A little game with a comic in the background – a review of the game “Knights of the Round Cheese” by Rafał Cywicki

It turns out that our foxes, although cute, really like to compete with each other. I will tell you about a small card game – just in time to take it on a journey.

A visit to a kiosk

I’ve always liked picture novels. As a child, I took a liking to Donald Duck , on which I was able to spend all my modest savings. The stories from Kaczgród stayed in my heart for a long time, and after them was my fascination with Marvel comics. The superhero concept intrigued me, and the colorful experiences of the characters made me forget about ordinary, everyday life. Another group of comics that I appreciate are smart and fun short forms featuring anthropomorphic animals. In this field, in my opinion, Liz Climo has been in the lead overseas for a long time (I recommend it!), But also in Poland we have nothing to be ashamed of.

Artur cheese

The Knights of Round Cheese is the second offer of the Gindi publishing house in the universe of Beata Smugaj’s Lisich Affairs . It is a series of short stories about everyday problems in the fox kingdom. The characters have human vices, and the whole thing is charming and beautifully illustrated by the author. The first of these titles was Ojojanie, an easy-to-use cooperative game that made a sensation on the Polish crowdfunding website. Unfortunately, I have to admit that despite the low expectations, I was very disappointed with it. I was charmed by the beautiful setting and the charming theme of overcoming everyday worries. In my opinion, it was poorly balanced and there were banal games (less often) and virtually impossible to win (much more often). I am happy to say that despite the initial objections, I gave the authors a second chance and I certainly do not regret it.

Kamelot

There are 27 cards in a tiny box, including two help cards and a first player card. So we associate with a classic-size waist. Most of the illustrations are taken from the previous title, but there are also some new foxes here. The cards are quite thin and ask to be sleeved, but then they will definitely not fit in the box. In my opinion, you could have tried a small card symbolizing the cost of cards on the market.

Knights

We are dealing here with a two-player game (with two copies you can supposedly play four people). The gameplay is very simple and reminds me of Fantastic Worlds and Red Rising. There are five cards in a line on the table. Players start with four in their hand, which either pay the cost of cards from the market or can be used by others. On his turn, a player must buy one of the cards and resolve its play effect, then draw the number of cards from the deck to a hand that has disappeared from the table this turn and replenish the market to five cards. Each of them also has rules for scoring at the end of the game (they can refer to the player’s hand) and this is where the tactical element of the game is, because we will be figuring out what to play so as not to help the opponent and not harm ourselves. The game will end when the number of cards in the deck drops to zero. Then the game continues until the number of turns is equal.

Is it worth it?

The game is fast, fluid and pretty mean. The two-player game took us from 10 to 15 minutes. This is not a strictly duel position, but the main emphasis has been placed on the interaction between players understood in two ways. By using a few cards, you can directly harm your opponent, but for most of the game we think about how to set the card market so that we can buy what we want. The only thing that really bothered me was the limited amount of “meat” in the game. I understand the game balance and duration assumptions, however, you would like the pot making up the main deck to be a bit wider. Sometimes it can also be a lot of randomness, but he does not treat it as a vice, but a characteristic feature of card games, especially those in which all cards are different.