Game Info
Year
2027
Players
1-4
Age
12+
Playtime
60 min
Collection
Your Tier
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Description
A beetle-themed strategy game in which players grow their beetles through successive life stages using card play and resource management
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All mentions
Browse transcript mentions, sentiments, pros/cons, mechanics, topics, quotes, and references.
Total mentions: 10
This page: 10
Sentiment:
pos 9 ·
mix 1 ·
neu 0 ·
neg 0
Showing 1–10 of 10
Video O0UbzwNKHi0
The Dice Tower Other at 20:40 sentiment: mixed
video_pk 103741 · mention_pk 299684
Click to watch at 20:40 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
mixed
Pros
- Doing incredibly well for a game about beetles.
- The stag beetles theme is interesting.
- The cover and art on the cards drew the reviewer in.
Cons
- Wasn't gleaning a whole lot of gameplay from it.
- The board looks clinical.
- Mycelia, a similar game, plays clinical and doesn't strongly bring out the theme.
- Doesn't necessarily want to pick up the game.
- The rotating board starts to feel clinical.
Thematic elements
- Beetles.
Comparison games
- Mycelia
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Simultaneous Strategy — A simultaneous strategy game.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- Good afternoon everybody. Welcome to the Dice Tower.
- It is a crowd surfing episode and we are here to talk about games that are on Kickstarter and Gamefound and Backer Kit.
- We just got back from Dice from Gen Con. I don't know why I've always said Dice East, but then Gen Con Dice Tower booth at Gen Con.
- So, Crowd Surfing is a show where we talk about board games that are on Kickstarter and Game Found.
- This is the 2026 annual Robins Nerds supplies. That's a lot of S's in a row. Dice advent calendar.
- So, they give you that container and there's a few other companies that have tried this whole, you know, put put a few games together.
- If your game is called Pirates with a Y, I'm not as afraid of you.
- Battle Stations is a gigantic game from Guerilla Games. Uh, that is half RPG, half space war game, half run around on a ship and blow things up. It is a lot. It is huge games.
- This is a cool sci-fi setting.
- Every single deck is unique to you and the entire universe. There'll never be a repeat of your deck.
- It's a tower defense where there is a tower that you are making it difficult to get to.
- A co-op sandbox where each expedition. Every expedition changes the world you return to.
- The Lord of the Rings Ascension. Now, maybe it's just me. Every time I see this, I get bugged by the logo by Lord of the Rings.
- I was so psyched for this when it was announced. I love Ascension. Ascension's a it's a great deck building game. Lord of the Rings. Seeing the Ascension kind of look used for Lord of the Rings. That's great.
- There's a reason to play the board game outside of the video game. And sometimes that's because it's more simple or the tactile experience, but you don't want it more complex.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
Video Yms742BuYaM
Before You Play Rules Teach at 0:04 sentiment: positive
video_pk 103139 · mention_pk 296762
Click to watch at 0:04 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
- Efficient planning and programming of action tiles is required.
- Players need to manage resources wisely.
- Positioning pieces wisely is important for gaining bonus tokens, meeting objectives, and gaining traits.
Cons
none
Thematic elements
- players progress through the life cycle of a beetle, developing from a grub to a pupa, and finally into a fully grown beetle before competing in a final showdown.
- the beetle breeding grounds
Comparison games
none
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Action Point Allowance System — Players arrange action tiles to resolve actions from left to right, and collect resources from uncovered symbols on their action mats.
- Area Majority — Players compete for space on the main board and for being the highest on trait tracks, which can block opponents and provide bonuses.
- Card Drafting — Players draw beetle cards from a deck, and these cards can be used for growing beetles or tucked for ongoing benefits.
- End game scoring — Points are awarded at the end of the game based on beetle cards, objectives, tucked cards, and trait track positions.
- Resource Management — Players collect and spend resources like eggs, water, wood, fruit, nectar, and sap to perform actions.
- Set Collection — Players collect bonus tokens for various traits and can score points by collecting specific combinations of these tokens.
