aaroninrockford

This game was not too hard to pick up. Almost too quick to end, you’re building three threesomes of colors to win. Liked the mechanics. Quick turns in fortune (the lead) made it fun and not to be taken too seriously. Color cards double as money cards, which protect against losing cards when you have to pay money to another player. Lots of specialty use cards. Would like to play again, and this game apparently resides in the usual retail chains, and is inexpensive to purchase.

You’re trying to complete routes on the board that match the cards you have in your hand (some picking and choosing ability). You don’t know what routes other are trying to complete, some connections only allow two people to use them. More points added (or deducted) for completing longer routes.

For some reason I really didn’t like the mechanics. This is apparently a very popular game, so another version may have worked better for me. This version seems to have one of the more difficult boards.

You have to collect five cards of the same color as a virus, then get to a health center and turn them in to “cure” that virus. Can then sweep them off the cities they occupy faster. There are four viruses, if you cure them all you win. But there are more infected cities at the end of each player’s turn. It’s a coop with each player having abilities, with city cards and ability cards. Each turn involves doing four actions, then picking two cards from city/ability/epidemic deck, then unleashing 2-4 virus cards.

Definitely helped to play with two experienced (and good) players. The odds of winning seem about 40-60, maybe 50-50 if you can play strategically perfectly (using other players special cards, meeting in cities to swap cards, etc). Lot of variation as far as roles played, and starting city infections on a Risk-type board.

Two nice features off the bat with this game – we were able to set our chances to win at 71%, and each Hero was given a difficulty rating. It was my first time playing, so my Hero was not difficult – a rating of 2. I appreciated having and getting that option, though the actual Hero was pretty weak, so don’t know if that’s always the trade-off. The randomly picked bad guy goes (flips a card), then each player goes (picks a card from hand, uses, or waits to use on next turn, then plays power against the bad guy), then the environment card (actions against all players), then bad guy’s turn again. I would play again, but with a different Hero. High replay value given all the choices in Heros and bad guys.

First time playing this after playing Samurai Sword. Previously this one was avoided since players do not come back once killed. This time it was played as a time filler (agree with previous review – this game isn’t going to take center stage at a game night. But it is fun! The game is short enough that eliminated players aren’t going to be sitting out for long, and likely will be interested in seeing how it plays out anyway. And it felt like you were making more progress since eliminated players did not come back. This and the dice elements made me like this game even more than Samurai Sword.

Played this for first time two nights ago. Some elements were withheld, apparently because they give some players too much power. Without those cards or elements, we still had one player with an advantage – Parasite. He could aid in the attack every turn. Once you have advanced to five additional worlds you win – it’s possible to lose a gained world but this didn’t happen in our game. So once he got to 4 of 5, the rest of the game became joining up against him to make sure he didn’t win in another attack. Of course he didn’t want to state his intention each turn til others did, and vice versa. The best we (I) could do in the end is go for a three-way victory, myself, another 4-pointer, and the Parasite. Would like to play more and see some of the other aliens and their powers. One player had it bad off through the whole game so that probably wasn’t too fun.

Took almost two hours to play a found round game because 2 of the 4 players were new at it and had lots of questions. Had to laugh when I saw someone say this game’s rules where light and simple. Compared to what? I would recommend taking out a couple parts of this game for the first few times, and adding them in if you want more variables to worry about/remember. I ended up winning, but in part because I got the decision in a tie (the player who goes first in the round decides winners of a tie in that round).

As I said in the title, the dynamics were fun but complex (Ameritrash genre). People familiar with the world of Blood Bowl seemed to derive extra pleasure from playing, though that knowledge was completely peripheral to the game itself. I scored this game a 7, if I knew how to change it I would say 8 instead.

As others have pointed out, the most similar game I can think of is Risk. Except basically impossible to keep an area (continent) because there’s one big land mass. Instead of trying to take over the whole area, you’re trying to end the game with the most money, which you collect at the end of each turn based on how many territories you own plus other bonuses. A challenging part of the game is deciding when to basically give up a turn to put your armies (race) into “decline”, and on your next turn start playing with a new race (leaving the old ones there to get taken over eventually). Everyone buys race/power combos that are randomly combined for each individual game.

