Miami Dice, Episode 165 - Cthulhu Realms

Tom Vasel and Sam Healey are joined by Zee Garcia to take a look at this re-doing of Star Realms

00:00 - Introduction
02:10 - Game overview
06:21 - Final thoughts

[thegamethemovie]

I get Zee's complaint about remembering - solution: I put a token on the player aid, covering whatever icon I've done this turn. It might seem a bit busy, but it's very worth it for the clarity.

[lordreku]

Thank you for pointing out color blind gaming challenges! Several games like Ticket to Ride and (surprisingly) Coloretto do a great job of augmenting color matching with shapes or symbols, but I think a lot of companies just never even realize it could be a problem. You guys have a lot of pull in the board gaming community, so thank you for helping raise awareness!

[HulksterWarhammer]

This is easily my favourite review team. I always feel like it is a complete review with these 3. I hope more reviews can be done with all 3 of you guys.

[homelessjoe]

I'm with Zee, the artwork is fantastic and adds to the lightness of the game.

[johnnyangel]

Thank you, Tom... I now will consistently use "Cthulhu" as a verb!

[zaprowsdower]

I would love to have the 3 of them as the default review format. I like Tom, Zee and Sam but all together they are at their best.

[FR]

The changes to the mechanics seem really interesting and fun though. The changes to buildings, only three colors but much more interaction between the cards and interactions (triggers) by actions not only colors. I'm looking forward to it. Also I think I might have an easier time teaching this since it has no text to the cards it's all iconography so I can teach it to young people (kids) as well as people generally struggling with the english. The colorfull and humoristic artwork will probably also help a lot.

Looking foward to adding it to the collection, right next to Star Realms.

Tapping discarded cards (turning trashed ones upside down) and using cubes to place on the actions already taken and accounted for could help lessen the confusion of what actions one has taken and so on, especially when teaching the game. I think I might try that if I notice people has issues keeping their actions in order.

Oh, and I liked the Authority cards in Star Realms, atleast the new printing which has the numbers icons in the corners as well.

[errolwilde]

You guys need to review cthulu's vault. You previewed it at origins and it's like a create your own story game, which the story is the coolest thing about arkham horror, so I'm really interested in seeing what you guys think about it.

[AgentKuo]

I'm with Zee on this. I don't remember everything I do every turn in a game.

[zainrizvi]

I got this game hoping to get my wife into 2 player tabletop games.
Sadly, it did not work. We enjoy tabletop games with our group of 4-6 friends.
We also enjoy the Cthulhu theme; Elder Sign, Mansions of Madness, Call of Cthulhu, etc.

Any suggestions on how I can get my wife to enjoy 2 player tabletop games?

[mrbrianparker]

More cool music for 60's style fans. Who's doing this great music?

[Mark-snkh]

I prefer this slightly to star realms if only for the art work and the added complexity, albeit just a small amount of extra complexity.

[TrueGamer]

I know this is way off topic, but I can't help but wonder how the makers of the game were able to get away with using "Arkham City" without copyright infringement. There's an extremely popular Batman game with that in the title.

[errolwilde]

it just seems to me that star realms has more unique abilities than this game can have given that there is no text on any of the cards. correct me if I'm wrong in that please because I like the cthulhu theme more than space.

[StrayFire]

Sam, loosen up! I know you want to show us all how serious you're taking this new opportunity, but I really miss your 'prankish' and funny way of talking about others opinions. Anyways, I am glad to see your face more often now.

[SquaredbyX]

Don't forget in 3-4 player games you deal damage to both neighbors

[MarcelPogorzelski]

Zee, discard the cards tapped. That way you will remember. When your turn ends untap all the cards. Problem solved.

[ghostlightx]

I like this more than Star Realms. It has everything SR has but with a couple of genius additions that take it to the next level imo...firstly, being able to see the top card of the main deck is huge and adds a surprising amount to the game. Second, the trash mechanic allows you to trash the 5 central cards as well as your own hand or discard cards, which is great. And both these little mechanics added together....sublime. Hate the art though. Also why do Americans pronounce Whately as "What - lay"? It is "Whate - lay", as in rhymes with "Hate - lay"

[wetwillyccma]

I prefer Star Realms way more. The art work on Star Realms is way better. This looks like fun to play and good art work. I guess I like Space themes better.

[maxmaxwell]

I think they missed the boat in one respect on the artwork. Harbour and Belfort seem to share the same universe, I'd have preferred if that carried over to here. Enforcer trolls, dwarves followers, cultist gnomes.... just my two cents. But I do like they kept the same cartoon style.