Episode 22 - Unmatched: Clash of the Titans

Hi Everyone, thanks for joining us for this month's episode!

In this edition of the podcast, we discuss not one game, but several, as we tackle the system of modular sets that is Unmatched which tries to answer age old questions such as, could Alice from Wonderland beat up Dracula or could Shakespeare kill a T-rex with poetry?

While we may not get definitive answers to these, we can tell you whether we think the game system is any good as as always we assess how it plays as a 2 player experience. Hope you enjoy!

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:15

Hello everybody and welcome back to another episode of Board with Each Other, the board gaming podcast that reviews board games and asks the question: how well does this play with two people? Whether that's your BFF, your significant other, or that guy that insists on bringing a T-Rex to a knife fight. As ever, I am joined by my wife and co-host, Halle Kelly.

SPEAKER_00 0:35

Hi guys.

SPEAKER_02 0:36

And today we are reviewing not just a game, but a game system in Unmatched. So Unmatched is a game that's it. It's a modular game, so it's made up of multiple different sets. So there is no starter set for a matched. You can start and dive in wherever you like. Every box comes with a full set of the rules and everything that you need to play.

SPEAKER_00 0:58

Some of the miniature boxes don't come with a map, though, do they? Yes, they do.

SPEAKER_02 1:01

They all come with a map. Yep. And uh a matched is a basically a miniature skirmish game. So you take control of a hero represented by a miniature, and they're sidekicks, in most cases, sometimes they don't have sidekicks. Uh T-Rex don't need no sidekick. Um which are usually represented by sort of plastic discs as such, no miniatures there. Um you also get a deck of cards uh unique to your character, and the battle takes place on a map, which they're usually at least one side, usually double-sided in every box. And the map is basically made up of linked circles of showing where you can move during the fight. So how gameplay works is on your turn, you can take one of three actions. You can either maneuver, which means you draw a card.

SPEAKER_00 1:49

You can take two of three actions.

SPEAKER_02 1:50

Two of three actions, that was correct. You can maneuver, which means you draw a card and can move up to your hero's unique movement speed. You can attack, which means you take an attack card for your hero or psychic, place it face down, and then your opponent may place a defence card face down, and then you flip them over, and they all have printed numerical values on them. And the difference between those numerical values is the amount of damage that you do. So sometimes zero if the defence is equal to or higher.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

They also usually have modifiers on them or special games on them.

SPEAKER_02 2:24

Almost every card does something, it's not just attack number, it usually does something else either during or after the combat that's just taken place. Finally, you can scheme, which means you can play a scheme card from your hand, and that usually has quite significant impacts and effects on what's going on on the cards.

SPEAKER_00 2:42

So it might be recover health, it might be pick up a load of cards, there might be bring your psychics back to life. Yep. Yeah, stuff like that.

SPEAKER_02 2:48

Um each hero has completely unique special rules with that hero, so they all have a special ability that interacts with their deck, so they all play significantly differently. If you run out of cards, so your deck runs dry basically, you take two damage every time you have to draw a card. And when you maneuver, you have to draw a card, you can't choose not to. Uh and game the game continues until one of the heroes is uh defeated, or multiple heroes, and you have one left standing if you're playing with more than two people. So, yeah, this is uh this is an interesting one. I mean, me as a ex sort of war gamer miniature freak, this leaped out to me like I've got to try this. Looks this looks sort of ace. And we ended up buying a set which was Battle of Legends, that's where we started. And then uh since then we've picked up quite a few. We've got Cobble and Fog, which are sort of Victorian literary villains.

SPEAKER_00 3:43

Jurassic Park?

SPEAKER_02 3:44

Yeah, we've got both Jurassic Park sets. We have a Marvel set with Spider-Man, She-Hulk, and Doctor Strange. Um, so the the IPs involved are massively varied.

SPEAKER_00 3:54

I'm yeah, and I think that's kind of one of the things that really stands out because you they're all very well known and very well loved characters from movie literature myth.

SPEAKER_02 4:04

Yeah, for the most part. Some of them are some of them are a little bit esoteric, but um there's something in there I think for everyone. You'll find something that you're interested in. And from the sort of collectory side of things, this definitely has a a bite to it because they tend to get access to IPs that then they lose access to. So if you're somebody that suffers from FOMO, be careful.

