Look Back - 7/11/26

0:17 Hey everybody, I'm Tom Vassal. Welcome to Look Back. This is a series that I do where I take a look at reviews that I did 1 year ago, 5 years ago, 10 years ago, and even 20 years ago during this time frame. So, let's go back 20 years ago to 2000 and 6. Uh I I reviewed a game called Buddy Daddy. Yeah, I don't know a lot about this game. Some card game. It's a calm game. I didn't really like it then. I assume I wouldn't like it now. 5 out of 10. I do remember Say What? This is a game from Twilight Creations and there are a lot of games in this category, which are games that It's a game that you play during other games. Like, get someone else to say this or say this without anyone noticing you say this. That sort of thing. Eh, it's okay. 6 out of 10.

1:02 10 years ago, I reviewed Tin Goose. Got a lot of heat for my review on this. People said I didn't play it right, but I did. I may not have explained it particularly well in the rules overview, but I did not like this one. People also told me I was wrong and it'll be very popular. It's It's doing okay. I think it's in the 4000s at BoardGameGeek. I just didn't like it at all. Boring, boring airplane travel game. Doesn't help that Rio Grande doesn't make their games look very good, but 4 out of 10. Uh Naruto Shippuden, I don't know if I'm saying that last name correctly, the board game. Um I remember this review. I did it with my daughter and made fun of the uh the uh Naruto the whole time, but uh it's it's a show my kids enjoy quite a bit. But, this game, unfortunately, the co-op game was not very good. 5 out of 10. Aquarium. It's a game where you're never going to guess it's about building an aquarium from Sand Timer. Pretty boring.

1:52 5 out of 10. Krakatoa. This is from Eagle-Gryphon, a game where you're are rolling 12-sided dice, which is my favorite sided die, about and about volcanoes exploding. Again, not particularly good. 5 out of 10. I took a look back at Feudal, the old isn't old game I played as a kid, like a giant chessboard with tons of pieces all over the place moving around. It doesn't really hold up. It's just too big, too many pieces, but it has some nostalgia, but that's about it. 5.5. Anaxi, this is a game in which you're matching prompts, but try not to match other players' answers, a party game, somewhat forgettable. 6 out of 10. Via Nebula, so this is a Martin Wallace game from Space Cowboys, which is clearly a train game, but instead it's about clouds, moving around in clouds, but it's a train game.

2:39 Um, very good production from Space Cowboys, but it just hasn't really taken off, but if you get a chance to play it's a nice medium-weight style game, 7.5. I also took a look at the old game Acquire, did not come out 10 years ago, but was another version of it. Acquire is a game I go up and down on how much I like it at any given point, but it really is solid. Sid Sackson really had something going there. 8 out of 10. Burano, this is a game that not a lot of people play, but I really enjoy this game. Not the biggest fan of rondels, we move around, but this the whole board is a rondel and you're moving around and around and around it. Some neat ideas and I like the colorful nature of it. An 8 out of 10. America, I just actually removed this one from the library because no one was playing it. It's, you know, coincidentally with the 250th anniversary, but America, pretty solid game. It's a follow-up to a game called Terra or Fauna from Friedemann Friese that that Ted Alspach worked on.

3:32 And this is a game where you need to know trivia, but you don't need to know it exactly, you just need to be close and kind of guess where it's at. A very solid game. 8 out of 10. And then 10 years ago I played Project Elite. What a fantastic game, a real-time shoot-'em-up strategy style game. Very entertaining. 10 out of 10. Just a great game. Still love this game 10 years later. 5 years ago I reviewed Taco Bell Party Card Game. Uh, this is a six out of 10, which honestly for a game that's themed on Taco Bell is like a 10 out of 10 in a sense cuz you're expecting it to be bad. I expected it to be bad. It wasn't quite so bad about tacos. So, what do you know? On the Rocks. This one is faded for me a bit. Some nice ideas here making mixed drinks with marbles and point the marbles are almost a misdirect. This is a very simple game that doesn't get played a ton, but it's fine. It's decent. I think that I just don't want to play it as much anymore.

4:27 Six out of 10. Dominant Species Marine. Seven out of 10 for me, which is I'm sure three points too low for the fans of this game. This is the follow-up to the very popular Dominant Species. Um, this one in some ways is easier than the original, but not as grandiose as the original. Still very long game, lot of things going on. Seven out of 10. Last Message. This is a fun party game in which someone's dying and they write a message on the board, but the other person he erases I think half of it. And then everyone else has to guess what the clues are from that. So, you're trying to write these messages on the board so that you're trying to find one specific person on this board with half of the clues. I love that concept and it works well as a party game. Seven out of 10. And then the Key Series. This is from Haba. The one in particular is Sabotage at Lucky Llama Land. There's a bunch of cards face down on the table.

5:17 You can grab a card, take a look at it, keep the information. You're trying to figure out who, what, when, where. And when you draw enough cards to figure out, yay, you've solved the case. But whoever uses the fewest cards to solve the case wins. So, it's real time, but it's not that big of a deal. You're just grabbing cards at the same time as other people figuring out. Very solid system though. 8.5. Last year I reviewed Ego. This is one of the Bitewing games, a remake of a Reiner Knizia's Beowulf. A little too weird and esoteric for me to love. It's fine. Six out of 10. Ruins. I think I like this game the least at the Dice Tower. One likes this card shedding game. It's sort of a remake of Custom Heroes from one of my favorite designers, John D. Clair. It just felt I didn't love the weird scoring at the end. It's It's It's fine.

6:02 Six out of 10. Overpower, one of my favorite collectible card games, finally came back out last year. Originally published in 1995 and then redone in 2025 and they fumbled it. I give it a seven cuz I love the game so much, but realize at one point Overpower was a 10 for me. So, this is like the lowest seven I can give a game in a sense. I think the artwork is a little uh uh It's all mixed over. It's muddled and they made it for people who love Overpower and they threw in the kitchen sink. What on earth? We're trying to get more people to play these games and they made it super complex. There's still some good stuff there. If you like Overpower, it's fantastic, but it was a disappointment. I still like it, which I gave it a seven for, but beware. And then Iso Farian Guard is a big giant poker chips moving around a board like a chip theory style game, but not quite with a lot of leveling up. It's a big game. I have not finished it. I probably never will, but I really enjoyed the battle system. Point chips from a bag.

7:01 That battle system is my favorite part and a lot of interesting decisions. The theme of the world is a little mundane for me. I wish there was more. It wasn't as interesting as it could be. I probably would have given it an 8.5, but as it is, I think it's very solid game. Eight out of 10. So, those are the games that I played 1, 5, 10, and 20 years ago. Thanks so much for watching. Until next time, I'm Tom Vasel and this is look back on the Dice Tower.

7:31 Hey, uh thanks for watching another video here on the Dice Tower. Uh we really appreciate you stopping by and checking our things out. Thanks so much for joining us today. And hey, if you really like what we're doing here at The Dice Tower, then there are different ways to support The Dice Tower. One of those ways is through Patreon. We have links in the description to this video. We have links to lots of other things we do down there, so definitely check it out. But either way, we're glad you watched us. Tell your friends about The Dice Tower. Until next time though, I'm Tom Vasel, and I hope you enjoyed this video.