it’s supposed to play in about 40 minutes). Also, in addition to scoring touchdown’s for the win, completing certain objectives randomly selected each game (for example, three monsters making run actions) unlocks various benefits for the team.

Space Marine Adventures: Labyrinth of the Necrons is a Warhammer 40,000 dungeon crawl with a squad of marines drawn from those troops’ various chapters. The game is cooperative and scenario-based, the first of which is a tutorial and the last of which is a “massive labyrinth adventure” that can be adjusted for difficulty level. Each player gets a plastic space marine figure but the enemy necrons are represented by cardboard tokens.

Inside both game boxes, as alternatives to the standard rule books, are series of cards with instructions that work like game tutorials.

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For a limited time, every print order direct from Goodman Games gets a free vintage copy of Dragon Magazine.

Renegade Game Studios is giving away Byzanz.

Blue Orange Games is giving away a package of Kingdomino and Queendomino. And Board Game Revolution is doing the same.

Use coupon code “rain18” to get Paizo’s Rainy Day Discount of 10% on a single order.

Through the end of the month, $600 of LPJ Design Pathfinder products are available in one 95% off bundle ($30) at DriveThruRPG.

For the relaunch of Button Men, arriving at retail this month, Cheapass Games is giving away multiple copies through an online quiz that matches participants with the game’s criminal masterminds.

Orders placed today from HasbroToyShop ship free with promo code “LOVE2018”.

Also today (ending midnight MST), save 30% on card sleeves from Mayday Games with discount code “chinesenewyear30”.

In recognition of February holidays, Skirmisher Publishing has bundled, at a 90% discount, RPG ebooks representing Valentine’s Day, Black History Month, Chinese New Year, and Presidents Day.

A Traveller: The New Era bundle is available at Bundle of Holding. Just $26 gets you everything.

Alone in the Jungle, Flying Pig Games’ solitaire expansion for ’65 Squad-Level Combat in Vietnam, is 30% off, direct from the company through today.

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Mongoose has a major Traveller sale under way at DriveThruRPG. Discounts are 33-80% off.

Gypsy Knights Games is also running a sale on Traveller material, to celebrate the company’s seventh birthday.

Another sale running at DriveThruRPG is the BAMFsies Sale, celebrating superhero titles.

Superheroes are also featured in Bundle of Holding’s Heroes Unlimited offer from Palladium Books, while another offer at the site features Ulisses Spiele’s English-language translation, The Dark Eye.

Victory Point Games is selling everything at 10% off (except for Darkest Night products) in celebration of Valentine’s Day.

Giveaways:

• By Happy Li’l Minis, a whole core set of Star Wars: Legion from Fantasy Flight Games.
• By Angie’s Angle, a bundle of three Gigamic games: Yogi, Imagidice, and Differ3nce.
• By EverythingBoardGames, Arcadia Quest from Dragori Games, Lucky’s Misadventures (two copies) from Great Northern Games, and an Herbalism Founder’s Pack of 4 games from Deep Water Games.
• By Katie’s Game Corner, autographed GMT Games box art from Roger MacGowan.
• By OffWorld Designs, two tickets to Gen Con 2018.
• By The Giveaway Geek, Cytosis from Genius Games.

At Amazon, Starship Merchants from Toy Vault is 71% off and Bloodsuckers from Fireside Games is 59% off.

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Today marks 10 years since Yehuda Berlinger posted the first article on Purple Pawn, a brief story about board games mentioned in the Sally Forth comic strip. I hope in that time that you’ve felt informed and entertained. We’ve tried our best to make a positive contribution. With 8,370 articles published so far!

Purple Pawn presents a unique voice in the game field, covering all types of tabletop games—board games, card games, collectibles, roleplaying games, war games, miniatures, and more. Games with modern movie tie-ins and traditional games played by generations. Games for the dedicated hobbyist, as well as the casual gamer.

Of course we report news of product releases but we also work hard to document the business side of the game industry, provide tips to the game consumer, and highlight the significant role that games play in culture and society.

