So sit back, grab your favorite beverage and make sure you've got your breadcrumbs because we're about to take a look at The Princess and The Goblin!
As always, here's an excerpt:
"There, in the dark, she discovered her friend, the miner boy Curdie, who had been trapped while searching for clues to the goblins' evil plans. Now, together they must make a daring escape. Can you retrace Irene's steps through the dark maze of caverns, using only her special golden thread as your guide? Can you discover clues to save the kingdom? Or will the goblins catch you first?"
The Princess and the Goblin is a great family game by Bellwether Games which is a bit of a tile laying, push your luck and memory game for 1-4 players and takes roughly 10 - 20 minutes to play.
In it, players will be playing the part of the princess who has been given a golden thread which she finds out is magic and leads straight to the goblin kingdom.
To start the game, players set it up as per the rules with all the tiles face down in a stack in the center of the table. This stack is called the "Mountain". After that you draw, face down, 4 tiles and place them to the top, bottom, left and right. These are considered "The Caves".
From here on out, players will be choosing to do one of two things, Explore or Escape. To explore in the game a player will draw the top card off of the mountain in the center, take a look at it to themselves and place it in an open spot besides the face down cave tiles of their choice. Then, the player that places the tile gets to peek at any tiles directly adjacent to the tile just laid.
To keep track of certain tiles, once players get to see any of the tiles they drew or placed next to, they can place a single "breadcrumb" once per turn.
Once a player thinks they have enough of an idea of the tiles laid out that they've peeked at and laid breadcrumbs on, they announce at the beginning of their turn that they are going to escape.
When a player announces they are going to escape they can NOT go back to exploring. From this point on, the escaping player(s) choose a cave tile OR the top mountain tile and flip it over. If the signs on the flipped tile match the signs on the tile they have in front of them they can place it next to it and continue flipping tiles.
Once they come to a tile they cannot match up to their previously laid tile their turn ends. The OTHER way their turn ends is if they flip over a goblin tile. In this case, the player who did so must return all of their tiles minus the Goblin Fortress tile to the caves and start anew.
Now, I've left a little bit out of the game here and there so as not to entirely spoil it so make sure you take a look at the kickstarter!
On to my Opinion of the game:
Game Art: The art on the prototype is wonderful and playful. The art on the finished game is AMAZING looking and really captures the story quite well. There are plenty of diagrams to aid you in setup as well as gameplay in the rule book and they all do a wonderful job at making the game easy to understand should you have trouble with something.
Gameplay: The gameplay of this game is wonderful as well. It's very easy to learn and quick to play. I found that after one game, my daughter eagerly wanted to play again which is a nice thing for me because she doesn't often want to replay a game right away. Not to mention SOLO Gaming is ALWAYS a plus in my book!
The mixture of tile laying, luck pushing and memory really makes this game appeal to me as a wonderful learning resource as well. It's a great way to sharpen your memory skills if they're starting to lack as mine are and the tile laying is a great touch for building up the board as well as your path home.
Game Quality: Now, I'd like to be clear on this one. I received a prototype copy of the game. The quality I received was in no way a reflection of the final quality of the game. Now that I've got that out of the way, My copy as a prototype is great. It has the playful and drawn looking art that I love when it comes to prototypes which gives the feeling of hand made.
If you take a look at the kickstarter you can see that the final quality is GREAT.
So, should you buy this game? If you're looking for a great game for you and your family, YES! If you're looking for a fun filler game that has a "take that" element, YES! If you're looking for a game with a lot of depth or strategy then you may want to pass on this one but I STILL suggest you give it a look!
If you think you like what you see or hear about this game, it is currently on kickstarter with a mere 6 DAYS LEFT so make sure to grab your copy while you can!
CHECK IT OUT ON KICKSTARTER HERE!
Check our Bellwether Games' other awesome products on their site RIGHT HERE!
As always, thank you for reading and take care! :)
-Tim
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