I finally received This War of Mine the board game early this week, I backed the game through Kickstarter over a year ago. This is board game based on the PC (and now Android/iOS app) version which I thought was one of the best games I've played, and it is extremely true to the digital version. You can read my review of the PC game HERE.
I've been playing this game solo and with Caroline for most of the week and we managed to survive through the entire campaign once, so I figured it was time for a review.
Basic idea of the game
Just like the PC game the board game version is about players controlling a small group of civilians trying to survive war in an abandoned building. During the day you try to make the building a bit more habitable by clearing debris, building furniture, water collectors, animal traps and boarding up holes in the walls to increase security.
During the night phase you can send people from your group out to scavenge locations in town for supplies and perform trade. Scavenging is always combined with a risk of running into the wrong kind of people – be it soldiers, thugs, hobos or other survivors. You may also run into regular civilians hiding in locations.
At the same time as members of your group are scavenging the town, your own house regularly comes under attack (from other people and raiders also scavenging!). You have to post guards, arm yourself and board up holes in the walls to prevent injury and theft.
At the start of each new day a card from the "event deck" is drawn, it tells you the main event going on during the upcoming day. Events could be artillery fire hitting your house, cold weather getting worse, spreading of sickness in the town, items becoming more scarce etc. The game ends when the "event deck" runs out, which is randomly determined as the final couple of cards in the event deck include one "War is over" card. In the basic campaign you have to survive with at least 1 member of your original group of survivors in order to win.
That's the basic idea of the game.
Check my blog for the complete, long and comprehensive review of the game along with 49 pictures of the game and the components:
link
