Players: 2-4
Playing Time: 30-45 minutes
This review draws heavily from my review of Penny Arcade The Game: Gamers vs. Evil. They're both standalone deckbuilding games that use largely the same ruleset, but have different sets of cards. My "Relations to Other Games" section contains most of my notes on how the games differ.
Summary of the Components
Rumble in R'lyeh comes with 400+ game cards, 1 20-sided die, and 1 rulebook.
Quality: The cards are all gloss and regular texture. Some of my players found the hero cards a bit floppy in the original game, but that's been corrected here with a thicker stock for the heroes. Overall, everything is thus good quality. 4+ out of 5.
Beauty: The cards all feature artwork from Penny Arcade (or in the Penny Arcade style). In general it's attractive and it's very frequently funny as well. 4 out of 5.
Usability: A standard design on the cards makes it easy to pick out the type of card, its victory point value, and its cost. Unfortunately, there's no iconography for the powers that a card bestows (which sadly had been an issue with almost every deckbuilder game out there). Some of the players also found the print for the powers to be pretty small (even when there's plenty of space that could have been used for bigger type). 3 out of 5.
Theming: The adaptation of the Penny Arcade artwork to the Rumble in R'lyeh game is probably the game's highlight. It's very well done, not just in the choice of great topics to turn into cards, but also in the excellent adaptation of those topics into game mechanics. Some of the cards, such as "Were-Swan" and "Bromance" generated comments and laughter almost every time they were played, and that added a lot to the game. However, if you come in here expecting Cthulhu stuff based on the game's title, you're going to be disappointed. There's indeed a Cthulhu boss monster, which is terrific, but that's the extent of the Mythos' infiltration of the game. Caveat Cthulhu cultist. 4+ out of 5.
Variability: I use one additional criteria for reviewing deckbuilders: how variable the gameplay is. Rumble in R'lyeh gives you enough non-boss cards that you can play two games in a row with zero overlap of cards (other than the standard starters), but unfortunately only has one boss for each type, which means you'll always see all three in every game. 4 out of 5.
Though Rumble in R'lyeh doesn't push the envelope on usability, it's well produced with good theming, and thus I've given it a "4" out of "5" for Style.
Summary of the Gameplay
In Rumble in R'lyeh you're trying to build up a good deck in order to buy the cards worth the most victory points — especially the bosses.
Getting Started: Rumble in R'lyeh is played with three sorts of cards: green gamer cards, red evil cards, and gold hybrid cards — each of which is purchased with different currency. You'll start each game with a hand of green quarters (which give you 1 token, which can be used to buy more green cards) and red cardboard tubes (which give you 1 power, which can be used to buy more red cards). The exact number of cards that each player gets is based upon his "character". The character also tends to grant a special power, giving each player a slightly different starting point for the game.
Creating a Board: After each player has selected a character, a "board" of starting cards is laid out which always includes the green Merch (+2 tokens), the red Fleshreaper (+2 power) and a random selection of 12 other types of red, green, and gold cards, drawn from the larger set that makes up the entire Rumble in R'lyeh game. The pile of Pax Pox (-1 victory point) cards is also placed on the table as are three Bosses … a topic we'll return to.
Green (Gamer) Cards. These cards are all purchased with tokens. They're more likely to grant tokens than power, and they are often more powerful than the red cards … but they don't give you any victory points.
Red (Evil) Cards. These cards are all purchased with power. They're more likely to grant power than tokens, and they're often weaker than green cards … but they tend to be worth between 1 and 3 victory points.
Gold (Hybrid) Cards. New to this set, these cards are purchased with a combination of tokens and power. They're worth 1-3 victory points, just like the red cards, and they have relatively powerful powers, just like the green cards.
Boss Cards. Each pile of boss cards actually consists of three boss cards and eight loot cards. The boss cards tell you how much it costs to defeat (buy) the next loot card, running from 8-13 tokens or power (as appropriate) — or 8-13 of each tokens and power for the gold cards. The loot card are worth big victory points (typically 7 for green bosses, 5 for red bosses, and 12 for gold bosses) and also have super big power.
A boss can be defeated up to nine times: the first eight times generating a loot card for the victorious player and the last granting him victory points from that final boss card.