Purple Pawn would not exist if not for the vision and guidance of its founder, Yehuda Berlinger. Thank you, Yehuda, for letting me keep it going when you decided to move on to other game-related endeavors!

Thank you also to our various contributors over the years: Ben Clark, Thomas Deeny, K.C. Lee, Lory Gilpatric, Phil Kilcrease, Randy Snyder, Richard Bliss, Josh Street, Rob Kalajian, Sam Mercer, and Tracy Tang! In the early days it was Yehuda as the snarky commentator, Josh as the fanboy, and me as the straight-man. Ben provided an amazing inside look at the business side of games with the Paper Money podcast. Sam gave us some cool graphics. Rob—who, other than Yehuda and I, was with Purple Pawn the longest—was of tremendous support to me personally, did a wonderful job of covering the independent publishers, and also solved many technical problems behind the scenes. Thomas, who is still with Purple Pawn, has an amazing knack for identifying the hot trends and controversies.

And of course, thank you to our readers!

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Online decor retailer Wayfair is giving away the components for awesome game room: carved wood table, throne armchair, bookcase, and a variety of fantasy-themed decorative items.

In Grey Gnome Games Hot Winter Sale, get significant discounts on select games, plus free promos, free expansions, and free shipping.

Osprey Publishing’s February Site-Wide Sale means up to 70% off in all categories, books, ebooks, and games.

A Pawn’s Perspective is giving away Hero Realms from White Wizard Games.

To go with the release of its free living campaign, Modiphius Entertainment is running a sale on Mutant Chronicles books.

Darksilver Forge is giving away a Dungeons & Dragons Starter Set prize pack, which in addition to the actual Starter Set includes metal dice, a dice tray, a comic, and dungeon tiles.

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Cabot Creamery is running a board game recipe contest. Three winners will each receive two tickets to the BGG@Sea 2018 Alaska cruise.

The Dungeon Masters Guild New Year, New Campaign Sale means a 25% discount on all tier 1 (levels 1-4) Dungeons & Dragons adventures, as well as some rulebooks.

Parenting in Progress is giving away two games from Goliath, Greedy Granny and Jumping Jack.

For The Love To is also giving away a Goliath game, Doggie Doo.

Promo code “GAMES2018” is good for savings of 25% on games from HasbroToyShop but only until midnight ET tonight.

Plumpy Thimble is giving away Torres from IDW.

MyMBuzz is giving away three Magic: The Gathering Rivals of Ixalan Bundles (box, 80 lands, and 10 boosters each).

Board Game Revolution is giving away Valeria Card Kingdoms plus expansions and accessories from Daily Magic Games.

USAopoly is giving away three sets of promo cards for Harry Potter Hogwarts Battle.

Buy one, get one 30% off on HexBug Battle Ground toys.

Through February, Noble Knight Games is offering free domestic shipping on all orders over $149.

The latest at Bundle of Holding is Oone Blueprints, maps for RPGs.

Unfiltered Gamer is giving away something from Mayday Games.

Name Dropping is giving away Stranger Things games.

Sentient Cow Games is giving away some miniatures.

Rolling Solo is giving away UBOOT: The Board Game (pending Kickstarter funding and production).

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It’s Rambo. It’ll have miniatures. For many people, that nostalgic excitement will be enough. Frankly, that was all I needed to volunteer for this preview. But the question, of course, is will the final Rambo: The Board Game product live up to the expectations of potential backers?

I, at least, expected a miniatures combat game. And while fighting is certainly the focus of the game’s mechanics, I was pleasantly surprised to find it more a cooperative adventure game. In fact, the highlight for me was how well the game differentiates and personalizes the individual characters—including Rambo himself—which players adopt to complete various missions. Successfully achieving objectives is not just a matter of plunging forward shooting at enemy soldiers. Instead, it requires players to coordinate and make use of their heroes’ unique talents.

Another nice aspect of the game is the scenarios, which not only advance the story but also provide players further development for their selected characters. As each scenario is completed, the players are afforded additional choices of gear and tactics.

