Bloober Team, the prolific horror studio behind The Medium and the upcoming Silent Hill 2 remake, has teamed up with Skybound Entertainment, best-known as the creators of The Walking Dead franchise, for a new licensed project.
09.12.2023 - 12:01 / gamesreviews.com / Adam Roffel
As a longtime fan of board games, it was shocking to me that I’d never played something from Arcane Wonders. My eyes were opened to all the fantastic games they have on offer at GenCon 2023, and over the past few weeks I’ve been making my way through their catalogue? Here are my two favourite titles from Arcane Wonder as of writing!
Neotopia
I love an abstract tile laying game, and while Neotopia attempts to get you invested in building this great city, I still view this as an abstract tile laying game. What I love about it, however, is how accessible it is, how easy it is to teach, and how quick it plays, even at the maximum player count.
I’ve played a lot of tile laying games in my life – think Azul here in a way – but none of them have been games that lasted long on our shelves. I think Neotopia is going to buck that trend and stay around for a lot longer than others have. The ease of play makes it attractive, but there is a ton of depth here as well that I love to explore. This is an easy top 3 game from Arcane Wonders in my opinion!
Furnace
This one might be a bit older, although a brand new expansion has just launched to breathe new life into this game. That being said, I’m once again praising Arcane Wonders for creating an experience that is so accessible. This one is even easier to teach then Neotopia, but still has lots of depth and great decision making opportunities.
Couple that with fantastic cards and resources, and you have a game that is fun to play, looks great on the table, and provides a great value-for-money ratio. I love manipulating my various factories to get the resources I need. I also really enjoy the complex decisions required to get the right cards into your tableau. This is another easy-to-teach, hard to master experiences that I think is great for new gamers and veterans alike!
Why Not a Top 3?
You might be asking yourself, “Why not make a top-3 for Arcane Wonders? I would, but I’m pretty positive that Top 3 would be obsolete by the time I play World Wonders for review next year. So I’m sticking with two for now!
Adam Roffel has only been writing about video games for a short time, but has honed his skills completing a Master's Degree. He loves Nintendo, and almost anything they have released...even Tomodachi Life.
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Twitter: @AdamRoffel
Bloober Team, the prolific horror studio behind The Medium and the upcoming Silent Hill 2 remake, has teamed up with Skybound Entertainment, best-known as the creators of The Walking Dead franchise, for a new licensed project.
Bloober Team, developers of Layers of Fear, The Medium and the upcoming Silent Hill 2 remake, have added another notable name to their plans for the next few years. The horror-focused studio is working with the creators of zombie comic book-turned-TV show The Walking Dead on a new video game adaptation.
There were many things that Tears of the Kingdom “did right” upon its release. Regarding its story, one of its best acts was bringing Zelda to the past and having her interact with Hyrule’s first king and queen. As players would find out, the first king of Hyrule, Rauru, would have a huge role in the story, including saving Link from Ganondorf’s curse and helping him understand his new abilities. Polygon translated an interview with the game’s director, Hidemaro Fujibayashi, and the game’s producer, Eiji Aonuma, where the two commented on what it was like to make Rauru and the “two sides” of his character via the time periods gamers met him in. Fujibayashi started with:
Before players meet Rauru in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, they see his arm. At the very beginning of the game, Link doesn’t really know what’s going on, but he wakes up with a mysterious appendage that’s not his — and that allows him to harness incredible powers. It’s not much later that Link meets a spirit version of Rauru, the first king of Hyrule and a character who belongs to a race of creatures called the Zonai. In lending Link his arm, Rauru gave the hero the means to go out into the wide world of Hyrule and realize the carefully laid plans of Princess Zelda.
Fuse materials in can create some of the best items in the game when paired with different weapons. Stronger resources allow Link to mold tools with very high damage bonuses for different combat situations. Bosses and other tough enemies are best fought with the Fuse materials that have the most potential throughout your adventures in Hyrule.
It is likely that will be the last game to feature its particular version of Link. is a direct sequel to, and because of this, it features and further develops the same incarnation of the famous hero. However, looking towards the future of the franchise, it may soon be time for ’s Link to retire.
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The producer of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom has revealed he doesn't quite understand why fans want to revisit the series' older, more "restricted" games when the new ones give you so much more freedom.
It’s not very often that a new mainline Zelda title is a direct follow-up to a previous instalment, with Majora’s Mask having been the last one (not counting the handheld titles) to do so until Tears of the Kingdom launched earlier this year. And whenever the next Zelda title arrives, it is going to be an entirely new thing once again, as per series producer Eiji Aonuma.