16th April 2023

It's a Sunday and we're logged into Board Game Arena for more gaming fun.

Take on the role of Perseus, Jason or Hercules. Battle The Hydra, vanquish The Gorgon and defeat Cerberus in Legends of Hellas, a cooperative card game of Greek heroes and Greek mythology.

Caveat: We've only ever played this game digitally.

What's in a game?

• Cards: Legends of Hellas features 2 types of cards.
• Action cards: In the top left of each action card is an icon. Each one relates to 1 of 5 different virtues or qualities that a hero might posses. They are 'arms' (As in weapons.), 'courage', 'guile', 'speed' and 'strength.
  Furthermore, cards are also colour coded to each quality.
  Action cards illustrate the kind of events that Greek heroes get involved with using those virtues.
  Divine intervention cards: A final type of card depicts that good old mythological staple; divine intervention. These cards have special uses as explained below and are considered different to 'normal' actions cards.

With a chunky, cartoony style, Legends of Hellas is a bright and colourful looking game. It's crisp, clear artwork and the monsters on the monster cards are all instantly recognisable. I think it looks great.

There's half a dozen icons in the game and they're only used in reference between action and monster cards. Players should have no problems here.

How's it play?
Setup
Legends of Hellas presents players with 12 different missions to undertake which may have some varying setup and game rules. However, broadly speaking, they share a common theme - which defeating monsters until the boss monster 'the chimera' appears then defeating it.​

• Monster cards: Shuffle the monster cards into a face-down deck. Then according to the mission deal a number of them face-up into a central playing area.
• Action cards: First ensure all the divine intervention are separated from the other action cards.
  Then as per the player count (And also difficulty.) add a number of divine intervention cards to the action cards and shuffle them all into a face-down deck.
  Now deal 4 cards to each player.
• Hero discs: Give each player a hero disc in their chosen player colour. Each player should put their disc into their personal playing area with the 'normal' side face-up.
• First player: Determine a starting player.

On to play
Players in Legends of Hellas are cooperatively attempting to defeat a number of monsters inspired by Greek mythology.
This is done by playing cards but players will also need to perform other actions to facilitate this.
Legends of Hellas uses a traditional turn order with active player completing their action before play progresses to the next player.

• Game start: All players should place their hero disc on any monster card, more than one hero disc may be on a monster card.
• Action: During their turn, the active player may perform 1 of the following actions.
  • Draw card: The active player may draw 1 or more cards from the action deck and may temporarily have a hand of up to 5 cards. However, after drawing cards, the active player must discard a card.
  • Fight monster: This is probably the most common action players will perform and and is required to defeat monsters. The following rules apply to fighting monsters.
    • Location: The active player may only fight the monster at their hero disc's current location.
    • Action: To fight a monster, the active player must play an action card that matches the icons on that monster card. I.e., if a monster card displays the speed and courage icons, then the active player must play a card with either the speed or courage icon.
    • Victory: A monster is only defeated when both of the following 2 conditions have been met:
      Both action types: At least 1 card of each type has been played.
      5 cards: If a total of 5 cards have been across both types has been played.
      When both conditions have been met, the monster is defeated.
    • Divine intervention: These are incredibly useful for defeating monsters and can be used in 1 of 2 ways.
      Wildcard: A divine intervention card be played as a action card of any of the 5 types.
      Instant defeat: Provided the 'both action types' condition has been met, a divine intervention card can be played to instantly defeat a monster regardless of how many cards have already been played against it.
  • Give card: The active player may give any number of their cards to any other player. That player must then discard at least 1 card and must also discard down to 4 cards if they have more.
  • Move: The active player may move their hero disc from one monster card to another by discarding a card. This is regardless of whether the monster the hero disc is currently on has been defeated or not.
  • View cards: The active player may draw 6 cards from the action deck and view them.
    Then they must discard 1 cards and return the other 5 back on top of the action deck in any order they see fit.
• Next player: Once the active player has taken their action, play progresses to the player on their left.
• Other rules:
  • Special action: Each player has a special action available to them that can be activated once per game and is dependant on the colour of their hero disc.
    It means a player can flip their hero disc to the 'broken' side to play any card against a monster, consequently that card is considered to have the same colour (And thus quality.) as the flipped hero disc.
    E.g., if a player has Hercules' red hero disc, they may flip it to play any card against a monster and that card is considered to be a red 'strength' action card.
  • Chimera: Once the allotted number of monsters as per the chosen mission have been defeated, the final boss monster appears - this is the Chimera!
    To form the Chimera draw 2 monster cards and places them so that one is above the other - and the one at the bottom is upside down.
    This means the Chimera will potentially need cards from 4 qualities to defeat! If the Chimera has duplicates of the one quality, then at least 1 action card for each instance of that type must be played.

Endgame
If the players manage to defeat the Chimera once it has appeared, then they collectively win the game!
If however, at any time a player needs to draw cards and there are none left in the action deck, then the players collectively lose the game.

Overall
Between it's bold colourful presentation of Greek mythology and card mechanics which will have heroes travelling about to battle monsters using their guile, strength and so on; Legends of Hellas is pretty strong thematically.
I personally like how The Chimera will be a random amalgam of 2 other monsters.

Mechanically, on the surface it's a pretty straightforward game - play cards with symbols matching symbols on monster cards to defeat them but in practice, Legends of Hellas is quite unforgiving.

This is because players aren't really battling the monsters, they're battling the action deck - or more precisely, fighting to stop the deck running out and luck can play a very big part here.
Every choice and action a player takes ​- not just attacking monsters - will cost a card.
Draw cards - one of them must be discarded.
Give cards to an alley - one must be discarded.
Move or view the deck - you get the idea.
Even deciding which cards to discard is also an important decision. I.e., if none of the current monsters require a certain type of card, is that type safe to discard? A monster requiring it might turn up later

Consequently it can be very easy to run out of cards, players will need to try and play as efficiently as possible with minimal squandering and no frivolous moves. Judicious use of divine interventions can be critical here, playing one at the right time can defeat a monster with only 3 cards instead of 5. It might not seem like a saving of many cards but it can be.
While players can not explicitly discuss the cards in their hand, they will need to coordinate actions, especially actions such as passing cards to each other and viewing the deck.
Being a cooperative game, there's also a degree of luck in Legends of Hellas, perhaps a little too much like for my liking. Sometimes players will draw a hand of cards they just can't use and will have to find a way to adapt.
Conversely, sometimes luck will deliver the exact cards you will need which will make it easier and maybe a little unsatisfying.
It also means that sometimes it felt like my decisions had been taken out my hands by chance and sometimes it felt like any strategy I had was was reduced to simply 'play what you have' and adapt to 'what you get'.

Despite this I found Legends of Hellas to be a fairly enjoyable experience mixed with dollop of frustration from the luck which strangely, could go 2 ways; too much bad luck or too much good luck! 

