Space Hulk: Death Angel – The Card Game
1-6
13+
30
Purge the Xenos Threat!
Genestealers have infested a remote Space Hulk called Sin of Damnation and a small squad of Space Marines have been sent to purge this alien threat. The odds are overwhelming and survival is unlikely. It is a bleak undertaking.
Enter the Blood Angels.
Space Hulk: Death Angel - The Card Game is a cooperative card game for 1-6 players. Set in the grim Warhammer 40,000 universe, Death Angel pits a squad of Blood Angel Space Marines against a growing alien horde. It will take strategic teamwork to make it out alive.
Pick your combat group, fall into formation, and prepare for the Genestealer swarms!
images © Fantasy Flight Games
User Reviews (20)
Add a Review for "Space Hulk: Death Angel – The Card Game"
You must be logged in to add a review.
Me and Space Hulk: Death Angel – The Card Game
I travel a lot domestically. I needed to have a game that is portable and playable from solo to at least four players. I’m also a bit of a WH40k fan and also like co-op games a lot, so what’s not to like about this?
Well, for one, I don’t enjoy pure card games as I think they are not engaging enough. With this game, I made the exception just because of sci-fi Warhammer theme and bought it.
The premise
You are Space Marine terminator, top of the elite army branch of the imperium of Men. You are sent on a mission to investigate a space hulk: derelict space ship drifting in the space.
The abandoned ship isn’t void of life though. In fact it’s teeming with them. Thousands and thousands of small reptilian creatures live on board. They are called genestealers, and they eat human flesh. Your chances of survival just dropped down to 44%.
Out of the box
Cards, cards and more cards. Some cardboard tokens and a dice. With a price of 20 euros/25 dollars, I didn’t expect much else. The rule book is not written very well, but it’s clear enough on the rules once you find them. The art on the cards is average. It doesn’t exactly shine, at least I didn’t like it that much. Some of the cards seem a bit cluttered with info. The art isn’t bad either though. Maybe I’m used to too good (LOTR LCG).
I had to remove the insert once I sleeved the cards in order to fit everything in. They fit barely, but I’m happy with the result.
Actual gameplay
Now, the game itself is something else. I can’t believe I have this much fun with a pure card game! You have to make difficult choices on every turn, as you can’t do the same thing twice in a row. You can’t, for example, have that Gatling Marine mowing down alien scum turn after turn. The man’s gotta reload at some point!
The game is harsh. First times playing you won’t probably even make it beyond the docking port of the ghost ship before your marines are ground beef. The game has a desperate feeling trough as you try to advance while your team members drop down dead left and right.
This has a strong cinematic feel to it which I haven’t encountered even in many full priced games. This game engages you from the second you start playing it. The game also has multiple possible stages so it has replay value as well.
I do have to point out though that as this game is purely card driven, it isn’t very meaty. You should definitely own a copy of imagination before considering buying this, otherwise you might find the game a bit bland.
Final words
This game is fun. I have only played it solo, but I could imagine playing it with some of the members of my board game group. You do have to coordinate with your friend as you both have squads under your command, and they have to support each other as well. Kinda like soldiers do.
As it is only card driven though, it isn’t exactly dripping with theme if you can’t get into the mood of living out the battle. The dice also has an annoying tendency to roll bad results for me, but I don’t know if it’s just me or if others have encountered this “problem” as well.
All said, I’m happy with my purchase. I don’t see myself getting bored of this anytime soon, and if I do, there’s also expansions out for this one.
I started to write a really detailed examination of the Space Hulk : Death Angel card game from Fantasy Flight, going over each component, the set up rules, the rules of play and my overall view of the game but maybe it’s better to just cut to the chase and explain what the game really is…
Death Angel is a brutal, hard to win and highly re-playable Co-op card game of desperate survival in the face of a relentless horde of alien monsters. The players field a pair of Space Marines which wield a variety of impressive weapons and/or special abilities which, hopefully allow them to survive long enough to make it through the labyrinth of the derelict space craft.