- Simultaneous action selection — Players simultaneously select and arrange action tiles on their action mat to determine the actions they will take.
- Track Advancement — Players advance markers on trait tracks (mandibles, coloring, wingspan) which provide ongoing benefits and end-game scoring.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- Stag is a simultaneous action selection planning game for one to four players in which players progress through the life cycle of a beetle, developing from a grub to a pupa, and finally into a fully grown beetle before competing in a final showdown.
- This game is designed and fully illustrated by J.J. Neville and published by Split Stone Games for helping sponsor this video.
- each round is split into six steps, and most of these steps are actually done simultaneously, which means that this is mainly a simultaneous play game.
- As for the grow a beetle action, in order to grow a pupa to its final beetle form, all you need is time.
- the showdown stage is sort of what the game culminates to, and so players will want to choose which side of their showdown token to play wisely.
- this is a game that requires you to be efficient in planning and programming your action tiles.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
Video VXJumBk0jQQ
kovray Review at 0:14 sentiment: positive
video_pk 100029 · mention_pk 278123
Click to watch at 0:14 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
- Outstanding art and presentation.
- Crisp table presence.
- Flow of the game makes sense.
- Dynamic resource management.
- Simultaneous play requires brain crunching.
- Interesting planning ahead and strategy.
- Showdowns are a memorable deduction moment.
- Spicy and interesting risk/reward dynamic in showdowns.
- Social element with negotiation and threats.
- Core aspect of trait markers providing abilities and scoring.
- General engine building with tucked cards, personal objectives, and upgraded action tiles.
- Appeals to players who enjoy optimizing turns and strategizing.
Cons
- Fear of beetles, especially horned ones (personal phobia, not game flaw).
- Risk of losing everything in a multiplayer fight showdown.
- Can get a little bit heated around the table.
Thematic elements
- Guiding beetles through their life cycle, from grubs to fully developed beetles.
Comparison games
none
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Area Majority (implied) — Competing to be the highest on trait tracks for points and abilities.
- Card Drafting (implied) — Choosing beetle cards from hand to grow grubs.
- Engine Building — Upgrading action tiles to become more efficient, tucking beetle cards for permanent abilities or resources, and growing the beetle population on the player board.
- Push Your Luck / Take That (Showdown) — In showdowns, players secretly choose to 'fight' or 'forage'. Fighting can yield high rewards if done alone, but if multiple players fight, everyone loses traits and beetles. Foraging is safer but yields fewer rewards.
- Resource Management — Gathering resources like wood, water, and eggs, and exchanging them.
- Set Collection — Collecting pupa trait tokens of different colors, and collecting specific pupa trait tokens for personal objectives.
- Simultaneous action selection — Instead of taking turns one at a time, everyone will plan out their actions then resolve them together. Players arrange five action tiles across their action board, and placement determines the action. Actions are resolved from left to right simultaneously.
- Tile Placement — Players place five action tiles across their action board, with the placement determining the action performed.
- Track Advancement — Advancing on trait tracks (mandibles, coloring, wingspan) which provide end-game points and unlock ongoing abilities.
- Worker placement (implied) — Beetles are placed on rings of the board to represent stages of their life cycle (grub, pupa, beetle).
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- This game features simultaneous play.
- It's a bit of organizational madness, if you ask me.
- Every showdown will become a memorable deduction moment where you're constantly trying to read everyone else at the table.
- The risk factor of this is huge, because the thing is is if you fight and both of you fight, you lose your beetles, which is really valuable points, and you'll lose a trait as well, which is potential points.
- Stag is definitely a game for people who enjoy optimizing their turns, strategizing about how they're going to move up on different tracks, and given that engine building feel along with how the showdowns are done, if you're interested in a bit of player interaction, that's definitely a game you're going to want to check out.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
Video mIkOrc00hyo
Board Stupid Top List at 0:56 sentiment: positive
video_pk 100025 · mention_pk 278115
Click to watch at 0:56 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
- Beautiful artwork
- Strategic rotating main board
- Interesting prisoner's dilemma interaction
- Engaging personal board puzzle mechanism
- Ability to upgrade beetle resources and fighting capabilities
Cons
none
Thematic elements
- the life cycle and battle of stag beetles
Comparison games
- Mycelia
- Smartphone Inc.