With it's cartoonish art style and somewhat lightweight rules, Legends of Hellas would appear to be aimed at a family audience but we found it actually quite a tricky game, I'm not sure younger players will have a easy time. however a bit of adult/parent contribution would make a difference, I guess that's what makes it a family game.

If you want a ancient Greece themed cooperative game or in fact any kind of low maintenance cooperative game, Legends of Hellas might fill the bill.

9th April 2023

Sunday night on Board Game Arena means gaming goodness.

Ruffle your feathers, flap you wings and squawk for this err... bird and fruit themed set collecting card game.

Caveat: We've only played this game digitally.

What's in a game?
Cards: Toucan consists of a deck of 70 cards, broken down into 3 types.

• Fruit cards: These form the bulk of the game's cards.
  They each depict 1 of a selection of different fruits with a colourful illustration.
  Furthermore each type of fruit displays its own set-collecting rules as shown on each card.

Tucano features colourful and bright cartoony illustrations throughout.
It's a nice art style that works well with cheerfully anthropomorphic fruit and stylised birds that suits the game's lightweight nature.

The game's only iconography are the 3 symbols found on the toucan cards and icons used for set collecting scoring on fruit cards.
All of these are easily and quickly explained and understood.

How's it play?
Setup

• Cards: Separate all the toucan cards from the deck and put them aside.
  • Shuffle all the remaining cards and deal them into 2 face-down decks.
  • Now take the toucan cards and shuffle them into one of the 2 decks, ensuring it all remains face-down.
  • Finally, take the other deck and place it on top of the deck with the toucan cards.
    ​Thus all the toucan cards will be in the lower half of the deck.
• Columns: Deal 3 cards face-up into the central area to form the beginnings of 3 columns. Then deal another card face-up into the middle column.
• First player: Determine a starting player.

On to play.
In Tucano, players will drafting cards from a column in the central area and add to their personal area with the aim of collecting sets which will in turn score them maximum victory points (VPs).

Tucano uses a traditional turn order with the active player resolving their turn before play moves on to the player on their left.
The active player will perform the following.

• Draft: The active player picks any 1 of the 3 available columns and adds all the cards in that column to their personal area.
  It's a good idea to sort cards by type at this point.
  Toucan cards: If one of the cards that were drafted is a toucan card, its action must be immediately resolved.
  Joker: If one of the drafted cards is a joker, it does not need to be assigned to a set until the game end.
• Refresh: Once the active player has finished their turn, a card each is added face-up to the 3 columns - including the empty one.
  Next player: Play then progresses to the player to the left of the current active player who then becomes the new active player.

Endgame
Play continues until the deck has been depleted and there's only 1 column of cards left in the central area.

At this point, any players with a joker card may choose which set to add it to.
Sets are then scored.

​Most sets will score according to how many cards a player has collected of that set.
However, some sets score based on how many cards a player has collected in relation to other players. In this case whoever has the most cards will score the larger amount and all other players with cards in that set will score the lesser amount.
It is possible in some circumstances for sets to lose players VPs!

Points are tallied, highest score wins.

Overall
I guess toucans collecting fruit is a good a theme for a set collecting game as any! 

When playing, players are broadly speaking, faced with 3 choices during their turn which on the surface is not a lot.
However, Tucano does a clever thing is by having some sets earning increasing VPs, some sets intermittently scoring VPs and some losing them - and then having columns that get longer.
Invariably, when a column contains a card that loses VPs; players will initially ignore that column, this means that over the rounds more cards will be added to that column, making it more appealing to draft.
As a result; sometimes players will have no-brainers on what to draft but sometimes they will have to choose between columns which will add negative cards to their collections. They'll be looking to minimise the negatives and hoping to get rid of them at some later point.
Which brings me to the toucan cards, these wisely appear in the latter part of the game - where they'll have the most impact. The right use of toucan cards when they appear can be a real game changer (And also frustrating!), particularly when giving cards to other players: In the right circumstances a player can remove a negative from one of their collections and add it to an opponent's!

There's not more to add. Tucano is a pared down, fairly simple set collecting game and I'm pretty certain I'm not the target audience here.
Even as a filler or short game, I'm unsure it offers enough depth for seasoned players. Personally I found it a fairly shallow experience and the mechanics of the toucan cards a little frustrating.

Conversely though, just from the appealing, colourful art, it apparent Tucano is squarely aimed at younger players.
Its simplicity makes for a accessible game and a great way to introduce set collecting mechanics to budding future gamers and for family gaming.

9th April 2023

​Sunday is here again and we're logged into Board Game Arena for some gaming fun.

'Triiiiooo, triiiio
I want a trio,
And I want now.'

I'm showing my age here, but this is not a game about a chocolatey biscuit, instead it's a set collecting card game.
Furthermore, Trio is apparently a reskin of a game called Nana, which disappointingly, is not about collecting grannies.

Caveat: We have only ever played this game digitally.

What's in a game?

• Cards: Trio uses​ a deck of 36 cards, numbered 1-12 three times.
  Along the bottom of each card will be 1 or more numbers that relate to the numbers on other cards which when added/subtracted mathematically reach 7.
  E.g.; the 1 and 6 cards are related because 1+6=7.
  ​Additionally; 4 and 11 are also related because 11-4=7 and so on.
  A 2 will be related to a 5 and a 9. 5+2=7 and also 9-2=7
  These sets of 2 related numbers are known as 'spicy' sets!
  
  

That's it for components.

Trio features cards decorated with quirky little monochrome illustrations with what appears to be a Mexican day of the dead theme? These illustrations are set against colourful backgrounds which are associated with each of the 12 differently valued cards.
I'm not sure how the them ties with the game but the cards definitely look colourful, dynamic and eye catching.

Cards are numbered 1-12, there's no other iconography. This is all very easily understood.

How's it play?
Setup

• Cards: Shuffle the cards into a face-down deck.
• Players: Dependant on player count deal 5-9 cards face-down to each player.
  All players should sort their cards into numerical order.
• Central playing area: All the remaining cards (Which will be 6-9 cards.) should be dealt face-down into a central playing area.
  This means all cards will have been dealt either to players or the central area.
• First player: Determine a starting player.

On to play
There are three ways (A trio!) (SIC) to win Trio. Each involves revealing cards to collect sets of identical values.

Trio follows the typical turn order with the active player taking their turn before play progress to the player on their left.
During their turn, the active player may reveal up to 3 cards by performing the following actions.

