Source: The cube
By: Omri Avni, game expert
Even before the global pandemic that left us at home, the field of board games in Israel enjoyed a renewed flourishing, and what was once reserved only for children and mega-geeks, became a legitimate means of entertainment for Muggles as well. In recent years dozens of board games have been translated, and after we have already recommended three equivalent board games in Hebrew – here are 3 more recommended.
The Sheriff of Nottingham
(3-6 players, 45 minutes, ages 8+, medium complexity)
Welcome to Nottingham (yes, that’s Robin Hood). You play merchants trying to get your goods into town, and the brutal sheriff checks you to make sure all your goods are legal. In each round of the game there will be a player after the sheriff, and the other players are the dealers. During the round, each of the merchants puts goods (cards) into a sealed bag without anyone seeing, and then announces what is in the bag (he must announce up to 5 cards, all of the same type – for example 4 loaves of bread). He then decides whether to bribe the sheriff so that he won’t check the contents of the sack. The sheriff can choose for each player, whether to check him or accept the bribe (or neither, but that’s unnecessary). If the sheriff chose not to check, he takes the bribe money, and the merchant puts his goods on the market and gets paid for them (except for illegal goods, which will be hidden and redeemed only at the end of the game). If the sheriff chose to check – then each card has a fine price. If there is a card that was not declared – the merchant will pay the price of the fine (and if it is an illegal card, the card will also be confiscated and will not enter the market). But if the sack contains all the cards that the dealer declared – then the sheriff pays the dealer the price of the fine for all the cards in the sack.
For example, if there are 4 loaves of bread in a sack, and the merchant declared 4 loaves of bread, then the sheriff will pay 4 times the fine for each loaf (2 coins). But if there were 3 bread and cheese, the merchant will pay the sheriff the fine only for the cheese.
We will play until everyone is twice sheriff (in 3 players – each player 3 times), which means there will be between 8 and 12 game rounds. The game tests your ability to lie to the other players, and give them the feeling that although you cannot be trusted, you cannot know that you are lying…
sold out
(2-4 players, 30-40 minutes, ages 10+, medium complexity)
The King of Portugal visited Spain and saw the beautiful baths there. When he returned to his kingdom, he began to frantically search for excellent bathroom builders, who could help him build the most beautiful baths available. This is exactly where you come into the picture – because who among us hasn’t longed and fantasized about being the builder of the King of Portugal’s bathtubs?
During the game everyone has the bathroom they are trying to build. There are shops (their number varies according to the number of players), and each player, in turn, must take all the tiles of the same color from only one shop (or from the street, we’ll get to that in a second).
just what? The Portuguese tile sellers are a bit crazy (does anyone know a Portuguese tile seller who isn’t crazy?). As soon as someone has taken goods from them, they get angry and throw the rest of their goods on the street. From there you can also take, and you must take all the tiles of the same color from there.
After we have collected the tiles, we will place them in our board. Each row must contain tiles of the same color only!
--As soon as the round is over – we take a single tile from each row we filled and place it in the appropriate place in the bath. Then we calculate points (which is a bit more complicated – but not rocket science. All in all, we check how many sequences we made), redistribute tiles in the stores, and start another round.
Once someone finishes a row, the game is over and points are tallied. Whoever wins the most points will be the master bath builder for the King of Portugal. Congratulations, now go update your LinkedIn.
the underground
(5-10 players, 20-30 minutes, ages 7+, low complexity)
Welcome to the future. Your country is held by a tyrant with his military rule, and there is an underground that tries to oppose this tyrant. You will be part of the underground. That is – some of you. Some of you will be spies for the government.
At the beginning of the game, each player receives a card indicating whether he is part of the underground (blue) or a spy from the guard (red). Then we’ll start going on missions. There are 5 missions in the game, each one needs 100% success otherwise it counts as a failure. If 3 missions were successful – the underground won. If 3 missions failed – the rebels won.
Each mission has a mission leader, the captain, who suggests a team that goes on the mission (each mission requires a different number of people). All players can vote – secretly, with cool approve or disapprove cards – on the team that went on the mission. If there is a majority who approved – the team goes on the mission, and if there is not, then a new captain is appointed and the time marker is moved by 1. When the time marker reaches 5 the mission is failed.
The crew members on the mission have one thing they can do. put a “success” or “failure” card. One mission failure card is enough for the mission to fail. After all, think that you are robbing a bank, and the most insignificant job is, say, the driver – what happens if he spies against you?. After that, the cards are revealed, and the speculation begins when we put the appropriate marker on the task (red or blue). The last mission will usually need all non-spies crew members – so try to have as much information as possible.
The game is of course full of lies, trickery and cheating. as we like.
Don’t miss these games:
