Smash Up Core Set

Recently I have received a copy of Smash Up to review and over the week-end my husband and I have discovered this game.   The game is for 2 to 4 players but apparently we keep hearing or reading that it is better when you play 3 people.  Personally, we will try to tweak it have 6 players so that our kids can play with us.  We realize that it could make the play time a bit longer if we do so.   

The goal of the game is pretty simple – use your minions to crush enemy bases and the first player to score 15 victory points wins!  The game is essentially a shufflebuilding game where you select two factions which contains twenty cards each, shuffle them into a forty cards deck and compete to smash bases.  

As I mentioned previously there are 8 factions in this game.   Let me present them to you:

• Aliens
• Dinosaurs
• Ninjas
• Pirates
• Robots
• Tricksters
• Wizards
• Zombies

Each faction is composed of twenty cards.  You will need to choose two factions in order to play.

You will also have sixteen bases included in the game.   Before the game start, you will shuffle the bases and positioned some for play.  You will have to put as many bases as you have players plus one.  For example, if you are three players you will put four bases on the table.   The rest of the bases are put on the side for future use when a base if conquered.  Oh!  Each base also has a breakpoint that needs to be conquered as well as three value point listed on the card for the first, second and third.  Bases also possess an ability that could be done during or after conquest.

So the first player to play is the person who got up the earliest that morning.  Most board games have funny rules to decide who is the first player.   It had some twist I find!  Play continues clockwise.   On your turn you will play one minion, one action, play one of each or play none.  Once you have finished your turn you can pick two cards for your hand.  You cannot have more than 10 cards at a time in your hand.  

To play a minion, you will select a base and put the minion card beside it, facing toward you.   Do what the card says and move on to the next step.   To play an action, show your card and do what it says.   Once you have finished, you need to discard the action unless it has an ONGOING ability.

Slowly as the game progress, you will check regularly if the base is ready to score.  Scoring a base happens if    the total power of all minions on that base equals or exceeds the bases’s breakpoint.

When a base is score, the player with the most power on it is the winner.  That player gains victory points equal to the number on the left on top of the base.   The second highest gains the middle number and finally the third place gets the number on the right.   Once a base is score, all cards return to the discard piles of each player except the ones who have some special ability allowing them to move to another base.  Once a player reach fifteen value points, the player wins the game.

For the price of the game, you get quite a bit in it – 8 factions, amazing dividers, and 16 bases.  The game is easy to learn and play.  You should expect a game time of about 45 minutes.  This game is perfect for ages 12 and up.   However, I am pretty sure that my younger kids ages 8 and 10 will grasp the concept quite rapidly – maybe even faster than me…   After two games with my husband, I have yet to win.  However, even if I get frustrated because I do not completely get the ability that I need to do or simply because my hands is packed with minions with no actions (or vice versa), I persevere and I hope to win Smash Up one day.

Smash Up has also a bunch of expansions which will make you game even more interesting like Awesome Level 9000, The Obligatory Cthulhu Set, Science Fiction Double Feature, The Big Geeky Box (Essentially this is a storage box which allows you to store the game and its expansions in it.   It also contains plastic dividers, one factions and two bases.), Monster Smash, Pretty Pretty Smash Up, Smash Up: Munchkin, and It’s Your Fault.  And from what I have seen on BoardGameGeek.com a new expansion titled Cease and Desist is coming out this year.

Smash Up and all its expansions are available for purchase at your favorite game store, even on amazon.ca and amazon.com.

AMAZON.CA

   

   

   

 

AMAZON. COM

  

  

  

 

Disclaimer: Thanks to AEG for sending the above mentioned game for review purposes. I was not monetarily compensated for this post . Please note that the post was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way. All opinions expressed here are only my own.

For Crown And Kingdom

For Crown & Kingdom
Rio Grande Games

About the game

The king lies weakened on his deathbed.  His Majesty has but days to live, and has failed to produce an heir.  Any of the local barons could be next in line, as long as they are able to gain the approval of the people.  Each has set off on a heroic campaign around the kingdom. They vie for fame, for glory, and for the crown!

Our Thoughts

When we received the game Crown & Kingdom, we didn't know what the goal of the game was as this was a new release on the market. However by reading the instructions we discovered that the goal is to have your team of specialized emissaries to travel the kingdom, raise funds, obstruct opponents, and gain support of the people in order to become the new monarch.

For let me talk about the components of this game. First, you will see that there are six region tiles which are double-sided. I will explain later on how you can set up the tiles depending of the number of players. Second, you will obtain 20 character discs which you have to setup by placing the male sticker on one side and the female sticker on the other side. This will allow the players to either choose to play with the male or female side of each character. Also included in the box are four reference cards Finally, you will find two type of tokens - support and coins.

As I mentioned above, the regions can be placed differently depending of the number of players. On side of a region will consist of a large pie shape while the other side will display two smaller pie shapes. Here's how you can set up the game when you consider the number of players.

2 players = 6 large regions
3 players = 3 large regions, 6 small regions (The pattern of larger and smaller regions does not matter.)
4 players = 12 small regions

A fun way to start the game is the first player to make a trumpet sound and announce himself/ herself as the starting player is the one to go first. I love it when there is originality like this in games.

Essentially there are three steps each player will have to do: purchase a bride (which is optional and varies between 1 to 4 coins), move a character, and use that character's ability. You will have five character discs in all: duke/duchess, merchant, thief, knight, and scholar. The duke/duchess adds support tokens to regions. The merchant earn coins. The thief steals coins from other players. The knight remove opponent's characters from the kingdom. The scholar's ability depends on its current region where you use the action written on the region.

I am very impressed with the thickness and the quality of the map pieces and the tokens.   The tokens itself are easy to manipulate during the game.   But the part that really impress me is the character discs as these are made of wood and are very smooth to the touch.  I would suggest that when you open you box you take the time to read the instruction for the character discs.   If you are not careful you could make an error while placing the stickers on the wood discs.   Make sure that you are using both the correct male and female stickers for each character.   I really like the idea that you can choose to be a male or female for the characters as this gives you more flexibility in what you want to play.    I also like the different way we can set up the game depending on how many players you have.   And the fact that you can set up in various ways – particularly with 3 players is interesting as you can have numerous possibilities.

The only negative point I would like to mention is that I wish the player reference cards would be made of ticker material like the tiles and tokens.  This would allow you to protect them against bending and tear.   My other little disappointment would be that this game is geared for two t four players.   I wish that creators of games would offer more possibilities for bigger families sometimes.  Most board games we find on the market have a limit of five players which is not the best for a family of six.  Sometimes you can get an expansion that would allow you to play with six people but not all games offer this.  On another hand, I guess we could play in teams but it beats the purpose of the competition sometimes.   

The game can be played between two to four players.  One game could last from 30 to 60 minutes long depending of the number of players.  

For Crown & Kingdom is available for purchase at amazon.ca and amazon.com.

  

Disclaimer: Thanks to Rio Grande Games for sending me the above mentioned product for review purposes . I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way. All opinions expressed here are only my own.