• 1st action: The Active player may choose 1 of the following 2 actions to perform which will result in revealing a card..
  • Reveal highest or lowest: The active play may ask any single player to reveal their single highest or lowest value card, the active player may also choose themselves to reveal a card.
    Any revealed card should be played face-up into the playing area.
  • Reveal from central area: The active player may flip a single card face-up from the cards in the central area.
• 2nd action: The active player now again chooses 1 of the same 2 actions above to perform, which will result in revealing a 2nd card
  • No match: The the 2nd card to be revealed does not have the same value as the 1st revealed card, then the active player's turn is over.
    Any card revealed by a player is returned to their hand.
    Any card that was revealed from the central area is flipped face-down again.
  • A match: If the 2nd card revealed matches the 1st card revealed, then the active player gets to take a 3rd action!
• 3rd action: The active player now gets a 3rd action and once again, must choose from the 2 actions described above.
  • No match: If the 3rd card revealed does not match the 1st and 2nd cards, then the active player's turn is over.
    Any cards revealed by a player is returned to their hand.
    Any cards that was revealed from the central area is flipped face-down again.
  • A match: If the 3rd card revealed matches the 1st and 2nd cards, then the active player has revealed all 3 cards of the same number! They collect all 3 cards and place them into their personal playing area.
• ​Next player: Regardless of whether the active player failed to match 3 revealed cards or managed to collect a set, play then progresses to the player on their left who now becomes the active player.

Endgame
​There are 3 ways a player may Trio.

• 3 sets of 3: If a player collects 3 sets of 3 cards they immediately win.
• Spicy set: If any player collects a spicy set, then they immediately win.
• Collect the 7s: If a player collects the 3 7 cards, they immediately win!
  Interestingly, the 7 value cards are the only cards not in a spicy set.

Overall
​Trio's has a fairly abstract theme but to be fair I don't it detracts from what is a fairly accessible game.

In fact, Trio is such a straightforward game that almost has nothing to write about. It mixes simple deduction and memory mechanics.

Players will want to remember what cards are revealed and where they are revealed from, allowing them to create sets of 3.
Players can also glean information from what their opponents reveal, either from their own questions of those of others. E.g., if someone is asked to reveal their highest card and it's an 8, then it's obvious they wont have cards of higher values. This is useful when deciding which sets to try and work towards.

There's also something mechanically interesting going on with the game's probabilities.
Generally, players should look to collect sets of either the highest or lowest value sets - simply by virtue of being able to only reveal the highest and lowest value cards of opponents.
This is why collecting the 7's insta-wins the game, because the 7's will likely be in the middle of players' hands and will be harder to collect
This becomes even more likely in games with lower player counts as each player will have bigger hand sizes. Conversely the distribution of cards will be less even in games with a higher player count, making it a little more unpredictable.

Talking of player count, we played with 3 players and I felt it was a little underwhelming. Trio can play with up to 6, I think the game improves with more players and the greater unpredictability adds to the experience.
We also played online which I feel detracts from a game like this which benefits from interaction between players.

Trio is obviously a lightweight game and will have crossover appeal to families and more casual gamers, it's set collecting, memory-based gameplay is something most people will be familiar with to some degree or other. I that's something that might appeal, them Trio is worth a look.

I would say it might be a bit too simple for seasoned games but truthfully, I think can serve as a filler game or an ender for the night.
It's something I would like to try with the physical version at a higher player count.

​2nd April 2023

Sunday is here again and we're logged into Board Game Arena for some gaming fun.

'Goa is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region' according to Wikipedia.
If you've ever fancied a holiday to that region of India, now's your chance to game it, visit beaches, historical sites, forts and more in... Go Goa.

Caveat: We have only ever played this game digitally.
What's in a game?

• Player sheet: This sheet displays the titular region using a hex map while around the outside of the map are a number of holiday themed illustrations.
  The majority of the hexes are blank but the remaining are coloured and contain icons which represent tourist destinations.
  The top of the sheet contains a day tracker which actually serves as a turn tracker, the bottom contains a score tracker for the game end.
  There's also a direction guide or 'compass' hex at the top - more on compass later.
  The physical version of the game has 2 slots on the left side of the sheet to align 2 'tour plan cards'. Again, more on these below.

• Dice: Go Goa comes with 3 normal six-siders.

​Go Goa has a nice art style to it. Much of it has a sort of simplistic cartoony nature which is colourful, cheerful and bright that I think fits the game's holiday theme quite nicely.
The illustrations on the tour plan cards look more 'realistic' but equally bright and have a postcard quality to them. They seem to depict various locations and I'm sure that they're referenced or based on locations in Goa.

A few icon/colour combinations are used to represent destinations and scoring opportunities throughout the game. Fortunately, everything they reference can be found on the sheets, for the most part it's all readily apparent and shouldn't represent a problem.

How's it play?
Setup

• Player sheet: Give each player a player sheet.
• Tour plan cards: Sort the tour plan cards into their 2 types, shuffle each type into a face-down deck and deal 2 cards from each deck to all players.
  Each player should choose 2 to keep and discard the remaining 2 out of the game.
• First player: Determine a starting player.

On to play
In Go Goa, players are attempting travel to as many destinations on the hex map over 12 rounds which will earn them VPs. This is done by using the result of dice rolls which will determine their direction, distance and err uhh deviation!

There's no typical turn order in Go Goa, instead all players play out their turn simultaneously.

• Game start: All players begin the game on the hex marked 'start here'.
• Round start: At the start of each round, all players mark a day off of their day tracker.
  Dice: The first player now rolls all 3 dice.
• Assign dice: Players must now assign 1 die each to direction, distance and deviation as per the rules below.
  First player: The first play can assign any 1 die to direction, then they can assign any of the remaining dice to distance and deviation.
  Other players: The other players cannot assign the same die to direction that the first player did, they must assign a different die to direction. After that, they can assign any of the remaining dice to distance and deviation.
• Resolve dice: Now that all player have assigned dice to the 3 criteria, hey must be resolved and when done so will determine where each player ends the round
  • Direction: As per the the compass hex, the value of the die assigned to direction will determine the direction the player leaves their starting or current hex.
  • Distance: The value of the die assigned to distance determines exactly how many hexes the player moves in a straight line. Although that can be potentially altered by...
  • Deviation: The die assigned here allows a player to change direction once or twice when moving their distance. This is dependant on the die's value
    1-3: If the assigned die has a value of 1-3, the player can change direction once.
    4-6: If the assigned value is 4-6, then the player can change direction twice.
• Mark destination: Now that players have ended their movement, they can potentially mark off the destination they have reached.
  Blank space: If the player ended their day on a blank space, then obviously, nothing is marked off.
  Destination: When a player ends their day at 1 of the 5 different types of tourist destination, they should mark off a spot on the corresponding line on their destination tracker.
  Tour plan: additionally, if they have reached one of the destinations named on either of their tour plan cards, they should also mark it off.
  Tour guides: If a player stops at one of the three listed spots on the tour guide, then they should record which destination they have reached. Tour guides can provide help to players.
• Additional rules:
  Tour guides: If a player has recorded a tour guide destination, then they can mark that destination off in order to alter any one assigned die roll by +1/-1, this can make a die roll 'wraparound'.
  This can only be done once per tour guide destination - thus 3 times only.
• Next round: Once all players have resolved their movement and recorded the result, the round is over and play progresses to the next round.
  The player to the left of the first player becomes the first player for the subsequent round and begins it by rolling the 3 dice.

