Our The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game review, what we have to say about the cooperative adventure game that also has elements of a legacy and deck building game. You are all the characters you love from the 1987 film trying to complete the objectives of 6 different chapters before the grandson gets board and no longer wants to hear your story. There are many games in this whack-a-mole / race-against-the-clock coop games like this but Princess Bride has many different things that make it a cut above the rest.
We took a look across fun, replayability, player interaction, quality and art & style to come up with the overall score for our The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game review. See the breakdown by category below.
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– CATEGORY BREAKDOWN –
Fun (8 out of 10)
For the fun section of The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game review, we award a wonderful 8 out of 10. In the game, you work as a team and you need the characters to handle the tasks that keep coming before they get out of control. This is a very specific type of game, the race against time coop whack-a-mole, and there are several of them. The most well known is Pandemic but think games like Forbidden Island or Horrified.
Princess Bride is a step above its competition because it adds a few small tweaks to the format that kick it to a new level. You have to make it through 6 chapters to win, with each one equating to a a different mini game that links to the overall larger game. This is already cooler than doing than the same objective on the same map over and over. Next is the deck building like aspect that follows you along the way. When you accomplish something, you get to add a cool card to your deck that you will get to draw over and over on your journey. This keeps things fresh and gives you a feeling of building to a larger conflict.
Replayability (8 out of 10)
For the replayability section of The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game review, we award a fantastic 8 out of 10. Both Co-op games and legacy games often have low replayability. The former’s have lofty goals but once you accomplish them you are ready to move on and the latter usually is a robust journey but one you are only going to make once. Despite being both of these things, The Princess Bride Games solves all the inherent problems by combining those two very things.
Remember it is not one game but six games. That alone is enough but your journey through them could also be completely different from one overarching playthrough to the next. You meet people along the way that could be completely different. These are the aforementioned special cards that get added to your deck, redrawn as you need to shuffle, and stay with you the entire time. Once you get to chapter 4, you are going to need what you have built up and it could be very different from what you have done in a prior go.
Player Interaction (6 out of 10)
For the player interaction section of The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game review, we award a solid 6 out of 10. This is a cooperative game, which is supposed to be filled with player interaction by nature, but can suffer in that department if there is nothing that sets you apart from the other players. When playing with 1 is the same as playing with 4, just with more people talking.
That is what is happening here, you are just a group taking on a journey. There is nothing wrong with that but if you are looking for something that is more than just a group decision-making process, this is not your title. These types of game often try to bring variety and flavor to the different roles by offering unique player abilities. That is not really happening here, because the game opted to be more on theme and make sure the different characters play their specific parts in the story, which was the right decision.
Quality (9 out of 10)
For the quality section of The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game review, we award a nearly impossible to beat 9 out of 10. Any time your thing is representing an iconic film property, you have a heavy responsibility. You need to be true to the project but you also need to make a great game with it. If you do not do that, you are deeply disrespecting something important and you are wasting everyone’s time.
The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game is definitely not wasting anyone’s time. They found a fantastic way to represent what the film was, Fred Savage being read a bed time story about a magical adventure that had different settings and characters coming in and out, all leading to escalating danger for a man to save the woman he loves. This turn the page chapter gameplay mechanic has not been done. What a genius way to represent moing through a book. How all the mechanics tie into the theme are on point.
Art & Style (7 out of 10)
For the art & style section of The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game review, we award a good 7 out of 10. The game is a great representation of the film. Nothing out of the ordinary just a very solid production and quality through and through.
The main part is the book which does feel like a very cool story book. The settings, from the farmhouse to the final castle, do very accurately depict the scenes from the film and make them come alive. You also get molds of all your favorite characters from Inigo Montoya, Vizzini, Prince Humberdink and more. All the logos and type are very on brand and the gold stamp on the game box is a very nice touch.
– IN CLOSING –
The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game Review | Board Game Halv
There are many board games in this cooperative race against the clock genre but with Princess Bride taking place over 6 chapters (or small mini games) with cards earned following you on your journey, this game offers something new and unique that takes it to another level. Any fan of the original 1987 film will be very pleased with how they are thrown into the different settings of the film and how they come to life. This game is great solo or with a group. This has been our The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game review, we hope you liked it.
Product In-Stock: InStock
7.6
See the full explanation of the judging criteria here.
