►►► The heaviest game yet from Delicious Games?

0:00 Hey everybody. Today on Roto Runsue, we're taking a look at chrono critters. But before I get going, please turn your subtitles on to the Klingon channel so that when I make rules goofs, you'll know what they are. And if you've done that, well then welcome to Earth. The year is 2562 and humanity has finally learned to live in peace and harmony with nature. We are so in touch with mother nature, we can actually talk to the animals now. In fact, we are allied with them. we enter into um beneficial um partnerships with them. And so it is the animals, the um the noble eagle, the stalwart lizard, the friendly beaver, and maybe if you're lucky, the fancy peacock, these critters will help us save the future. Because while everything's going great, um you know, humanity cities are now overgrown with lush, beautiful greenery. We talk to animals. IT'S ALL AWESOME, BUT a catastrophe has struck. See all this uh purple? That's the space-time continuum being destroyed right in front of us. In one year, the whole world will be destroyed. And so, we have to stop this.

1:12 But we can't do it alone. We need to use our critter friends because they're chrono critters. They are capable of harnessing this mastrom of energy and opening portals to the future and to the past to up our chances of saving the world. And I'm going to show you how all this works today in a solo run through, which means it's going to be the green player playing against the blue player um who is controlled by this deck of action tiles. And don't worry folks, you're going to get a good sense of what this feels like to play as a two-player game because uh my um opponent, who is racing to be the first to save the world, can do everything a human player could do. So, you're going to get to see it all. So, I've got the game set up here. There's a ton of setup variability. There are all these artifacts um spread around the board. We need these artifacts because the way we're going to save the world is open up a channel of communication to an ancient intelligence, an ancient knowledge, which is why we need these ancient artifacts. We start with a few and we're going to pick up more as the game goes on and they are scattered around. You can and these are the only ones that are out there and there are fewer if we're not playing a three or a four-player game. So, here's all the two-player artifacts waiting to be grabbed. We need to collect those. We need to program them into our transmission device here to talk to the um ancient intelligence, which is to say, we need to complete little mini objectives having to do with this grid and manipulating dice. So anyway, all the dice are placed out there and there are a we're about to get

2:42 a couple of starting transmission quests, but there are other ones to grab um seasonal ones, you know, over here, value and color ones over there, bonus ones over there. And so there's 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 eight different depots of objective tiles we can grab to try to well for the most part manipulate our transmission matrix and get bonuses. So those are all come out randomly. Oh, another thing the board itself changes. These three worker placement zones, the one for creating solar panels, the one for getting bonus quests, and the one for doing mining. They start out in one of three random places. Uh, in this game, mining is going to happen in autumn, which is this portion of the board. Uh, bonus objectives are going to happen in summer. And it's not till the end of the game in winter that we'll be able to build solar panels. And that's terrible because the sooner we can build solar panels, the sooner we can upgrade our workers. But it's in the past. It could have been that solar panels would be the very first thing we could do.

3:46 Well, we start out here in spring. You can see it's saying right now it's spring. When this rotates, you can see it's going to be summer in rounds two and three, autumn in rounds four and five, and then round six and seven are winter. And this could have been over here, but instead um our getting solar panels is not until the far future, seven rounds from now, unless the critters open up time portals for us. Anyway, though, so we've got the board randomly seated with the actions in different spots, the quests in different spots, the dice plate. But I'm still not done setting up, folks, cuz I've got to do a fair bit of setup myself. Um, I start with no lumber, one sand of time, no solar panels, three critters waiting to recruit a fourth, three dice, and players are going to have to draft to get some starting quests. And now, if you don't care about this, if you This is too much setup, just start playing. Folks, there's a link down in the show notes, or you can use the YouTube scrub bar to jump right to gameplay. But I've got some tough decisions to make. I've got to pick two of these four quests to be my starting quest. And I also have to pick two of these um tw 12 different bonuses to give me a little leg up at the beginning. So anyway, let's do this now. Let's uh do my first setup. And the way it works is it's number of players plus one. If we were playing a two-player game, there would be three sets of these. But since I'm playing solo, there's two sets.

5:07 Let's look at them and decide which ones we're going to take. So, I should say there are two types of um transmission quests or hard disk quests they're called. I don't know why they're called hard discs. It makes it very very difficult. Um it's just hard to say. Hard disk quests. These are hard disc quest, but I like to call them transmission quests because they're it's all about using I guess they're hard discs because you plug them in to the transmitter, right? I guess that's why they're called hard disk quests. Anyway, so um these ones are all about getting my dice arranged such that they total like 6 + 4 plus 2, that's 12. That's not enough. If I could turn this two into a three and they were lined up, that would be 13. And if this were here, I would complete this quest and get that bonus. So, there's ones that mean you have have a certain value in the rows and columns and ones that mean you have to have a certain collection of colors, like two greens and a purple or all colors of the same type. And so you can see what you need, you see what you get. I got to pick what actions do. Oh my gosh, look at that.

6:06 This, if I were to take this one and this one, they both give the same reward, allowing me to build the dam for free. Building the dam is one of the hardest things to do in the game. It's very expensive to contribute to the great dam. Um, but these would let me do I mean, if I just get my dice in place, I could do it for free. Plus, this one also gives me two points in a berry. That's nice. I think I want to take these because they combo nice together. But I didn't have to. I could go like this. And that says, "Hey, get to do a dam, get some berries, get some points, and then get some lumber some points and increase or decrease the value of any of the dice in my transmission matrix [clears throat] or get a level five die of any color and a lumber depending on which one of these I do. They're all good, but I think this is too good to pass up. Having two that are backtoback. Yeah. So, that's my first choice made. Although if we were playing at a higher player count game, if we were playing a three-player game, the way it would work is or I'm sorry, a two-player game. I'm the first player. I would pick any one of these, right? So, I might pick that and then you would pick a thing and a thing and then I'd get one of the remainders because each player has to have a color quest and a value quest. But I liked just the this color and value quest because they both do the same. They both focus on the same thing. So, I've got them, but now I've got to decide where do I program them onto my transmission machine. Wherever I put them, I get the benefit. I could get if I just do this and this, I could get two sands of time.

7:30 That'd be nice. I start with one sand of time, but it would be better to start with three sands of time because that gives me more control when I open portals in time to go into the future or the past. That would be nice. But, you know what? If in this game I'm going to try and make the dam my thing because I'm getting two dam bonuses to do dam actions. You've got to spend lumber, right? So, how about I put one of these over here and that will immediately give me one lumber. You can see I can hold up to six. And the more lumber I have, the more benefits I can get out of building the dam. So, I'll take that one. Now, I've got to put the other one. I cannot put the other one opposite. The rules are very clear. Later on, I can, but as part of setup, when I get the two, I can't just put them because then, hey, I could maybe arrange things so I could complete two with one. It is legal to complete two with one, but as part of setup, these bonuses I get, they have to go elsewhere. So, I could put it any place other than there. So, what do I want? Um, some sands of time is nice.

8:27 Being able to manipulate a die is nice, and I do it right away. Getting a berry is nice. Um, interesting. Oh, and this is nice because this is any berry. This is only berries that I have access to. This is only um uh summer berries. This is or sorry, this is spring berries, summer berries, autumn berries, winter berries. This is any berry I want. And this is any berry that I have access to right now. And access is an important. I'll come back to it. But right now, at the beginning of the game, we're in spring. So, I only have access to spring berries unless I open a portal to get access to different berries. So, this is nice. This lets me get any type of berry, the spring, summer, autumn, or winter berries right now.