Endgame
Once the 12th round is completed, the game is over and goes to scoring.
Players can acquire VPs from several sources in Go Goa.

• Destinations: Each destination visited earns a flat 10 VPs.
• Sets: The tourist destination sheet provides 2 ways for scoring VPs.
  Set of 5: Each completed set of the 5 different types of destination will score VPs. Players are essentially scoring for completing a vertical line.
  3/6 of a kind: If a player reached 3 of the same type of destination, they score some VPs. If they managed to reach 6 of the same kind, they score more VPs. Players are scoring horizontally here.
• Tour plans: Each fully marked off tour plan will earn the player 20-40 VPs dependant on the individual card.
• Bonus: There's 20 bonus VPs or reaching the hex with the camera icon.

Points are tallied, highest score wins.

Overall
Go Goa's theme is kind of crazy and has players essentially randomly travelling throughout the titular state looking to find various holiday destinations in what would be a fairly chaotic holiday. I imagine this to be the opposite to what most people want actually on their vacation.
Having said that... choosing your holiday itinerary based off off some dice rolls might have some appeal but I digress. 

Mechanically, Go Goa is straightforward.
Firstly, players need to pay attention to the tour plan cards they receive and if possible select cards which work well together, that is potentially have their destinations close to each other. I like how the cards provide players will asymmetrical objectives.

After that; the game's central mechanic will have players assigning to dice in order to try and move to their selected locations. 
'Try' is the operative word here, at times randomness will scupper a player's plan, it means they must spend a fair amount of time adapting to the options presented to them by the dice. This might involve going to alternate destinations or trying to reach objectives in a different order and so on.
This provides players with somewhat meaningful decisions when selecting their dice but makes future planning a little futile. YMMV on whether you find this frustrating or not.
It's also interesting that the game forces some asymmetrical decision making on players in the form of the rule whereupon the first player will have different destination die to their opponents.
There is some flexibility in assigning dice though and also how to score destinations on the tourist destinations sheet (Which is welcome.) but even so, Go Goa is fairly harsh in this respect. Players only have 12 turns and thus only 12 opportunities to reach destinations, each time a player stops in a blank space, they'll drop at least 10 VPs .

I should add that this is also a game with no interaction between players, who will be acting simultaneous but whose decisions will have no impact their opponents.
This makes Go Goa all about players optimising their moves to reach as many destinations as possible.

More casual gamers might find the unusual rules a little obtuse but I think they would learn them quick enough. Additionally, the theme gels with the mechanics well. Everyone should understand the concept of visiting tourist spots while on holiday.

But for seasoned gamers I'm not convinced they'll find Go Goa engaging. While Go Goa is easy to pick up but it comes at the cost of being perhaps a bit too simplistic for my liking, I also feel that luck plays too big a part in the game and a lot of my decisions felt out of my control. All of this contributed to make the game a little frustrating.

If you're looking a lightweight, roll-and-write game with a strong theme and a fair amount of randomness, then maybe Go Goa is worth a look.
​I'm not sure it's one for me though.

• ​​Completion tokens: These round tokens display the International Rescue logo and are used to track progress during a mission.
  

The component quality throughout Thunderbirds Danger Zone is average, that is to say it is the quality we've come to accept from modern games which means pretty good. The cards feel OK and the tokens seem sturdy enough. Nothing bad here.

For its art, the game sources what seem to be stock photos and stills from the TV episodes that inspired the mission cards.
It's usually at this point I would accuse the game of looking cheap for using photos instead of producing actual art.
However, this style works for Thunderbirds Danger Zone and I think it looks completely acceptable. Partially because marionettes and models look different enough from bland photos to look good and partially because those marionettes and models were part of the TV show's unique aesthetic and what people would expect from a licensed game.

The only icons used in the game are for the 4 resources, they will be easily learnt and each one looks distinct in shape and fits its theme, a cannister for fuel, a computer terminal for knowledge and so on.
Except for tech; no matter what anyone says, the icon for tech just looks like a drain to me!

How's it play?
Note: The setup and rules description below are for games with 3+ players.
​Additionally, the setup and rules are for the beginner mission - End of The Road. Later missions introduce more cards and more rules.
​Setup

• Mission: First choose 1 of the 7 available missions.
  Danger zone cards: Take the 3 danger zone cards associated with the chosen mission and place them in a row, thus forming the top row of 3 columns of cards.
  Journey cards: The mission's difficulty will determine how many rows of journey cards should be used, typically 1 or 2. Players can theoretically choose to vary this to alter the mission's difficulty.
  The journey cards should be shuffled into a face-down deck, cards should be dawn from here and placed beneath the danger zone cards to form 3 columns.
  Character tokens: The mission card will determine which characters are used. Place each character token below the bottom of their specific column.
  Journey tokens: shuffle all the journey and Hood tokens and randomly deal one on to each of the journey cards. Finally deal a journey token to each character token.
  Tracey Island card: These cards count as a countdown timer, the lower count on the card used, the harder it is to successfully complete the mission. Players can decide on which of these countdown cards to use, they are numbered from 4-10.
• Players: Players have the following setup.
  Resource cards: Shuffle the resource cards into a face-down deck and deal 3 to each player.
  First player: Determine a starting player, give them the 'Jeff' character token.
  This player becomes the.... 'Jeff player'!

Overall
I know why resource values have to be matched exactly mechanically - otherwise it would be too easy a game. Thematically though, it feels a bit strange that players might have too much team spirit or knowledge.
Other than that, Thunderbirds Danger Zone feels quite strong thematically. I like how the game sends specific characters to deal with specific danger zone cards which I imagine mirrors what occurs in that episode. I like the that idea characters can also provide some assistance.
The art direction also makes it feel quite like playing a Thunderbirds episode which is exactly what you'd want from the game.

Mechanically, I feel Thunderbirds Danger Zone is a bit of a mixed bag. This is particularly true of the slight asymmetrical gameplay.
The Jeff player is faced with a somewhat meaningful decision when choosing which objective to target. They'll want to pick one which they have the most options and flexibility in modifying if required.
Luck will also play a part in the Jeff player's role when they pick 2 cards to flip, frequently they will need to adapt to what is revealed.
For the non Jeff players it will feel less meaningful. Basically; if the objective has a low value, players will want to play cards with a low value in the required resource and vice versa if the objective resource has a high value. Since players will not know what other participants will be playing, luck will play a not insignificant part in this.
To be fair, there is a bit of higher level play in remembering the resource value on a journey card that the Jeff player picks up in a swap and such knowledge can prove advantageous in later rounds.

