On the table this month we had Fortune and Glory. Another great co-op where we took the roles of Duke Dudley (British Lord) Shelly Hargrove (Racing Driver) and Doctor Zhukov (Master of Science). We were scouring the world, Indiana Jones style, looking for ancient artifacts. To find them we had to face mobsters, snakes, Nazis (who are equipped with a Zeppelin, obviously), dark, satanic cults and femme-fatales while we negotiate car chases, getting thrown out of aircraft, escaping from submarines and dodging booby-traps set by ancient civilisations. To help us recruit allies (Baxter the dog will get you our of a few tight corners) and rush around the world looking for the next clue.

Let’s be clear, there’s a huge amount of randomness in this game with the roll of the dice and the turn of the cards. The game does a great job of running the bad guys so it’s never easy and you always feel you’re one step from disaster, but it feels great to win and, win or lose, you’ve always told a great story!

Black Fleet is one of our favourites. Everyone has a merchant ship which they use to trade goods between ports; trading them earns you doubloons. Everyone has a pirate ship which they use to attack everyone else's merchant ships to steal their cargo and earn doubloons. Everyone has control of a navy ship which goes around sinking other's pirates which earns doubloons.

So, what are we doing with all these doubloons? First of all we're upgrading our ships so very quickly everyone has a different set of advantages which everyone else needs to watch out for. Some have longer range cannons, some go faster, some make more from their trades, some can even take their ships over land!

So, the game changes as it goes along with everyone trying to trade, steal or blast their way to more doubloons using their different powers. Then the aim becomes to make enough to pay the ransom for the governor’s daughter (isn't she lovely?) The first player to get to that amount wins and everyone else mutters darkly into their grog...

This month we played “Joyride: Survival of the Fastest”. We loved this – each of us had a car we drove around a junk-covered circuit full of nasty obstacles to crash into. When moving our cars we chose a number of dice to roll; roll more, go further and risk hitting something, roll fewer, stay safe but get overtaken. A really great push-your-luck game. What made it even more fun was that you could hit the side of another car and spin it round so that player was pointing in the wrong direction. Add to that missiles to fire at each other, mines to drop behind us and oil slicks to send opponents spinning out of control and it was wonderfully chaotic!