SPEAKER_00 4:29

Buffy's a really good example. I am a diehard Buffy fan. Of course I am. I'm a woman of a certain age who watched TV at some point in her life. Um you were a teenage girl. It was the girl at one point in the 90s, yeah. Um, and that's a really good example because I think that was out of print.

SPEAKER_02 4:43

Yeah, you can't you can't get hold of her, and there's some like Deadpool and Bruce Lee that go for crazy money.

SPEAKER_00 4:48

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_02 4:49

Yeah. Although the the collectors are very, very annoyed about Bruce Lee because they're bringing him back. Because he was going for sort of 200 pounds on on eBay. Okay. Um, so yeah, I mean, is there anything else you want to mention? Runtime?

SPEAKER_00 5:01

Yeah, so games are I would say fairly short, so at two players we kind of average around 20 minutes.

SPEAKER_02 5:06

Yeah, 20 to 30 minutes, I think, is ro roundabout what they what they tend to take, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:11

Um but yeah, I mean, is there anything else you want to mention before we sort of crack on to our our review?

SPEAKER_00 5:17

No, I think let's get straight in with the scoring.

SPEAKER_02 5:19

Okay, do you want to do you wanna kick us off then?

SPEAKER_00 5:21

Yep, so on the top of our uh general scoring criteria we have components. So that's thinking is what what's in the box, but also things like setup, teardown, and all that kind of jazz. Um do you want to start by talking about miniatures?

SPEAKER_02 5:34

Oh god, yes.

SPEAKER_00 5:35

Okay, off you go.

SPEAKER_02 5:36

So for plastic solid state miniatures, these are great. They're an ace, they look really good, they are fun to paint if you're into that sort of thing. Um, I have very little criticism, uh particularly given around the price point, which we'll come on to a bit later. Um, they look really, really nice. So yeah, that's I mean, that's my my miniature splurge. Um I I rate these, I think they they look great.

SPEAKER_00 6:02

What I'll also say for it is that all the components, so both including things like your health trackers, your little plastic tokens for your psychics and any other tokens that come with it, and your cards, all fit nice and neatly back into their allotted spaces within the box. Yes. Which is really, really nice. And I like that.

SPEAKER_02 6:20

Great, yeah. However, the ball boxes you buy, they're quite big boxes. Yeah. And I would probably own a lot more of this if it wasn't for the insane amount of shelf space it takes up. I think if you get serious about this, which I'm starting to get to the verge of, I think you probably need to start thinking about some sort of storage solution for it that you can get rid of the boxes. I've said I know there are things out there on Etsy that people have done inserts where you can get basically 12 characters and decks and everything in a single box.

SPEAKER_01 6:49

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:49

So there there's ways and means, but you prep definitely want to start thinking about that unless you live in some sort of palatial mansion because the stuff takes up room.

SPEAKER_00 6:58

I also would say that in your individual your your character-specific deck of cards, the ones that there are some that are sort of generic across all characters. But there are an awful lot that are very unique, and they've all got unique names that are quite fun and quite quirky. And so there's a real when you unbox for the first time and you play with, say, for example, Malcolm from Jurassic Park, you have Sattler who's Malcolm's the sidekick before people get too excited. Yeah, but you've got a card there that says, um, what's it like? I want to introduce you to the next. I'm looking for the next ex Mrs. Malcolm. Yeah, yeah, you know. So all the cards are actually quite fun, and it's really fun to sit there and read them out to be playing with it. If you're a massive nerd like we are.

SPEAKER_02 7:42

Yeah, I mean, if you're getting a game about battling, you know, Jurassic Park Raptors against Spider-Man, you probably are quite a nerd, so we could just skip over that if you're engineering. You've either turned off already, or you're like, okay, yeah, I'm in. But there's a great deal of respect and nudge-nudge winking that goes on with there's real respect for the IPs, and there's there's not there's nods and winks to I wouldn't say memes as such, but just you know, jokes and humour that go along with these characters. Like, for goodness sake, they brought out the miniature of Doc Dr. Malcolm reclining with his shirt open if you wanted to purchase such a thing. I'm they're going to do a witcher set. Yeah, we bet you do. They're gonna do a witcher set next year, and yes, they've done a uh a miniature of Geralt in the bath. So they know they know their audience, and but there is a sense of humour to it that I love.