I will add that this kind of luck particularly bad luck is fairly typical in cooperative games to keep them challenging.
Luckily (SIC), the game provides the Jeff player will some tools to mitigate bad luck when it occurs.

Thunderbirds Danger Zone is straightforward for a cooperative game which is a advantage. Many games of this type of game tend to have fairly elaborate rules to manage the boards turn, there's none of that here.

Although that does bring me to complexity/difficulty. Thunderbirds Danger Zone sits in a bit of nebulous middle space here.
The game clearly has some scope as a family game but can be a bit overly complex and challenging for beginners or casual players. Conversely, I found the sometimes lack of meaningful decisions and swingy luck a bit frustrating and engaging, I also feel that most seasoned gamers would find this to also be the case.

If you're a fan of Thunderbirds and are in the market for a licensed cooperative game, this may float your boat, or if you're looking a more approachable cooperative game to play with more causal players or the family, it's also worth a look.
​Not one for me though.

​1st April 2023

We're no April's fools, we're at Wogglecon 7! For a day of gaming fun. I played the following games at Wogglecon7.

Akropolis
Sushi Roll
Just One
Sagrada - First Play!
Pan Am

1st April 2023

We're at Wogglecon 7 for a day of gaming fun. Second game of the day was Sagrada which means 'sacred' in Spanish.
Gaming and Wogglecon are definitely sacred but is Sagrada all about creating stained glass windows through the medium of dice-placement, albeit with dice that look quite glassy!

The most noticeable component of Sagrada are the bright colourful dice. They are well made, rounded and translucent with a 'gem' type finish.
Usually I have a preference for wooden dice but can see why the game uses this type as it's a great fit the stained glass window theme.
The player board with it's recessed grid works well when used with the window pattern cards which slide smoothly into place and dice which happily set in their spots.
The cards are the standard you'd expect off of a modern game and the inclusion of glass beads is a nice touch.

The game's art direction continues the theme of stained glass windows. There's lots of brightly coloured glass panes shown on the player boards and round tracker. White much of it is just abstract shapes, it's very colourful without obscuring important detail.
It also lends the game a eye catching quality all of which I like.

For the most part, the game's iconography is easily understood.
Some of the objective cards and tool cards might require explanation or looking up in the manual but this doesn't really affect the flow of play and isn't an issue.

How's it play?
​Setup

• Player board: Give each player a player board.
  Window pattern cards: Give each player 2 pattern cards. Each player should then choose 1 to keep and discard the other out of play. The chosen pattern card should then be slid into the player's board, this will display the pattern cards colours and numbers through the board.
  Favour tokens: Give each player a number of favour tokens as indicated by the pattern card they took.
  Private objective card: Shuffle the private objective cards into a face-down deck and deal 1 each to every player, players should keep this card hidden from their opponents.
• Public objective cards: Shuffle these into a face-down deck and deal 3 into a central playing area.
• Tool cards: Shuffle the tool cards into a face-down deck and also deal 3 face-up into the central area.
• Dice: Place all dice into the bag and give it a good shake.
• Round tracker: Place the round track into the central playing area.
• First player: Determine a starting player.

On to play
In Sagrada, players will be placing dice on to their player board in an attempt to match the criteria on the public/private scoring cards while also meeting the requirements dictated by the pattern cards.

The game utilises something of a typical turn order but during each round every player will have the opportunity to draft 2 dice; although only 1 at a time.

• Round start: At the start of a round, whoever is the first play should take the bad and draw out a number of dice dependant on player order. This amounts to 2 dice per player plus 1 more. Then the first player should roll those dice and place them into the central playing area.
• Drafting: Each player will have the opportunity to draft 2 dice, first in turn order and then in reverse turn order.
  ​First player: Drafting always commences with the first player beginning as the active player. They perform their action(s) then play progresses to the player on their left and so on.
  Once the last player in the turn order has completed their turn, the order of play reverses, mean the last player now goes first with play progressing to their right and the first player going last!
  This means the first player has their 2nd action last while the last player has 2 actions in a row.
• Active player: Whenever someone becomes the active player they have the option of performing the following 2 actions in any order they see fit.
  • Draft die: The active may draft 1 of the available dice and add it to their window with the following placement rules.
    • Pattern requirements: Any die placed on a player's window must match the requirement shown on the pattern card. Thus a green die (Of any value.) must go on a green space and a die showing 4 (Of any colour.) must go on a space showing a '4'.
    • First die: The first die a player places in their window must be along the edge or in the corner.
    • Subsequent dice: All other dice placed in the window must now be adjacent a die already in the window, the can be diagonally or orthogonally.
    • No matches: When placing a die orthogonally adjacent to another die, it must be a different colour and number. A blue die cannot be placed orthogonally adjacent to another blue die. A '2' cannot be placed adjacent to another '2'.
  • Use tool card: The active player may choose to spend a favour token to utilise the ability on any of the tool cards. This can be be performed before or after drafting a die.
• End of round: Once the round has been completed; that is each player has had the opportunity to draft 2 dice, then the round has ended and the following occurs.
  Round tracker: Take the remaining die or dice and place them on the spot for the current round on the round tracker. All of these dice are now out of play.
  New first player: The player who drew the dice should pass the bag to the player on their left who now becomes the first player for the following round.

Endgame
Play continues for 10 rounds whereupon the game ends and goes to scoring.
VPs can be accumulated from several sources.

• Public objective cards: Players will score VPs by meeting the criteria of the public cards, it is possible to score a card multiple times.
• Private objective card: As with public cards, players can score VPs from their private cards, this too can be done multiple times.
• Favour tokens: Every unspent favour token is worth 1 VP.
• Empty spaces: Players actually lose VPs for spaces on their window no containing dice. Each empty space will cost the player 1VP.

Points are tallied, highest score wins.

Overall
Using translucent, glass-like dice to represent details of a stained glass window is a cool nice idea that fits thematically. It doesn't hurt that it all looks quite pretty when finished.

Mechanically, Sagrada is straightforward - drafting and placing dice to try and match objectives. The challenge facing players however, comes from managing the obstacles that will impede them.
Players will have to take into account both the requirements of their pattern board when placing dice and the placement rules and how they interact with each other.

E.g., placing a red die on a blank space orthogonally adjacent to a red space on their pattern board will mean now that no die can be placed on the red space - because it will be adjacent to the already placed red die.

Leaving spaces empty like this will cost players VPs.
It means players will need to anticipate which dice they place to avoid pitfalls such as this. They will need to pay attention to not only which dice they draft but since they draft 2 dice per round, the order in which they are drafted.
Additionally, players will need to manage having to draft dice they might not want at that time. This can be difficult because of the rule's placement restrictions.
There's also definitely a higher lever of play here that comes from seeing what dice other players will need and trying to gauge which opponents will take which dice and react appropriately.

