You know, I've been meaning to make my "review debut" for a while now. Really, it's extremely sad that this game is the one that motivates me enough to do so. I just walked away from an hour of this thing, and immediately ran to the PC to ensure nobody else (in the rpg.net world anyway) wastes their money like I did.
Anyway, as I said, first review - Any feedback greatly appreciated.
Angel - The Board game is published by Susan Prescott Games. It comes complete with a fairly large gameboard, three dice (D6, D8, D20), a tiddlywinks counter to keep track of the day/night cycle, two decks of cards (one for day and one for night) and 6 counters for player pieces. When I saw it in the shop, I bought it immediately. Not only am I a big Buffy and Angel fan, but I have (and LOVE) the Buffy board game MB put out. Because on the back of the box it shows part of the board, with the day/night cycle showing, I thought "wow, it's similar to Buffy", so I plonked down my $85 (about $40US I guess) and brought it home where my wife and I eagerly started playing.
Didn't even finish one game. It's that bad.
Basically, the game board is a single long track, that you move around according to the roll of a die (like monopoly or ludo). The track is split into colors for the players, so as you move around, you move into and out of other players "sections". Each player gets 5 day and 5 night cards to start with. Players are not allowed to look at their own cards or the cards of others. You are allowed to roll any one of the three dice to move, which lets you change your "speed" somewhat I guess. Each square you can land on instructs you to do one thing:
1) Move the day/night marker according to a die roll. This is important because all the other squares instruct you to work with your or other players' card piles, but you can only use their day pile if it is daytime or their night if it is nighttime.
2) Take the top card from the pile (day or night) of the player whose "area" of the board you are in. This will either be a "soul" (in which case put it on top or on the bottom of your own day or night pile), or it will be an instruction. The instructions are things like "move forward the same number of squares as your age" and "roll the dice again". Yes, you heard me right.
3) Look at the card pile (day or night) of the player whose area you are in and rearrange them (sometimes you can only look at them but not rearrange them). Note, this is the only way you will ever know what cards you have in your own piles, making it almost impossible to ever win.
4) Take a new card from the deck and put on top of your pile.
5) Lose the top card from your pile and put it on the bottom of the master deck.
That's about it. You keep going around and around, following these innane instructions. The point of the game is to "save" three souls. That is, you have to have three souls (only) in either your day or night pile and none in your other pile. Then you face the basically impossible task of getting back to your start square (random roll remember.. oops... missed it, now I have to go right around the board again and hope that my cards don't get changed before I get back again). If you succeed, you win.
Am I explaning this well? If it sounds interesting then I am not, because it's mind numbingly boring. When you consider the fact that you almost never see your own cards, so you can never be sure how many souls you have, plus the fact that it's all random anyway, plus the fact that the day/night thing changes annoyingly frequently, and on top of all that even if you manage to get the right configuration, it's impossible to get back to your start square without landing on another square which changes your card configuration anyway, it's pretty much:
a) impossible
b) pointless, and
c) staggeringly boring. I mean the kind of boredom that makes men eat their own nipples just because the sensation of pain is better than nothing.
And what the hell is up with the blurb on the back of the box? "As the night approaches you will turn into your alter ago.. a vampire! You will have special powers to see what others are not able to see in the day. Make the most of this time, for come the dawn, you will lose these powers and have more mortal weaknesses". Excuse me?!?!? The game doesn't change even a little bit at night, except you use the other pile of cards. What a crock.
I can't believe anyone thought this game was fun enough to publish. For the love of God, do NOT buy this game.
I'll say that again in Shatnerese, in case you missed it:
Do. Not. Buy. This. Game.
Not even on a dare.
Substance: 1 - I wasted my money (and I'll never get back the hour I spent playing it either). Damn shame the lowest score I can give is a 1, let me tell you.
Style: 2 - It only gets one point because of the cool looking box, which is what enticed me to buy it in the first place.
Go to forum!
(Due to spamming, old forum discussions are no linked.)