jimbobovalsocks

This game has the unhappy distinction of being the only game I’ve ever played that I really disliked. The reason being that it has a mechanic (which I’ll get on to later) which means that not all players get to play the same number of turns, and some might barely get to play at all.

The theme of the game is similar to Cluedo, but instead of solving a murder, you are trying to commit one! Players start off all together in the same room. They take turns to move, play special cards or ‘search’ to draw more cards into their hand. Doctor lucky himself moves around the board in a semi predictable fashion following the numbers printed in each room consecutively unless someone plays a special card to move him out of sequence. If DR. L moves into a room containing a player, it immediately becomes that player’s turn and the player has a chance to try and murder him. It’s this mechanic which I didn’t like as it means that some players can get ‘locked out’ of the game as they are skipped over in the turn sequence. In one game I played I only got to take 2 moves in the whole game!

The game has a good quality components and a heavy dose of humour. The theme is pretty strong and definitely comes through in the rules as well as the artwork. This game would appeal to casual and family gamers but would be less suitable for more competitive and serious gamers.

I love the original Elder Sign game, so this was a natural choice to buy when my girlfriend recently bought an Ipad.

Initially, I was disappointed with this game. I found the controls to not be particularly intuitive and choice to be significantly more restricted than in the original.

After a few play throughs though, I warmed to it and it’s now a game I play quite regularly.

So….

Pros:

Works very well as a solo game, much better than the physical version in fact!

No components to set up and easily transportable on your Iphone/Ipad.

At £5.50 this is a cheap way to get your elder Sign fix.

Strategic element to team selection and resource allocation within tasks makes this much more fun than a simple game of chance.

Cons:

Limited number of Ancient Ones compared to the original

Narrow range of difficulties. Yig is ‘normal’ (quite beatable within 5 or so play throughs) but the other 2 Ancient ones are significantly more difficult to beat! There’s no ‘medium’ option!

Controls are not as intuitive as they are in the original.

Limited replay value in the long run due to low number of Ancient Ones.

A bit cheeky to charge £4.00 to unlock 2 extra Ancient Ones!

I managed to find a way to freeze the game! if you lock your final 2 glyphs using a spell lock, the dispose glyph icon doesn’t appear and you’ll have to fail the adventure!

Summary:

Not as good as the original in my opinion. However, for the price I would recommend buying this if you enjoy the Cthulhu setting or want a quick and slightly tactical game to kill some time on your Ipad/Iphone/Android.

Be warned, it is difficult though, and that can be frustrating! The rules might take a few play throughs to completely ‘get’ as well!

Overall, I’ll give it a 6 out of 10 (where 1 is terrible, 5 is fine and 10 is incredible).