As an amusing bit of theming, the green and gold bosses actually have variable powers, based on the roll of a twenty-sided die. You usually get the normal result, but you can get an extra powerful result with a "crit" or all of your opponents can get to draw a card with a "fumble". This is another fun bit of theming, as it leads to jeers calling for fumbles and screams when a crit is rolled.
PvP. Attack cards (called "PvP") are a strong (but not overwhelming) theme in Rumble in R'lyeh, making them somewhat more common than similar cards in other deckbuilders. The result is that you can more frequently expect opponents to directly affect you and more frequently may want to think about PvP Defenses to avoid those problems.
Taking a Turn: On your turn you draw a hand of 6 cards. You can use the power and tokens generated by these cards to buy whatever new cards you want (including defeating leaders at a cost of 8, 10, or 13 power/tokens). You can also play any cards for their powers.
Ending the Game: The game ends when one of the three bosses has been defeated nine times (emptying his deck of cards) or when six other piles of cards are emptied.
Winning the Game: Each player now picks out all the cards in his deck which score victory points — typically red (evil) cards, gold cards, boss loot, and the final boss. Whoever has the highest number of victory points wins.
Relationships to Other Games
Rumble in R'lyeh is (of course) a deckbuilding game. I've written about how Penny Arcade generally expands the deckbuilder genre at Mechanics & Meeples. It's part of a whole series of deckbuilding design articles.
The big change that Rumble in R'lyeh introduces to the Penny Arcade game is those gold cards, which must be bought with a combination of both tokens and power. Whereas most double-currency deckbuilding games like Penny Arcade (and Ascension) encourage players to specialize in one of the currencies, the gold cards encourage players to instead balance the two currencies, so that they can get these great cards.
The cards in Rumble in R'lyeh also feel slightly more complex than those in the original Gamers vs. Evil. It felt like there was more deleting and drawing of cards, which resulted in somewhat longer and more thoughtful turns. Some of the heroes special powers also support these deleting and drawing strategies.
The Game Design
Generally, Rumble in R'lyeh is a simple deckbuilder that results in fast play. Turns go quickly, without some of the complexity that slows down even quick-playing deckbuilders like Dominion, and the game itself runs pretty quickly too (though perhaps not as quickly as the original Gamers vs. Evil due to changes in the card composition).
I thought that the dual currencies were used well in the original game, but Rumble in R'lyeh just makes them more interesting. The setup leaves most players equally balanced in the currencies at the start. You have to make a real effort to concentrate upon just one of them, so there's some solid strategy in filtering and rebuilding a deck. However, with the gold cards, perhaps it's better to maintain that balance …
The bosses are the most interesting element of the game. Part of that comes from the fact that these high-value victory point cards also feature very powerful powers. This is a big change from a traditional deckbuilders like Dominion, where victory points tend to be useless. The results in easier play, since there's no longer a hard decision about buying victory point — instead, if you can, you do. However, it can also produce a more fun result, particularly for an amateur player. The boss loot also causes a rapid ramp-up in the end game, as the more powerful effects make it easier to achieve the final end game conditions.
The one other mechanic that requires some note is the "PvP" element. As I said earlier, it's a powerful element of the game (though certainly not overpowering) and that makes for a more interactive deckbuilding experience.
Finally, I want to again note the funny theming. Though it's not an actual mechanic, the theming's good integration into the cards and their effects makes the game that much more enjoyable to play.
I think that experienced deckbuilders would probably find Rumble in R'lyeh a little simple (though a bit more strategic than Gamers vs. Evil and probably still fun in any case), and for that demographic I'd give the game's Substance a pretty average rating. However, I feel that Rumble in R'lyeh is really directed toward the newcomer to the deckbuilding subgenre, and for them the game is a good entry point with solid but simple mechanics that get out of the way and let you play. For them, I've given it a "4" out of "5" for Substance.
Conclusion
Penny Arcade the Game: Rumble in R'lyeh is a simple and funny deckbuilder game. It will appeal less to experienced deckbuilders, unless they're looking for humor and satire in their game. However, for newcomers to the deckbuilder genre of games, it's a great entry point. It's also a nice expansion to the original Gamers vs. Evil thanks to new and different cards appearing — with the gold cards being a pretty major change to how the game plays.