One of the unfortunate aspects of the game is the set up rules which tend to scare off some of the idle gamers and the rule book which takes several reads to understand what they are trying to convey. The set up takes several minutes but is really straight forward. It involves taking a Void Lock which matches the number of players (1-6) and then following the Void Lock’s Icons for terrain placement, Blip numbers which set the initial number of alien Genestealers, it serves as a guide to create the Location Deck and sets a number of Genestealers to be spawned in the event of a Major or Minor Spawn (dictated each round by drawing an Event Card).
If you get past the setup, the rest of the game is fairly easy to understand although it’s far from easy to succeed. This is a tuff game that you’re likely to lose more often than win.
Each player gets a pair of Space Marines with three seemingly simple commands – Move+Activate, Supply or Attack. To keep them alive better, each pair handles these three commands differently and it is this difference which gives the pairs their identity. For example, the pair of Brother Valencio and Brother Leon can Attack in Full Auto, use their Supply command to go into Overwatch or their Move+Activate card to place an extra Support Token on a Door that they open which can eliminate several Genestealers when travelling from the current location to the next. Carefully coordinating the special abilities and range of the pairs of Space Marines with your fellow players is vital to win.
What really makes this game stand out is the speed with which the heroes can go from easily dispatching random Genestealers to having the monsters amassing in huge hordes that no one could survive! There is a real sense of doom and despair on the part of the heroes. One wrong play, one unlucky die roll can lead to a crushing defeat!
Some players might dislike the randomness of the Attack die but the original Space Hulk was much the same – one bad die roll away from defeat! You can plan and conspire all you want to, in the end its a die roll that decides your fate.
Playing a solo game is also fun though it does take a player that doesn’t mind to play 3 pairs of Space Marines instead of just one. The game doesn’t have different rules for solo play, it just changes the set up of terrain cards and which location cards are used. Regardless of solo or multiplay, deciding what orders to play is a crucial step in order to win. Since you can’t repeat the same order two turns in a row, you have to balance which teams are attacking, which ones can activate doors and move and which ones are going to bravely face death in order to give a fellow Space Marine a Supply token!
Finally, when comparing it to the original, I’d have to say this is pretty good and for the price, it’s even better. All of the components are well thought out with no additional fluff. One minor disappointment is only because of the scope of the small box game. Each game, you get to draw 1 card from between 3 to 4 location decks, each with have 3 cards each. While this gives you several games without repeats, after several plays it all looks and feels pretty much the same. An expansion with several more locations to add to this set would correct this.
Overall, Death Angel is a great game though be prepared to lose. Someone said it has a 44% success rate and while that is unconfirmed I’d imagine that success number may even be exaggerated! If you enjoy the journey more than the destination then you shouldn’t mind the failure rate. If winning is all you care about, this might not be the game for you. There are a couple of expansions available for the game (alternate Space Marines to trade out with those in the base game or Tyranid aliens that replace the Genestealers as well as add a new location type) in case the base game begins to get stale.
Not that the Space Marines scream, you understand. Genetically engineered and unquestionably loyal to the Emperor of the Warhammer 40K universe, these fighting machines fight and die with zeal and fervor – no regrets, no remorse type of an affair. A small squad of these heavily armoured warriors armed with chainswords, flamethrowers and psionic powers is deployed to a Space Hulk – a remnant of a ship floating through space. Heavy infestation of alien zerg-like Genestealers is reported. Your marines will have to move carefully through the claustrophobic corridors of the ruin, blasting aliens and most likely dying in the process to get to the final location that will contain the ultimate goal of your mission – an alien lair, a delayed self-destruction activation and the like. The game pegs your success chances at about 44%. Sound good? For the Emperor!
Space Hulk: Death Angel is a light/medium cooperative card game for 1-6 players of 12 and up that plays anywhere between 20-45 min.
Each player controls 1-3 squads of 2 marines (number of squads controlled will depend on # of players – e.g. in a 4-player game each player gets only one squad while in a solo game you will have 3 squads). Laying out these marine cards in a vertical pattern creates your battle formation – it serves as a spatial basis for the game, as terrain elements and aliens pop up to the sides of your column.
