Snowdale Design - The Land of GALZYR - Board Game - English Version - Multi-Colour, Single Piece

Product Information

SL: Lands of Galzyr is a story-based adventure game set in an open world. If you would like to delve into a rich and colourful world where you’re granted freedom to choose your own destiny while your actions can have long-lasting consequences, this might be a good fit for your gaming collection. Lands of Galzyr has been a game I’ve had my eye on for years. It’s a storybook game in the same vein as Sleeping Gods or Tales of the Arabian Nights. Except instead of thumbing your way through a tome of stories, you’re using a web app that serves up stories at the touch of a button. The gameplay, however, remains similar. Where your turns are made up of moving around the map before being dunked into a milky cup of storytelling like the delicious Oreo you are. The flavor of the test is highly important. If you have the right tags (i.e. the test is a “Search” test and you have an item that has a “Search” tag – i.e. a lamp) you can get bonuses in the form of free re-rolls or even a number of guaranteed positive results. The skills also work in cohesion with this – they dictate which dice you are allowed to roll. You will have the greatest odds if you have skills that correlate to the required tests (i.e. if you’re fighting you want the dice with the swords). Let’s talk about the characters in the game – who can we start as, and how do their stats work? We’ve got lovely coloured pegs to show our attributes and progress For instance you could become skilled at negotiation and stealth, become tranquil and enlightened or even become a respected hero. All these abilities and changes help you grow attached to your character and give them much more personality. Heavy Lifting

If you’re in a location and can’t (or don’t want to) resolve a quest, there will always be a scene for you to enter. In cities, there are markets and other locations, while in the countryside, you draw an event card and get a scene number from that. These scenes, however, are shorter than the ones in quests and the rewards are also smaller. But they are a nice filler when you’re on the road to a quest location. Winter side of the map. More Gameplay Impressions I'm fascinated by the elevating effect that storytelling can have on a game. My goal is to inject life, personality, and a bit of humour into the characters and the world. Joash Kari Music The suggested playing time is pretty much spot on. This is fine for solo or a 2-player game, but the game gets longer with more players, despite there actually being fewer rounds. Again, there’s a lot of reading and players resolve their scenes one at a time. Having been a professional fiction writer for a decade, this is my first board game gig. A challenging and eccentric experience, but one I am pleased to be a part of. Calvin Wong Tze Loon 黃子倫 Story writing Lands of Galzyr is an adventure board game for 1 to 4 players, featuring nearly 400 unforgettable stories and many unique features.Setting up the game requires you to bring out the beautiful map of Galzyr, which features a summer and winter side of the board. You use a weather card to set up the game, place your locations and any previous cards from the last game. These can be quest cards, status effects on the board or event cards from a previous game. Open game world: You decide the direction of your adventure. There’s lots to see wherever you choose to go. SL: While the rules stay the same outside of the game end condition, player dynamic can change a lot based on the mode you choose to play in. In competitive mode, you can be even more thirsty for prestige. It’s even possible to partner up with your competitors if you try to catch up with other players or get ahead. You can choose between the game modes before each individual play. SL: Me and the co-designer, Seppo Kuukasjärvi, couldn’t find the perfect story-driven board game that we would fall in love with so we wanted to try creating one ourselves. When I came up with the idea of a board game which would remember your actions between sessions, I got really excited. We're ambitious with Lands of Galzyr, combining adventure stories with meaningful choices in a persistent world. Many player actions have lasting consequences. Jesús Delgado Illustration

While you’re waiting for these quests to filter through, there are also day and month mechanics. Where it’s a new month each time you play, and a new day of the week each round of play. Although I don’t know if this affects anything within the storybook app. It does add a sense of time and seasons passing between rounds, and between games. Warning: Undefined array key 0 in /home/u66218/public_html/wp-content/themes/toiminimi/functions.php on line 477

Likewise, the setup is rapid, as well. The card library is already prepared in the box – you just take the appropriate character cards and set up the map and you’re good to go. Similarly with storing and saving the game state. Just stow the active cards in the appropriate compartments and they’ll be ready for the next game. Being totally immersed in a new and exciting world is something that you don't easily forget. I hope you can experience that in Galzyr. Seppo Kuukasjärvi Game Design World building Story writing

We love that you gain companions in the game, but only for a limited time – can you tell us about how this interacts with the characters, world and challenges?And now, we have the outcome of putting so many games in the same universe – Lands of Galzyr is an adventure game with a persistent world and so many stories to tell. From a mid-sized box of fairly unassuming pieces comes a game of rich storytelling that happily goes toe to toe with games like Descent and Gloomhaven, but with a focus on story over combat. With an web driven choose-your-own-path adventure which takes you through the story, provides choices, and triggers your tests based on your stats and the keywords your and your companions have to hand. You see, there’s a limit on how strong your character can get, and you’ll hit that limit fairly early on. From there, you go on adventures, but you rarely grow beyond that power level. So while the journeys are wonderfully fun, they rarely leave a permanent imprint on your character.

The base game comes with four characters to choose from. They all come with special abilities, pre-selected skills, and personal tags. Some also have a starting quest that helps you introduce yourself to the world. Other than that, you can do everything with all of them. Playing Lands of Galzyr While I’m sure games such as Sleeping Gods or Tainted Grail are masterpieces, it was Lands of Galzyr that ignited my interest in an open-world board game. It promised a casual, family-friendly environment, and an evolving world, that is both easy to enter and exit. Theme and Setting This transports you into the world of Galzyr, with hundreds of stories and adventures to be discovered. You might meet unusual characters, save a town, avoid mercenaries, travel to ancient temples and more. The possibilities are almost endless. I can see how some players may find this a little odd and unless your really engrossed in the world here, might not enjoy it as much as others. Final Thoughts There’s two main worldbuilding elements, time, and board persistence – can you tell us about how the seasons and time affect the world, and the way we keep the world persistent between playthroughs?We got in touch with Sami Laakso, the designer behind Lands of Galzyr and the man behind Snowdale Designs to talk about the upcoming game, and what drove him to create such an epic, persistent world. SL: You can play Lands of Galzyr as many times as you want, there’s no real end in the vastness of Galzyr. That being said, we have one huge story arc planned for the game that will keep you on your toes. Also, Sami has an ongoing series on his YouTube channel where he plays Lands of Galzyr with a different guest roughly once a month. If you wish to join the live streams, consider subscribing to get notified as soon as the next stream is set up. See you there!