9:14 Otherwise, I'd have to wait a long time to get those autumn berries. Do I want autumn berries? Well, that means I got to look around. Like, here's some quests down here that require me spending berries. This requires an autumn and two summer berries. This requires three autumn berries. Over here in summer, there are um you can see there are quests all over the place. You need different berries. So, am I going to get any berry I want? Am I going to change a die to be whatever I want? Am I going to um get some sands of time so I have more control over the passage? No. You know what I'm going to do? It's kind of lame. I want to put one of these because then, you know, hey, when I put this here, this could be helping towards that in that same time. But if I put this down here, which is fine. I just can't put it opposite, I get a golden plate. Golden plates are hugely important. I'm going to take I'm coming here to start with some lumber and a golden plate, which means I can't have my dice contribute to both of these at the same time. But on the other hand, I have a golden plate. Two uses for these.

10:17 They let me manipulate the dice up or down for every plate I spend. Or if I can collect six plates, I can spend them to recruit my fourth worker, the fancy peacock, and then I'm doing four worker actions every round instead of three. That is important. uh worker placements. Yeah, having more workers is a good thing. So, I'm going to start saving towards that and I'm going to get some lumber for I don't have to I don't have to get the lumber. I could get any berry I want. And then I'd be wanting to focus on, you know, whatever die I put here helps with both of those objectives at the same time. That is good. But I do like the lumber. I think I'm going to be a little inefficient with my grid to get some better resources. You can see that's why they're put next to each other because you can't be as efficient with them. All righty. Anyway though, so there's one last thing. Remember, I start with three dice. It's my choice. One of these dice is going to be a value two, one's a value three, and one is a value four.

11:10 I'll make my purple a value four. And I don't know, I'll make the the the orange value two and the green a value three, let's say. So I it could have been anyway. It could have been 2, three, four the other way. And now I have to put all three of them on either diagonal. So I'm setting myself up. Let's go on ahead and put the two over here. So, this is contributing to having three dice here that are value two to sectional. Of course, I wanted my lowest value die in this one. Let's go on ahead and put this greeny over here. And then let's put this over here because I have to put I could have gone the other way, but it has to be on a diagonal. Let's go like this. Now, the reason I made purple the biggest one is purple dice have two functions. They have the regular functions of, you know, helping us complete transmissions, but I can siphon the tachons or whatever out of the temporal particles out of these things and convert them into more sands of time. So, having more purple gives me potentially more sands of time if I need them. So, that's it, folks. We are now set up, ready to go. We got our extra bonuses, and the game is a foot. And I am the first player. So, what am I going to do? Well, on your turn, you're simply going to deploy one of your chrono critters. You're going to get some work done. There are a lot of worker placement spaces. I've got one private one here on my own board. And by the way, if you look, you'll notice it's octagonal. Octagonal worker placement spaces can be visited multiple times.

12:29 Well, I can just do this three times over my next three turns, but that would not be very smart. I will do other things. Um, this is always available to me. Nobody can ever freeze it out. But all the space is up on the big board. They're first come, first serve. And I have access to some of them, but other ones are not available because they're in the future or the past. What do I mean by that? This is a big rotating disc that marks the passage of time. At the beginning of the game, this section, this is the present, is pointing down here. It is springtime. We are in the present. That means I have access to the worker placement spots of spring. I also always have access to these worker place no matter where it is. Um, you know, this is always a present. So, you always have these. But once this rotates in round two, I will not have access to these spring actions anymore. Instead, I'll have access to these and these summertime actions that are over here.

13:22 And by the remember, these were randomly chosen. This I mean this is the bonuses, but it could have been the solar panels or the mining. And every time you play, you're going to get a different combination that really makes the game feel different because you're going to focus on different stuff on a fixed pattern. Because these are the seven rounds of the game. Round one, you have access here. Rounds two and three, you have access to summer. Rounds four and five, you have access to autumn. And then rounds six and seven, the end of the game, you have access to winter. So, we don't get access to solar panels till almost the end of the game unless we open up a portal through time so that we can um break out of the present and and do worker placement in the past or the future, which I'm probably going to do. But um right now it's Well, here is ripping a hole in the space-time continuum crazy expensive. This is a free action. Your turn is always just place one worker. That's your whole turn. do workers in the present, the past, or the future on your own board.

14:16 Or I should say there are also these actions over here that are always available all year round, no matter what. So, I'm going to send one of my workers and do one of these various worker placement actions. But I'm denied access to this, this, or this for now. But in addition to the one worker, I've got a cavalcade of bonus actions. I can do as many of these as I want on a turn. This is spend sands of time. um and dice to uh open up portals to the past or the future. And as soon as I open up a portal to the future over here, if the summer is in the future, if I open a portal now, I have access to these worker placement spots and these worker placement spots as long as the portal lasts. All right, so that is and it's super expensive giving up sand of time.

15:04 I only have one sand of time and I have to give up um dice as well. I I I And I should say you might think this is an or because in most games a a diagonal slash like that means that it's this or this. Nope. In this game, it's this plus this. You need to spend a purple die and you need to spend sands of time to open a portal. I could do this if I want, but again, I don't want to start throwing my dice away. I only have one. So, I'm going to see if I can just do good stuff in the present and worry about the future and the past later. Um, what else can I do? Well, I can spend golden plates. And remember, I gave myself a golden plate as part of setup. And I've also got two times these little plus one minus one tokens. These are if I were if I were the fourth player, I would have plus two minus2s instead of plus one minus ones to make up for a player order. But um as it is, oh I I gave myself a plus two. That's a cheating thing. I'm the first player. I have a plus one and a plus one. So I can use these or these um to manipulate the dice that are in my transmission matrix there. I can do that as much as I want.

16:07 I can spend solar panels to upgrade my workers from level one to level two and then level two to level three. And oh my gosh, this is hugely important, but it costs three panels to go to level two and then an additional two panels to go to level three. So that's why I want to get solar panels as fast as I can to start leveling up my workers. And then finally, this is a reminder. If I've got objectives, I can complete them if they're set up. I have these two that I got as part of setup. I'm trying to fill up some dice in this column and this column to get those bonuses as a free action. So anyway, I'm going to take one of my workers, my eagle, my lizard, or my beaver. And it doesn't matter which one. They're all the same. But remember, they can get upgraded. My level one beaver can become a level two beaver. And that means they get access to other powers, and it get makes them better to go out and do stuff in the world. But that's going to be later that I upgrade them. Right now, I'm going to send Mr.

16:54 Eager Beaver out and do something. And remember, if I don't open a portal, what do I have access to? building the dam, getting more um resources, getting additional quests because these are always available or um getting manipulating the dice so that I could try to get these dice into position to be able to do the one of these objectives by being in the right place or doing one of these things in the time zone I'm in. And I think that's the first thing I'm going to do. I'm actually not going to come here or here or here or here or here. I'm actually going to come out here onto the outskirts because these dice represent ancient artifacts. These are the dice we need to have in our little matrix to be able to get stuff done. And you there are only so many of them. They're very rare and they're they're first come, first serve. So, I'm going to grab one.

17:47 So, do I want the orange six, the purple two, or the green one? It was totally random. And by the way, you could see oops, this green should be over there because if we were playing a three or four player game, there would be more of them. But as it is, these are the only ones I have available to me. Oops. Let's go on ahead and look at them. I'm coming over to this area and I'm going to grab the green one because I've got a quest that wants low value dice. So, I need more lowv value dice. So, I'm going to take that. So, I'm taking you, Mr. uh die. And I can now put it wherever. If I had a qu if I had chosen a quest for highv value dice, I'd probably want to take the sixer instead of the one, but I'm taking the wer. And I could put it wherever. I'll just gone ahead and put it right here. Um, I can't put it in an occupied spot, obviously. But what have I done? I just need to put one die here of any color. And as long as that die is a one, two, three, or four, then the sum of these dice will have completed this because the sum have to be three to seven. So, I'm halfway towards or two-thirds of the way towards completing this objective, which will get me a dam, two points, and a berry. And I would like to have all those things. Those are very very handy. So that was it folks.