After the aliens spawn (likely accompanied by an ugly side effect that makes things harder for you) – your marines may react either supporting others, moving and interacting with environment or everyone’s favourite option – blasting things to pieces using advanced future weaponry. An elegant rule limitation prevents you from doing the same thing you did last turn, so you can’t just keep shooting, forcing you to vary your tactics. Each squad (base game comes with 6) has some sort of special ability associated with each of its three actions – so for example the fellow with the flamethrower will be able to target a whole group of aliens instead of just one, the marine with the chainsword will be able to slice up attacking aliens while supporting others and the psionic Lexicanum will be able to trap aliens in a forcefield.
You can also “activate” terrain pieces like doors, levers or fuel tanks locking aliens away, getting a temporary boost or destroying a large group (also risking your own life naturally). This provides welcome variety as “spray and pray” is not always the most effective tactic. All attacks are resolved by a single die roll and have a base 50/50 chance of success. “Support tokens” received through others helping you and auxiliary game effects allow you to reroll these as well as defense rolls.
Defense? That’s right, if any aliens survive your turn phase they attack, trying their darnedest to chomp through your marines’ armour. Surprisingly, their chances are pretty good – even a single alien has a 1/3 chance to slay a marine. More aliens – more chances for a lethal outcome. If your marine anticipates the attack (is facing the right way) – support tokens (mentioned above) can be used to reroll potentially lethal results. But you’re always short on these and that die can be truly cruel, especially since it goes not 1-6, but 0-5 for that added difficulty :).
This sequence repeats until you clear out all of the aliens on the current location and then you travel to the next one. Each game features 4-5 stages that you have to get through in order to win. If you survive until the last stage and are able to fulfill the win condition – you are victorious!
Not that you have to worry about it too much though. This game is HARD. Wait, not hard, Robinson Crusoe is hard. This is unforgivingly brutal, especially after you realize just how easily your marines become Genestealer chow. The game throws many nasty surprises at you and you will fail. A lot. My personal win rate currently stands at 10% and after I finally got that win I’m kind of hesitant to approach it again. As the named marines fall one after another you feel a bit of a helpless frustration – was there something you could have done to save Brother Claudio or are you just a terrible die-roller?
In this unforgiving difficulty lies the nature of the game. On one hand it provides for a definite challenge. You will not win this game on first or second try. It will definitely make you work for your wins. But you will experience a certain level of frustration over your poor dice rolling that leads to defeats. Luck plays a significant role and no matter how much you plan and strategize – sometimes you’ll need a clutch roll. This will not sit well with some people.
However, the brutal and sudden mortality of your marines goes very well with WH40K feel – they are both ****** and vulnerable at once. Their trek through the tunnels relayed to you via the palpable claustrophobic sense of impending danger that you feel for every new alien spawn you draw. Every success is greeted with a fist pump. A win is an event to celebrate. These aliens are not your usual mooks – the danger they emanate is real and the feeling of accomplishment you get for winning is way more than anything I got out of Pandemic.
The game is basically a solitaire re-purposed for multiplayer though. The best experience I had was playing solo and introducing artificial intrigue for several players does not work. You’re supposed to discuss what you’re going to do but not spell it out exactly – confusing? yes! More players just dilute the planning and it’s very prone to quarterbacking as experienced veterans can easily become over-controlling of newbies’ characters.
It is, however a great solo game and very compact – perfect for travel. If you want a solo experience with a lot of challenge – this is a game for you. For a more light-hearted (actually having a chance to succeed!) experience – seek elsewhere. If you are averse to dice deciding your fate – this vessel is also not for you. Fans of WH40K will not be disappointed with appropriate atmosphere and flavour text. Those looking for a meatier experience can try the full version of this – minis and everything, although the brief duration of this one is a definite strong point.
Because this game is somewhat polarizing I can’t give it too high of a score but because it does what it does really well – I can’t go too low as well. Know what you’re getting into, be ready for glorious death and eventually triumph will be yours.
