The Odyssey Journal: January 2025

At Odyssey Games, we've just completed our first month of business and what a month it has been! 

If you have popped in and said hello in person, or if you came and supported us at our first SOLD OUT event at the Maltings, then a big thank you for making a dream come true and helping the shop be such a success. 

If you think this means I haven't been playing games in my downtime, then think again! Each month I'll be popping a review up on what I've been loving and hating in the world of board games.  I will admit that my January has been filled with games that are easy to learn and quick to play, because I'm in bed at 9pm, but below is the list. 

- Robyn, Director of Odyssey Games

Canvas

10/10

Starting with the prettiest game in the shop, I've been wanting to play this game for a long long time, so when a friend came to visit with a copy, it was finally time to open that beautiful box! 

As you can imagine, the transparent cards with tiny bits of paint blotches, arty tropes and symbolism are just as gorgeous as the box art, but does this actually translate into good gameplay? The short answer is YES!

Unravel the neoprene playmat and dole out your palette tokens and bid on your transparent art cards. Collect and combine them into your masterpieces, but remember that composition matters, you do actually need to score points to win the game. 

My first masterpiece was spectacular, I was scoring ribbons and victory points across the board and puffed myself up like a proud peacock showing off my art to everyone and of course had a good (but early) brag. My hopes came tumbling down on my second piece when I realised I was now a completely broke artist, unable to bid on anything decent and bawling when my fellow artists were creating things I couldn't dream of. I felt totally uninspired and dramatically woeful at my rubbish art. I crawled back to a middling success by the end, but I did not feel like my art was worthy of the gallery it hung in. 

I fully see why this game comes with 4 Dice Tower awards on the box, and why it is worthy of two very cool expansions. The price tag doesn't seem worthy of such a small box, but that box packs a very special punch with high quality cards, mat and tokens. I think this special game will be sat at the top of my best games of 2025 and it is only January!

Cockroach Poker

7/10

I admit, I am 10 years late to the game with Cockroach Poker, but I can see why this tiny box of cards is still being devoured by gamers everywhere after all this time. Firstly, it is well worth the £10.99 you pay for it, and a great game for pubs, parties or family gatherings at around 25 minutes long a session and with a player count of up to 6. 

Yes, this game with the grossest bugs around asks players to simply give a card from their hand to another player around the table face down, and state which kind of animal is on that card. The player who has received the card can decide to believe the dealer, reject the card as a lie, or peek at the card and pass it onto another player, stating the same animal or a different one. If you guess incorrectly, that card sits on the table in front of you, taunting you, stressing you out, and that pressure mounts with the more incorrect guesses you make... get 4 of one animal in front of you, and you lose in the most crushing way possible, as everyone else wins. Darn Charlie and his trustworthy face.. you fall for the lie every time! 

I'm normally not a fan of bluffing games, generally being utterly useless at them, but this is a gem of a game that takes up minimal space on the shelves, and a must for any collection. 

Next Station: Tokyo, Paris, London

9/10

Calling all Sudoku and roll and write fans, top up your collection with a little box of magic in the form of Next Station: Tokyo, Paris, or London. 

I'm always very wary of the recent deluge of roll and write, or in this case, flip cards and write games that have hit the board game arena over the past couple of years. When a new mechanic hits the scene, everyone wants to make their version of it, and some have been hits - such as the Railroad Ink series by Horrible Guild - and others just add noise to an already crowded scene! 

These gems retail at £15.99 and like a kid you open up a magnetic box find a packet of colouring pencils and a pad of paper and if you are anything like me, you will be drawing and doodling in the margins before you even take in any of the rules. 

The simple premise of drawing lines to make your metro is easy to grasp but devilishly difficult when you take in the extra scoring rules, like gaining points for creating intersections, hitting monuments for your tourists or creating bridges gives you just enough decision paralysis to question every choice you made before this one. WHY WON'T THE LINES GO WHERE YOU NEED THEM TOO GAHHH... 

Quick to play and with just enough frustration to want to make you go again straight away, these games are clever in their design and accessibility levels. I found London the simplest to grasp but a nice place to start, but if you want to dive into slightly more challenging scenarios pick up Paris or Tokyo. 

Pocket it and take it travelling with you. Have a quick solo round whilst eating your lunch. Keep coming back for more.

The Fellowship of the Ring: Trick-Taking Game

9/10

The same question applied to this game as Canvas, is the pretty box worth it? It seems like 2024/2025 is the time of the Lord of the Rings comeback, with at least 4 new game releases in the universe. 

This pretty box offers a lot to its players; a card game with a trick-taking element like hearts, a narrative storyline to work through, and on top of all that it is co-operative. How on earth does all that work together? 

When you open the box you are presented immediately with lovely wooden tokens and a starting hand of cards and characters. We played the game in 2-player mode so we set up a 7 wonders style card pyramid that works like a 3rd character in action. Each character comes with an objective to the number of tricks or specific cards they must win to win the chapter as a group, but you don't know which cards the other players are holding and communication is strictly limited to the information that is open on the table. 

I liked the theme and concept and we successfully raced through chapters 1-3 in around an hour. Then chapter 4 came along, and with the confidence boost behind us, we were quickly shot out of the sky and landed on earth with a hard thud. 4 attempts later, and the game is still showing us who is boss... and there are 18 chapters in total... sob... 

This game is smart, pretty and devilishly difficult to conquer. Is it as enjoyable if you aren't a Lord of the Rings fan... maybe... Go for The Crew or The Gang by Thames and Kosmos games instead... but if you want to relive the adventures of Frodo and Sam, at £24.99, you really can't go wrong.