18:58 That was my turn. Worker placement turns in this game are usually very quick. Quick as grabbing a die or grabbing a objective or grab, you know, or you know, spending some stuff to do a simple action. Most turns are very, very quick in this game until you start comboing them with free actions. So before my turn is over, do I want to open portals yet? No, I don't know that I need to. We'll wait and see. Do I want to manipulate dice? No, I don't need to do that yet. Uh, and I cannot upgrade and I cannot complete any quests. My turn is over. It's Blue's turn. So, what are they going to do? Well, they've got three workers just like me. And they have infinite resources. They have infinite portals. They can go anywhere, do anything. They're just blocking me from doing stuff. What are they going to do? Their first action says, "Hey, they want to go grab one of these bonus tiles." Now, if I wanted to go grab one of the bonus files because it's over here in summer as a free action, I would have had to have built a portal into summer and then that meant I could have done this. I could have come to these worker placement actions and grabbed um these. And these are super powerful.

20:02 These top ones give you either income or ongoing powers for the rest of the game, plus a nice little boost of stuff. these ones down here that are even more expensive um give you uh uh points in-game go uh points that you're trying to shoot for, right? So, you're looking, you have an eye towards these to grab them later in the game before the game is over. You want to grab these earlier because they give you all kinds of ongoing cool special powers, but I'm not going there because I have not opened a portal into the future. My opponent did, and like I said, I could put that out there, but they have infinite portals. They've got portals open to every place so they can just do whatever they want. So they are sending a worker um here and if they can they'll take the space. I should I think I started to mention this octagonal worker placement spots any number of players can go. Round ones once they're gone they're gone. So they're coming here and now I'm frozen out. If I want to open a portal to summer so that I can grab one of these cool uh tiles that are so impactful, well, I would have to come to the uh second spot and I'd have to spend a berry. And by the way, if we were playing a three or a fourplayer game, there would be more opportunities to go.

21:18 But we're playing effectively a two a solo game is a two-player game. So, if I wanted to go here and get one of them, it's going to cost me extra in addition to making the portal and all that. I'm not doing that. They're coming here and so they're going to take one of these and they use these little markers to say which one they want. Which one do they want? Well, you look at their little draw pile. This is what they want to do. This is they say, "Hey, one left from where I am." So, they were eyeballing this, but then they move one left to say take that one. This is the one they took. And these are all awesome. They, if they were a human player, um, they would get a golden disc. they would um get three points and they would have income or no they would have this power. Uh this is they get this stuff instantly. They get this stuff immediately for the rest of the game. Whenever they're completing a value quest and remember I've got one of those. Let's look at my value quest. If I had this power, what this means is whenever I'm doing these, I can increase or decrease the target by two. So this could be a three to nine. So I'd have an easier time hitting the target. And this would be a great power to have. Too bad.

22:20 So sad it's gone because they took it for themselves. Boom. And you might say, "Wait, do they get points?" No, I should not have put their victory point track. They do not keep track of points. This is one of those games where you can consider it a win if you've gotten 160 points. If you gotten 200 points and you're an expert, you know, that kind of stuff. Uh there's a uh where is it in the rule book? There's basically a um yeah, 160 is good for beginners. 200 is great. 220, well, you've shown yourself to be excellent. I'm not going to come anywhere close to that stuff. I'm not excellent at this game. But anyway, that was it. They effectively opened a portal. Um went over here and denied something. And now you'll notice there's this arrow. That means everything that's left slides over and a new one comes out because at the end of the season, see that little X there? These ones are going to be out of the game. If I want this, I better grab it fast because it's going to disappear soon. Um right. So anyway, that was their first turn. It is now my second turn. And what would I like to do? Well, before this season is up, I do want to open a portal, not into the future to do this stuff, but into the past to get solar panels. I would like to get at least one solar panel before the year is out. Because here's the interesting thing. If I'm sorry, not the year, at the end of a season is out because we get income at the end of a season. And one of them is if you have no solar panels on either of these tracks, you don't get anything. If you have a solar panel on a track, they multiply. It's the future. Um, you know, the solar panels of the future are alive. So, I mean, I guess they're

23:50 chloroform based probably. Who knows? Which means if I have at least one, I'll get one for free. So, I do not want spring to end without having gotten one of these things. And because they're over here, they're only a little hop, skip, and a jump in the past. If this had been way over here in autumn, it would probably be way too expensive um right here in spring to open up a portal all the way to autumn to be able to do it. But because they're only a little ways in the past I could get that done. I want to get that done. And when I get there, I'm going to want to spend berries. I'm going to want to have two berries so that I can get two um instead of only having one berry to spend one. So, I've got one berry. I need to do a few things with my remaining two workers. I need to open a portal to the past, which is a free action. I need to come here and I want to start getting these things because here's the deal.

24:43 That other barrier I want, it's waiting for me right here on this bonus. So, let's do this. My second action is going to be What's it going to be? What's it going to be? I think you're going to be a little bored, folks, because I'm not going to open a portal yet. I'm going to stay home as I can't get frozen out of this. I'm going to have my little lizard come here to do this action, which is always available to me. It's a very important one. This Well, first of all, if my lizard were level two, if I'd already gotten to upgrade them, if I came here with a level two lizard, I as a bonus, I would get an extra solar panel, which would be awesome because once I have three solar panels, I can upgrade a worker, which would be very awesome. But in the meantime, I'm going to come here with a level one, which means I don't get that benefit. I get to do three things. I get to pick any one die in my matrix and move it wherever I want. In addition to that, I get to pick two dice and swap their position. And in addition to both of those things, I get to make modify a die, either increase or decrease its value by one or two or change its color. So, I get to do all three of these things off of this action. And so I am going to do all three of those things. And I think it's going to be to manipulate dice to complete this objective. Right? So what do I want to do? Um I've got three actions. I need to get something over here. Let's just go on ahead and move this over here. So I'm doing three things. One is I am moving a thing.

26:08 Right? And that's it. I'm done. Three, four, five, six. I have completed this objective. But I've still got two more free actions or two more manipulation actions to do. While I'm at it, you know what's nice to have more purple? Because remember, purple can be converted into sands of time. So, how about I change the color of this green three into a purple three. So, I've moved a thing. I have uh ch changed a thing. And now, the other thing I can do is I can swap. I don't think I need to swap, though. I do need to get stuff over here so I can complete this objective. And I'm kind of regretting not having put this like this so I could be working on two at the same time, but whatever. Um, I had my reasons. you saw on setup. So, I could do a swap, but I don't think it really matters much. I mean, no, actually, I could still do that because I'm still at seven. And maybe I do a swap because I have some other objective I need someplace else. Who knows? But I I I don't really care about I'm not going to do the swap. So, that's it. I I've made two of the three modifications I can.

