GLASS GARDEN | A Solo Puzzle 18-Card Game (BUTTON SHY)

All right, everybody. I have got another buttonshy 18 card pocket game for you. This is a solo game that takes about 15 minutes to play and has the best theme for the season right now because I actually just last weekend planted all of my succulents and my pretties as I call them. Just some annuals uh that I put in little pots in my backyard and on my porch and you know all over the place that just kind of brighten up my space.

And so if I can remember, I will try to include a picture of some of my succulents in some of my favorite containers, things that people have given me as gifts. And my one of them is my sister painted for me. I love these like receptacles. And in this game, you've got these jars on the side of your um 3x9 space, and these are going to hopefully be flipped over from that dark um phase into the light phase.

You might actually have in the sunlight phase an advantage, which is at the end of the game. Once this little fly or in your any game you play with any critter, you want to start with the fly. It's a little bit easier, is going to move his way down this path one space at a time until he's at the end and he can't go anymore.

And that is essentially going to be your timer or your trigger in the game. And then you move to that sunlight phase. So hopefully you'll be able to flip those. Now right now all of our cards are in the soil side. There is another side that is the succulent side. And so this is the hyworthia coupery clear succulent with transparent leaves.

And it's going to have uh an ability that's at the bottom. So it's going to remind you of what that ability is. But they're also going to be nutrients and sprouts. So nutrients are these blue symbols and if they are blue or colored in and not gray and faint, you have access to them right now. So again, you've got your nutrients, you've got your sprouts.

And every single one of these cards has either a nutrient requirement. So there's a lightning bolt, a water drop, a box, and then this kind of like little mountain pile. That's one. So each one of those needs three of those symbols to be adjacent to each other in a in in some kind of sequence with each other.

They need to be in line with each other. And the same thing for the sprouts. There's this weird sprout here. There's this kind of plant leafy sprout. There's the aloe vera sprout. And there's just a nice single leaf sprout. So a player is going to take two actions on their turn. And it could be the same action twice.

And just to make things a little bit easier, um I'm just going to show this to you right here. Um you could shift a plant horizontally any distance in the direction of the critters shift arrow. And that direction will change every single turn. So you can't pass the critter. That's one rule. And it stays within the garden.

So every time you shift a card, you have to essentially fill that gap. You can't have more than one card in any given column even though you have three rows. So shifting just simply means I'm going to shift this card. The direction says this way is the way you can shift. And really what you can do too is shift is you're going to go any distance that you want and then everything else will just move um to kind of fill in the space.

So let's say I move want to do waters close to each other, boxes close to each other. Nope, I don't have any of those things. Everything seems pretty spaced out right now. So, let's do let's do this. I'm going to move this one and I'm going to shift it to here. I'm just going to shift it down. Unless Yeah, I'm going to shift it down.

Now, the reason that you have three of these different rows is because your succulents when you grow them are going to be scored based on where they are in those particular um spaces. [Music] So, I moved one and I again got to go any direction I want. And again, I have to go in this direction, but I could choose to just um um move.

This is going up and down. I can put a plant up one row or down one row. Um and that is something that's going to help us get to the water droplet. So, I'm going to move this plant up one space. And you're wondering why. I mean, it's a soil. It's not a plant yet. But my idea is that when this fly moves to the next space at the end of this round, I'm going to move this down and I will be able to grow this succulent.

So, I'm going to play it out. But I do need to make sure I follow all of the rules. I took two actions. So, I am simply going to grow my succulents now. So, this is what I'm going to do next turn. Now I want my symbols, my water symbols to be like this in a row either at the top or the bottom where they are covering one to the next of the next.

So this water I'm going to be moving down here so that it is water, water, water. And those are all going to be adjacent to each other in the same soil patch. That's how you grow a succulent of the requirement of that card. I can't do it yet, but I'm trying to. And now the critter is going to So we have take two actions.

grow your succulents. Damage none. So, the fly is the basic one. There are other critters that do more harm. So, the snail comes with the game and does damage to the closest plant on the right side. And damage simply means moving down into the zone that doesn't score you. So, it's not good. And then you've got the ant um closest plant on both sides.

And then you've got the worm, which is all plants in three closest columns on the right side. So, these are really, really dangerous critters. Um, but you play with those after you've got the the hang of it. So, we don't have any damage here, but then the critter will advance. So, we advance this one essentially moving that over.

