| 👨👩👧👦 | Players: 1-4 |
| ⏳ | Time: 60-90 minutes |
| 🎂 | Ages: 10+ |
| ⚙️ | Mechanisms: Cooperative, deck construction, deck building, campaign |
Dungeon Legends from Rebel Studio is a tower defence-style game, with some light deck-building. It is designed to be played cooperatively with 1-4 players over a 5-chapter campaign. However, chapters can be picked up and played in any order the player(s) wish. I chose to play solo and played all chapters in order.
It’s okay if you want to take a moment to admire this lovely organised box!
The basic gameplay remains the same throughout each chapter. Heroes must prevent monsters from entering the castle, or it’s game over. In each chapter, heroes also have a task to complete to be successful (e.g., in chapter 1, put out all the fires). If the monster deck empties before the task is finished, you lose, try again. Each chapter introduces chapter-specific monsters, events, tasks, and rules. The difficulty of each chapter also increases as the game progresses.
Chapter 1, put out all the fires! And don’t let those pesky monsters into the castle…
As monsters moved closer to the castle, I enjoyed puzzling over how to use my cards most efficiently to attack, move, heal, gain the magical resource known as dust, and use locations along the path. Defeating monsters gave my heroes helpful rewards (e.g. advanced item cards to add to my deck). Using dust at locations along the path gave me ways to complete my task, and provided options for attacking monsters and other helpful bonuses.
Advanced cards are gold and shiny, and have an even more powerful option if you’re willing to spend dust!
The chapter-specific monsters and events served their purpose well; they made the theme so much more immersive and increased the difficulty of each level. The extra tasks elevated Dungeon Legends from being just a tower defence game, and gave it a bit of a Dungeons and Dragons feel. Each task was unique and I felt truly engaged by the challenge they presented.
Firesnakes are always trying to start something… Lucky I have my bucket of water handy!
I appreciated that I could play solo, using 2 heroes and a selection of cards from their decks. Anyone who has played a campaign knows the difficulties of playing with a group! However, I am looking forward to gathering some friends (some might even say, a party) and taking on the dungeon again (yes, it’s completely replayable, hooray!).
You can see this post on Instagram here. For further information about Dungeon Legends, check out the publisher’s website.
The copy of Dungeon Legends used for this review was provided to Board All The Time by VR Distribution.
The Boardgame Detective 