27:06 And as a free bonus action, I will complete this goal. I will score two points. Yay. 158 more to go. I will get a berry. any berry I want. Um or I'm sorry, not any berry I want. Any berry I have access to. The little question mark. Um you'd think it means anything, but the game actually comes with a very very nice thorough breakdown of what all the objectives are and of what all the icons are. And here it is. Uh berry of any season. Um right. Oh yeah, it does mean yes. Question mark means any season. I could grab a winter berry right now or an autumn berry or whatever I want. If it was berry with an equal sign, if this had an equal sign on it, it means I could only grab a berry I have access to. And the only berries I have access to right now are spring berries. But I have access to spring berries anyway. I say, well, hey, if I can get any berry I want, let's make it an autumn berry because they're way off there in the future. They're the furthest thing to get. They're the hardest thing to get. So now I've got two berries. Although I'm probably not going to keep them long, but there are objectives for berries which I could be chasing after. I'm not chasing after them. So, I got two points. I got a berry. And I now get to make one free contribution to the dam. I started out I'm I'm going to be Mr. Dam in this game. So, normally to make a contribution to the dam, you send a worker over here. You have to you can spend as much wood as you have, as much as you want to deploy these little wood tokens and start building the dam and get benefits based on where you put

28:37 them. Also, for coming here with a worker, you get another golden disc. And remember, these let me manipulate the dice. But once I've got six of them, I can unlock my fourth worker. But I am not sending a worker here. Mr. Eagle is not going there. I'm just getting to do this action right now. I do not spend my wood. Instead, I am just making a wood-free contribution to the dam immediately. And that is going to get me my choice. We're here in round one, so it has to go on round one. You can see there's only three opportunities to contribute. If we were playing um a higher player count game or three or four player game, there's another column. But in the solo game, this three player column is used by the AI to keep track of stuff. Anyway, I can give myself another Sand of Time, a victory point, or a purple die that's worth one.

29:28 What do you think is the best thing to get, folks? You guessed it. Another die. I'm getting a purple die that I'm going to put in my matrix. Also, I'm doing two other things at the end of the game. Whoever has the most in this leftmost column Oh, by the way, I'm sorry. There's one more thing. I could I could have come here and gotten two points. Um, [clears throat] so whoever has the most in this column gets three points at the end of the game. Same for this one. Uh, this one, whoever has the most in this column gets four points. Whoever has the most in this column gets five points. So, I am now laying down trying to get a majority of this so I can get those points at the end of the game. Plus, when we move into the next um round, whoever is first is whoever put the most on the current when we move into the next round, we look at the current round. Who put the most who built the most for the dam? Well, that player becomes first player. So, I'm putting in a bid to be first player next round, trying to get area majority there and getting rewards. So, that uh and importantly, um I've got my two berries.

30:24 Oh, this I've got to put someplace. Where am I going to put it? Um Oh. You know what? You know what? You know what? You know what? I've already done things out of order. My um I didn't have to do this immediately. I am No, no, I do. I do have to do this immediately. Here's the thing. I could put this in the center column so I can start working on this, but it would have been nice to have swapped positions. No, it's too late for that now. I'm just going to put this in the center. I'll put it in here in the middle. So, it could this could contribute like if I were to grab another low value like this one. Hey, total of three or four and I put that here. Then in this column uh a one a one and another one or a two means I can complete this getting clo and this is a much more valuable trying to get all low values or all high values that's harder and you get bigger rewards. This is a whole mining action which is huge if I could get that. That would be nice to go grab quite frankly I want to keep an eye out for that and it's going to stick around for a while at the end of the season. These are going to disappear.

31:22 This one's going to I'm eyeballing that one that I could get this one when I get to summertime because now I've got two ones. And if I could just move this over here, then boom, I will have completed that and do a mining action. So, that's kind of my long-term thinking. So, I'm putting this here. Plus, if I ever need it, I've got four, five, six, seven, eight additional sands of time if I need them for making portals. But worry about that later. That was my second turn. I just stayed home, manipulated this, got a benefit or got three benefits, in fact. Um, and I'm setting myself up for good for the future. Next turn, folks. I promise there'll be some time travel. But now it's my opponent's second turn, and they say, "Hi." Oh, we just like to grab a die. Um, so any color. Uh, and but they want a one. And if there is no one here, they just start going clockwise until they find a one. If I wanted that one, too bad. So sad. It's gone. They started from there and they go clockwise till they find it. Okay, so that was it for them. They they didn't have to make a decision. This told them everything they needed to know. That was their second action. It is now my third and final action before the end of the first round. And folks, the eagle says, "I'm ready to fly, boss. I'm ready to fly into the past." So again, as a free bonus action, I'm going to open a portal. [snorts] To do it, I have to sacrifice one purple dye and I have to spend one, two, or three sands of time.

32:45 I have to do both these things. Again, this is not an or. This is an and. Really should probably be a little plus there because this looks like, oh, you do this or this, but no, you got to do both anyway. So, I'm going to do that. That means I have to say goodbye to one of these purple dice. I don't want to do that. Well, I don't want to get rid of this one because this is important for my long-term goal of finishing that objective. And if I get rid of this one, I'm throwing away four potential sands of time. Although, there's something else, too. Because here's the deal. Um, right down here, then it says, "Oh, look. Would you like to make a portal?" Which, by the way, the portals are represented by these very, very cool three-sided dice, which sadly you never get to roll in this game, but I rolled a one, one, and a one. It's snake eyes. These are only for marking. That's a 11 one. The the strength of the portal I open is based on the purple die. I have a purple three and a purple four. If I give up the purple four, it'll be a strength two portal, which means it sticks around longer. If I instead use this threeer, then I'll have a strength three portal and it'll only stick around for one round instead of two. So, kind of pains me. I'm going to pay my more expensive die to make not a one, not a three. I can find it. There it is.

33:59 A two. I am I I'm deploying a level two portal. But now, where can I put it? Remember, I have to spend uh uh sands of time. I only have one. Everybody starts with one. You can see there's a little marker. So that means I can only place here's where I am in the present. Since I'm spending one uh sans of time, I can put it one step into the future or one step into the past. If I had more sands of time, I could put it two or three into the future or past so that I could put it in any time zone. But it's just more expensive. That's why I was saying before, if I wanted to open a portal to autumn, I would have had to have three um sands of time and I only had one. Now, I could have started. I mean, these two things could have been here and here. And then I would have started Three Sands of Time, which meant I could have opened a portal over here, and I'd probably be the only player to have access to autumn back here in spring.

34:47 But I don't have those because I chose this and this. So, I only have one Sansa time. But one is all I need because I just need to go into the past. I need to go into last winter so that I can make a solar panel. Let's do it. All right. That was a free action. Now, the eagle has landed in the past, and that means I could come here or here and grab some more dice. Or I could do the central action. I haven't talked about these. This central action means, hey, get three berries. And the equal sign means for what I have available. And I have available to um spring and winter berries, but I don't want berries. If I come over here, it says, "Hey, get access to a seasonal quest." Again, the equal means what I have access to. So, I could grab a spring or a winter quest.

35:37 Again, I do not want those. I'm not doing either of those actions. I'm actually going into the past and doing this. And this says since I again, this is for four players. I'm the first player here. If I were the second player here, if this were blocked, I'd have to spend an extra berry of any type. But I come here, I don't have to spend. So, my action is I can spend one berry to get one solar panel or two berries to get two sweep solar panels. And hey, guess who has two so two two who has two berries? This guy right here with his two thumbs. So, I have come here to spend two berries. Didn't matter what type of berries they were. Bye-bye spring and bye-bye autumn. And I get two solar pan and oh shoot. Folks, always watch the thing on subtitles turned on. Paulo always keeps me on the straight and narrow. Here's the mistake. I was supposed to start with no solar panels, two sands of time, and one wood. So, anyway, sorry I misspoke earlier. So, I've got no solar panels, but no, I just picked up two. So, I could go boom boom or I could split them up and I'll do that uh for reasons you'll see at the end of the round. Basically, it means both of these have income. So, these two are going to turn into four and turn into six because remember I ultimately need five to completely upgrade. So, I've done that and it was definitely worth it. Although, I've sacrificed a lot of stuff. I'm not giving myself extra bonuses. I am not actually getting myself income off of theuh industry that I could do. So, I'm giving up a lot to get those solar panels. And that's it.

