Mansion of Madness

[vikinglad]

I made it out to a demo for this game today at Games Kastle in Santa Clara, CA, but I wasn't early enough to get to play it. I did get to watch up close for a while, though, and it looked really fun. Everyone playing seemed to really like it. Here are some of my thoughts:

The figures and board are beautiful. The character cards (and all of the other cards) looked a little small compared to LNOE, but it didn't seem to bother anyone much.

The board is painted with lots of detail, and made up of lots of different tiles that are built up differently based on the scenario. At first, it was a little confusing for folks to get the "space" VS "room" differentiation down because the spaces aren't squares and are marked somewhat subtely, but it clicked soon enough.

The game is very story driven, and has copius amounts of text that is read at specific times by the Keeper (GM). Fights are described in great detail, ie "you kicked the monster in the head, and it fell to the floor, taking 1 damage" or something similar. These fights often start out with a some special rule that makes you pass an attribute test right off the bat. All of this is accompanied with well-written story that describes everything.

Another cool thing about fights is that you don't know much about your enemy until you actually attack it. Even though you know what type of monster it is, they have varying attributes and special rules that are revealed on the bottom of their bases after the initial wound is inflicted. I believe this even included the number of wounds necessary to kill it. Also, wound markers were inserted into the enemies' bases, so the bases were really functional.

Moving into rooms often involves passing an attribute test to break the door opoen or jimmy the lock. I saw someone have to try to rewire an electric lock similar to the hacking mini-games in Biohazard. Also, doors can be boarded up to keep anyone or anything from getting througjh. All of this was really cool. You can see it in the video OD posted.

There are a lot of rules and steps to each turn/round/whatever, so stuff was a bit slow-going at first while everone got used to it, but it was just starting to pick up a bit when I had to leave.

I think it was the heavy story and exploration elements, along with the cool board and figs, that sold me on it. It looked like a really neat game, and I can't wait to get a copy.