Majority Control Games

After Pablo
Nate Hayden; Blast City Games; 2-4; 120
The bloody saga of Mexican and Colombian illegal drugs following Pablo Escobar's 1994 death. Each player controls a drug cartel and tries to dominate sales to the USA. Key measures are obtaining transportation, finding reliable distributors and coping with all three governments. Mechanisms include cardplay/hand maanagement, majority control and fighting. Have to admit it is not relying on a hackneyed historical theme; on the other hand may replace Lunch Money as the most distasteful topic currently in print. [more]

aufRUHR! - Das Ruhrstadt-Spiel
Tibor Bartholomä, Helen Chen, Romuald Dehio, Anna Feldmann, Gerald Friedel, Lutz Heilmann, Julia Heilmeier, Cilly Kurkhaus, Anthony Perinucci & Sara Serodio; Ruhrstadt-Netzwerk GmbH; 4-6; 90
Developed by architecture students at the Berlin University of Art as part of the Ruhr being European Cultural Capital for 2010. Small-town mayors compete to become the new overall mayor of the city unified Ruhrstadt, thus bringing control of the 53 towns of the Ruhr region under one banner. The board is an irregularly-shaped jigsaw. Players place developments on adjacent spaces and can stand for election by all the players to become temporary overall mayor. The successful candidate wears a paper hat to wear and rewards different sorts of developments, which might affect the next election. Players may also bribe with victory points or threaten a scandal to induce other mayors to collaborate. Money takes the form of coal, as the Ruhr is a significant coal area. [more]

Charon Inc.
Emanuele Ornella; Gryphon/Pegasus; 2-5; 45
The time: 2288 AD. The place: Pluto's largest moon. The goal: be the best at exploiting its resources. Stake claims to the mining regions, acquire gems in various colors and if you have the right combination use them to construct buildings (which provide only victory points), including from some that are in the public pool. Special actions, some of which mess with opponents are also possible. Main mechanism of placing flags at the corners, sides or in regions and the majority getting all of the resources there is borrowed from Hermagor. [more]

Dakota
Piero Cioni; Nexus/Heidelberger/Hobby Japan; 3-5; 90
Players represent either settlers or native tribes. What's interesting is that your type makes you value items differently. Settlers are interested in forests and mines while the Indians are interested in bison and horses. Players are allies in trying to open up new territories, but rivals when exploiting them. Using the majority control mechanism there's thus plenty of opportunity for backstabbing. [more]

Hornet
Jani Moliis & Tero Moliis; lautapelit.fi; 2-6; 45
Each player controls a pair of hornets (apparently the bee is too tame sounding) that collect nectar and produce as much honey as they can. Features simultaneous action selection and a dual-layered resource system. The board is modular, being built from hex tiles representing fields of flowers and hornet nests. Players hold identical decks of action cards, each of which can be used multiple times. Action cards played are allocated to one or the other hornet. [more]

Jerusalem
Michele Mura; Abacus; 2-4; 90
Intrigues in twelfth century Jerusalem, a period of the Crusaders, in which one of them tries to become the ruling baron. Success revolves around gaining majority control of the following: king, Church, market, military, nobilty and Tower of David. The controller of each receives its revenue, manpower and tower points, which are then plowed back into further improving positions. There are also special privileges to be gained and negative events to be dealt with. In the end the highest tower shows who wins. [more]

Khan
Christwart Conrad; White Goblin Games; 2-4; 60; 10+
In 1244 players represent generals working for the mighty ruler of Mongolia. They are charged with driving out the native rules of eight different lands and conquering as many valuable regions as possible. These are realized by placing yurts (tents), which permit conquering two or more adjacent areas by laying one of the variously shaped conquer tiles over the yurts (not all of which need to be the player's own). The larger the conquer tile, the greater the points. At the end, players having the largest connected territories gain additional points. [more]

Régents
Joël Boutteville; Krok Nik Douil; 3-5; 120
In 1286 the leading citizens of Scotland vie to become regent for the four-year old queen. Areas of endeavor are political, military, religion, finance and trade. [more]

Verona
Petra Chvala; Czech Board Games; 2-5; 60
Players compete in auctions, plan intrigues and guess those (intrigues) of others by completing secret or public tasks. The winner needs sufficient economic and military power as well as domination of territory. Includes secret objectives, blind bidding and dice rolling. [more]

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