I understand your point of view and some of your feed back is valid but I had a blast playing this with my kids. And it was the gateway I needed to get them on to RPGs. We played through it a few times before it got old.
Why do people insist on reviewing this game as something it's not? There is no shortage of full fledged "kid friendly" TTRPGs if that's what you're looking for. This isn't that, so why are people expecting it to be?
Point of view is one thing. But in the context of a well delivered review it’s beneficial to take into account the level someone enters the game through. Would I play it with serious D&D fans no, have I played it with my kids who absolutely loved it, absolutely! Any chance to get them started on the path. Step back a minute, take yourself less seriously and ask yourself who the intended market was. They could do a version that was way truer to form. Also they could have done nothing and expected kids to jump in to the full game how we did. Unfortunately their brains are running at a different speed and sometimes a few hours of solid gameplay is all you can ask. Don’t hate your review, just dislike the narrowness of it.
I disagree. As a first game for my 10yo he loved it. You obviously went into this review wanting to hate the game. Maybe from your advanced dungeons and dragons experience you don't appreciate a game with colourful artwork, fun tasks and easy to learn game mechanics.
I think its good for much younger kids, 4-7. Making decisions with the odd encounters is fun and demonstrates cause/effect and consequences for kids. The reactions to traps, etc. while using whats in your backpack sparks creativity with kids. We had a laugh at the cards and the silly item cards. It got some chuckles with the dad joke puns in the game. The “game” of just dice chucking gets old fast, so the encounter decisions breaks it up. Also, its easy to modify it to shorten the length. No reason you need to go through all 4 levels. Its a game for a parent to play with young kids. The 10+ on the box is misleading. I’ve never played D&D, though I crushed the Baldurs Gate Saga in my youth. Its a good young kids game. Grade it on that scale and its solid.
Its good for young kids. The dice chucking is meh, but the decision space with the encounters and the making reactions using what they have in their packs helps spark creativity with young kids. My 5 year old enjoyed it, and I enjoyed getting her reaction to the encounters.
I was hoping for a "Jaws of the Lion" treatment of the big games (Legend of Drizzt, Wrath of Ashardalon, Castle Raventloft, etc). A simpler, cheaper versión but with similar mechanics... This is just... Way to simple 😅
I appreciate your review and always interested to hear your opinion. For a minute there I thought you were about to recommend an alternative. Did I miss it?
I don't know if anyone else has already mentioned this but... this game is great for younger players, or for using as a DM-run DnD game, or for using the components in other games (including other DnD games). I actually like the artwork on the tiles because it was child friendly (maybe I'm a DnD heretic for this, as I imagine the more seasoned players don't like the cartoony style). The event/monster cards are good (the final boss monsters, and heroes, could use a little more variety between them, that is true), and the child-friendly material and artwork is still horror and fantasy themed enough. I like the figures too. On its own, for adult / more experienced players, it's pretty simple and not very challenging. But it's a good sandbox game. What someone thinks of the game seems to depend on what he/she was expecting.
The problem is the target gamers age for this game. The box says 10 and up. I would put between 4 and 6 years old, supervised by an adult for this one. And even then, the attention span of toddlers would not last the whole game. So I completely agree, this game is a waste of cardboard.
This is the better comment than Roy. It went well with my 5 year old, and its super easy to modify its length to make it play shorter. It was good for sparking creativity to make reactions with her pack, and make decisions in the silly encounters. We share all rewards from killing monsters and I deliberately avoid drawing too many monsters because it gets old dice chucking. Theres so many encounter cards that weve played 10 times or so (shortened games) and havent drawn the same ones.
IDK, the middle school kids I teach would probably get a kick out of this and they're 12-13. There are certainly much better games out there though so I wouldn't touch this with a ten foot pole
@@BoardGamesBricksHobbies Average middle bschool kids are basically chimpanzees in shorter human bodies though. Taught 7th-8th grade. I was once a Middle Schooler too, so I can say with experience.
Competing for coins despite it being a co-op game does feel like something from D&D, but it's the worst part of D&D. Also, WotC/Hasbro printing cards that curl? Color me not surprised.
I bought this when it came out, hoping it would be a gateway for D&D with my son. I read the rules and saw that it’s essentially a race to the “boss.” Too formulaic and essentially shows that you don’t fight strong monsters until “the end”, which I personally detest. Anyway, after reading the rules, I shelved it. I decided the best way to get him into D&D is to…PLAY D&D!
