Steam's TurnBasedFest packs some great deals for digital board games
Your turn to buy ends on Dec 12th
Your wallet may still be quivering from the Steam Autumn Sale. Tough. It's time to grab hold of it again, comfort it with a few tender strokes, then gorge on its innards to pay for some of the splendid turn-based strategy games on sale in Steam's TurnBasedFest.
There are decent discounts for Katharine's beloved Dorfromantik, my beloved Slipways, and many generally beloved digified board games. Most of the sales end on December 12th, so don't spend too long thinking about it. Reality's turn-timers aren't optional.
You can head over to the sale's Steam page to see all the deals. There'll be a batch of new ones at 1pm EST/ 6pm GMT tomorrow, too.
Many of the better deals are for older board games, including classics Wingspan, Terraforming Mars and Istanbul. Those are all digified versions of real board games, with Terraforming Mars in particular benefiting from the sweet sweet faff-elimination baked into automation. Dozens of hours spent playing it on my iPad now make me shudder at the idea of moving its many trackers by hand.
My highlight is actually Antihero, which is a videogame pretending to be a board game. It's about out-ganging other bands of thieves and wastrels in Victorian london, powering your economy via street urchins and burglaries. It's got a solid single player campaign, which helps it dodge the feeling that you're just playing an inferior version of a board game with hollow AI stand ins for people. A 75% discount makes it a bargain for £3/$4/€4.
There's also a streaming event running alongside the sale, with various YouTubers hopping into assorted games. You can see the schedule on the event's website.