There's not much more to say about Sagrada.
I guess some people may not like the low amount of interaction between players which only occurs when drafting dice but I don't have an issue with it. I will add that Sagrada sort of feels a little like a puzzle to solve than a game in itself and some people may not like this aspect. Again, it doesn't bother me.

Sagrada is easy to understand with its 'draft and place' mechanics but presents players with a not insignificant challenge: Since the game is played over 10 rounds and players can get 2 dice per round, it is possible to entirely fill a window but I don't think that is a simple proposition.
It feels kind of unremarkable as a game because it is so straightforward without bells and whistles or any gimmicks but in practice provides a solid, enjoyable gameplay experience which taxes the braincells a little and pushes players to make tricky decisions. 

Number of different games played was almost identical to last month being only 1 lower but there were more total plays. First plays were down on last month.
It looks like went spend more time playing games we were familiar this month.

​First plays: 4
Different games: 22
​Total games: 38

​Tuesday 28th at The Sovereigns with the Woking Gaming Club
Akropolis - 5
Istanbul - First Play!
​
Sunday 26th on Board Game Arena
Martian Dice - 24 
Tranquillity: The Ascent - 4
Stella: Dixit Universe - 15
Dice Forge - 13
Just One - 19
None Shall Pass! - 3

Thursday 23rd Aldershot
Jump Drive - 18
HeroQuest - 14; Final Mission!

Tuesday 21st at The Sovereigns with the Woking Gaming Club
Port Royal - 25
Rolling Realms - 5

​Sunday 19th on Board Game Arena
Lucky Numbers - 65
Roll'n Bump - 11
Loco Momo - 17
Just One - 18
None Shall Pass! - 2
Tranquillity: The Ascent - 3

Sunday 12th on Board Game Arena
Lucky Numbers - 64
Can't Stop - 42
Just One - 17
Tranquillity: The Ascent - 2
None Shall Pass! - First Play!

Friday 10th Woking
Wingspan - 7

Thursday 9th Aldershot
Scout - 4
HeroQuest - 13

Tuesday 7th at The Sovereigns with the Woking Gaming Club
Canvas - First Play!
Rolling Realms - 4
Jump Drive - 17

Sunday 5th on Board Game Arena
Lucky Numbers - 63
Can't Stop - 41
Railroad Ink - 46
Just One - 16
Tranquillity: The Ascent - First Play!

Thursday 2nd Aldershot
Akropolis - 4
Jump Drive - 16
Trains - 2
Heckmeck - 15

28th March 2023

Tuesday is here again and we're with the Woking Gaming Club at The Sovereigns for an evening of gaming goodness.

Game of the night is Istanbul.

Ah, Istanbul, home of an ancient settlement and exotic gateway between the east and the west...
...Also a place where frenzied merchants rapidly push wheelbarrows around the bazaar, trailed by assistants while looking to acquire rubies in this worker placement game.

The component quality is good for nearly all of Istanbul.
The game makes good use of wooden components and dice which is always good. All the cardboard tokens and tiles are sturdy enough. The cards are also good.
It's all the quality you'd expect from a modern game.
The only criticism I have is that fitting the extensions into the wheelbarrow feels fiddly and when trying to put in the final extension it can be too tight and wont fit properly. It's a minor oversight that doesn't affect the game experience but it could have been a bit better.

There's unique artwork on all the location tiles. Even though it uses a pretty standard style of illustration, I think it looks good and gives the game a eye-catching presence on the table. I also feel that it's quite suitable, being evocative and colourful without obscuring important information.

Iconography in Istanbul is a bit of a mixed bag. Much of it is easily understood but the occasional icon and in particular, bonus cards will find players leafing through the rulebook for clarification.
This is fairly infrequent though and is a minor inconvenience rather than detrimental

How's it play?
Setup

• Players: Give each player the merchant, assistant, family member tokens and cubes in their colour.
  Wheelbarrow: Each player should take a wheelbarrow tile, then place their 4 cubes on the 4 'empty' spaces on their goods tracks.
  When players gain goods, they move the cube along the respective track.
  You will note at the game start, players can only have 2 of each good. By acquiring extensions, players can eventually hold up to 5 of each good.
• Tiles: The 16 location tiles will need to be put out in a 4x4 grid. This can be done either by using 1 of the 2 predetermined setups or randomly - although there are some restrictions using the random method. Additionally, many of the locations will have further setup.
  • Caravansary: Shuffle the bonus cards into a face-down deck and place them close to the caravansary.
  • Fountain: Each player should create a stack of 5 tokens with the the merchant token at the top and 4 assistants beneath and place their stack on the fountain location tile.
    The 5th assistant token should be set aside for the time being, they can be acquired during play.
    Gemstone dealer: Place rubies on the gemstone dealer location tile as per player count.
  • Markets: Sort the demand tiles into their 2 types. Shuffle each into a face-up stack and place them on to their respective market tiles.
  • Mosques: Sort the mosque tiles by type/colour, then sort each stack by goods cost, with the lowest at the top and highest cost at bottom. Then place 2 stacks on each of the 2 mosque tiles.
    Rubies: Finally add rubies to each mosque as per player count.
  • Police station: Each player should place their 'family member' cylindrical token on the police station location tile.
  • Post office: The post office has 2 rows of 4 spaces, place the 4 mail cubes along the upper row on the post office location tile.
  • Sultan's palace: Place rubies on the Sultan's palace location tile as per player count.
  • Wainwright: Place rubies and wheelbarrow extensions on the wainwright location as per player count.
  • Governor & smuggler: Roll the dice for each, then place their tokens on the location with the matching number.
• First player: Determine a starting player.
  The starting player should take 2 Lira, the next player gets 3 Lira, 3rd gets 4 Lira and so forth.
  Bonus card: Each player should draw a bonus card.

On to play
In Istanbul, players are attempting to acquire 5 or 6 rubies (Dependant on player count.) and the game provides a variety of methods to achieve this.
Istanbul follows the usual turn structure with the active player completing their turn before play progresses to their left.

During their turn, the active player will act in 2-4 phases - depending on circumstances.
The 4 phases always occur in the order shown below.

