Review of Red Rock Tomahawk

Blurb from the publisher: 'The infamous Cooper clan has begun taking over small villages. Those villages, however, belong to the Native Americans, who are armed with bows and tomahawks, and are ready to defend their land in five exciting scenarios. But they best be careful around the Cooper clan's new weapon: the relentless Gatling gun.'

What you get: Your USD 35 or equivalent will buy you Red Rock Tomahawk, the second expansion for the Flick 'Em Up game line that started from Flick 'Em Up (wood edition), the premium dexterity game made exclusively from wood and cardboard that can accommodate from two to ten players and lasts around 45 minutes.

In addition to the 96-page rulebook (twenty four pages per English, French, German and Dutch) that can be found on the publishers' website free of charge, the game also contains the following: one Tipi, one Totem (3 parts with one base), 3 Forests, 5 wooden Native American figures, 5 Feather Headdresses, 6 Forest Tiles, one wooden team box for the Native Americans, one Red Rock Mountain, 2 Bows (reversible), one wooden Tomahawk, 8 support blocks, 5 Character Tiles for the Native Americans, 6 Arrows, one Gatling Gun, 6 Gatling Bullets, 21 tokens (5 Pelts, one Bow, 2 Gatling Guns, 2 Identities, 9 Fires/Tomahawks, one Water, one Dynamite), as well as a branded Canvas bag.

Barring reasons of aesthetics, the present expansion can also work with the Flick 'Em Up (plastic edition).

Gameplay: [queue in Run to the Hills in its original ludicrous video]

Injuns! Bows! Arrows! Tomahawks! Gatling gun! There are more things to flick in a couple of new ways. Bows are effectively a portable platform from where you flick short sticks, while Tomahawks are exactly that, flicked vertically with your index finger. The Gatling gun uses a platform not different to the one of the Winchester from the basic game, with the difference that it fires simultaneously four non-aligned bullets and hits everything in its path, even if that was a result of a ricochet.

Characters can now climb Red Rock mountain and fire from elevation, or enter Forests and hide. There are three practice fields (like in the first expansion, think of them as mini games) to help you get accustomed with the new rules. In Hundred Arrows the natives are shooting cactuses and cowboys with their bows and arrows to help you train in this new form of flicking, in Tomahawk Tornado the same happens but with Tomahawks, while in Gatling Bowling the new weapon of war brings devastation to the practice field. Once you have gotten used to the novelties, the game offers five different scenarios to test your mettle against the locals. As an example, in Arrows Over Cactus Creek the Native Americans try to find the arsonists that burnt their shaman's tipi, while the Outlaws try to stop them from doing so in five turns. In Sacred Land on the other hand, the Natives are trying to burn the two documents that steal their land while the Outlaws try to stop them.

The strong points: It was unavoidable to have Native Americans in a game like this. The question was, how would the game emulate arrows and tomahawks instead of bullets. The answer is simple: with quite the style! To start with, it is cool to have a third faction fighting it out; the scuffles between the sheriffs and the outlaws started getting old. The fact that the new faction shoots differently is good fun, in case you felt you were getting a hang of flicking bullets. Neither arrows nor tomahawks are that obvious to flick and the results can be quite entertaining. Even more so with the gatling gun, which literally wreaks havoc due to its uncontrollable behaviour.

It is also cool to have new scenarios out. This means increased replayability and variety in creating your own scenarios, should you need to do it.

All the components are of the same very high quality as the original. The tipi and the totem are great eye-candy and create even more diverse landscapes. The mountain is more than a prop; controlling it can give you quite a benefit, if you can flick things from higher up. I appreciated the fact that the Natives got their own box with different colours and grave markings. Everything still fits in the original game's wooden, super-sturdy box, even though the rulebooks with their extraneous languages may cause trouble. In any event, one can print out only the English versions from the free pdfs and have everything fit nicely.

Seeing how this is the second expansion and you know it since we already saw it together, you also know that the game line is well supported.

The weak points: Red Rock Tomahawk adds to what the game is about, making it into an even more involved affair of flicking tokens. Don't expect it to ascend into something different; it doesn't.

Those who like easy gaming experiences might be slightly miffed by the extra rules that this expansion introduces. The worst part however is that again they are not presented authoritatively enough, leaving dozens of what-if situations that you will have to interpret with common sense around the table. Again, I am not happy with that. A game, even more so an easy one, is supposed to be played the same way in any table, unless the participants decide to houserule it. Here it is kind of not possible, seeing how many things are simply not explained. I can give examples about horses or terrain falling here and there and how that is to be resolved, but it would be pointless. An FAQ for that sort of a game would also be pointless. I simply wish the rulebooks, all rulebooks, were redone.

Again, I wish the scenarios could be linked in order to create a singular campaign. Kinds would love it, gamers that are in it for the lighter experience would love it, it's a pity it does not exist. It's also weird how three-way free-for-alls do not exist. That could have been genuinely chaotic.

Seeing how this is a very light-hearted dexterity game, I'd find it silly if anybody were offended by the game's depiction of Native Americans, the bows and arrows stereotypes and what have you. Yes, they are there. No, they are not meant to offend.

Conclusion: Red Rock Tomahawk is the expansion I'd go for if I could have afforded only one of the current two. It provides new flicking methods in a well-themed new faction that is fun to play in scenarios that are entertaining. What more does one look for in a dexterity game?

For more info on Red Rock Tomahawk and Pretzel Games, visit its website at http://www.pretzelgames.com.

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