Watching this again as I just backed the reprint on KS. I initially had gripes with the art style, but the gameplay has me truly intrigued and excited to play. And seeing more content around this game actually helped the lighter theme grow on me. I just hope the randomized initiative doesn’t completely thwart my plans like modifier cards do in Gloomhaven lol
Several people on our Discord ended up creating an "initiative row" that doesn't change round to round. That's an easy variant to try if you don't love the bag.
So my kids and i love Dungeon Crawlers. Two girls, 15 and 13 and one boy 9 1/2. We just finished playing Gloomhaven JOTL and WANT to play Gloomhaven "next" but ate going to wait on Gloomhaven 2.0 to come out which is like March 2025 or something. I missed backing it and am thinking of juat waiting until its on Amazon or I can get it directly from Cephalophair next summer. Anyway, i had thought of getting Tales from The Red Dragon Inn in the meantime. School starts back in a week and we won't have 20 hours a week to game anymore. (I teach at their school so we're all home all summer together.) Anyway, from what I've heard and this video it sounds like it might be just the thing to tide us over until GH 2.0 is released. Thanks so much for a great video! I'm gonna watch your playthrough next.
I would've totally written this off as I can't stand the original red dragon inn game, but it looks like this does a whole lot of right! Seems like it really balances puzzly and fun. I like the dedicated board for each map (it's what almost got me into gloomhaven with jaws of the lion, but i ultimately backed out)
It’s so funny to me that this company made the original RDI, this ultra competitive take that game, and followed it up with this one and Battle for Greyport, two of my favorite cooperative games 😅
Got this fulfilled a little while ago and been playing it almost for straight days for the last week. Really one of the best game structures we've had for this type of game, possibly the best rules and reference books in any board game I've played so far. A few of my downsides are (1) component quality, good minis but not great printing and quality on the rest of the components, and also the maps do feel a little too thin (2) the narrative has a bit too much dialog that do contain important narrative information in some places and just goofy talking in other places. For this type of game, I would prefer a lot less dialog in the narrative, or prompts asking players to come up with their own dialog or responses to narrative cues.
I keep seeing this game at my local game store and I’m so intrigued. I also have a 7 and 10 year-old (and a few others) that I think would love this! Keep up the good work!
@@OneStopCoopShop I feel like I'd still use the bag, but draw them all at once at the beginning of each round. That way it's still random each round, but you know when you're going, so combos can be orchestrated.
I'm superglad you found your one true dungeon crawler, Mike! 🥳 I don't think it's for me though. I'm a more thematically-immersive dungeon crawler fan, and despite there being a campaign and story in this one, it still looks like it focuses more on the tactical gameplay puzzle than the overall feeling of being on an adventure. Also, the visual style is too light for my tastes. It being "D&D high fantasy"-ish is actually a drawback personally. Still, if you're just getting into dungeon crawlers or like to keep it casual in both tone and gameplay, then I can see this being a success. Thanks, man! Keep exploring!
Yeah, I'd compare this one to playing D&D with a GM who wants to get to the hack & slash as quickly as possible. The story is THERE, and it's pretty FUN, but there isn't much exploration of story, no branching choices, etc. You read some stuff, kill some stuff, repeat :)
Would you say 7 is sort of the minimum age for playing? My oldest is 5 and she's starting to get into the young adventurers books for DnD that I picked up and I was looking at games like CoraQuest.
My 7 year-old barely games with us, usually. He's able to play a bit of Small World, a bit of Rallyman, and of course more basic kids' games like Gulo Gulo. The fact that he can do well with this one surprised me, and he still needs handholding from time to time. I think it would be tough for a 5 or 6 year-old. Coraquest is definitely MUCH more straightforward. Also, the scenarios here take longer, so attention span becomes a factor.
Gloomhaven light? What's the set up time? We played gloomhaven but kinda quit because of the setup time. Although we really love the gameplay and scenario aspect. This game seems to have very similar gameplay elements but everything is a bit faster.
Definitely much faster than Gloomhaven. There’s little to no terrain to set up and no enemy decks to search for. You do still need to get the cards for each hero and set up all the standees of course
We’ve never minded having one set, but if you roll a ton of exploding crits you will have to keep track of your total damage as to reroll the same dice
Thanks for the review! Will have to look for this in retail. I'm curious...were there any games that got your 7-year-old engaged with the hobby now or when he was younger? My 4 year old has been into some games but he seems to not have the patience or interest in learning rules currently (and he's obsessed with Legos, which doesn't help). Just curious what your experience has been or if any games seemed to work at that age. Looking forward to playing this one with him down the road!