SPEAKER_01 8:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:33

Um, and yeah, the the the effort that's gone into sort of the naming of all the cards, um, and the artwork is fantastic. It's very important.

SPEAKER_00 8:42

And I'm gonna say the artwork varies again by your character. So for Jurassic Park, it's very much taken from the film, yeah. But then you've got things like King Arthur, which again is very I'm not gonna say medieval art, but yeah, there's a bit of sort of like tapestry-esque element. Yeah, there's a tapestriesque element to it, which again is very thematic and very well thought, just a level of thought and detailed into it that I would applaud, really.

SPEAKER_02 9:05

Yeah, it's really laudable. And as you said, they're generic cards, but they've done different artwork for those generic cards for all the characters. So again, even though it's a car that you know is in there, it's like, oh, I love the way what they've done with this. Um the maps look great. Again, the maps are sort of themed on what whatever set you've got. So, for example, in the Marvel set, you've got the Sactum Centaurium, uh Doctor Stranger's hideout, for instance. Um, they all look really, really nice and they all play very, very differently. Yeah. Although we probably I'm probably going away from components here, I'm just waxing the little.

SPEAKER_00 9:34

So, how did you score it?

SPEAKER_02 9:35

A nine.

SPEAKER_00 9:36

Oh, so I scored it an eight.

SPEAKER_02 9:38

Yeah. Um this is uh components-wise, I have almost nothing to fault on this.

SPEAKER_00 9:43

Possibly because you like miniatures more than I do.

SPEAKER_02 9:45

Yeah, quite possibly. Yeah. Um, but I do rate these. Um we haven't mentioned setup and teardown.

SPEAKER_00 9:51

Oh, it's a doddle.

SPEAKER_02 9:52

Yeah, three minutes.

SPEAKER_00 9:53

Yeah. I mean, the the great thing is because it comes with um standard decks that are prefabricated, you don't have to, there's no deck drafting.

SPEAKER_02 10:00

No, there's no deck building.

SPEAKER_00 10:01

It's just shuffling.

SPEAKER_02 10:02

Yeah. Um shuffle, put the map down, put your guys on the map, done. Yeah, you're done. Which is great because you just crack it out so quickly. And it's that kind of game. It's like, oh fancy a match of this bang, bang, bang, you you you're done, you're in.

SPEAKER_01 10:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:12

Um the only thing is when you've got multiple sets and you want to fight people from different sets, you don't have getting them all out and having to unpack them. But again, that goes back to the storage solution thing, I think. Then it's probably the way forward with this. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 10:24

Alright, so then on to complexity. So this includes things like um AP, um, also how much we argue about the rules, but as always, it's not about how complex the game is per se, but how much uh how the complexity serves the gameplay. Um, as you've said in the rules, actually, it's a really straightforward, really, really easy game to pick up. There's nothing particularly complicated about it. The devil in the detail is playing your character. Yeah, playing your character and playing your character well and knowing what your character can and can't do, and the limitations of them and the strengths and limitations of your opponent. Um, because again, it's a very quick, fast, easy game to play that can be played, you know, with complete beginners, I would say. I think it's absolutely fantastic for that. I've got absolutely zero complaints. And in fact, I would say we've probably had less issues with the rules and had to go searching through the rule book than any other game we've got.

SPEAKER_02 11:15

Yeah, I read the rule book once and that was it. Yeah. Done. And the cards are we have we haven't had many sort of edge cases or cards that we've been like, what does this do? I don't really understand that. That's not really happened in this, so it's very, very clearly designed.

SPEAKER_01 11:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:28

When you're talking about complexity and how well it serves the gameplay, I think it fits the bull absolutely for what it is. I think I like this a lot, and there is a part of because I skew heavy in terms of rules weight, there's a part of me that almost wishes for something a little bit more there another dimension to it, perhaps. But I I am I'm very much clear that that is a personal thing, and it's because I like it so much that I just wish there was kind of a little bit more meat on the bones.

SPEAKER_00 11:59

Yeah, I think it's also worth mentioning that some of the expan not expansion, some of the other sets that we have do add other rules. So, for example, one-way systems um when you manoeuvre, um, and also there's one map where you can get like bonuses.

SPEAKER_02 12:14

Yeah, there's there's basically equipment and stuff on the map that you can use to increase or decrease attack and defence.