For the Emperor!
Final grade: 7/10
This game has become a staple for my solitaire sessions. When I really desire a card/board game, but have no one available to play with, I had been playing Elder Sign or (more recently) Mage Knight.
However, Elder Sign takes a bit of time to set up, and Mage Knight is even more involved to get it going for a solo session (which led me to setting it up in its own room, and leaving it ready to go for subsequent sessions).
I had forgotten I had Death Angel, because when I bought it about a year ago, the rule book was so bad I felt it would give me an aneurysm. Seriously, you get to page 7 and read about setting something up, and the book tells you to go to page 27 for the real info. You read 2 pages of that, and go back to page 7, move on to page 8, and you are asked to reference page 16. Keep repeating like you are reading a bad “Choose Your Own Adventure” book. It made me want to throw the game out the window, and it got shelved.
I took it back out last week, though, and I’ve been playing it non-stop. I can see myself growing tired of it eventually, however, without some expansions. But it is a very quick, simple game to play once you get the rules down. That isn’t to say it’s easy to beat. It’s very luck driven, and once you get that first strike of bad luck, it can snowball into “REALLY BAD!” territory fast.
Basically, you have 3 cards to play for each squad – move, support, and attack. You can’t play the same card type for the same squad twice in a row, so you have to choose your actions wisely.
However, once you attack/defend, it’s all up to the die roll. I’ve had it go my way where I won 4 games in a row, and then have lost 7 games in a row aftewards (some quite early and horribly, others right at the end/last room).
This randomness can sometimes grate, especially when you have worked hard to get to the last room, and it all comes down to one **** die roll. But, it’s easy enough to wipe everything clean and start again.
I find a game like Elder Sign much more lore/theme heavy, and with a lot more mitigation to the luck factor, but SH: Death Angel is much quicker to set up and play (and transport). For that, even though I don’t think it’s quite as GOOD of a game as Elder Sign, I probably play it more often, at least for now.
I’ll definitely buy the expansions, though, to keep it fresh.
That being said, I don’t see this game succeeding for me as a co-op game. All squads/card play have to work together in unison. One person playing incorrectly can (and most likely will) end the game faster than you can roll a die. The game asks that you NOT play open-hands, to mitigate the Alpha Player syndrome. However, since you NEED to discuss/play your course of action each round, this rule really makes little sense. I can read the card text, talk about what I’m going to play, and make suggestions and discuss that with other players, but can’t put the card down?
Also, since there is player elimination, in a co-op game someone could be eliminated very quickly, and then just be sitting and watching the other player(s) try to stay alive. Honestly, it is NO FUN to sit there and watch a game in progress.
This game succeeds as a solo game, but not as a co-op in my opinion. I would probably never take this to my group/game night and suggest a co-op game of it. I have, however, shown it to people as a solo experience, and that has gotten the better response.
Components: Fantasy Flight can always be counted on for solid components and this Silver Line game is no exception. The cards are a nice, sturdy stock, and the art is very crisp and fresh while capturing the grim darkness of the Warhammer 40,000 setting. The rulebook is another story and is definitely a step back for FFG in terms of layout and comprehension
Rules: The poor layout of the rulebook only adds to the confusion of a ruleset that requires at least one step by step turn sequence. After stumbling through a few turns (both solo and with friends) I finally got comfortable with how a turn is supposed to play. Once the ball gets rolling, though, SH:DA does a good job of capturing the feel of an elite team of Space Marines beset on all sides by horrifying alien creatures.
Gameplay: My experience with the game varies. As a solo game (once I got the hang of the rules) it plays quick and easy. With a group, things tend to run a little longer due to the small space the game occupies and the fact that players generally gravitate towards discussing the best courses of action. In both cases, SH:DA succeeds in delivering tense moments where success or failure hinges upon a die roll. The luck factor is mitigated some by the ability to gain re-rolls, but sometimes you’ll lose a team member in the blink of an eye. One huge black mark against the game is the fact that players can be eliminated completely due to bad dice rolls.