37:00 Oh, and I guess since I did actually have two sands of time, I could have gone further, but I was happy where I went anyway. So, to repeat, I opened up the portal uh and did this action. If anybody else wants to do it, they've got to spend an extra now. But anyway, that was it. And um it is now my opponent's turn. I have other things to do, but I haven't completed this objective. And um I do not have enough. I only have two solar panels. I would need three solar panels to level up a character. And I'm not quite there yet. But we'll when we get into round two, we'll do that. But anyway, it is now time for my opponent to do their third action. And they say, "Hey, I just want to grab a purple a purple dye." Any purple dye will do. Um, and oh shoot, folks. I totally screwed this up last time. Again, turn on those cling on subtitles. That looks like a one pip, isn't it? No, that's just a reflection. I misspoke earlier on their last turn when they did this. Um, they did actually have to pick what color they wanted, which means they had to look here. This didn't help them pick.

38:01 So, I got to pick what they took. So, actually, I I misspoke earlier when I said they took this from over here. They took something from here. And, um, if if it's all the same, I get to pick which one. And I'm I'm going for low, so I'll say they took that one and left that one because I'm trying to do low value quests instead of high value quests. I might want to grab that more than necessary. And so now they're going to take another one. And this time it says, "Oh, I must have a purple and it must be the uh highest value one." If there were multiple purples available, there's only one purple. So they ended up taking that anyway. So they just grabbed there are no more dice in spring and there no more are ever going to show up here. So there's still plenty more in but you have to be able to get to those as we travel through time. So anyway, so that was their third thing. They grabbed another die and now if I had a fourth die, if I had unlocked the peacock, I could keep going, but I can't. So it's but if other players had they would keep going but eventually everybody's passed and so now we have finished the first of seven rounds and this is a breakdown of what happens. First of all the wheel rotates. It is now summertime and if we want to go to spring well we have to open a portal to the past because it's behind us now. Um but and the next thing that happens is any portals that are out weaken. Remember I had a level two portal. It is still around as a level one portal. So now in this second round, I have access to summer and I still have access to spring. So I can still do stuff back here and stuff over there because my portal has still lasted. All right. And you know, if I had actually spent a bit more and put the portal out here, I'd still have access to winter,

39:32 which would be very, very cool. But I do not because I didn't spend extra to put it off in that direction. It's okay. I still got access to spring. I'm happy with that. So we rotate. Um the portals get tuckered out. We get our workers back. Where's my workers? There's my lizard and my beaver and my eagle. And they get their workers back, too, which was here. And they your other two workers were just picking up dice. So, they get their workers back. We figure out turn order. So, um it's whoever did the most. I did the only one. This one doesn't actually count. This is just for reference. I'm the only one who get So, I hold on to first. If they had two, then they would get to go first. Um but, uh it didn't matter. So, I hold on to first player and we move this little marker up to say that we're in round two now because there's seven rounds. And it means on on the next turn, if I were to do a a dam action like you saw me do before, I could put it on the current level we're at or any level below. And that's it for the end of a normal round.

40:33 But on the end of a round where we switch seasons, which we just did, we also do this stuff. Uh things that stuck around, if you didn't get them in time, they're gone. Bye-bye to that and that and that and that and that and that. So, you got to grab them quick and remember the one I wanted is still there. So, I and it's available. Um, you know, these actions are always available all the time. So, did I just put a one and a two out? Yes, I did. And these slide over. So, it's not going to stick around much longer. So, in summer, I definitely want to get over here and grab that objective because I'm about to finish it. You go down there and you go down there and two more come up here. A 3 to 10, but a 3 to 10 is not going to be as good because it's such a wide target. It's easy to hit. These tight targets, they are the tough ones to hit. They give you the better rewards. So, we clear out the stuff. Everybody gets their income. Um, and if you got solar panels, they multiply. I sadly have no income. If yours like what's one of the ones just disappeared like if I had come over if I had opened a portal into the future so that I could have come over here so I could have grabbed one of this. I could have had this thing which would have given me two points another golden plate to manipulate the dice and my income right now would be for every round two points and a fruit that I have access to which right now is summer or spring fruit. So, if I had gotten this in the first round, this is a 14-point tile. Not quite

42:03 because this does I mean the income doesn't happen at the end of every round. It happens at the end of every round. We switch seasons. That happens from round one to round two and then round three to four and round five to six. So, you know, this would actually fire several more times over the course of the game and it would have paid out. But I did not invest in anything that would give me income like these bonuses nor these. These can be huge um bonuses down here if you could do the mining. But to have done the mining, I would have had to open a portal all the way over to autumn and that would have been tougher to pull off. It could have been done, but it would have been tougher to pull off and then I'd be sitting pretty getting a ton of mining income. So again, there's so many things you could focus on. I focused on, you know, the solar panels so I can upgrade my workers and the dam and just trying to get my objectives done and I've ignored a lot of stuff that other players might be doing. But anyway, the last thing is if either of your lines have at least one, they multiply. So, I now have four. One more. One more solar panel and I will be able or no, I'm sorry. Uh I I can upgrade. I have four. Three will let me upgrade any of my workers now as a free action. And then one more solar panel. I can get them all the way up to be a level three. Or I can Well, um I I still need to get more to get a second level.

43:16 You get it. Anyway, though. So, that was pretty pretty good. And you know what? I am actually thinking now I'm kind of regretting not since this was going to stick around not having spent one more uh sands of time so that it would have been further out. That means I still would have had it and it would be here. I could get more solar panels. I paid the big die to have the one stick around longer. How about we say I spent two so it's still in winter. So I have access to winter and summer. I think that would have been the smarter way to go. I just had to spend one more s of time which I clearly should have done. All righty. So, anyway, we are now on. We've done all this. It's on to round two. It's summertime when the weather is fine. Da da da da da. And before I do anything, I am going to spend one, two, three, and I'm going to upgrade a worker. And I get a different things. Remember that's one of my actions. Spend three to upgrade to a level two. If I upgrade the beaver, I can now immediately do two damn actions, which normally takes a whole turn and you have to spend lumber, but I could just do these two damn actions for free.

44:22 It's kind of my thing. I I'm kind of a busy beaver. Or I can upgrade the lizard, and that will let me grab any color dye I want up to a value of four. So, that's very nice. That's a whole turn to grab a die that could get me closer to finishing another objective. Or the third thing I could do is I could upgrade the eagle. Now is not a good time to upgrade the eagle because what they do is I immed the eagle needs to be out on the board. If the eagle is out on the board and then I upgrade it, I get to immediately move the eagle someplace else that I have access to and do a bonus action. So these are bonus actions, too. You know, these are more powerful than normal. I mean, getting to do two for free, getting a die for free, no matter what, any color I want, or send my worker out to do a second thing.

