There are not that many solo-only games that get released (only Friday comes to mind off the top of my head as another option), so when one is created, it's a pretty big deal for the solitaire gaming community. Unbroken had some really stellar hype when it came out on Kickstarter and I jumped on that hype. Yes, the hype has turned into straight up drama as the shipping issues and customer service problems has been quite the distraction from the actual game. Now, I received my copy several weeks ago and I feel like I've played it enough to get a good sense of the game. So, what do I think?
TOTAL PLAYS: 3 solo
The pieces really are beautiful. The cards come in a variety of sizes, which is an interesting choice as it makes it strange to lay out your table set up, but I kind of like it. You have some regular cards, some tarot cards, and then some super tarot cards. You also have a few boards to keep track of your resources (which you will be doing a lot). Everything seems pretty good quality. The art on the cards is dark and edgy, really drawing you into the theme of being in a fantasy vengeance movie. My one major complaint here is that you have all of these beautiful dark and edgy pieces, but then you keep track of everything with bright blue and red cubes. I would have liked to see those more muted as well. I think they would've fit with the theme better. That's being pretty nit picky, but it's the truth! Still, overall, great components. Very satisfied. 5/5
RULES
This is not a complex game, which always helps with the rulebook. The first few pages really help you to set up for your first game very easily. They show you exactly where to lay out your many cards and boards. The step-by-step exploration and battle cards work really well too. You follow the pathways, answer "yes" or "no" and it tells you where to go and what to do. There wasn't much of a learning curve with this game. When you have to look up something specific in the rulebook, it's pretty easy to just follow the table of contents and find the right page. There are lots of hints on all the boards and pieces. Solid work. 5/5
This is not a complex game, which always helps with the rulebook. The first few pages really help you to set up for your first game very easily. They show you exactly where to lay out your many cards and boards. The step-by-step exploration and battle cards work really well too. You follow the pathways, answer "yes" or "no" and it tells you where to go and what to do. There wasn't much of a learning curve with this game. When you have to look up something specific in the rulebook, it's pretty easy to just follow the table of contents and find the right page. There are lots of hints on all the boards and pieces. Solid work. 5/5
GAMEPLAY
This is where things go downhill, which is a shame for such a beautiful, thematic-looking game. Playing this game didn't make me feel like a heroic adventurer. It made me feel like a fantasy bookkeeper, using my abacus to keep track of the deposits and withdrawals at Gringott's Wizarding Bank (that reference is for all you Harry Potter fans). I couldn't make myself believe that I was collecting food, treasure, and steel, but just moving a tiny cube along a track.
This is where things go downhill, which is a shame for such a beautiful, thematic-looking game. Playing this game didn't make me feel like a heroic adventurer. It made me feel like a fantasy bookkeeper, using my abacus to keep track of the deposits and withdrawals at Gringott's Wizarding Bank (that reference is for all you Harry Potter fans). I couldn't make myself believe that I was collecting food, treasure, and steel, but just moving a tiny cube along a track.
The basics of the game are that you use your starting resources of time and effort to acquire cunning, food, wood, metal, and treasure. As you explore you have different encounters that take up time but allow you to trade some of these resources for others. You use your tracker to keep track of what you've got. You use these resources to craft new weapons, attack your enemies, and everything else in the game. You adventure through four levels of a dungeon and face increasingly strong enemies at the end of each one. These battles are all done using the trackers and resources as well. I wish it were exciting and gripping, but it's really not. It feels like a Laurel and Hardy sketch where you're trying to trade two tens for a five. 2/5
REPLAYABILITY
There are a lot of cards in this game - four different heroes, twenty-four different enemies, seven weapons, and a bunch of encounters, skills, and conditions. Supposedly, there are a lot of ways to go on your quest for revenge, but to me, it felt the same each time. Three games is too few to all feel the same. I think the best part are the enemies who have very unique attacks. Some weaken your effort, some give you negative conditions, some increase their die rolls, there's a lot of variability. The encounters, however, just start to feel like mostly the same. And in the end, you're just moving cubes around a board. I really wanted it to feel like more than that, but each game felt the same. 2/5
There are a lot of cards in this game - four different heroes, twenty-four different enemies, seven weapons, and a bunch of encounters, skills, and conditions. Supposedly, there are a lot of ways to go on your quest for revenge, but to me, it felt the same each time. Three games is too few to all feel the same. I think the best part are the enemies who have very unique attacks. Some weaken your effort, some give you negative conditions, some increase their die rolls, there's a lot of variability. The encounters, however, just start to feel like mostly the same. And in the end, you're just moving cubes around a board. I really wanted it to feel like more than that, but each game felt the same. 2/5
FUNAny guess what I'll put here? I think I've made my feelings pretty obvious. I had way more fun writing my playthrough, thinking of a back story to the game, than actually playing the game. In fact, this third game was by far the most fun of the three I played for this very reason. It was a lot of work, though, and all done using yours truly's brain. I feel bad for the creator of this game because he obviously put a lot of time, effort, and money into this game and there has been a lot of bad press around it. I hope he's able to bounce back from this set back, keep his amazing artwork and components, take and use the feed back from Unbroken, and make an amazing next game. Unfortunately, this one's just not amazing. 4/10
TOTAL SCORE: 18/30
Sorry Unbroken. Great idea, great components, just lacking in the gameplay. I look forward to seeing what you come out with next!
EDIT: The wonderful designer commented on my review on BoardGameGeek, and it made me want to rethink, or at least add to, my ending a little bit. This game is definitely all about resource management and if that's not for you, you probably won't like it. That being said, if you love resource management games and moving around cubes, this is a beautiful package to do that in. I'm just one person with my own preferences and foibles. Good luck Artem! I will keep an eye on your future projects!
EDIT: The wonderful designer commented on my review on BoardGameGeek, and it made me want to rethink, or at least add to, my ending a little bit. This game is definitely all about resource management and if that's not for you, you probably won't like it. That being said, if you love resource management games and moving around cubes, this is a beautiful package to do that in. I'm just one person with my own preferences and foibles. Good luck Artem! I will keep an eye on your future projects!
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