I won the first time I played (72 bucks after 7 rounds), so don’t know if I was lucky or the game strategy is simple, or in the end it just comes down to luck. I was given the good advice at the beginning to not spend too much time figuring out which race/power combo to purchase. I was content to learn that over time after repeated play.

A modern board game due to picking your race/power combo and then tailoring your play to maximize profit based on its specifics. I rate it a 7.5-8. Not too hard to pick up, would also recommend to new players to just pick races and see how they do or don’t work for a few games. I see various gamer types enjoying this. Will have to see how it holds up after playing more.

I’m comparing this primarily to Heroes Unite Deck Building Game. I liked that game, so really got into this game since it was quicker to play, takes less room, and slightly less complex. Quicker because you just toss your dice into a bag (when you need to reload), shake, pull out six, and roll to play. Takes less room because it’s small dice instead cards (four people played w/ plenty of room on a small fold out table). Slightly less complex because you aren’t a particular character w/ a special power, and everyone is playing with/learning the same three spells and seven creatures that are randomly drawn for that game. Enough variation to make for good replay value.

There’s a lot of high reviews for this game so take this one with a grain of salt. I just didn’t like the mechanics. There’s a lot to learn here. The only social component to this game is all the time it takes to teach a new player what to do. You get 7 cards, in each of three rounds. Pick a card, pass the other 6. Repeat til there’s one card left. Repeat the process over again for two more rounds. A pretty fast game except again for having to help the new guy every time he gets cards helping him decide what to pick or not pick and why. I didn’t see this game getting much better once completely figured out, but just didn’t keep my interest. Even regular players were fuzzy on a couple parts. Don’t recommend this for casual or social gamers.

Now have played three times – I like that I’ve figured out how to play for the most part, but still not the game itself so much.

Played once and for the first time last night. Lots of rules! We were looking things up as we went and learning as we go – and realized all but one of us died at the very beginning (we all went to the equipment room and spent the same total minutes, then I left the room and a fire started in the equipment room). Original gameplay (in my experience). Had mostly casual gamers and all enjoyed (although the one female in the group got a little stressed about surviving). Took 2.5 hours to play, expect it would be much quicker the second time we, or anyone, plays.

After playing Heroes United, Deck Building Game, this game didn’t seem too hard to pick up. There was five of us, took about 45 minutes, w/ explaining for a couple new ones among us. Good dynamics, of the 5 of us, there was a loner, the Ronin, a team of Shogun and Samurai, and 2 Ninjas. The catch is only the identity of the Shogun is known to all. More strategy compared to Heroes United, since you decide how many of your cards to play, if any, and sometimes who to use a card against. There’s also the element of figuring out who your teammate is if you aren’t the Ronin. Otherwise you have the usual elements of attacks, defenses, special powers, ability to draw, discard, or trash yours or others cards. Liked it, would play again.

Creative design for a game. I did have fun. High replay value for obvious reasons. Only have played once so still not sure what optimal strategy would be. Only complaint is that after one player defeated the boss, things became complicated and technical. Is he still a hero, or the boss, or both? We had tricky situations arise from this point on. I believe one question/situation we had wasn’t even in the instruction book. Interpretation of instructions at the end basically decided the winner. If no one else mentions this issue, I apologize, we could have just been ********.

This review comes from someone who normally plays scrabble, or angry birds, or texas holdem, who has recently been trying these types of board games. I played this once, last weekend, and did enjoy it. Game lasted about 2.5 hours (5 players which is the max). Moderate in complexity, I was getting the hang of it half way through, but fully understood the game once we were done and had added up the points to determine the winner. I feel that the second time I play (or you play), you will be hitting the ground running. I liked the mechanics of the game, there’s lots of room for variability, starting w/ what player you are, and what cards you end up able to buy as you go. So high replay value. Components – easy setup, “just right” amount of variables. Moderately easy to learn, to a degree depends how much you’ve played similar games. Have played a second time now, still really like it, but felt like there was a lot more luck than skill involved, starting with which hero you randomly draw, which decides your special skill and which cards you are able to purchase.