45:08 Now, these are all just one-time bonuses once you've done the worker. But the thing is, if I if I do this, and this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to do the beaver because I love that dam. I'm all about the dam this game. I'm going to do the beaver. And um as a free bonus, I'm going to send two out without having to spend my lumber yet. I still haven't done that. And because this beaver is level two, if I send them to actions like here, hey, if I do this and manipulate my stuff again, I'll get another solar panel without having to go into the past or etc. Although I still have the opportunity to go to the past, but having level twos benefits you in lots of places. Um, like they get extra berries if you go out to do berries or um, let's see what else. Right. No, you need level Yeah. Uh, level twos. if you send a level two out to get one of these uh you get a discount on them. I So there's it's having leveled up uh beaver is better than a regular beaver. And all right, so anyway, I'm doing this and this means I'm immediately doing two. And because we're on level two, I can do two dam actions now or I can keep doing one damn actions. Remember, I want to monopolize this column. So I'm going to come here and it says, "Hey, get any berry you have access to." I have access to winter and summer berries. Let's grab a winterberry while I've still got access to him. And um and now I can put another one down for free because of this beaver upgrade. And I can't go to the next level yet to keep on maintaining. So let's go over here on level two and get

46:41 a nice little level one die. And let's put it right there. Isn't that lovely? Isn't that a sweet little die? I think so. And now folks, I am going to do an action. And you're a level two. Here's what I want to do. I want to go get that quest before it disappears or before my opponent takes it. My opponent might take it at any time because it's about to go. But I won't get a I I need a level three worker to get a bonus there. So, I'm just going to send my regular level one. I'm going to come over here because remember these actions are always available all the time. And this says, "Hey, I don't have to spend an extra berry because I wasn't the first one there." And so I have to spend a dye though to get these. And the one I want is perfect. It says spend a level one or greater green or orange. So any die will let me get this. If I want to grab this one, which is a very tough target to hit, but look at all these bonuses you get off of it. Well, I would have to have a level uh seven orange or green.

47:41 And you say, "What? a level seven. Yeah. Did you not notice, folks? This game has very, very cool dice that continue past six. They go to seven, eight, nine, 10. Um, you know, or they go up to all the up to nine. So, um, I have to get some level sevens. How do I do that? I take a six. I bump it up. Or there are ways that will let you grab them. But these are just the coolest, funkiest looking dice ever. So, if I wanted that one, I would need a a level seven die. Also, if I did that, I would get to, as a little bonus, increase the the the livability. I would get to make my um portal last longer still. But anyway, I'm not doing that. I've got to give up one die any value. And which one am I going to give up? Well, I don't need this die anymore because I finished that. I could take one of these, but I want to get this completed ASAP. So, let's go ahead and take this two. It's a bit I'm a bit overpaying. I'm gonna spend this. I'm gonna spend a level two orange to get this. This is a new quest. Where am I going to put it? You know where I'm gonna put it? I'm gonna put it here or here because then it will immediately be done. This will get me a sand of time.

48:46 This will get me any berry I want. I want more berries. Any berry I want. I will put this here. And as a free action, I'll say, "Oh, look. It's done." And because [clears throat] it's a it's three, so that hit the three or four. So, oh, first of all, I put it here. I get any berry I want. Let's go ahead and get another um autumn berry because they're in the future. And then I put this here. I complete it as a free action. And um I get the reward, which is a reward that normally I would have to send a worker into the future where a level two worker would get me um two points for sending a level two worker over there. I'd have to send them into the future because this is the autumn. And then that would let me make an investment down here. But no, I'm not going to do that. I completed a quest that lets me do the mining action that would normally be in the future. So, let's do that now. Um, [clears throat] right. So, I still have to pay. It's expensive to mine. I have to mine with either a level four or greater green or a level seven or greater green. Oh, no.

49:53 And I just realized I have a problem. I don't have any. I don't have a green. That's a four or a seven. Now, I do have a way I could solve this. I have a green one and I don't need it anymore because I've already finished this. I've got two plus ones and I've got a plate. So, that's 1 plus 1 plus 1, that's three. That's turning this into a four and I could do it. But no, I am not going to do that. I'm going to wait a little bit. So, I put this here. I got the berry, but I don't have to complete it. Even though it's ready to go, I could wait until later to flip this over and do the mining cuz I need to make I need to get a higher value green. That's what I need to do. In the meantime, I'm sorry. When I took this, all these should have slid over. And you can see a red one came out that, oh my gosh, gives you two solar panels. Oh, but it is very expensive to grab right now. So, anyway, so I put this here. I'm not completing it. Um, and that was my turn, right? What did I do? Oh, right. I What did I not do? I did not actually um send the worker out. Um, where did where did my worker go? Right.

50:58 So, there's my level two. There's my level one. Where's my level one eagle? Where's my level one eagle? Am I blind? Oh, right. No, it's right here. Here's my I sent my lizard. My level one lizard got me the thing. Fine. That was my first turn. It is now my opponent's second turn and they say, "Hey, I'd like to do the solar panel thing, please. Yes, I would." So, it's like they just open a portal to the past. And now this is a bummer. So, they're going to send somebody um to the past and they're there first. So, if I want to get solar panels, I now have to pay extra berries. They don't take them. They've just blocked me. And that's totally That's I was totally going to go there and get some more. I can still do it, but now I got to pay an extra berry. Oh, that's painful. I have two berries, but that means one one I can only get one. I need to get a third berry now before I go there so I can get two.

51:48 All right. This is a game of very narrow margins, folks. Anyway, so that was what they did. And now it is my second turn. And um right, well, I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to send out my little eagle. And uh I am not going to get more quests. I I could come over here and get more berries because I need those berries, right, to be maximum efficient. But I'm not going to do that. I'm gonna come out here and I'm going to grab this level six green dye. And I can put it wherever I want. doesn't matter because it's not going to stick around very long. This level six green die. In fact, that was my main turn. Now, my bonus is I'm going to finish this. Hey, it's finished. I flip it. I say I'm going to once again I'm going to mine and I have a level six. So, I'm going to spend one of these that I started with to turn this six into a lovely looking seven. And because I'm spending a seven, I can get this mining or this mining done. And what this means is I will get income every other round for the rest of the game.

52:53 I'll get it right now immediately and during income phases. What do I get? It's my choice. Two points um and a level four die of any color or a level two orange and a berry of any color and two points. So, which one do I want? Normally, I'd go for the higher die, but if I can just make a go of only doing low value quests, then I think it makes more sense to do this. So, I'm gonna come here. So, I get two more points. Yay. I get an orange level two die that I've got to put somewhere on the grid. And I will put it right there. So, now I'm getting close to finishing this. Now, I just got to put a green right there. And this will be done. Yeah, baby. And um so I got an orange. I got two points. Oh, and I get any berry I want.

53:40 Let's see. Well, again, these autumn berries are the furthest in the future. From here we are have to go one two into the future to get them. So, let's just get some more August berries. Um, you know, you know, while while the getting is good. Okay, cool. So, there we go. And that was my free bonus. And I am done. And I've got one more worker, my level two. But let's see what my opponent does. They say, "Oh, they're going to mine as well." But they're not doing it like I did as a cool special bonus. They're just sending out a worker and saying, "Oh, they're opening a portal to autumn and they're blocking. If I want to go there, too bad. Now I got to spend more." So that's it for them. All they do is just block spaces and make things more expensive for me just like a human player would. And now finally, it's Bucky the Beaver. Although not Bucky. Bucky is evil. Um Oh, Buckyy's can't not a good company.

54:29 Anyway, though, uh Bucky, no, not Bucky. Uh Bob the Beaver is gonna go out and he's a level two. And if I send him out here to do the solar panels, he doesn't do he doesn't get any bonus for that. Whereas if I send him um let's see. Yeah, like if I send him over here because this is available, I could get another one of these quests which will immediately give me another benefit by putting it on the outskirts and um I will get a discount for using him. Although, wait, no, his discount is not having to pay to get in. Oh, and I still have to give up a die to get these, but the die would be one less. So, instead of this being an eight or better, I'd have to give up a seven or better to get that. So, that would be the main use of a level two. But if I instead So, this is painful. Well, if I come up here, I'm going to have to pay two berries to get one solar panel, right? It means I'm using my my um what's the jig, but I'm having to spend two to one. How about I just come over here back to my favorite little spot? Because if I come over with a level two or three, I get the solar panel and I save the berries. I don't have to spend them. So, that means I am not using that portal a second time, unfortunately. Anyway, and this is gone.