• Movement: The active player can move their stack of tokens up to 2 spaces during this phase, this cannot be diagonal and when the stack reaches its destination, one of the following must occur.
  • Drop off assistant: The active player takes one of the assistant tokens out of their stack and places it elsewhere on the same location tile.
  • Pick up assistant: If the active player already has an assistant token on the location space they stopped at, then they can add it back into their stack.
  • Pass: If the active player cannot or does not want to drop off or pick up an assistant, then their turn ends immediately unless the active player ended up at the fountain!
• Encounter merchant: This phase is conditional and if the active player ended their movement in a location tile with 1 or more merchants that belong to other players, then the active player must pay those players 2 Lira each.
  If they cannot or do no want to pay, then the active player's turn ends immediately, this does not occur if they stopped at the fountain.
• Action: This phase represents the bulk of gameplay and the active player may now choose to undertake the action for the tile they stopped at.
  There a quite a few actions a player can perform.
  • Black market: When the player's merchant is at the black market, they can gain 1 green/red/yellow good.
    Additionally, they should roll the 2 dice, the result will grant them 0-3 blue goods.
  • Caravansary: The active play draws 2 bonus cards into their hand and then discards 1 bonus card.
    When drawing cards from being at the caravansary location, the active player may choose to draw from the discard pile instead.
  • Fountain: When the active player's merchant is at the fountain, they can recall any number of their assistant tokens back into their stack.
  • Gemstone dealer: Here the active player may purchase a ruby. The more rubies that are purchased throughout the game, the more they will cost.
  • Market: When a merchant stops at one of the 2 markets, they can sell goods matching the demands on the current demand card. The more matching goods they sell, the more they earn. Each of the markets will determine how much the player earns.
    Regardless of how many goods are sold, the current demand tile is put at the bottom of the stack and a new demand tile is revealed.
  • Mosques: When a merchant stops at one of the 2 mosques, they can acquire one of the 2 mosque tiles there.
    To do so, the player's wheelbarrow must be carrying the goods that match was is shown on the top mosque tile. However, acquiring a tile costs only 1 good of the displayed tile.
    Once a mosque tile is taken, a more expensive version will be revealed beneath.
    Players can only have copy of each type of tile regardless of where they acquired it from.
  • Police station: When a player's merchant stops at the police station and if their family member is there, then the player can 'free' their family member.
    Since their family member 'knows how to get stuff', the player can immediately place the family member token on any other space and trigger its action. The family member does not have encounters and does not benefit or is restricted in that way.
  • Post Office: If the active player's merchant stops at the post office, they acquire all the items shown on the 4 uncovered spaces.
    After this, they must slide the leftmost cube on the upper row to the space directly below, thus changing the resources earned by the next merchant to stop here.
    When all 4 cubes are on the lower row, the next merchant to stop at the post office will claim their resources and put all 4 cubes back on the upper row.
  • Sultan's palace: When a merchant stops here, the player can trade goods for a ruby.
    As with the gemstone dealer, the more rubies that are acquired here, the more costly they become to trade for.
  • Tea house: Time for some friendly gambling! When a merchant stops here, the player announces a number from 3-12, then they roll both dice.
    If the rolled number is equal to or greater than the announced number, then the active player acquires Lira equal to the number they announced.
    If the number was lower, then they take 2 Lira.
  • Wainwright: Stopping here allows the merchant's player to buy an extension for their wheelbarrow. Once the 3rd and final extension has been acquired, the player can acquire 1 ruby from the wainwright tile.
  • Warehouses: There are 3 warehouses, one each respectively for green, red and yellow goods.
    If a merchant stops at a warehouse, they can fill the related good on their wheelbarrow to the maximum amount.
• Other encounters: As with the other encounter phase, this is conditional and depends on what tokens are also on the location where the active player's merchant stopped.
  • Other players' family members: If a merchant encounters the family member of another player on their location, they must snitch on them to the cops!
    This earns the active player 3 Lira or a bonus card.
  • Governor: When the governor token is on the same location as a player's merchant, the player can draw bonus card, then they must discard a bonus card or pay 2 Lira.
    After encountering the governor, roll 2 dice and move the governor's token to the location with the number that matches the dice roll.
  • Smuggler: When the smuggler is encountered, the active player may gain the good of their choice, they must then discard a good of their choice or play 2 Lira.
    As with the governor, after encountering the smuggler, roll the dice and relocate the smuggler to the new location.
• Bonus cards: These are not part of any phase in particular and the active player may play any number of bonus cards during at any time during their turn.

Endgame
The game end is triggered when any player acquires the required number of rubies.
​Play continues for the current round until all participants have had equal turns.
Finally, each player will have the option to play unused bonus cards, since Lira and goods act as a tie-breaker this can be important.

Rubies are tallied, highest amount wins.

Overall
I don't know whether it's deliberate or not but there's a slightly cynical thread of humour running through Istanbul. 
It's an amusing facet of the game that merchants are useless without assistants to boss around or how everyone has that one shady cousin who 'knows someone' or 'can get you stuff'.
Thematically, the game is presented quite well.
Your merchant and their little band go from place to place, looking to earn money or get goods in order to eventually gain rubies.

Mechanically, Istanbul is relatively straightforward. While there's quite a lot of tiles and consequently a lot going and a lot to think about and possibly remember, none of it in practice is actually overly complex.
Istanbul presents players with the conundrum of balancing the need to increase their abilities via mosque and extension tiles or trying to acquire rubies.
Broadly speaking, the game game provides some one-off way of gaining rubies but two main avenues to accumulating them - which are by spending goods or spending Lira and then providing several ways to acquire goods and Lira.
It means that Istanbul is a game of planning efficient moves and maximising actions. This is particularly the case when dropping off or picking up assistants. Well thought out play will allow a player to do this without visiting the fountain which requires an entire turn to gather assistants.

While the game is essentially a race without direct conflict between players, there's still some interaction that goes on.
There is arguably a higher level of play where players could try and anticipate the actions of their opponent allowing them to block opponents by putting their merchant on specific locations, forcing other players to pay out to go there or preventing them entering all together. However, this tends to occur by accident more than design.
Another area of interaction is at the markets, the more goods sold a player can sell an once at a market, the more money that player earns but taking longer to do this risks being trumped by another player fulfilling the demand tile earlier.
So players will need to occasionally adapt to situations as needed as well as planning their actions.

Istanbul does a good job balancing varied gameplay, strategy and meaningful decisions with ease-of-play, although I'm not sure I would describe it as entirely suitable for non-gamers but core gamers should have no problems comprehending the game
It also has a novel and clever implementation of worker placement mechanics which provide some satisfying moments when used effectively.

This is a mid-weight game with a somewhat lengthy play time - although it never felt overlong or unwelcome. I found it to be an enjoyable worker placement game. Istanbul   is a game that's definitely worth trying.

12th March 2023

It's a Sunday and we're logged into Board Game Arena for an evening of gaming.

'None shall pass.'

Don't worry, I was done with the Monty Python quotes years ago!

None Shall Pass is a cooperative, turn based battle game inspired by the 8bit JRPGs of old where the players take on the roles of 'guards' facing evil monsters 

Caveat: We have only ever played this game digitally.

What's in a game?

• Tiles: None Shall Pass! uses numerous tiles, boards and cards to track both players and monsters.
  Monster board: This board is used to track the health or hit points (HP) and attack strength of whichever enemies appear.
  ​Finally, there's a breach track that goes from 5 to 0 and is used to track time - or lack of it specifically!

• Dice: The game comes with a set of dice in each player colour. There are 3 normal six-siders in each set.
• Tokens: Tokens are used to track enemy monster stats as well as player stats such as HP and XP.