SPEAKER_00 12:20

Heidi holes, for example, that you can only go through if you're normal sized, if you're large, like a T-Rex or your giant Alice, for example, Alice in Wonderland, then you can't go through. So, again, there is that element with as different expansions or different m modules come out, it does allow you to change gameplay and bring a fresh element to it. Although I appreciate that's not what you're talking about.

SPEAKER_02 12:41

No, but uh yeah, a little bit. And because of that, I mean there's characters that I like more than others because I find them more interesting to play tactically. Um, I think if you there are certain characters where it can feel a little bit like you just pushing pushing two toys together and going bash bash bash and fighting them, you know? Um and there are some that do lack that little bit of yeah, I don't know, that I'm just looking for that that that sort of depth and that tactical nouse and that bit of extra rules, I guess.

SPEAKER_00 13:12

I don't know that's what this game is.

SPEAKER_02 13:13

No, it's absolutely not, and I'm not marking it down for that at all. Um I think why I mention it is you know, you see miniatures and you see a skirmish game, and if you like me are an ex-Warhammer player, or perhaps you play some of the games, workshop skirmish games and things like that, don't go into this expecting something that it's not. You know, you're not going to get that that level of depth from this. And you know, you you look at look, ooh, miniatures and it's a skirmish game. You might think, oh, the I I just want to make it really clear to people that this is a very lightweight, uh lightweight experience, it's not something that you're gonna have loads of rules chucked at you, there's no sort of progression between games, anything like that. So I just wanted to make that clear.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

Yeah, and I think um from my perspective, uh again, no analysis paralysis, you know, it's very quick, very fluid. Yeah, um, your hand can change from round to round depending on what's going on, so you don't have that same agonizing choice.

SPEAKER_02 14:11

No, you don't.

SPEAKER_00 14:12

Um, for that reason I scored it a nine.

SPEAKER_02 14:14

Yeah, I gave it an eight. Like I said, I'm not gonna mark it down for the things that I said. I just want to make those clear to our listeners. If you you are like me, you might you you there might be something there that's lacking for you that might look like it's it's there, but it's not. I just want people to go in with sort of false expectations. But I think as far as the rule set serves the game really good. Okay. So I say mate.

SPEAKER_00 14:37

Right, so moving on then to shelf life. So this includes things like value for money and replayability.

SPEAKER_01 14:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:44

So as you mentioned, there's lots of different modular expansions for it. I would say that the big boxes are around what, 30 to 35.

SPEAKER_02 14:54

Yeah, the they're usually about 30. And then the two-person ones tend to be low 20s.

SPEAKER_00 15:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:01

Um, so in that sense, I think the bigger boxes, the four player, the the four characters, the four-character, four hero boxes are better value for money than the the two two-character ones. But I think it's a necessary evil because of the way they've approached us. I think if they just sold little blister packs with a hero and a card, uh a deck of cards in it, but while you think like almost like Marvel Champions, then it would be a cheaper proposition. It's the board, I think, because every set, every set comes with everything you need to play, and because of that, it means it's less friendly to uh I want loads of this kind of collector. If you are just going to dabble and grab a few sets, fine, but if you like, I want it all, then it starts to get quite expensive.

SPEAKER_00 15:40

Yeah. And I think we've been burnt in the past by going quite heavy on you know things like LCGs, for example. I'm looking at Marvel Champions, um, where we know we've spent quite a lot of money and we've kind of been a bit completionist until we got to a certain point we were like, actually no, we want to play something else. Yeah. I think that I would reach that point a lot sooner with this because that price point is that much higher. I'm not saying that that doesn't represent good value for money, but I'm saying you're prepared to what I'm prepared to pay to you know have a really vast collection, whereas I think we're more likely to cherry pick ones that we like because the characters particularly appeal to us. Yeah, absolutely. Which is probably how it should be done, really.

SPEAKER_02 16:20

Well, yeah, yeah, probably how it should be done, but yes. Um yeah, absolutely. And I have been cherry-picking with us, you know, that's the approach that we've taken to, and therefore it's it it's one of those things, and I think the the characters play so very differently, and I'm yet to encounter one where I thought this is an F. Um so I think the the there's all almost an amount of um dependence the dependency there where you you know you're gonna get something good.

SPEAKER_01 16:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:48

So they prove through the sets like I I'm willing to occasionally cherry pick something because I'm like, I know this is gonna be fun.