55:50 But I'm now going to get to do these manipulation again. And what do I need to do? I need to move a green up here. So, let's just move that green right there. And look at that. I have finished this. Hooray. And I'll mark it as done right now. So, I get to do another mine action. Again, I can't go to the third level yet. So, do I want to get another berry? Do I want to get points or do I want to get some sands of time or two points or a berry equal to where I am? Oh, you know, that's interesting because if I do this, if I get the berry, it's equal to what I have access to. And right now, I have access to summer and winter. So, if I go for that, I can get a winter berry because they are harder to get. We are moving further and further away from winter. They're only going to be more expensive. So, I'll go there. And um clearly I've got the majority. So, I'm going to be first in the third level because my opponent hasn't gone there at all yet. And so, that was my third turn. Wait, but no, I get to do more stuff, right? Because I got to move a thing. I get to manipulate a thing. I get to in Let's go on ahead and bump this up by two. So, now I've got five of these. If I ever do this action, I need to bleed it dry. And I can swap some stuff.

56:55 I don't know that I need to swap anything right now, though. I don't think that helps much. So, I'm not going to bother with the swapping. That's a second time. But we have now Oh, my opponent. They're going to do a third thing, right? One, two, three. Yeah, they're going to do a third thing with their third worker. And they're going to Wow. You know what? You should really see something else from them just constantly getting the dice over again. Oh, they're going to do this. This is for the solo game. This means they use this little thing. Um, which means um, you know, even if you have figured out what's still coming, they do this. This says, "Hey, move two steps on this little mini wheel here and do stuff." So, they move one, two, and that means they're doing another mining action. So, they went to the mining action, but since they passed both of those, they're doing those actions as well.

57:41 So, it's like they finally did some, you've seen me do bonus actions, they're doing bonus actions. Their main thing was they did the other worker placement action. And in addition to that, they are going to take one of the um color quests. And again, it says two here. So, they go one, two, and they have taken that quest. If I want it, too bad, so sad. And they cross this. So, they're taking another one of these. And so, they go one, two, and they wraps around, and they grab this one. If I want it, too bad, so sad. Gone. Again, these are incredibly powerful, and they should be because they're incredibly expensive. My opponent just grabs them. Easy peasy. But if I wanted to come to these worker placement spots, which I could because we're in summer, I would have to give up a die of at least value four to get one of these. Or if I wanted one of these, I'd have to give up three dice, two fours, and something else and two time two sands of time. So those are incredibly expensive. But again, these are super powerful. They're instant income plus bonus powers for the rest of the game. So what did they just give themselves by taking that one? It is um this one. No, was it this one? I think it was this one. Uh where again income of berries and money every round plus this stuff right now. So that would have been nice for them or for me if I could have gotten it. But I again I'm focusing on different stuff. So I've done their three, they've done their three. We have now finished, folks. The second of seven rounds. This is going to rotate again.

59:05 And now my portal just in time to come to spring is gone. It reduces down to zero. We get our workers back. Beaver, which is my level two beaver, and my level one eagle and my level one lizard. And there, where would they go? I forgot what they all did. They did the that and they did two damn actions. It grabbed them all up. And um we figure out turn order. Hey, it's me because I did the most. So, the turn order is not changing. We move up. Say we're round three and this time we don't do all of these steps including the income of these because we didn't switch seasons yet. At the end of this round when we switch from summer to autumn, these bonus steps happen. So those will have to wait. Um, right. But I put this little thing as a reminder here that the AI does some extra stuff when it gets to round two, including reshuffling their little action deck.

1:00:04 So, so you can't really, you know, know exactly what's coming because they've reset. They could do anything. Who knows what they're going to be up to and that's it. But in future rounds, they will all Oh, folks, I never mentioned, did I mention there are universal objectives everybody's racing to complete. First player to have three or more seven plus value dice. First player to have four of these things that my opponent is grabbing. first player to actually complete docking, which I haven't even talked about yet because like I've got this green and I finished it, right? But you notice there's this space. If I were to go back to spring, which means I'd have to open up a time portal to get back here. I could grab one of these and this says, "Hey, spend a time in these two berries to get another one of these actions done, but then take it because it's green and snap it into this like so." And I have done um and by the way, this is a uh prototype, so they're a little bit offset, but I'm sure in the final game it'll look just fine. Whenever you make these docking complete, you get bonus points. And the sooner you do it, the better. And the game reminds you somewhere how many points you get. Oh, it's right down here. that if you could do if you could get a matching um value or color along with a season one, if you get the two matchings and you put them together and complete them both, you get five points if you do it in spring and summer. If you wait until autumn, it's worth three bonus points to do that. If you wait until winter, it's only two bonus points. So, you want to be collecting these seasonal things that

1:01:35 match these. And by the way, these things that he's been grabbing, if I'd been grabbing them, I would be putting them down here and I'd be getting those points for the matching plus the ongoing things. You can see how valuable these are. I've been avoiding them because I've been focusing on leveling up because if by the end of the game, I can have three workers leveled up to level three, I can get this big benefit, one more ch four points, one more chance to do a damn action and a golden plate. And I still need to get five golden plates because if I do, if I can open a portal to spring, I can get my peacock. So, I'm doing four workers for the rest of the game. But how much time will there be? Because it's hard to get these plates, right? Well, I'm not sure, folks. So, I think though you have a pretty good idea of the overall flow of Chrono Critter, so I'm going to stop right there. And if you'd like to hear some final thoughts about the game, well folks, every year you know how excited I am about whatever new is coming from Delicious Games, which is the small little independent publisher uh comprised of Vladimir and his wife uh who just the two of them every year put out a game or two and every year it is one of the big hits of Essence Spiel and it's just phenomenal.

1:02:49 And somehow they do this in spite of the fact that they have real day jobs and they never actually crowdfund they Kickstarter. They just by hook or by crook find a way to do it putting out a new phenomenal one. You know some of the all-time greats of the last decade have come out through delicious year after year. you know, Prague put Regni and Underwater Cities and you know, last year I loved Deonia. And so, like I said, I'm always so stoked every year as October is coming up and I get an email from Vladimir um or his wife and they say, "Hey, would you like to cover the new one?" And I'm like, "Yes, please. You know how much I love your stuff." So, I was a little nervous this year, though, because if you look closely, you might be forgiven saying, "Oh, yeah. Look, it's designed by Vladimir Sushi, the solo mode, and there's game development on it, but it's actually a brand new designer. Tristan um Gearart, who is the actual designer here. And um this is really interesting. I think this is the first time Delicious Games has had Vladimir do co-designs, I think, with a couple designers on some of the previous games, but I think this is the first time that they've done a completely different designers approach.

1:03:54 And so I worried, am I going to think this game is as has that delicious magic that Vladimir is designing? Because Vladimir, he was one of the first people I ever put in a top 10 favorite designers of all time, going all the way back to uh um you know, some of his earlier just, you know, masterpieces like Shipyard and whatnot. And I mean, and I'm always impressed by his designs, even if they don't quite work for me in Jen. I'm always so glad I got a chance to play them. And I thought, well, is this going to be different? I shouldn't have worried. Uh Tristan, you did a phenomenal job and I am so happy that this game is coming out because originally it was going to be published by a different publisher um under a different title. It was called Test of Time, I believe, and it was the same basic idea, worker placement where um you can open up portals in time to send your workers to the future or the past or only place them in the present, which is such a cool highlevel concept and it works so well. I mean on the simple surface it just means oh you're paying resources to get access to different worker placement spaces on the board but thematically it's so much fun and anyway um a different publisher I think it was game brewer was originally going to publish it but sadly game brewer is no longer with us they are one of the uh ones who you know basically did not survive the travailes of this decade and so it looked even though there was a lot of enthusiasm for test of time it looked like maybe it was going to disappear but I got to say Vladimir was right to sweep in. Because here's the deal. If I did not know any of this history ahead of time, if I if if if I didn't see who the designer was, I I would say, "Oh, yeah.