Overall: Well worth the price of entry for something to pack up and play either with a few people or by oneself – especially if you’re a 40k fan. However, there are several other games that will scratch the same itch with a less frustration at the rules and without the possibility of player elimination.
I will keep this short. I have only ever played this game Solo and it works very well. I love the Space Hulk theme, and the artwork on the cards is fantastic!
The rules are hard to learn and I had to watch a YouTube playthrough just to get a grasp on it. However, since then, I have played this game about 40 times. I like it. It’s much less effort to take out this small box and shuffle a few cards, than it is to unpack the boardgame Space Hulk and set up the entire map.
As with any game that uses a dice, sometimes you are going to roll badly and your Space Marines are going to get chewed up before you’ve even moved to the second location! Other times, you will feel like you’re landing all of your shots, and blasting a path through waves of Genestealers feels great! The designed has really managed to capture the feel or “vibe” of Space Hulk the boardgame!
My win rate is absolutely terrible, around 10%. Perhaps I’m just awful, but that’s definitely in keeping with the Space Hulk theme here. If it was easier to win, I wouldn’t enjoy winning …
I have all 4 expansions and randomly play with various ones — they were all quite cheap and add replayability to the game. I recommend this game for solo play, along with any of the expansions if you like the base game.
Surprisingly enough, Space Hulk: Death Angel quickly became one of my favorite co-op games. It really balances the feeling of “We can totally do this!” and “Game over man, game over!” because of how quickly things can turn from bad to worse on a mission. The Genestealers are just as dangerous to the players as the players are to them and without the right planning and usage of every Marine’s special ability and cards, you’ll quickly get overrun by the flooding enemies. And that’s why I’ve never once felt like how a game was just an impossible mission, but simply a matter of not putting enough effort into winning.
I also feel that Death Angel is varying enough to make me wanna come back for more, even if it’s for the same mission. The different Chapters/Marine squads has their own kind of strategic play to them which helps creating a new experience the next time you play and end up with new marines to fight with.
What you do in this game is create a column of Space Marines cards of different Chapters (i.e. squads/legions/warbands) with two Marines per Chapter, as depicted on the product’s picture here at Boardgaming, and unless you’re playing this game with fewer than 3 people – then each player is controlling their own Chapter of two Marines. Your mission objective is positioned at the top of this column of Space Marines and consists of a couple of cards that needs to be dealt with one at a time, as you try to fulfill a certain condition per card (which is quite often simply “kill all the aliens”). These objectives also tells you the layout of the Location cards – which spawn Genestealers (when drawing Event cards) and also hold certain mission objectives, as well as a few special actions that may be taken.
Marines may either reposition themselves in the column or attack a nearby Genestealer and this is done by playing cards; each player has three Action cards and while everyone sits with one of the same type (Move, Support, Attack), every such card is unique for that very Chapter of Space Marines. Players all decide which Action to take simultaneously (one per round per player) but the cards are then resolved in order by looking at each card’s timing value – from lowest to highest.
Each of these Action cards can only be played once every second round.
And that’s a quick rundown of how Death Angel: The Card Game works.
Space Hulk: Death Angel is a cooperative card game in which marines proceed through a abandoned spaceship. They are trying to get to a final room and complete an objective there before they are all killed by the aliens (called “genestealers”) that infest the ship. It sounds bleak, and that is the point; it is supposed to be bleak.
Space Hulk: Death Angel was a game I had been anxious to get for quite a while at that point. The theme of fighting aliens as the team travels through a derelict space ship was very intriguing to my geek sensibilities, and I have always liked the idea of cooperative games (even though Pandemic, Scotland Yard, & Shadows Over Camelot were the only ones I’d played at that point, and I’d only cared for Pandemic). This game was even a 1-6 player cooperative game, and the ability to play it with so many different numbers of players sounded great; that flexibility is nice. Moreover, the game had a interesting mechanic of lining the marine cards up along with location cards to determine who can shoot what, where the genestealers will be popping up, how the genestealers move, and who they will attack. (If you want more info about the game –beside my opinions to follow– you can find plenty at boardgamegeek.) Finally, the game is cheap at about $20. Despite all those points going for it, sadly, it has not lived up to expectations.