SPEAKER_00 16:55

And yet I don't find any of the characters particularly unbalanced, mainly because their playstyle is so different. And yes, okay, fine, you can exploit someone's weakness because be because that's where your strength lies, but there isn't that unbalanced thing that I've come across in lots of other or sort of similar kind of games.

SPEAKER_02 17:12

Yeah, stuff with a lot of content seems to happen. I think there is situations where you've got a bit of a rock, paper, scissors thing where some characters are way better at fighting other characters and some characters but I don't think we've ever played a game where I was like, this is broken, this character can never be there. I don't think that's the case at all.

SPEAKER_00 17:28

No.

SPEAKER_02 17:28

Um so there has been a lot of thought that's gone into the design.

SPEAKER_00 17:31

Yeah, very much so. What I would say is it definitely needs additional packs or different boxes. I think if we'd have just bought the first one and that was it, I think I would be bored of it quite quickly.

SPEAKER_02 17:47

20-ish games, maybe, and then that'll be a lot of things.

SPEAKER_00 17:49

Yeah, then I think I've been quite bored. But because we can add in different characters, we do things like tournaments, for example. Yeah. So we'll draft our own tournament and it keeps it fresh and it keeps it novel.

SPEAKER_02 18:00

Yeah, it does, yeah. And learning to play the characters is really, really rewarding. But learning to play the same character against the same character would probably get quite boring.

SPEAKER_01 18:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:09

It's that puzzle of oh, I'm not I, you know, I'm not a fay with fighting She-Hulk with Ellie Sattler. You know, but it's it's things like that. Like you start to go, oh, you know, because the characters do play so differently, you're not you're not trying to sell the same puzzle every time. You you are playing a very it's a very different playing field for each character.

SPEAKER_01 18:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:29

So yeah, I gave this a seven.

SPEAKER_00 18:34

Snap.

SPEAKER_02 18:34

Yeah. Because I think in its in its essence, the shelf life is great, but there is an element of pay-to-play in that. So I can't with good conscience give it higher than that because it's you know how how much time would you expect to get out of a£150 ball game, which is roughly what we've spent on so far. And we have a great time, it's great, and I can see myself playing it for ages, but over time we have spent£150.

SPEAKER_01 19:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:01

So it's it's that value for money shelf life thing, yeah, it's good, but beware, you're probably gonna want more than just one.

SPEAKER_00 19:09

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 19:12

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 19:13

Alright, so now our final uh scoring category under the general section is fun. Do you have any fun when you play it?

SPEAKER_02 19:21

I have loads of fun playing this.

SPEAKER_00 19:23

It's so cool.

SPEAKER_02 19:25

It's a blast.

SPEAKER_00 19:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:26

Um, it's really fun. It is so I know I know we've gone through a bit of a patch where we haven't talked that much about theme, but it is so thematic. Like, everything is so thematic, everything's just dripping with theme, like the all the thought that's been put into every single facet of it of playing that character. It's just it's great. It's a it's a it's a nerds-wet dream. This it's it's brilliant.

SPEAKER_00 19:50

Very much fun, and again, you get to do really cool things that you would never thought that you would be able to do. So, for example, having Alice in Wonderland fight, I don't know, Dracula, for example, like just you would never even see that happening, and and it just to be able to do that is is really quite it's it's it's that element of it that's just so much fun, and as you're playing the game, because everything is so thematic, it's great for the theatre of the mind, you can kind of see it happening, there's so many laugh out loud moments, it's just it's it's great.

SPEAKER_02 20:22

Um, as a game, we'll come on to I'll come onto this more in competitiveness, but it's it's it's a tight competitive game. Yeah, it is. You don't feel like there's an awful lot of luck involved.

SPEAKER_00 20:36

Yeah, I mean, I think that depends on your deck. So I have, for example, so I've drawn consistently a really rubbish action. Yeah, it's a card back, and I've not been able to get going. So, you know, there is there is always that element of luck there. Um, but equally, I think because you've got this big white board state, there are things that you can do to mitigate it, you can dance around, you can fuck things up for your opponent instead of actually doing any damage. So you've got options. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 21:05

Um and it's tactical, that would be brain burning.

SPEAKER_00 21:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:09

And yeah, yeah. Um so I mean, I don't know what else there is to say. I've got very little negative to say on the fun side. Um if it's so easy to crack out and play, and it's short that if you're having a board game evening, you can fit in a game or two of this around whatever and again you want to do.