Actually some of the random encounters and mini bosses can be rather challenging, you can accidently run into Owl bears, hags and banshees. If you have any small children new to table top, give it a try!
We had fun playing in my family, but we basically scrapped the rules. I was the exclusive DM and I used the cards as inspiration and just make stuff up to make combat more interesting. As written, this game is trash.
This isn't role-playing. Even in my goofiest RPG session, I never felt the urge to fart out a song or rip off overused Monty Python quotes. This is a bad party game masquerading as a board game with a theme pasted on to make D&D collectors FOMO buy it. Throw it off Tom's roof.
Great game for kids 10 and under to get them started to table top role playing, very silly entry level and that's all it needs to be. If it was any more complicated than this, my small child wouldn't be able to play... my 8 year old has really been enjoying it. When she's a few years older, I'll grab the D&D starter kit and upgrade the experience.
Thank you for your honest and through review! You are exactly right there is a huge catalog of source material for D&D and the development failed to capitalize on it. No passion and love for RPG's are felt with this game sadly.
What's wrong with Ravenloft and Legends of Drizzt as starter D and D adventure games? Parents can help the kids with reading the cards and explaining the rules and kids can have fun exploring and fighting monsters. If needed, simpler versions of these could have been produced for very young kids. Why the need for vulgarity? This is board games sinking to the lowest level. My family and I have dozens of wonderful games, some ready made for children, some heavily complex for adults, but I cant believe this game will enter people's collections. 1 or 2 out of 10 sounds about right.
I thought it would be a quick simplistic rpg entry level game to try with new players. I was wrong, we didnt enjoy it, wont play it again. I think this would put people off D&D moving forward if this was their first experience. Sorry may be good for some but I would avoid it if your not under 8. Good review.
Ya, I don't really want my kids to be doing or saying some of the stuff written on those cards. Hard pass. I'm sure they'll come up with something awesome soon, D&D seems to be surging in popularity again.
The silly, singing, farting, and quipping aspects are an instant turn off. It's trying to be quirky game when it's not that type of game at all. Thanks for the review, gonna avoid.
Had similar thoughts in my own review. Went a little deeper into how and why this game fails. Enjoyed your take on it as well. ua-cam.com/video/flSvrpPBzhs/v-deo.html
As a queer person i don't particularly care if people wear stuff that isn't typical of their gender, but we're long overdue as a society in seeing black nail polish as gender neutral. Same with black eyeliner. Roy is rocking the black nails here!
I mean, i dont think this is for rpg vets. I think its for people who are interested into trying out dnd without fully committing to it
I understand your point of view and some of your feed back is valid but I had a blast playing this with my kids. And it was the gateway I needed to get them on to RPGs. We played through it a few times before it got old.
Are you kids playing Baldur's Gate 3 now?
No way the themes in that game are to adult. I am enjoying it though
Thanks for saving me time and money.
Why do people insist on reviewing this game as something it's not? There is no shortage of full fledged "kid friendly" TTRPGs if that's what you're looking for. This isn't that, so why are people expecting it to be?
Point of view is one thing. But in the context of a well delivered review it’s beneficial to take into account the level someone enters the game through. Would I play it with serious D&D fans no, have I played it with my kids who absolutely loved it, absolutely! Any chance to get them started on the path.
Step back a minute, take yourself less seriously and ask yourself who the intended market was. They could do a version that was way truer to form. Also they could have done nothing and expected kids to jump in to the full game how we did. Unfortunately their brains are running at a different speed and sometimes a few hours of solid gameplay is all you can ask.
Don’t hate your review, just dislike the narrowness of it.
I disagree. As a first game for my 10yo he loved it. You obviously went into this review wanting to hate the game. Maybe from your advanced dungeons and dragons experience you don't appreciate a game with colourful artwork, fun tasks and easy to learn game mechanics.
We do NOT go into reviews wanting to hate games. Why on earth would we have our jobs if we did that?
Enjoyed your "welp" face right before you went to the overview! Too funny
I think its good for much younger kids, 4-7. Making decisions with the odd encounters is fun and demonstrates cause/effect and consequences for kids. The reactions to traps, etc. while using whats in your backpack sparks creativity with kids. We had a laugh at the cards and the silly item cards. It got some chuckles with the dad joke puns in the game.