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Life cycle progression — Players collect resources to advance their beetle grubs through larval stages to fully grown adults.
- Player Interaction / Dilemma — When adult stags meet on the main board, players face a prisoner's dilemma choice to collaborate for points or fight for individual gain.
- Rotating Main Board — The central board rotates, impacting resource collection and the timing of moving beetles onto it.
- Tile Sliding Personal Board — A personal board divided into sections with sliding tiles determines available actions based on visible icons, which can be upgraded to gain more resources or stronger beetles.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- It's time for yet another episode of the Hype Factor.
- Yeah. But instead, [laughter] you you're going to be playing a board game, which this man also will be.
- This is uh Kubernet which is a reimplementation as this is the year of the reimplementation of a game called Cuba from 2007.
- Uh so I'm I'm really curious to understand what is he going to do with this one because his potentials are high.
- Yeah. A little bit of shot and fo.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
Video 5AWQyb-l2B4
Analysis at 27:28 sentiment: positive
video_pk 93396 · mention_pk 252626
Click to watch at 27:28 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
- beautiful art
Cons
none
Thematic elements
- mushrooms
Comparison games
- Mycelia
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Area Majority — Not explicitly stated, but implied by comparison to Mycelia and 'strategic mushroom game'.
- Set Collection — Not explicitly stated, but implied by comparison to Mycelia and 'strategic mushroom game'.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- Felt a little bit lackluster in terms of big releases for me.
- But you know, if uh there's no one around to Does the forest still shuffle?
- This is a game of managing resources, is a game of um uh territorial control and tableau building.
- Dexterity games are not ball games.
- IV Studios smashed it out of the park with this one.
- My main point of contention with Drillers is maybe it might run long with too many players and there is a little bit of downtime in the game when you're waiting.
- It's all to play for. It's only half time.
- The industry is backloaded. It's like heavily weighted towards the second half of each year.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
Video eeYkeExY6jU
kovray Top List at 10:08 sentiment: positive
video_pk 80931 · mention_pk 309469
Click to watch at 10:08 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
- Intrigued by it.
- Comes from the team that did My Celia.
Cons
- Speaker is unsure if they like beetles.
Thematic elements
- Beetles
Comparison games
- My Celia
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
Mechanics unknown.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- So, we have two more games to talk Oh, wait, no. I guess four more games to talk about because two to buy and two to demo. Wait, one more to demo, two buy. Oops, silly little figured.
- You're going to play and you're going to instantly get hungry cuz all the unique illustrations and of all the little treats are just
- This is a The Lord of the Rings. The Lord of the Rings and it is a roll and write. It is a roll and write.
- I understand the game being like very much you're playing the person on your right and you're playing the person on your left. You're taking the role of like the good and the bad in this game to uh go on against the opposite on the right and the opposite on the left and I think there's a lot of interactions that go on, a lot of communication that will have to happen around the table to make sure that the turns are flowing.
- I'm a huge fan of Sashi and Sashi and they will be debuting to move Railway Porters at UKGE.
- It is by Taiki Shinzawa and it's a trick taking game where every player has a condition that they must follow in their trick taking. But every condition is different.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
Video mqx3jCd_VCs
Crimsonboardgames Event Coverage at 2:32 sentiment: positive
video_pk 80742 · mention_pk 309214
Click to watch at 2:32 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
none
Cons
none
Thematic elements
Comparison games
- Mycelia
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
Mechanics unknown.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- went over to play Shug, which oh my god, I will back that straight away when I get home. Um, because that was amazing.
- it's so whimsical and unique.
- You're like exploring trying to find this mythical creature called Shug and you need to bring him back to the pub because there's this like prophecy or like legend that when you bring Shug back to the pub, the king will be defeated.
- all these like whimsical, nonsensical things. It was just very, very fun.