So the odd thing is he’s been kind of against playing hobby games. His brother was easy to get interested, but the youngest often refuses to play, walks away halfway through a game, etc. This one, for some reason, really grabbed his attention. I think it’s maybe partially because he’s started playing tears of the kingdom (new Zelda game on switch), and it’s gotten him into an RPG leveling mindset, so suddenly a crawler with power ups and items seems really cool to him? Hard to say!
Looking to get a dungeon crawler or campaign game for my son and I (10 year old). Has BG experience. Looked at kinfire cronicles but cant get it in canada. Then jaws of the lion, but maybe too heavy for him. Is this the ticket you think?
It has been for my family. Kinfire Chronicles is also good for that age range if availability opens up. Jaws of the Lion didn’t hold my kids’ interest as much.
Does your 7 year old read and understand the cards in their own? Or do you explain it and they remember? My kids are at the early stage of reading on their own, so I still feel kinda stuck on no or limited language games.
My 7 year old is getting there with reading, but since you have the same selection of abilities for a few scenarios in a row (and the game slowly adds to them as you go), he hasn’t had much trouble. Now that’s only with me giving him the most straightforward melee tank character, to be clear, and him not swapping items and abilities much between battles :)
Barry, just a suggestion to make one comment with several questions, instead of a whole bunch of comments with one question each. It makes it easier for us to respond. That being said: "Can I see them releasing side quests" - No idea! I hope the game does well and they make more stuff. "How does it compare to Altar Quest" - Not very much, except that they are both dungeon crawlers and both have forgiving dice systems with exploding crits. Altar Quest has no story in the main mode, has room exploration and random spawns, is all about card management and combos, and isn't very well balanced unfortunately. "Do you think Pooky is too powerful?" - Not in my experience so far. Certainly fun though! "One off mode" - This is pretty easy to do. You just have to unlock some cards from the Vault and then you are ready to play any mission you want.
It is in the process of delivering from the Kickstarter, then it will be available in retail afterwards. So the “out of stock” doesn’t mean much yet I think :)
Just to be clear, the pro/mix/con part only refers to my tastes and preferences. The idea of the reviews (hopefully they do this) is to discuss the key parts of a game so you can figure out if they will be pros or cons for you instead of me :) So hopefully the answer to that is yes, and you love the game!
Pretty quickly, since all the relevant info is generally printed on the map. When you start a new act of the game you do have to punch and organize standees and such, but then those same enemies are used for the next 4-6 scenarios.
Which Descent? I like red dragon more than any of them, but if you mean the most recent descent with the app and all that, then the gulf is even wider. That one was sadly a disappointment for my group (though I’m still going to check out the upcoming expansion and hopefully it improves the experience). But your opinion is yours and mine is mine, so no worries if they don’t match 😅
Watching this again as I just backed the reprint on KS. I initially had gripes with the art style, but the gameplay has me truly intrigued and excited to play. And seeing more content around this game actually helped the lighter theme grow on me. I just hope the randomized initiative doesn’t completely thwart my plans like modifier cards do in Gloomhaven lol
Several people on our Discord ended up creating an "initiative row" that doesn't change round to round. That's an easy variant to try if you don't love the bag.
@@OneStopCoopShopgood to know! I’ll give it a shot if the random initiative doesn’t feel fun
So my kids and i love Dungeon Crawlers. Two girls, 15 and 13 and one boy 9 1/2. We just finished playing Gloomhaven JOTL and WANT to play Gloomhaven "next" but ate going to wait on Gloomhaven 2.0 to come out which is like March 2025 or something. I missed backing it and am thinking of juat waiting until its on Amazon or I can get it directly from Cephalophair next summer.
Anyway, i had thought of getting Tales from The Red Dragon Inn in the meantime. School starts back in a week and we won't have 20 hours a week to game anymore. (I teach at their school so we're all home all summer together.)
Anyway, from what I've heard and this video it sounds like it might be just the thing to tide us over until GH 2.0 is released. Thanks so much for a great video! I'm gonna watch your playthrough next.
Jesus. Now I am very excited for my copy to arrive. :) Thanks for the review.
Hope you love it too!
This sounds perfect for us. Thanks!
What??? A 5 pro in a row??? Waiting for my copy!!!
Just for my tastes! Won’t be all pros for everyone ;)
I would've totally written this off as I can't stand the original red dragon inn game, but it looks like this does a whole lot of right! Seems like it really balances puzzly and fun. I like the dedicated board for each map (it's what almost got me into gloomhaven with jaws of the lion, but i ultimately backed out)
It’s so funny to me that this company made the original RDI, this ultra competitive take that game, and followed it up with this one and Battle for Greyport, two of my favorite cooperative games 😅
I love both RDI and Battle for Greyport. I’m so glad they made a solid co-op crawler!