SPEAKER_00 21:28

Easy to pick up and to learn to understand. So again, it fits into a variety of situations.

SPEAKER_02 21:33

I taught a non-board gamer to play this in three minutes.

SPEAKER_00 21:36

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 21:37

Literally three minutes, and he was away. Yeah. So that that goes to show. Um, so yeah, I've I've I've I don't really have any criticisms. Um I'm not going to give out a ten, because I feel that that's very much reserved for the absolute creme de la creme, but I'm gonna give it a nine for fun.

SPEAKER_00 21:54

So I gave it an eight, and the reason I only gave it an eight is because I don't feel we crack it out as much as we would do. If it was a little bit more fun, but that's I think I'm surprised that we don't play more often, I guess. But maybe that's because we're I think we have so much else to play at the moment.

SPEAKER_02 22:12

Yeah. I mean we have just full disclosure, we have had over 20 games of this. So we have played it a lot. Um and it's just it's one of those things that I like having because there's always those moments you're like, I'm not sure what to play. Actually, I've quite fancy a quick game of a match that usually gets the juices flowing as well.

SPEAKER_00 22:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:27

So it does fit that spot for me. But yeah, okay, fair enough.

SPEAKER_00 22:30

Okay. So let's total those scores up and see where we're at.

SPEAKER_02 22:34

So we add all those together, and that gives us a general score of eight.

SPEAKER_00 22:38

Yeah, I think that's pretty fair to be honest. It's a crappy game. Solid game.

SPEAKER_02 22:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:43

Yeah. Okay, so then on to our second set of scoring categories. This is how it plays as a two-player game. And our first one is table talk.

SPEAKER_02 22:51

Yeah, so this is how much uh you you chat during the game, how how much trash talk there is, how interactive it is, how much you get to know the other person playing it. Um this is great.

SPEAKER_00 23:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:04

Yeah, it's a very, very interactive game. You constantly having to interact with the other person. There's an awful amount of trash talk that goes on in our case. Um there's little jives like, oh, I've got to do this, uh how dare you, and all that kind of thing.

SPEAKER_00 23:16

Um there are also um other parts of it, and I might come on to this under competitiveness, where actually you can pull like a card out of your sleeve almost, so you've got like secret hidden tricks that you can do, so you can bolster attacks, for example, or you can negate the special thing that they do on their card, which all make for these fantastic aha moments that just increase that kind of like banter and absolutely, and the other thing I will say is as you get to know your characters better and other characters better, there is a massive poker element to this.

SPEAKER_02 23:48

There's bluffing because you have to put those cards face down. You you can either tease your opponent out with a really soft attack and get them to defend, or you can make them think you're teasing them and actually hit them with a full wallet. There's a great deal of person-to-person bluffing and depth to this, which is one of the secret sources that I wanted to mention under fun, but I thought I'd save it for yeah. Um, there is that adversarial, like, I am going to try and trick you, going on all the way through this, which is fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 24:17

Um, and also, as we've said, each of those cards are or can be very uniquely named or with unique thematic abilities, so being able to read them out is actually like a really cool sort of thing. I I don't think we've you can play this game without talking endlessly at each other.

SPEAKER_02 24:33

No, you quite it's constant chat, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 24:34

Yeah, it's really, really interactive. And again, because it's um quite easy to pick up, again, really great first eight game or kind of game. Um it doesn't really matter what skill level you are because it's a pre-constructive.

SPEAKER_02 24:48

Disagree, we're gonna get onto that in the quick.

SPEAKER_00 24:50

Oh, to a certain extent, I don't think I mean how well you know the heroes, the characters, yes, but actually that getting to know you element, I think this would be a really, really fun game to pull out.

SPEAKER_02 25:02

Oh, absolutely, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:03

It's also really cool to see because obviously I you and I do play quite differently and we have different strategies.

SPEAKER_01 25:09

We do, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:09

Um, it's really cool and fun to find out which characters you prefer and why you like them, yeah. Um, and also how you might play something differently to the way that I would play.

SPEAKER_02 25:18

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:19

Um, and that's that's quite novel, I think, again, when you've been together for like fucking forever.

