I can’t remember the last time I sat down and played an actual board game. No checking my email, no getting sidetracked on my phone – just two people sitting at a table with some dice and a stack of cards. But when FUNKO offered to send over their latest toy, a 12″ Batman-themed board game, I just couldn’t resist.
Scheduled for release later this month, the game comes packaged in a giant-sized, FUNKO-style Batman that stands a towering 12″ tall. This piece alone would be well worth the price of the entire game, but you also get two 2.5″ collectible figures/game pieces (Batman and Joker) plus the actual “battle mat,” dice and combat cards.
For such a simple game, there are a lot of components (Combat Cards, Power Boost Coins, 4 battle dice) and I admit that it took slightly longer than it should have for my playing partner (my daughter) and I to figure things out. Once we got the hang of gameplay, however, it was a blast. Basically, a turn consists of each player “attacking” and “defending” by either rolling the dice or, after three turns, drawing one of their Combat Cards. After each turn, both players get to add a Power Boost Coin to their character which adds 1 extra point (ie. dice) to either their defensive or offensive ability.
After you’ve got a handle on that, there are also Mystery Combat Cards that a player might draw if they roll a question mark during an attack. These Mystery Cards are sort of wild cards that can either shift the tide of battle in your favor… or your opponents. They keep the game from being too short, or boring, which is nice since there’s only 10 moves until it’s game over (Game over, man! Game Over!).
Overall, the game is a blast. Once you get a hang of all the components it’s a quick way to kill 15-20 minutes and you still get 3 new collectibles at the end of the day. It would also seem that FUNKO has plans on adding expansion packs down the line as indicated on the packaging (Two Face and Robin, booster packs) which could add an interesting dynamic for even “bigger battles.”