And then we flip the card over. Now, in this case, you can move this direction, but not pass the critter. So, we are back at the start of my next turn, and I want to move this card down here to this space. These are all going to shift over. And at the end of my second action, I can then say, "I'd like to grow this succulent, which is over here." And even cooler, when you um uh flip a succulent over, it's grown and it's next to one of the jars, you flip the jar over to its sunlight side, so you can have that benefit at the end of the game.

So, this placement is fantastic. So, now I need to figure out how can I get the rest of mine lined up. Oh my gosh. Check this out. I'm going to move this one down because I've got lightning, lightning, lightning. This is so good. I'm going to grow as many succulents as I want, but I need to pick the order in which I do them in.

So, now let's grow my succulents. This ability with this this one will trigger. This one says swap two plants in the same row. Ex exchange their exact position. Okay. Um may or may not want to do that first. And then this uh lightning bolt triggers this one. Swap the two edge plants. I don't want to do that first.

I don't want to do that first because it says then I'll lose my my lightning bolt. So I have to do this one first. I have to do my this one. So I'm going to swap two plants in the same row. So I'm going to flip this over cuz I grew it up. I'm going to swap two plants in the same row. I'm going to take this one.

Oh, and don't forget your little glass. So I will take this one. my hyorthia fasciata and I'm going to exchange it in the same row. Exact positions. No shifting, just exact positions. And I want to shift with this one because I'm going to then do my boxes next. I'm going to move this card up and get my three boxes going over.

And so I'm going to put that guy down here. All right. So that was my first grown succulent. And then I'm going to activate this because I've got Oh no, my three lightnings. Okay, let me take that back. I'm gonna put those cards back. I was able to recognize my mistake cuz I need to keep my three lightnings.

Um cuz my box in were or my uh drops were this one, my water drops. So I can't exchange this one just yet. I can do something else. So let's do something else. I need to keep these three together. I don't know if any of them help. I don't know if any of them help right now. So, let's get Yeah, my boxes are not going to help either.

So, I'm just going to swap these two because I just can't see any other thing right now. And you have to do your U requirements. So, that's done. And now I'm going to do my lightning bolt ones. And so, this guy's going to flip and it's going to exchange the two edge plants. Then move one to the top row and one to the bottom row.

So, I'm going to exchange this one with this one. And then I'm going to move this one up because he will score more points this way. And I'm going to move this one down. And hopefully I will be able to trigger this card over here. That's my goal. I hope. We'll see. So that was really, really cool. I was able to do that.

Meet my cost. Flip perform effect and then damage none. Shift the fly again. One more step. And then flip them over. And now cards can only go this direction whenever I move them. And then this is going to be it. It's going to keep moving. And you're just going to keep on moving the cards around up and down trying to get those three symbols that trigger all of the cards in the center.

You probably want to start with the nutrients first and then move to the uh sprouts later because there are blue symbols showing and once you flip over your um succulents, they start showing the active green symbol. And so that's going to help you get that uh particular trigger. So really, really cool, super fun, really easy.

And I will say that there's the expansion. Almost always these Buttonshy games come with these wonderful little mini expansions. So this one's called centerpieces and creates a really, really fascinating requirement. You put your centerpiece in your board and then if you can get these succulents in these particular orders, then you are going to get a bonus.

And if you don't complete your centerpiece by the end of the game, then you uh can't win the game. It's it's essentially making it to where you can't actually um uh score your points up. So, these are really cool. They also include three new critters. So, you've got a beetle, and this is going to have different damage and um also have this special uh requirement here.

Grow succulents with the spider. Uh-oh. has a new restriction. No growing in this particular row. Wow. Wow. And then you've got the centipede. So, these are going to be critters that act in a very, very different way. So, just one more reminder. I kind of walked through it super fast, but it was simply two points per succulent in the top row, one point per succulent in the middle or bottom rows.

Um, and then zero points per plant card on its soil side. So, anything that's still soil doesn't count, but make sure that you do get one point for the middle and the bottom row, and you're going to essentially score yourself on this particular track here. And that sunlight phase does give you a whole free extra thing.

So, in this case, it says take one bonus move action after the end of the game. And if I can trigger some of these other ones, um, this one says take two bonus actions. So, I might start to get gain more and more of those sunlight actions that let me do some mobilization there at the end of the game to get some free bonus moves.

Fits in this nice little pocket um uh you know, buttonshy pocket game holder. That is Glass Garden. A delightful lovely thematic card shifting and swapping strategy game for one. Takes about 15 minutes to play. You can see how fast these turns go as you puzzle out to victory. So, Glass Garden, delightful.

I'll see you later, folks. Bye.