None Shall Pass! draws its inspiration for art from the same source as it draws its inspiration for gameplay - which is turn-based 8bit JRPGs.

I'm sort of conflicted about this art style.
8 bit pixel art has been done to death on a wide range of video and computer games seeking to invoke nostalgia over the last few years and doesn't have much appeal to me anymore. Having said that, it's a fairly uncommon style in board games and gives 'None Shall Pass!' a unique appearance with at least a little charm.

There's very little iconography in None Shall Pass! and what there is of it, is easily recognised: A heart represents HP, a blue shield means defence and a sword means attack power and so on.
All remaining game information is relayed via text.

How's it play?
Setup

• Players: Have each player choose one of the character classes (Called guards here.) and take their relevant character cards.
  These cards should be put into 3 stacks of 2 cards each and arranged so that the level 1 side is face-up at the top of each stack. The 3 stacks should then be arranged so that the activation numbers run sequentially from 1-6.
  Dice: Each player should take the 3 dice in their colour.
  XP: Each player takes 2XPs worth of XP tokens.
  4 Characters: If there are less than 4 player's, extra characters must be controlled by the players to bring the character count up to 4.
• Monster board: Put out the monster boards.
  Monster cards: Sort all enemy cards by level and shuffle them into face-down stacks. Take 1 card from each stack and create a deck of 5 face-down cards with the level 1 monster on the top, going down to the level 5 boss at the bottom.
• First player: Determine a starting player.

On to play
None Shall Pass! is a cooperative game where the players are trying to defeat all 5 monsters in the monster deck.
Each round is broken down into 2 phases.
During the first phase, the players will act in turn order and during the second phase, the enemy monster will counter attack.

• Round start: The following occurs at the start of each round.
  • Reveal monster: At the start of the game reveal the level 1 monster. Additionally, if at the start of any round where there is no monster available (Because the previous one was defeated.), reveal a new monster.
    Monster stats: When a monster is revealed, set the HP and damage tokens  on the monster board to the values as shown on it's card.
    Breach: Set the token on the breach board to '4'.
  • Roll dice: Each player rolls their 3 dice and places each one above the character card with the matching activation number.
  • Defeated character: If a character had taken more damage than their health from the monster in the previous, they are incapacitated. Incapacitated characters are not dead but do not roll dice and instead spend their turn healing.
• Player phase: During this phase, each player performs 1 or possibly 2 actions in turn order.
  • Activate action: The active player can activate an action that corresponds the result of one of their dice.
    Thus if they rolled 1, 2, & 5, they can perform one of the actions on their character cards that respond to those numbers.
    Rolled a 6: If active player has a 6 on one of their dice, they can activate the action for the 6 in addition to the action from another die.
    Triples: If the active player rolled triples, they can activate any 2 actions of their choice or a single action twice!
    Resolve action: Typically, actions will harm the monster in some way by decreasing HP or attack strength, actions will also commonly assist characters. A few actions affect the breach number or gift characters with bonus XP.
    Peril: Once the active player's action(s) have been resolved, they must move the die that used to active the action to the peril board. The die goes on the space indicated by the peril number on the activated skill.
    If a action that was activated has a peril number of '3', the die must go on to space 3 on the peril board.
    Spend XP: Players may spend XP to flip one of their character cards. to the next level at any time, giving them access to improved abilities.
    Each character card can increased to level 4.
    Next player: Once the active player has completed their turn, play progresses to the player on their left.
• Monster phase: Once all players have taken their turns, play then progresses to the monster.
  • Monster action: The monster now activates its action. There are a variety of actions that can occur but usually it involves attacking and damaging characters.
    Target: The monster will always attack the character the furthest up the peril board, if more than 1 character is furthest up, it will target all of them or split damage between them.
    Decrease breach: Move the token on the breach board down a space.
    If the breach token reaches '0', the monster has managed to escape the players. It is removed from the game, a new round begins by revealing a new monster.
    Players do not get XP for monsters that escaped.
    Defeated monster: If the players managed to reduce the monster HP to 0 during the player phase, then the monster phase is skipped entirely. A new round begins by revealing a new monster.
• Next round: Once the monster has had it's action, play progresses to the next round, either by continuing to fight the current monster or revealing a new one.

Endgame
If the players reach the 5th level boss monster and it's breach score is reduced to '0', the player immediately lose.

If however, they manage to reduce the monsters HPs to '0', then the players collectively win!

Overall
With its pixel art style and turn based combat, None Shall Pass! does a good job of invoking its JRPG theme of having the party stand in a row and attacking enemies! None Shall Pass! also manages to seem a little bit like a 'boss-rush' game.
The game also feels a little different to many cooperative games. There's no firefighting in None Shall Pass!, no need to halt the spread of something malignant here, or need to prevent something from being destroyed.

Mechanically, None Shall Pass! is mostly easy to understand.
The game has a good selection of character classes to choose from, all of whom genuinely feel quite different and offer a variety of actions.
The Death Strider who does more damage, the more hurt they become and the Stargazer with their solar and lunar aspects were stand out classes for me.

During their turn, a player will be presented with a choice of 1 or 2 of up to 3 actions from a total of 6 actions and the dice will to a certain extent dictate player choices.
Broadly speaking players will looking to hinder monsters or buff characters in some way or another with maximum efficiency.

Monsters need to be defeated as quickly as possible and every round a monster isn't defeated, it goes to slipping away and loosing XP for the heroes.
While this might not seem so bad, being underpowered when fighting the boss will make ultimate loss more likely.

Players will also need to be mindful of the peril number of their chosen action. Players will need to coordinate who goes to the top of the peril track and make sure they can deal with the incoming monster attack if possible. While getting incapacitated isn't the end of the world, it will mean the character will miss at least 1 following turn.
In fact, players will need to coordinate all of the time to work effectively and play off each others' strengths, strategies for this can radically change according to the mix of characters.

Players will also need to think about how they spend their XP. The power of abilities will be altered by level ups and even the ability to gain XP can be levelled up! This will effect how battles are approached
None Shall Pass! is quite rightfully harsh in this regard, I never felt like I had enough XP and it was always a difficulty, meaningful decision deciding what to upgrade.

However, while playing None Shall Pass! was fun, there was something a little lacking.
​It's a RPG-like game without the storytelling, adventuring, exploration and finding treasure - things I strongly associate with fantasy RPGS. Some kind of quest or story mode would have been a welcome addition. I just wish were was a little more 'meat on the bones'.
Additionally, despite the variety in classes and randomness the dice bring, I'm not too sure how much replayability the game has.
I think there's about 5 monsters each in every level and while that means there will be a lot of combinations that can appear, once you've seen a monster - you've seen it.

We still play the game occasionally and personally I'm happy to do so on those occasions, avoid overplaying None Shall Pass! in my opinion and it'll be an enjoyable experience.