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Ring Side Report- Unboxing, How to Play, and Review of Crusaders: Thy Will Be Done
Tag: Board Game Review
Ring Side Report-Board Game Review of Paper Tales
Check out our review of Paper Tales below!
Ring Side Report-Board Game Review of Professor Evil and the Citadel of Time
Product-Professor Evil and the Citadel of Time
Producer– Fun Forge
Set-up/Play/Clean-up– 30 to 45 minutes (2-4 players)
Type- American
Depth-Light
TL; DR-Let’s steal the Declaration of Independence -FOR JUSTICE! 97%
Basics- Saving relics in the knick of time! In Professor Evil and the Citadel of Time, players take the rolls of victorian themed heroes attempting to rescue items stolen across time by the evil PROFESSOR EVIL! This game isn’t subtle, but it is fun! This is a completely cooperative game, so each turn has a phase where the players help the team and a phase where the players hurt the team. During the phase where you help, you can are given three actions and a card action. The basic actions are move from room to room, deactivate traps, unlock doors, and rescue treasure. You can do any action you want multiple times. Also during this phase you draw two card from a deck specific for your character and you can use these special abilities to really help the team as a separate action! These powerful, specific cards vary a lot from having the ability to move the evil professor to turning off all the traps of one kind! The goal of this phase is to have all the traps off of all the types for a given treasure, be in the room with the item to save, and have an action left to save it. However, after you take your turn, you roll three dice to hurt your team. These dice advance the professor around his house kicking heroes out of his house, locking doors, resetting traps, or move time forward on the different treasures or all of them at once! Once a good hasn’t been rescued before its time is up, the good it put in the safe room where no player may go! However, all is not lost. As the game progresses, players unlock different global and personal abilities making it a much fairer fight! The goal of the game is to save four goods and return them to their own times before the dastardly professor can put four goods deep into his safe room.
Mechanics-This is a simple game, but that doesn’t make it any less fun. The basic turn of do good/do bad is a quick, easy, and fun way to do cooperative games and isn’t going away anytime soon. Those three actions and a card action get nearly surgical when you have to get to a treasure in time ramping up the tension and thought process in a fun way! I love this game, but the dice based nature of the bad action is very random, as dice should be. But, this makes it a bit harder to plan. Not a bad, but a different, and you can get absolutely wrecked on a bad day. Keep that bit in mind, and you will have a great time dealing with all your plans falling to pieces because the professor teleported into the room you NEEDED to be in the get that last treasure! 4.8/5
Theme- This game delivers its theme very much in the show don’t tell way. The characters and items all look like they belong to the same world, and the victorian/steampunk setting looks fun. I would like a bit more background as I’m very much a story driven gamer. That said, you do feel like a gentleman/gentlewoman sneaking around the manor of a madman hiding and stealing his ill gotten gains from across time. 4.5/5
Instructions– The instructions are six pages, full of pictures, and well written. When I cracked this box, I was playing in five minutes. That’s a great “opening box to playing” timeline! I also didn’t have to consult Board Game Geek to figure out any obscure rules. It’s a simple game with efficient, well written rules. 5/5
Execution-Quality components, quality box, quality art, and FULL CARDS make this a fun game. I like good quality cardboard, and this game delivers! This game is simply put together well. 5/5
Summary-Good co-op is a hard balance to find. Good, simple co-op is a much harder balance to find, and this game delivers in droves! It has good, simple mechanics, great art, quick to read rules, and great components. All these combine to make a fantastic gaming experience. The only word of caution is if you expect a 10 hour brain burning eurogame experience, keep walking. This is a fun, fast game in the tradition of Pandemic, but using dice, which have their own punishing randomness at times. If you’re looking for a great way to spend an hour with up to three buds, you can’t go wrong with this game. 97%
Ring Side Report-How to Play and Review of Railroad Rivals
Ring Side Report of Inner Sanctum with How to Play and Review
Ring Side Report- Unboxing, How to Play, and Review of Magical Treehouse
Check out our unboxing, how to play, and review of Magical Treehouse!