SPEAKER_02 25:26

Is that the official like title on our next anniversary? Um we should have a party and name it there. Um but there's also an element to this of I don't know how I'll subscribe, but with the IPness of it all, of shared nerdy bonding, which I think is worth mentioning. Like we both love Jurassic Park and we both love Marvel, and there's a there's an element of like that shared space of doing something geeky that you both love, and perhaps nostalgic bringing back memories, things like that, um, which is fantastic, and I've never seen in anything else really. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:04

Um, I think I'm just so used to IP being, you know, like a one and done thing, so not being necessarily shared over a a a series of game uh like modular games. Yeah. And I think that's yeah, again, what makes it cool.

SPEAKER_02 26:20

There's that classic playground thing of like my aspire to mine will beat your T-Rex, you know, there's there's that element of it, which is just really fun. Yeah. It's just cool. So yeah, why did you score it?

SPEAKER_00 26:29

Um, so I scored it an eight.

SPEAKER_02 26:33

It's a nine for me.

SPEAKER_00 26:34

Yeah, I mean, uh looking back, I don't quite know why I didn't score it a nine, really, because Oh, we don't have a live score revision. Yeah, maybe.

SPEAKER_02 26:42

Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:43

I mean, ten it would have to be absolutely spectacular, but I don't know that I've got a huge amount of complaints to make, so yeah, okay, nine.

SPEAKER_02 26:49

I just think as far as competitive games go, I don't think there's You haven't got into that category yet. No, I know, but I don't think there's much better for Tabletalk.

SPEAKER_00 26:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:56

I mean, co-ops are always going to be in a bit of a league of their own. You kind of score those sort of differently and separately, but I think in the competitive space, this one ticks so many boxes.

SPEAKER_00 27:05

Yeah, I suppose if I compare it to things like Nemesis, for example, or even Frosthaven or Gleamhaven, because we've not played Frosthaven, then maybe that's what those are the games that I would score a nine.

SPEAKER_02 27:16

Yeah, but those are both co-op.

SPEAKER_00 27:17

Well, I mean, that's not we're not rating it as table talk for a yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_02 27:23

But my point is as a competitive, purely competitive game, the table talk is up through the chart.

SPEAKER_00 27:28

Like Nemesis is competitive.

SPEAKER_02 27:30

Uh I'm sticking to an eight. Okay, and there's random scoring. I tried to convince, but no, not happening. Alright, fine.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

Alright, okay, so the next one is then competitiveness. Oh my god, yes, and I think we kind of already touched on this. So there are our heart gotcha moments because of the bluffing. There's also an element of if you've got somebody who's melee versus range, there's this whole kind of dance of chasing around each other map where you're like ducking in and ducking back out. Um and there are um so many elements I think where you're and then ultimately you are just hitting each other with big sticks or swords, you know.

SPEAKER_02 28:08

Yeah, but it doesn't feel like that when you're playing it. There's a lot more, there's a lot more to it. And you can get better at your character, you can learn to play your character, and the more you play that character, the better you will get. You can learn the other characters, and the more you understand the other characters, the better you will get at playing them. And if you do that together, this starts to get really juicy.

SPEAKER_01 28:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:32

Um I like I said earlier, I taught somebody to play this in in three minutes. Um I when we played, he did not stand a chance. So there is an element here where you can get good at this game, but also you need to approach with a bit of caution if you've got a newbie you like said uh great for newbies, if you're playing with somebody experienced, there is a huge skill gap, like a massive skill gap.

SPEAKER_00 28:57

But I don't think it'll take you particularly long to catch up and become competent.

SPEAKER_02 29:01

No, no, no, I I agree with you there, but I think that is to its its its benefit because a competitive game you should be able to get better at, it should be a skill thing, not necessarily a a like thing. Um so that was kind of the proof and the pudding there when I did have that experience. So yeah, I mean the other thing I always say about competitive games is is it satisfying to win?

SPEAKER_00 29:23

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 29:24

Yeah, you feel like you've actually beaten the other person, you know.

SPEAKER_00 29:28

And sometimes it can get really down close to the wire, and you really are just dancing with each other, trying to get the right combination at the right time, um, or trying to whittle whittle down their cards.

SPEAKER_02 29:38

Before you run out of time, yes, as well. Because there are certain characters that burn through their deck, so you don't do what you need to do in that time, you're your toast.

SPEAKER_00 29:45

T-Rex is a really good example of that. T-Rex stomping around is probably But again if that's thematically, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_02 29:51

You run away from this thing and hide for long enough, you're you're gonna get it.