Got this fulfilled a little while ago and been playing it almost for straight days for the last week. Really one of the best game structures we've had for this type of game, possibly the best rules and reference books in any board game I've played so far. A few of my downsides are (1) component quality, good minis but not great printing and quality on the rest of the components, and also the maps do feel a little too thin (2) the narrative has a bit too much dialog that do contain important narrative information in some places and just goofy talking in other places. For this type of game, I would prefer a lot less dialog in the narrative, or prompts asking players to come up with their own dialog or responses to narrative cues.
Cant argue with any of your negatives, but glad you are still having an awesome time
A very solid game , plays well at true solo and honestly there is very little overhead if you want to multi hand as well.
Agreed, solo has been fun both ways.
I played this yesterday and its amazing, great video!
Glad you are enjoying it
I keep seeing this game at my local game store and I’m so intrigued. I also have a 7 and 10 year-old (and a few others) that I think would love this! Keep up the good work!
Hope you have a blast if you end up getting it
Get it.
@@SpoonyBard88 every time I go to the game store I pick it up and look at it, but I just have so many other games I haven’t played!!
I hope there will be a retail copy more affordable
It’ll definitely be in retail, but I don’t know the price. It’s a huge box, packed full of stuff, so I don’t expect it to be cheap
random player turn order is something imma house rule right out the window
That’s what a few of our discord members did too
@@OneStopCoopShop I feel like I'd still use the bag, but draw them all at once at the beginning of each round. That way it's still random each round, but you know when you're going, so combos can be orchestrated.
@daveh9047 that’s a great idea!
My pocketbook hates you! Now, I MUST get this one. He He. Thanks for sharing!
Sorry! Hopefully you enjoy it too :)
@@OneStopCoopShop
Ahhh. You probably mentioned that it was on KS. I can’t find a retail copy anywhere at this time. Maybe it’ll show up later.
@@tonybowers9490 they said recently that it is definitely coming to retail, hopefully soon.
100% agree. This game is awesome. Definitely an underrated gem. There is nothing I don't like about this game.
Glad you’re enjoying it!
Thanks
I'm superglad you found your one true dungeon crawler, Mike! 🥳
I don't think it's for me though. I'm a more thematically-immersive dungeon crawler fan, and despite there being a campaign and story in this one, it still looks like it focuses more on the tactical gameplay puzzle than the overall feeling of being on an adventure. Also, the visual style is too light for my tastes. It being "D&D high fantasy"-ish is actually a drawback personally. Still, if you're just getting into dungeon crawlers or like to keep it casual in both tone and gameplay, then I can see this being a success. Thanks, man! Keep exploring!
Yeah, I'd compare this one to playing D&D with a GM who wants to get to the hack & slash as quickly as possible. The story is THERE, and it's pretty FUN, but there isn't much exploration of story, no branching choices, etc. You read some stuff, kill some stuff, repeat :)
I did think this looked great back when the Kickstarter was live.
Would you say 7 is sort of the minimum age for playing? My oldest is 5 and she's starting to get into the young adventurers books for DnD that I picked up and I was looking at games like CoraQuest.
My 7 year-old barely games with us, usually. He's able to play a bit of Small World, a bit of Rallyman, and of course more basic kids' games like Gulo Gulo.
The fact that he can do well with this one surprised me, and he still needs handholding from time to time. I think it would be tough for a 5 or 6 year-old. Coraquest is definitely MUCH more straightforward. Also, the scenarios here take longer, so attention span becomes a factor.
@@OneStopCoopShop Thanks! Exactly the info I was looking for :)
Gloomhaven light? What's the set up time? We played gloomhaven but kinda quit because of the setup time. Although we really love the gameplay and scenario aspect. This game seems to have very similar gameplay elements but everything is a bit faster.
Definitely much faster than Gloomhaven. There’s little to no terrain to set up and no enemy decks to search for. You do still need to get the cards for each hero and set up all the standees of course
@@OneStopCoopShop Ok thanks. Think I'm try to see if I can find a copy.
Do you think additional dice is needed?
We’ve never minded having one set, but if you roll a ton of exploding crits you will have to keep track of your total damage as to reroll the same dice
Thanks for the review! Will have to look for this in retail. I'm curious...were there any games that got your 7-year-old engaged with the hobby now or when he was younger? My 4 year old has been into some games but he seems to not have the patience or interest in learning rules currently (and he's obsessed with Legos, which doesn't help). Just curious what your experience has been or if any games seemed to work at that age. Looking forward to playing this one with him down the road!