The “game” of just dice chucking gets old fast, so the encounter decisions breaks it up.
Also, its easy to modify it to shorten the length. No reason you need to go through all 4 levels.
Its a game for a parent to play with young kids. The 10+ on the box is misleading.
I’ve never played D&D, though I crushed the Baldurs Gate Saga in my youth.
Its a good young kids game. Grade it on that scale and its solid.
My kids and I have fun with this as light RPG.
It’s pretty streamlined just to get to where the boss is but the ‘semi-coop’ feel is discouraging.
When we reset an enemy's life, does he still make the last counterattack?
Bought this for a family night. I agree with this review.
I’m sorry I was unable to save you! I’m hoping to keep others from your pain!
@@EpicGamingNight Ha! It would have been okay if there were young kids. But teenagers and adults won't get much joy from it.
Its good for young kids. The dice chucking is meh, but the decision space with the encounters and the making reactions using what they have in their packs helps spark creativity with young kids.
My 5 year old enjoyed it, and I enjoyed getting her reaction to the encounters.
I was hoping for a "Jaws of the Lion" treatment of the big games (Legend of Drizzt, Wrath of Ashardalon, Castle Raventloft, etc). A simpler, cheaper versión but with similar mechanics... This is just... Way to simple 😅
I appreciate your review and always interested to hear your opinion. For a minute there I thought you were about to recommend an alternative. Did I miss it?
A Gamma World dungeon crawler would be fun, as long as there’s a hoop fighting you in there.
WotC is just knocking it out of the park lately ain't they? (yes this is deep sarcasm for anyone confused).
I don't know if anyone else has already mentioned this but... this game is great for younger players, or for using as a DM-run DnD game, or for using the components in other games (including other DnD games). I actually like the artwork on the tiles because it was child friendly (maybe I'm a DnD heretic for this, as I imagine the more seasoned players don't like the cartoony style). The event/monster cards are good (the final boss monsters, and heroes, could use a little more variety between them, that is true), and the child-friendly material and artwork is still horror and fantasy themed enough. I like the figures too. On its own, for adult / more experienced players, it's pretty simple and not very challenging. But it's a good sandbox game. What someone thinks of the game seems to depend on what he/she was expecting.
So D&D stands for Dumb and Dumber with this one?
The problem is the target gamers age for this game. The box says 10 and up. I would put between 4 and 6 years old, supervised by an adult for this one. And even then, the attention span of toddlers would not last the whole game. So I completely agree, this game is a waste of cardboard.
This is the better comment than Roy. It went well with my 5 year old, and its super easy to modify its length to make it play shorter. It was good for sparking creativity to make reactions with her pack, and make decisions in the silly encounters. We share all rewards from killing monsters and I deliberately avoid drawing too many monsters because it gets old dice chucking.
Theres so many encounter cards that weve played 10 times or so (shortened games) and havent drawn the same ones.
IDK, the middle school kids I teach would probably get a kick out of this and they're 12-13. There are certainly much better games out there though so I wouldn't touch this with a ten foot pole
@@BoardGamesBricksHobbies Average middle bschool kids are basically chimpanzees in shorter human bodies though. Taught 7th-8th grade. I was once a Middle Schooler too, so I can say with experience.
This feels extremely "hello fellow kids"...
Competing for coins despite it being a co-op game does feel like something from D&D, but it's the worst part of D&D.
Also, WotC/Hasbro printing cards that curl? Color me not surprised.
So sad. Gary Gygax is weeping in his grave.
He’ll have to roll 4+ to weep.
That unicorn was "Great Value" Rarity
Wow, Hasbro has really milking their D&D and Magic licences lately. Is there anything they won't slap it on to at this point?
Sounds like it's somewhat of a D&D version of Ravine: a party game pretending to be something else.
I bought this when it came out, hoping it would be a gateway for D&D with my son. I read the rules and saw that it’s essentially a race to the “boss.” Too formulaic and essentially shows that you don’t fight strong monsters until “the end”, which I personally detest. Anyway, after reading the rules, I shelved it. I decided the best way to get him into D&D is to…PLAY D&D!
Actually some of the random encounters and mini bosses can be rather challenging, you can accidently run into Owl bears, hags and banshees. If you have any small children new to table top, give it a try!