The reason it has disappointed might be because my high hopes set the bar too high. I want to say that first. The game is not bad. I certainly will be keeping it in my collection and will not be looking to sell it. Especially given the small size of the box, it is worth the room it takes up in my board game cupboard. So, what are the good points? Well, ironically, they really are 4 of the 5 things I was excited for in the first place. It was inexpensive. It is cooperative. The theme is well implemented. The mechanics of the game are good.
It is worth spending a paragraph or 2 on those mechanics. The players place location cards, and those cards determine where the genestealers are placed. The event cards move the genestealers around. The genestealers are placed next to marines who are all in a single line; the explanation for that is that the marines suits are too huge to enter any other way. This system works really well. Based upon where the location cards are and the genestealers are, one can strategize as to where he/she wants what marines, given their special abilities.
My favorite mechanic comes in how travel works. There are blip piles (piles of genestealer cards) on either side of the formation (the formation is the line of marines). Whenever one of those blip piles is exhausted, the players finish their current phase and then travel to the next room. The reason I like this so much is because I think it works very well with the theme. If a group of these marines is continually moving through the ship it would make sense that more and more genestealers would come out at them as they move. Also, it is logical that the other genestealers already engaged with the marines would either be killed, or they would follow and continue fighting. So, the idea in my mind is that once you have encountered a certain number of genestealers you must have walked far enough to get to the next room. The genestealers then become a method to track the marines’ progress as they constantly trudge through the ship.
I said that the games strengths were 4 of the 5 things I was excited about before I bought the game. That 1 left over is the fact that the box says it is a 1-6 player game. The publishers do not lie. There are rules and even different setups for 1-6 player games. However, this is not a good 1-6 player game. This is a good 4-6 player game. When you play with 1-3 players, each player has to command at least 2 sets of marines. This is crippling. Some uber board game geeks might be able to handle this just fine, but for a average set of players it is too much. The problem comes when you have to decide if your marines will
1) move & activate
2) support
or
3) attack
You want to coordinate the marines attacks, which means you want to cooperate with the other players’ marines. Now add a 2nd set of marines and you have to do that for both sets. So, for example, you think “should I have my yellow marines support or attack, and how would that work with my purple marines that can support or move & activate?” You think you have that figured out and then the other players tell you what they will do. Now that may cause you to change what one set of marines will do, which in turn makes you question whether your other marines are performing the best action. It’s too much; it’s too cumbersome; and it slows down the action rapidly.
When you only have 1 set of marines, it is easy to choose between 2 actions and coordinate it with your fellow players’ marines. The game moves fast this way, and that is important. When the game moves fast a story builds in one’s mind. One knows where the marines are in the ship, remembering what happened before, what the formation looks like in relation to the genestealers, and what could happen next. Managing 2 sets of marines causes such a slow down that one forgets that context. That is where the management of 1-3 marines becomes Space Hulk: Death Angel’s most glaring flaw. The context and the tension is what makes the game fun (in the 4-6 player version). With that suspense stripped away, this game crumbles fast into something that would never reach my table. Accordingly, because I don’t have fun with 3 or less, I had to dock its replay value rating.
If you like the theme and you buy this game as a 4 – 6 player game, I think you’ll love it (or at least enjoy it). If you buy it as a cheap game to play with 1 or 2 buddies, save your money because that one short coming (of it not playing well with 1-3) is what caused Death Angel be a let down for me — despite it meeting 4 other enticing expectations.
