Clank! Mind the Noise!
There is a moment in almost every game of Clank! I have played, where all eyes become glued to what would be happening on the board. You look down, staring into the dark lower reaches of the dungeon where the heavy 30-point artifacts sit waiting. Your hand holds enough movement points to take you three steps deeper, right to the edge of absolute victory, but your heart knows the true state of play. The dragon bag is already heavy with your colourful wooden cubes, every single one of them a possible source of damage. You could turn around right now, grab a modest token near the surface, and begin the long climb back to the exit. Or you could take one more step, reach for the big prize, and gamble that luck will stay on your side for just one more turn. That exact tension, played out over a kitchen table surrounded by cards and tokens, is far more than a simple gaming mechanic. It is an exercise in self-control. Long before modern games gave us cardboard dungeons and plastic dragons, an...