Ring Side Report-Board Game Review of Custom Heroes
Product-Custom Heroes
Producer– AEG
Price– $25.00 here https://www.amazon.com/Alderac-Entertainment-Group-Custom-Heroes/dp/B07117V56Q
Set-up/Play/Clean-up– 30 to 45 minutes (3-6 players)
Type- Euro
Depth-Light
TL; DR-Build a hero! 89%
Basics- Cards! Assemble! Custom heroes is another in the card crafting games lineup from AEG. This game is a trick taking game where one player will play any number of cards of one number, and every player after them will play cards of the same number or higher numbers until no one can play any more cards, and the last player wins the round. Then, the player who went last starts again. An example would be starting with three 4s, and then play continues to 3 10s. You can also skip other players by playing the exact same cards as the previous player, so even if that player has an awesome play, they might not get a chance get it out there! Players continue until they have no more cards in hand earning various rewards. The first player out in a round then earns victor points, power chips, and inserts, while the last player left in a round loses a point, but gains many more chips and inserts.
And here is where the game really takes off! Each insert will give you a new base number, add, subtract, or provide a new power. When the round comes to you, you can insert as many inserts as you want into a card, as long as they don’t cover ones already there, and then play these new custom heroes. The game starts with base cards numbering 1 to 10, but I have seen three 18s played on a turn! Powers have to be activated with power chips, but if you don’t use the power, you gain back a chip. While you modified that heroe, they are part of a common deck, so you might watch as the hero you made one turn is played by a different player a turn later
The game continues until a player has 10 victory points and wins. So you might be over the 10 victory point top, but unless you are the first one out with that many, play keeps going. Three way battles between players with 14 or more victory points make for some tense games!
Mechanics-I have a lot of trick taking games, but the custom nature of this one is really fun. You get a bit more choice in the game. Lots of games like this just screw you on the flop, but now you get the ability to build your own numbers should the ones you are dealt suck. But, what’s really fun is how much this little game will make you think. You really do send your time thinking about the different math combinations you can pull to make your next play. This is a simple game that hides a much deeper one! 5/5
Theme- Here is where this game gets screwed by my love of theme. Hearts is a fun game, but it has absolutely no theme. This game has some good art and the nature of how the inserts customize what the heroes are doing is fun, but there really isn’t a story. It feels like some anime world, but beyond that, there isn’t much here. This game has a fun, but not deep, theme. It tries! There are descriptions of things in the book, but again, this is like asking for a custom, story based, version of poker that doesn’t change the cards in any fundamental way. 3/5
Instructions– Did you see the instructions up above? That’s the rules! The book says it nicer, shows pictures, and reads quick. This game isn’t hard to get into, and the rules make that transition quick. 5/5
Execution-Overall, i really like this game! The art is cool with a nice anime vibe. The inserts are great quality, as they build awesome heroes. The one things I don’t like are the card sleeves. AEG has to walk a hard line here. The card sleeves are the game, so they have to be rough and tumble enough to be used over and over. BUT, they are a bit too tough. They stick to each other way too much! Often when I’m about to hand out the 10th card for the round, I have everybody count to see if I have given them 10 already because the cards are stuck together. It’s not game ending, but it’s a slight annoyance that will drive you a bit mad. You can see our unboxing of the games here: https://youtu.be/3TAXTdlFGWA 4.75/5
Summary-Custom Heroes is just fun. It’s a small box game that teaches quick, plays fast, and isn’t bogged down in being too much. The art is great, the rules read easy, and the inserts are a fun addition to a simple game concept. I’d like to see more of this. I wish there was a story that we could build upon here to make more theme, but this is a simple game that any card player knows what to do next. Overall, it’s a blast that you will want to replay as soon as you finish your last game. 89%