This is a very easy to setup and travel solo/co-op game. I haven’t played it co-op, but I’ve enjoyed it as a solo game. I’m not a fan of WarHammer 40K universe either, but I remember the old Aliens movie. This game is based on it’s bigger more expensive board game cousin: Space Hulk. It’s a lot cheaper version with some tight game play and very thematic. It’s amazing how such a little game basically writes the story as you go along, and you can picture your marines stalking through the dark corridors with sweat dripping down their brows in anticipation of something bad about to happen. Yeah, lots of theme for a little game and the artwork is very well done. The components are good quality too.
This is game is tough to beat and is very challengingly. The rulebook could be better in going into more in-depth detail, but it does provide great diagrams showing you how to setup and play.
This game won’t be for everyone, because it has a darker and more tense theme. Not everyone likes macho marines in armor taking on creepy aliens, but others will take to it immediately. Might be a little too scary for the little ones too.
The issue I have with this game is that there are limited things to actually do and limited ways for the player(s) to impact the course of the game. It took me a game or two for this to truly sink in — I was bedazzled by the seeming variety that the different locations/Space Marines/events SEEMED to provide. An additional issue is that the rulebook is atrociously written.
I’ve only played this once with other people (none of them fanatical 40k fans) and it seemed to be met with a general feeling of “meh.” I’ve played a number of games solo, which can be enjoyable, but I’m always left a little disappointed. I really truly wanted to love this game, as I love the Warhammer 40,000 universe, but I just can’t.
This is a coop game that makes coop hard. You aren’t allowed to see the cards in your the other players’ hands, turns take a lot of pre-planning, and, oh ya, players can be eliminated from the game really easily. Who wants to have to sit out a coop game after only two turns (this has happened in a game I played)? As a solo game, when you control multiple teams of space marines it becomes a lot of fun. The preplanning becomes much easier and much more important while the game is more nerve wracking as you watch the number of space marines slowly dwindle.
I like the game solo it’s ok for co-op, but the thing that bugged me was the rule book it was not very well written but once you play a few games it all seem clear.
While some of the teams seem unbalanced it is a very well put together game(once you get past the rule book of course) it is challenging it makes you think about you next move and how you execute your cards, but don’t get me wrong this is a very good game you will probably lose more than you win(stupid genestealers), so if you like to win all the time pass this game up but if you like a challenge give this one a try.
Oh the expansions are good to.
This is a fast paced and fun card based game centered around the world of Warhammer 40k. If you are already a fan of the 40k universe, or are familiar with the Space Hulk board game, than this is right up your ally.
As far as cooperative games go, I really enjoy this one. The rules are straight forward, controlling the enemies movements and actions is simple, and there are few if any complications that arise during game play. While the level of strategy required is only moderate, it still requires a bit of thought. A great game to play with buddies while relaxing with a few drinks.
When I played this game I felt as if I play a card based first person shooter. Mow down dozens of enemies move forward, mow down dozens of enemies…
What I am missing here is a goal that makes me wanna kill every last of these genestalkers. Instead I felt like kill me so it is finally over.
Not a very fun game to be honest. Feels too forced and mechanical. Don’t get me wrong, its a fine filler for someone who’s a hardcore Space Hulk fan, but just doesn’t deliver in the fun department.
But I can’t see it being played with more then one player.
I wanted to like this game desperately, but I found it to be way too fiddly. A million different things to remember each turn, and the rulebook isn’t much help – usually when I’d turn to a specific section for an answer, there’d be a note to turn to another page within the rules to explain another part of the game and that’s where you might find the answer. This plus the sheer setup and number of cards on the table made this too fiddly to bother with. I traded my copy in after a month or so.
Death Angel is a great ameritrash game, but not so trash(sic) as to drive away strategists.
I found a very good balance between balance and choice to minimize it. Of course there are times that there is nothing you can do to avoid doom on your marines 🙂
The components are great and i am amazed byt the game engine. It achieves so much with so little components. Artwork and feel are of the usual Fantasy Flight’s standards.
Finallym, the solo option is a huge plus.
Really nice mini coop game, with very good theme and good solo play.
This is a good solo game, and has great value for its price. It really captures the feel of the Space Hulk theme in a quick, thrilling, intense experience. It’s also quite difficult; don’t expect to win very much!