Aeon's End
Here's a short review of Aeon's End.
If you like Dominion, and would like to play something similar in a cooperative fashion, Aeon's end is just what you want. It's got deck building, with some cards representing currency; and others, artefacts, energy, and magic spells. Yes, magic: each player represents a wizard, and the wizards fight a boss monster and its minions together.
The magic system is well done: spells must be planned ahead one move, and there are limited resources for activating them. Each wizard also has a special skill that can be activated once the wizard has accumulated enough energy, which can be purchased.
There's a large choice of wizard characters to choose from, and it can be an interesting exercise to round up a good army of them and supply of cards that can make for an interesting game. (Like in Dominion, there's a limited number of kinds of cards that can be part of the game to begin with.)
Boss monsters come in many shapes, sizes, and difficulties as well, and they spawn minions, sometimes many of them. They also have "plans" which they announce some rounds ahead and which can be flattened by the wizards before they're played out (which can have really, really severe consequences).
I've found Aeon's End to be fairly well balanced, with an interesting gameplay, and surprising dynamics. As mentioned, if you're looking for a cooperative kind of Dominion, this is for you.
Tags: games