About
The house
Velvet Heron Lounge is a small, independent site run by three people who play strategy browser games properly — three weeks each, on free accounts — and write down what they found.
The idea
Strategy browser games are judged in screenshots and first impressions, which tells you nothing about the third week, when the protection ends and the neighbours arrive. Our tables are played the way a working adult plays them: a few short visits a day, no press accounts, no gifted currency, no publisher contact until the card is written. We call the reviews table cards because that is what they are — what the seat costs in time, what the house takes, and whether it was worth staying for the evening.
What earns a table
- Runs in a normal web browser with nothing to install; a companion app is a bonus, not a requirement.
- Free to register and free to play properly. A shop is fine; a paywall on the core loop is not.
- Live for at least a year with an active English-speaking community, so what we describe is still there when you arrive.
- Marks at least 7.0 on our four criteria. Games that fall short are simply not listed.
Who writes it
Three of us. One builds, one wages war, one reads both sets of notes and asks the awkward questions. Where the two players disagree by more than two points on any criterion, we play another week before publishing. Cards are re-checked every season and the date is printed at the foot of each page.
How the house is paid for
The “reserve a seat” buttons on table cards are affiliate links to each game’s official site. If you register through one, the publisher may pay us a small commission at no cost to you. That covers hosting. Publishers cannot buy a table, do not see a card before it is published and have never been offered a higher mark for anything. If a mark changes after a re-test, the change is noted on the card.
Artwork
Game artwork belongs to its publisher and comes from official press kits, credited beneath each image. Illustrations elsewhere on the site are composed from public-domain clip art and credited where they appear. If you own something shown here and want it removed or credited differently, write to us.