In terms of gameplay, I particularly appreciated the individual “alert meters” and other features that focus players on keeping their heroes hidden from the enemy while moving about the board. Also special is the more cinematic approach that the game takes to combat. There are no dice or other random factors. If someone shoots, they hit.

Finally, though Rambo: The Board Game requires players to track a fair amount of detail among character skills, stances, tactics, and gear, plus a variety of enemy units, each type with its own programmed battlefield actions, the structure of the game and most of the rules are pretty straightforward. I rarely play this kind of game, yet one quick read through the rulebook was all I needed.

Still, my generally positive experience with Rambo: The Board Game comes with a significant caveat. The game I played was a prototype. Though I’ve seen much worse even in published games, the rules to this one are still rough around the edges. Some ambiguities and language issues remain. The graphics and design will improve, I’d hope. More scenarios should be added (the prototype only had three). And instead of standees, there are supposed to be plastic miniatures in the production box. The number and quality of those, I expect will be a significant factor for potential backers.

Rambo: The Board Game from Everything Epic Games launches on Kickstarter January 23rd.

A complimentary partial prototype of Rambo: The Board Game was provided by Everything Epic Games for review.

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World War Tesla is a new alternate-history miniatures war game from Fat Dragon Games. Designed by James Ward and Thomas Tullis, the game presumes a world in which Nikola Tesla’s concepts for death rays and force fields have made a real impact on a world at war.

Giant walking tanks, soldiers with rocket-packs, and flying machines armed with death rays rule the battlefield!

The game is also 3D print-and-play. That is, buy the rules and models just once ($20), print figures as much as you want. Along with the rule book are included STL files for 15mm scale troops, vehicles, markers, template, and terrain.

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CMON is giving away two 3-day passes to the CMON Expo (May 11-13 in Atlanta). To enter, post your New Year gaming resolution to CMON’s Facebook page, but do it by tomorrow.

Save 20% on Geeknson game tables through the end of the month.

Also through the end of the month, Rogue Genius Games is offering a bundle of all the company’s Pathfinder RPG ebook products for $29.87, a discount of 98%.

Renegade Game Studios is giving away a prize package that include every game and expansion in its North Sea series. That’s six boxes in all.

Save 20% on all purchases through the 12th in Victory Point Games’ New Year’s Sale. Save an additional 10% on Gem Rush and High Treason.

Featuring the first edition World of Darkness is Bundle of Holding’s Chronicles of Darkness offering, now $28 for the rulebook and eight supplements (maybe more).

Coupon code “holiday2017” will get you 30% off orders placed before the 31st from the Jon Brazer Enterprises Shop.

Save 18% on orders from Mayday Games with discount code “welcome2018” but only until 11:59 MT tonight.

Compass Games is holding a Holiday Sale. Preorders and recent releases are 25-30% off. Select other games are 40% off through the 15th with coupon code “HOLIDAY17”.

Flying Pig Games’ Post-Holiday Sale means 30% off for Old School Tactical Volume I, ’65 Squad-level Combat, and Night of Man.

Buy two card sets from Strat-O-Matic, get one free.

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Mikkel Bertelsen will hand-deliver an extra-large Klask anywhere in the world to the person who’s Facebook comment earns the most likes by 8:00 PM CET January 1st.

SahmReviews continues its 5 month series of daily giveaways.

North Star Games is giving away Evolution: Flight.

Gozer Games is giving away Codenames: Deep Undercover from CGE.

Blog and podcast giveaways:

• By The Mama Maven, Happy Salmon from North Star Games.
• By A Small Village, Catch the Fox from Goliath Games.
• By Backstage Pass, War of the Ring Anniversary Edition from Ares Games.
• By Boards Alive, Near and Far from Red Raven Games.

A bundle of Tony Petrecca’s DM’s Guild products is available now at more than 50% discount but disappears tomorrow.

Save 10% on anything from Strat-O-Matic through the 3rd.

Discount code “MERRY17” is good for 20% from Rebel Minis but only through tomorrow.

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