Quick Peaks – Ada’s Dream, Red Letter, Yellow Letter, Perfect Mismatch, First Class: All Aboard the Orient Express, Cascadia

Ada’s Dream - Bob Pazehoski, Jr.

As a fan of all things Ada Lovelace, I backed Ada’s Dream without reading the rules. I knew I wanted to be a part of the project. Without a doubt, Ada’s Dream is the most ambitious game I’ve attempted in a long time. I studied the rulebook for hours in order to get my teach down to 30 minutes. Our foursome sat for four hours with this title. Yes, you read that correctly. Four hours for the first play. Still, I love it.

The central mechanism of Ada’s Dream is a rondel of dice which players collect in order to build a model of the Analytical Engine, the 19th century prototype of a computer. The game’s expected 18 turns are split between gathering those dice and installing them in the Engine, or the Mill as it’s called in the game. Based on their color, installed dice unleash one of the game’s four major Action sequences. Each sequence has a unique protocol with a corresponding bonus track (and bonus actions). As the game wears on, Action sequences grow in length and strength, unleashing combinations as if it were a roll and write. Choices and protocols and combinations extend and complicate the learning curve for this title. They…

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