So the odd thing is he’s been kind of against playing hobby games. His brother was easy to get interested, but the youngest often refuses to play, walks away halfway through a game, etc.
This one, for some reason, really grabbed his attention. I think it’s maybe partially because he’s started playing tears of the kingdom (new Zelda game on switch), and it’s gotten him into an RPG leveling mindset, so suddenly a crawler with power ups and items seems really cool to him? Hard to say!
@@OneStopCoopShop Haha yeah, I guess each kiddo has their own temperament and interests. Have to let them get interested on their own timeline.
Nothing wrong with being obsessed with Lego 😉
@@Carfilliot exactly can’t complain!
Looking to get a dungeon crawler or campaign game for my son and I (10 year old). Has BG experience. Looked at kinfire cronicles but cant get it in canada. Then jaws of the lion, but maybe too heavy for him. Is this the ticket you think?
It has been for my family. Kinfire Chronicles is also good for that age range if availability opens up. Jaws of the Lion didn’t hold my kids’ interest as much.
@@OneStopCoopShop thanks for the reply!
Does your 7 year old read and understand the cards in their own? Or do you explain it and they remember? My kids are at the early stage of reading on their own, so I still feel kinda stuck on no or limited language games.
My 7 year old is getting there with reading, but since you have the same selection of abilities for a few scenarios in a row (and the game slowly adds to them as you go), he hasn’t had much trouble.
Now that’s only with me giving him the most straightforward melee tank character, to be clear, and him not swapping items and abilities much between battles :)
@@OneStopCoopShop Thanks! It's great getting input from people with similar aged kids.
How would you compare this to alter quest?
Barry, just a suggestion to make one comment with several questions, instead of a whole bunch of comments with one question each. It makes it easier for us to respond.
That being said:
"Can I see them releasing side quests" - No idea! I hope the game does well and they make more stuff.
"How does it compare to Altar Quest" - Not very much, except that they are both dungeon crawlers and both have forgiving dice systems with exploding crits. Altar Quest has no story in the main mode, has room exploration and random spawns, is all about card management and combos, and isn't very well balanced unfortunately.
"Do you think Pooky is too powerful?" - Not in my experience so far. Certainly fun though!
"One off mode" - This is pretty easy to do. You just have to unlock some cards from the Vault and then you are ready to play any mission you want.
I love this game. And the humor is awesome. Excited to get my kiddos to play with me.
Glad you are enjoying it too. And yes, it’s often funny for us as well!
Is this ks only? Or out of print already? Went to buy it and it’s out of stock everywhere
It is in the process of delivering from the Kickstarter, then it will be available in retail afterwards. So the “out of stock” doesn’t mean much yet I think :)
5 pros: I ordered immediately
Just to be clear, the pro/mix/con part only refers to my tastes and preferences. The idea of the reviews (hopefully they do this) is to discuss the key parts of a game so you can figure out if they will be pros or cons for you instead of me :)
So hopefully the answer to that is yes, and you love the game!
Is this game coming to retail?
They said yes. They are currently finishing up fulfillment, but should be in retail some time after
I see it listed as a pre-order on Amazon. It’s too pricey for me right now
Woah... that's a title...
It’s the truth, at least at this point in time. Love this game!
Do you think pooky is too powerful?
how quickly does it setup?
Pretty quickly, since all the relevant info is generally printed on the map. When you start a new act of the game you do have to punch and organize standees and such, but then those same enemies are used for the next 4-6 scenarios.
Compare your rating of Descent with this one, I don't see it your way. Descent beats it by far.
Which Descent? I like red dragon more than any of them, but if you mean the most recent descent with the app and all that, then the gulf is even wider. That one was sadly a disappointment for my group (though I’m still going to check out the upcoming expansion and hopefully it improves the experience).
But your opinion is yours and mine is mine, so no worries if they don’t match 😅
Will this come to retail?
They have confirmed that it is coming to retail, yes, after crowdfunding fulfillment finishes.
Too bad that the art is so basic
Yeah, I don’t disagree if I stare at it really closely, but it doesn’t bother me at all while I’m playing
Compared to the art of RDI and BfG it definitely lacks some richness, detail, and warmth.
The art is the reason I cannot bring myself to buy the game. Looks hideous.
The art is fine and fits the tone.
@@SpoonyBard88Yeah, God forbid a game actually try to stand out and not be "gritty" and gloomy brown mess.