We had fun playing in my family, but we basically scrapped the rules. I was the exclusive DM and I used the cards as inspiration and just make stuff up to make combat more interesting. As written, this game is trash.
I guess I'll stick to my D&D board game system games.
Like you I was also hoping for a lighter version of D&D to play with my kids.
I wish I could play this game.
The only thing I can see is if this was for kids who just wanted a simple something to mess around with and learn role play concepts
I've seen it in the shops. I like the art on the box cover.
Thanks for the video Roy!
It sounds interesting as a general board game
This isn't role-playing. Even in my goofiest RPG session, I never felt the urge to fart out a song or rip off overused Monty Python quotes. This is a bad party game masquerading as a board game with a theme pasted on to make D&D collectors FOMO buy it. Throw it off Tom's roof.
Great game for kids 10 and under to get them started to table top role playing, very silly entry level and that's all it needs to be. If it was any more complicated than this, my small child wouldn't be able to play... my 8 year old has really been enjoying it. When she's a few years older, I'll grab the D&D starter kit and upgrade the experience.
Are you being silly? Be silly!….. sillier!…… and smile NOW!
Thank you for your honest and through review! You are exactly right there is a huge catalog of source material for D&D and the development failed to capitalize on it. No passion and love for RPG's are felt with this game sadly.
That's supposed to be "on brand"? That's a very slippery slope ...
I am now hoping WotC/Hasbro loses enough money to get them to sell D&D to someone who actually cares.
They would only do this If they went out of business.
Magic (and wotc in general) is basically keeping Hasbro afloat these days.
Seems like utter rubbish.
Too silly for my tastes.
A real shame that this one is an apparent dud. I guess the best D&D introduction is probably still the Starter Set to play the actual RPG.
What's wrong with Ravenloft and Legends of Drizzt as starter D and D adventure games? Parents can help the kids with reading the cards and explaining the rules and kids can have fun exploring and fighting monsters. If needed, simpler versions of these could have been produced for very young kids. Why the need for vulgarity? This is board games sinking to the lowest level. My family and I have dozens of wonderful games, some ready made for children, some heavily complex for adults, but I cant believe this game will enter people's collections. 1 or 2 out of 10 sounds about right.
Well ... that's an interesting interlocking tile shape.
Hey, nice fresh cost of paint on the nails!
I thought it would be a quick simplistic rpg entry level game to try with new players. I was wrong, we didnt enjoy it, wont play it again. I think this would put people off D&D moving forward if this was their first experience. Sorry may be good for some but I would avoid it if your not under 8. Good review.
A game so obviously developed with an eye toward expansions 😂😂😂😂😂. Bought it for buttons and still feel fleeced.
Bummer, was hoping this would be a good intro.
Ya, I don't really want my kids to be doing or saying some of the stuff written on those cards. Hard pass. I'm sure they'll come up with something awesome soon, D&D seems to be surging in popularity again.
yeah didnt like it i wanted to play a dnd game on a board but i was pretty dissapointed not even the best dungeon msasters can save this one LOL
Fart humor and my little pony. D&D in 2022 folks. Man and wahmyn babies won, game destroyed.
Three damage!
The silly, singing, farting, and quipping aspects are an instant turn off. It's trying to be quirky game when it's not that type of game at all. Thanks for the review, gonna avoid.
I hate it too.
*Faaaart
Had similar thoughts in my own review. Went a little deeper into how and why this game fails. Enjoyed your take on it as well. ua-cam.com/video/flSvrpPBzhs/v-deo.html
Wow, this game is atrocious. Thanks for saving my money.
Oof.
Is he wearing nail polish?
He almost always does. This is just rare footage of Roy's nail polish (mostly) unchipped.
@@Keldroc I loled at the last part! 😂
I occasionally wear nail polish because I think it looks cool on camera in gameplay videos and Lego builds. People can do what they want 🤷
As a queer person i don't particularly care if people wear stuff that isn't typical of their gender, but we're long overdue as a society in seeing black nail polish as gender neutral. Same with black eyeliner.
Roy is rocking the black nails here!
Just awful. As a 30+ year D&D player, I weep.
Fart jokes?!?!
No thanks!
Out of 128 cards, there is one fart joke. Still unnecessary, but not part of a theme!