The degree of detail is unprecedented and utterly captivating. Fleeing from a deranged mob, desperately gleaning evidence while you wait for your rescue to arrive. Slamming doors to trap hideous monsters in a burning mansion as you escape with occult tomes. Yet from this, the most extraordinary adventures unfold. Most of the mechanics boil down to rolling dice trying to accumulate as many successes as possible. Here the division between quickstart rules and a longer reference works like a charm, getting you up and playing in no time. You even solve some puzzles on screen in the form of tile-sliders and Mastermind style conundrums.įirst time out of the box the result is exhilarating. Story drapes everything like a shroud: each action and encounter gets clothed in context and each scenario has a bare-bones plot. The app then lays out the map as they explore, adding clues, monsters and layers of narrative as they go. Players pick a scenario from four of varying lengths.
While using an app to turn a co-operative game into a richer role-playing experience isn't new, this takes it to a new degree. Making sense of it is enough to drive you insane.Īt the core of the confusion is the software which drives the game. It provides adventure and mystery while actually being quite repetitive. It offers the sense of close co-operation between players but has little real meat or strategy. It feels bold and inventive, yet has an obvious design lineage to its original edition and to other app driven games from Fantasy Flight.
This new edition of Mansions of Madness is a box full of paradoxes.