- I played Stack. Oh my god, that was great as well.
- Oh my god, that was crazy madness.
- It was so funny, so difficult, and just hilarious cuz you're like so uncomfortable sitting with all the sticks on your fingers and crazy.
- We played Mariners. I was very very excited to play this because just look at this artwork. Incredible.
- And the gameplay is so fun. I can't wait for this to get uh the Kickstarter release. I'm backing it straight away.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
Video mqx3jCd_VCs
Crimsonboardgames Event Coverage at 21:56 sentiment: positive
video_pk 80742 · mention_pk 309220
Click to watch at 21:56 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
- great as well
- really like the gameplay
Cons
none
Thematic elements
- involving beetles
Comparison games
- Mycelia
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- action combination — trying to get the best combinations of actions to do as many things in your turn.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- went over to play Shug, which oh my god, I will back that straight away when I get home. Um, because that was amazing.
- it's so whimsical and unique.
- You're like exploring trying to find this mythical creature called Shug and you need to bring him back to the pub because there's this like prophecy or like legend that when you bring Shug back to the pub, the king will be defeated.
- all these like whimsical, nonsensical things. It was just very, very fun.
- I played Stack. Oh my god, that was great as well.
- Oh my god, that was crazy madness.
- It was so funny, so difficult, and just hilarious cuz you're like so uncomfortable sitting with all the sticks on your fingers and crazy.
- We played Mariners. I was very very excited to play this because just look at this artwork. Incredible.
- And the gameplay is so fun. I can't wait for this to get uh the Kickstarter release. I'm backing it straight away.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
Video bGizpRc8oB8
Get into games Other at 19:31 sentiment: positive
video_pk 80709 · mention_pk 309005
Click to watch at 19:31 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
- Beautiful art
- Spins
- Educational aspects
- Next game from the Moilia and it spins
Cons
none
Thematic elements
- Nature and learning about nature
Comparison games
none
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Spinning components — It spins most importantly
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- We played Return to Dark Tower because we decided to pick another massive game.
- So, Sunday is always the day we take the kids. It's a little bit more chilled.
- I feel like more people took care of their hygiene.
- The artwork is beautiful, especially on those foily ones. Really nice.
- It was a truth or dare game.
- The main problem is the Shop and Drop boxes are small and board game boxes are not small.
- It's like Christmas. It's going to be like this. It's going to be amazing.
- It's clear that UKGE isn't the one for new releases because new releases of Gen Con and Essen.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
Video qrHeippm_Kw
kovray Discussion at 6:42 sentiment: positive
video_pk 80242 · mention_pk 308807
Click to watch at 6:42 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
- So interesting.
- Will be featured soon.
Cons
none
Thematic elements
Comparison games
none
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
Mechanics unknown.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- I think Castle Combo has been a game this year in particular. off castle.
- It's a simple draft game where you have to spend resources to play cards and you're building a nine card tableau. Super easy, super simple.
- I think it's definitely on the lighter side when it comes to hobby games as well.
- I feel like every time we play that game, you see people's faces light up and we want to come back to it again and again.
- What cult of the old game, so like 10 years old, have you discovered just this year?
- Last Will.
- Oh, it's so good.
- But the last will is hilarious because your whole goal is you got to spend money and you got to spend all of it
- Oracles of Delelfie.
- I played this game I think two or three years ago at a convention and I loved every minute of it and I have just not been able to find it.
- I'm really intrigued because I love Sweetland so much. I want to try Rosalie.
- I will shout out another store uh local to us called Pomemetto Games run by the owner of David. He is a phenomenal human being.
- A shout out I have is a Instagram creator named Dana from Better Mood Board Games.
- Dana is one of the most talented creators out there.
- What is your personal favorite piece of content we've created this year?
- Most recently, I think the UKG video we did, the tend to demo, tend to buy.
- I think my favorite video I like the one we did in the park.
- That'd be a long video.
- What game right now can you teach from heart? Setup and everything. You just take out the box, you teach the game.
References (from this video)
No references stored for this video.
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