4 people found this review helpful
9 people found this review funny
Not Recommended
0.0 hrs last two weeks / 6.8 hrs on record (2.6 hrs at review time)
Posted: 21 Dec, 2019 @ 4:53pm

Early Access Review
Well, spent some Christmas monies and sat down to get into another fine RPG and level-up gaming goodness. These blissfully ignorant anticipations were quickly dashed - as you can see I only have a few hours of game play. Sure, forgiveness up front because it's in development and early access. Leeway because I read about 1/3 of the how to and being an experienced gamer just jumped on in to get down and dirty. The setup and map listings are fine. Not a lot of definition on the map in way of colorization and fill-in, but no problem,

What hurt most was the actual game play mechanics. Perhaps this IS because I never played the board game before, or because I wasn't familiar with the exact turn-play sequence but whatever the case I ran out of cards and died (exhausted?) quickly. I had played the rogue and mage who have fewer cards in general so I thought it was just party balance. So i went back and chose some characters one would probably start out in an actual RPG - the Brute/Tank and the archer-like dude - both of whom have a lot of cards in comparison to the other classes. I went north this time to the "easier" route (I went east the first time which shows as more scenario/monsters) and blissfully walked in thinking no problemo. The adventure said 2 scenarios with easy monsters and was balancing card use much better as I began to work my way through. But after two doors and increasing creature encounters I once again found myself - naturally to the game mechanics - out of cards again and dying of exhaustion. The indication bar for this first of 2 scenarios still showed over half of the total creatures I would ultimately encounter here!

Summarized, it looks to me as either a rinse and repeat heavy learning curve or an unreasonably disadvantage to the player. The new encounter monsters in each room do not have the disadvantage I have going in as my cards are inevitably depleted (burned for scenario) and even resting doesn't help much as I am discarding cards still in my hand to retrieve the shrinking pile of cards still available to retrieve. So for me the game seems too much of a struggle to balance your few ever shrinking action/card abilities vs. the ever going creature encounters just to make it through 1 scenario. I like to learn the mechanics of my character abilities as I play and apply those "learned skills" to progress my way through whatever the game may throw at me. In this case - for me - the depleting mechanics were too difficult to master as an inherent learning curve and instead portrayed itself to be a challenge which took away from a nice relaxing learn-as-you-go RPG game play that I guess I am either used to or expecting to find. My two cents.
Was this review helpful? Yes No Funny Award
Developer response:
YunAsmodee  [developer] Posted: 27 Dec, 2019 @ 2:37am
Hello VectorAlpha,

Many thanks for your detailed review. We're sorry that the game didn't meet with your expectations.
Please note that Gloomhaven's gameplay is based on cards mechanics and therefore it requiers to think about each movement, each attack, while keeping in mind that some cards are considered "burned" at the end of a round (but while others are only discard!). It's up to you to plan your attacks according to the initiatives, but also to acquire levels in order to replenish your decks with new cards and unlock the perk system which will allow you to swing the attack modifier in your favor!

If you encounter any issue, you can also join our Discord, where many mercenaries will be glad to answer your questions! https://discord.gg/4Nrk6zh

Thank you! :)
Best regards,

Yuna
Comments are disabled for this review.