Last weekend I finally got a chance to play Sentinels of the Multiverse. It was quite fun. I've seen it mentioned in the forum
once before. There is concern that the beginning set could get boring kind of quickly. I imagine that it could, but I put in about eight games this weekend with just the base set and still had fun. I had access to the first expansion (Rook City) and was trying my hand at one of the new heroes, but the convention closed down at that time (if the hotel says it wants you out by 7, you comply dammit).
If you haven't heard of it, it's a comic-book-style cooperative game where your team of superheroes battles a villain in some peril-fraught location. A round is fairly straightforward:
- The villain goes first and follows a script. The flavor is heavy for this game. If you're fighting the self-aware robotics factory, then the villain alternates between building weapons to hurt you and repairing itself so that the piece you destroyed earlier is a threat again. If you're fighting the alien warlord, his horde of minions grows in number and threaten to overwhelm you. If you fight the inventor of the terralunar tractor beam (not the exact name), then you first race the clock to stop him from pulling the moon into the Earth and then contend with a vengeful mad scientist who blasts you every turn. Each villain is different.
- Each hero then gets a turn. You play a card, activate a power, and draw a card. Each hero has his own deck, so what you draw will be useful to you. Again, theme drips here. The Batman clone has gadgets and can deflect damage. The speedster cycles through her deck and plays a bunch of cards. The power suit builds up his ammunition for a devastating attack. And some heroes can help out others. The fire-based hero has a card that converts everyone's damage to fire, which allows him to increase that damage. The psychic can give other heroes cards or can predict what the villain will do next (and even manipulate its actions). There is a leader character who has some punch of his own, but he really shines when he inspires the rest of the team.
- The environment has a role in this too, and a card is usually flipped for this. On the Mars base, you may have to contend with pervasive red dust miring your equipment or an oxygen leak damaging the combatants. You may have to contend with rampaging dinosaurs on a lost island. And let's not forget all the innocents in danger when fighting right in the middle of Megapolis. The environment affects heroes and villain alike, but it just wouldn't have tension if it didn't inconvenience the heroes more.
I only played the basic set, and apparently it was the original Kickstarter version that my friend has. From what I read, the enhanced version, which costs $10 more, has better quality components, an updated rulebook, and updated villains. See, the villains in the original game didn't scale. I noted that the villain didn't change whether we had three heroes or five. And it was ridiculously easy to defeat the villain with five players (though each villain card had an advanced rule that you could use to make it harder). From what I read, the updated villain cards now take into account the number of players. Also, the enhanced box is large enough to house the cards plus expansions and now includes an insert to hold the cards. The original box was completely empty so your cards slid around and got all mixed up.
I plan on picking up this game. It's actually not a bad price if you go to CoolStuffInc or MiniaturesMarket. I have the expansions wishlisted on CSI; I am trying to package this game with the anniversary edition of Galaxy Trucker so I can get free shipping.
I definitely recommend giving this game a try. It's light-hearted fun, and you may even find yourself getting into the action.
