I think I'm in trouble. This new board game up on Kickstarter from Cool Mini or Not looks AMAZING. To use their own words...
Massive Darkness is a dungeon crawling board game for 1 to 6 players. With no game master and streamlined rules, players take their heroes on a series of quests to defeat the forces of Darkness. On their way they'll face many challenges, including a large variety of enemies that range from mobs of evil dwarves to gargantuan demons and spiders. To be victorious, heroes will need to acquire new skills throughout the campaign, find the the best loot to equip themselves, and learn how to use the cover of darkness to their advantage!
I really like a good dungeon crawler, but I'm rarely able to play as they almost all require either a player to control the bad guys or involve a PvP element that can't be avoided. This is a truly cooperative game for between 1 and 6 players. The key there is the number 1. This game can be played solo, which immediately puts it above other games like Descent and Imperial Assault in my mind. Granted, I love Descent and the Road to Legend app allows it to be played solo, but it currently has very little content.
The models for this new game look pretty amazing too.
I believe these are renders, but CMON does a pretty solid job of translating their renders to actual production. I haven't been disappointed with their previous games. Plus, there are a couple of production models displayed in the Kickstarter, such as...
...the Cliffbreaker Cyclops! This dude is a beast. The rest of the bad guys look pretty solid too. You have two kinds. Mobs are composed of Bosses and Minions...
...while Roaming Monsters run around on their own.
There are also Agent bad guys, but I'm not sure which those are. The way I read it, they roam around like the big guys, but have the ability to summon in low level Minions to make the encounters tougher.
The game play looks pretty well designed. Each player has a sort of dashboard and controls his or her dudes as they wander around a dungeon made up of two sided tiles and connecting pieces. As they quest, they'll level up and gain abilities and gear from treasure caches or from looting monsters. The quests themselves form the basis for a campaign, composed of a currently unknown number of quests.
The game is still early in its campaign, but given that this is a CMON campaign, I'm expecting to see TONS of stretch goals with lots of Kickstarter exclusive content.
I'm currently waiting Rail Raiders Infinite, Masmorra: Dungeons of Arcade and Arcadia Quest: Inferno. This new game looks amazing, and I'll likely back it, but I haven't decided to what level. The core pledge is $120 and there aren't currently any add-ons, but knowing CMON... there will be. This is a 30 day campaign, so I'm looking forward to seeing what they have up their sleeves!
For the Kickstarter link, click here.
