I have a personal weakness for board games with pixelated video game art, and Villages capitalized on that weakness immediately. The card game itself is pretty simple—you create villages out of similarly-colored cards, hoping to score big on the value of the cards you drop. The goal of each round is to steal, attack and otherwise disrupt your opponent while protecting your own villages from assault. At the end of each round, you count up your points and determine the High Point Player and Low Point Player. Many of the cards interact with these roles, benefiting a player who got stuck with the Low Point card while often punishing the High Point Player. Overall, Villages is pretty simple and balanced, and I enjoy its understated charm. There’s even a bunch of expansion packs that evidently add quite a bit to the game, building on its simple mechanics to create a more interactive experience. My one complaint here is that the game feels like its combat is pretty rigid—there’s not a whole lot you can do to change the outcome of a battle, and if you pay attention it can be pretty obvious where you should attack next. However, that’s a small quibble for a game that I could see myself busting out with a group of friends over a few drinks.