SPEAKER_00 29:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:54

So yeah, it's it's it's fantastic from the standpoint of competitiveness, and I've given it a nine as a result.

SPEAKER_00 30:00

Yep, I gave it a nine as well.

SPEAKER_02 30:01

Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_00 30:03

Alright, then finally on to our last scoring criteria from the two player scale. Um, scalability. So um, do you get FOMO? Does this work at two player? Um, or would more players help? And straight off the bat, this game works really well as a two-player game. It is fun to play as a two-player game. Do I wish we had more players playing it? Yes.

SPEAKER_02 30:30

I'm gonna throw a span on the works, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:32

Oh yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_02 30:34

Do I wish we had a third person? No. Do I wish we had two more people? Yes. Because I think Is it only up to four players? Only up to four.

SPEAKER_00 30:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:45

I think a three-player game of this would not be great. And the reason.

SPEAKER_00 30:50

We've played three-player games of this and it's been great.

SPEAKER_02 30:52

No, we haven't. We've never played a three-player game of this.

SPEAKER_00 30:54

Yes, we have.

SPEAKER_02 30:55

Well, let's phone a friend then, shall we? So, through the magic of editing, and uh I'm sure anybody in a marriage will recognise this, we just had to phone a friend to confirm whether we have played this with them or not. And uh one of the three times a year I'm allowed to be right, it turns out I'm right. So we'll carry on from there, shall we? We have not played this with three players. Um and so on to my original point. I don't think this will work very well with three.

SPEAKER_00 31:24

Again, I respectfully disagree.

SPEAKER_02 31:26

Because I think with three, somebody is going to get somebody's gonna smell the other two are gonna smell blood in the water, gang up on the the the weaker one, get rid of them, and then they're gonna have to sit there watching you play the game.

SPEAKER_00 31:36

Yeah, so I disagree with that on the basis that one game times run quite short, so they're not gonna start twiddling their thumbs for for long. But second of all, because of the way in which you can move around the map, particularly with some of the later maps that allow you to have one-way systems, hidey holes, escape routes, all this sort of thing, that actually you can move yourself out the way. Um, and I think that basically adds a level of depth or fun, and again, more trash talk and more banter, and also there's nothing to stop you from whittling someone's health right down and saying, Tell you what, you know, you stay in it, let's gang up on him.

SPEAKER_02 32:07

And yeah, I suppose that would add to it. I suppose. I think it'd be great with four players. I think four players would be brilliant. Um, but yeah, I I I disagree with you on three. But again, we haven't tried it, so you know, it's all sort of conjecture at this point.

SPEAKER_01 32:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:23

Um but given that I think it works remarkably well as a two-player game, perfectly well as a two-player game. So I think from the scalability perspective, I give it an eight.

SPEAKER_00 32:34

Yeah, so because I do think it would be a lot more fun with more people, I scored it a four. That does not mean to say that I do not think it works and that it is not fun, because I hope I made it clear to you that I absolutely do find it's an amazing game.

SPEAKER_02 32:49

Just I wish you really want to you want a more multiplayer experience than this, which is fine, fair enough. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 32:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:58

Alright, let's top the scores up. Right, so that gives us an overall rating of 7.6. So we round, as always, so that rounds it up to an eight.

SPEAKER_00 33:07

Yeah, I'm really happy with that. I think it's it's a really solid game and really good final. Just before we finish, who's your favourite character then that you've played so far?

SPEAKER_02 33:16

Medusa. Which I never would have thought. I always thought it would be one of the IP ones, but I enjoy playing Medusa the most. How about you?

SPEAKER_00 33:23

I like Dr. Ellie Sattler.

SPEAKER_02 33:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:27

Mainly because she's got Malcolm with a shirt out. She has had the shirt off.

SPEAKER_02 33:33

Yeah, no, definitely. Um, but yeah, I mean I'd I'd like a lot of them, but Medusa's always been my my clear favourite.

SPEAKER_00 33:39

And woman shall inherit the earth.

SPEAKER_02 33:43

Right, on that note, thank you very much for joining us. That this gets an overwhelming board with each other stamp of approval. So go and seek out whatever character you uh gravitate towards most and give it a go because it is a really fun time. But until next time, be good to each other, have fun, and play lots of board games.