1:05:25 Of course, this is Vladimir Sushi's latest game because this feels like a Vladimir Sushi big wonderful crunchy meaty euro. you know, the kind of stuff he does so well like um you know, Pragap Regy or you know, there's so many of them over the years uh that have always impressed and I don't know how much of that is a reflection of the fact that he did some development. I don't know how much of this is Tristan's, but I'm going to give all the credit to Tristan and say, "Sir, you have produced something really wonderful and lovely." The idea [snorts] of time opening and closing different worker placement actions, time passing in a game is something I'm always fascinated by. Ever since I played Zulk in the Mayan calendar, which was another timebased worker placement game where you put a worker on a gear and then you waited two, three, four, five rounds until you took it off because the longer it stayed there, the more stuff it got done. Here it's the actual worker placement board that is changing and morphing and updating through the passage of time through the game. And it's so cool and um it's such a clever conceit to say, "Oh yeah, I can go. I don't want to wait two more rounds to get to autumn. I need to do that action now. So, yes, I will burn a die.

1:06:34 And these dice are hugely important because they are how I complete all my objectives on my little uh transmission grid here, but I will burn that die to send a portal into the future so that I can do that action now instead of waiting. Um, but this is a game where you're only going to play seven rounds and it's very possible that you are only going to have three workers. You might never get that fourth worker. And so, you're only taking 21 actions and it goes quick. It is a big game. It is a crunchy game. And it is a game that because you have a choice if you want to get that action done because it's really essential for your overall plans because you're racing to be the first to complete one of the communal objectives or whatever it is. You've got a choice. You can be very patient and just wait for time to pass very slowly, very slowly. or you can burn a lot of resources to just jump the queue and get there now so you can do that action and hopefully it'll pay off the fact that you've given up dice that could have been you could have done a lot of other stuff with you could have gotten more objectives you could have completed more objectives but you're burning them to get into the future and once you've opened that portal you want to get as much use of it as you can because every round it's going to get weakened and eventually it's going to disappear unless you can find ways cuz there are ways to get it to live longer Um because I I mean you could leverage it and get advanced access to stuff long before anybody does. The longer you can keep a portal alive. And by the same token, IT'S LIKE, "OH, NO. I we were in spring. I really wanted to get this done

1:08:04 and it's too late." Well, you know what? You can just as easily go back in time. Oh, summer's over, but I'm now I can finally get that thing done. I'll open up a portal to the past. And if it can stay around again, it will let me do more stuff that's in the present in the future when it becomes a I mean it just it's just it's just wonderful. It's just fun and really thematically strong. I think you know the idea of reaching into the future or diving back into the fa past and making the most of it you can at great expense is here and it works great. And then talking about theme, they didn't have to do this. I don't know with the original test of time if it was just more of a straightforward sci-fi thing, you know, maybe more something that feels like anacrony maybe, but I got to say I love the anthropomorphosized critters that um you know, no, it's my it's my um my friend, not my pet, but my friend, because it's so far in the future that we ally ourselves with the animals. We have found a way to unlock or, you know, commune with animal intelligence. And it's the animals that can do this time travel stuff and help us save the world.

1:09:10 I love the theme. I love the story that's told. If I'm honest, I kind of wish it was a co-op game because it feels like if you're trying to save the future, you should be working with somebody to do it. And man, this game would be such a cool co-op game as well. But it would lose so much of the tension because, you know, the worker placement other than the whole time travel thing is pretty straightforward. Uh, you know, you want to get there first. You don't want to get frozen out. Although this game is a much more forgiving because a lot of spaces you can get there no matter what. People can't freeze you out. But this is a game of very very narrow razor thin resource margins and getting late to that mining action you want to do. And therefore just having to spend one more berry could scupper all your plans and that can be painful. And it's easy. Hey, I can just spend a WHOLE TURN JUST PICKING up three berries and then I won't have to worry about um you know losing out on that for a while. But in a game where I've only got three turns per round and especially once I've opened a portal, if I'm not making use of that portal and just grabbing berries, what am I doing? So, this game is constantly throwing one bird in the hand versus two in the bush type um compromises of no, I just got to grab this now. I've got to make hay while the sun is shining or I can wait. I will wait. There are other things I can do. I don't have to open this portal. Um, just five turns from now. The time will have passed and I could grab that die then.

1:10:32 And if I'm smart, I won't need that die till then. But if I'm waiting that long, somebody else might grab it sooner. And so you feel this constant tension, this constant push because um it is 21 turns, but they are tiny turns. Most of your turns you're just grabbing a die or grabbing some berries or just grabbing some little bonus and occasionally unlocking a nice combo chain of two or three extra things on your turn with all your free bonus actions. But um it is a game of smaller baby steps and so it does zip along quick. But it does require a real either one make that long-term commitment. Know what you're planning to do four rounds 12 turns from now or say to heck with it and burn another die and

1:11:19 [clears throat]

1:11:19 um open that portal now and go do it. Go do it now. That is cool. That is a fun problem to have. But my you know and and I loved it. I think it's great. My wife for her it was a bit too much baby step stuff. She generally likes to have more big combo turns. You get big combo turns in here but they are they are not the norm. They are the exception to the rule. So you have lots of little turns saving up for a big turn. And there is so much to crunch on. Every die has so many different uses. Whether you're sacrificing them to get bonuses, whether you're manipulating them to make them the right thing to complete objectives, whether you're burning them to open up holes in spaceime to get to the actions that you thought you were never going to be able to do because it's in the past now. But that's okay. I can travel to the past and finish what I started. But only if I sacrifice this die. And there goes that objective or there goes that super bonus I could get. Um, but oh man, it is excellent. It just works well. And if you are comfortable with, you know, games that do a lot of small baby step turns, if you're comfortable with forcing you to make those really tough, crunchy things because you are, there are so many spinning plates in this game. You can't do it all. But because of time travel, you feel like you can.

1:12:43 And so you grind and you crunch and your brain just starts having steam coming out of your ears. Is this heavier than a typical Is this heavier? I don't think my wife crunched as hard on underwater cities. Even underwater cities with expansions. I think Tristan with Vladimir's help. I don't know what Vladimir did on it other than do the solo. I think is this heavier than Prog Riggney? I think it might be and it's because of the time travel because you have so much flexibility, so much freedom. Um, you know, you think it's over, but no, I can go back. I can make right what once went wrong and get that objective done three rounds later after I had my window to do it if I'm willing to spend. But what am I willing to sacrifice? Yeah, I think this might be the heaviest game from Delicious Games yet. And if folks, if you like delicious games as much as I do, I think you might want to check it out this October in Germany at Essence Field or I'm sure it'll go, you know, into wide distribution later because it is another winner. Once again, Vladimir uh does it again. Delicious Games delivers and they also give a platform to what I hope is a very exciting new designer to hit. Uh Tristan, well done. Um, it looks fantastic. That folks is Chrono Critters. Thanks so much for watching.

1:14:11 Have a very nice day. Talk to you later. So long. Bye-bye.