Fallout Shelter: The board game, the review
Following such a great success, Bethesda thought of converting the title by bringing it to more traditional and less conventional platforms such as the panorama of board games. Here is the review of Fallout Shelter: The board game produced by Fantasy Flight Games, created by Andrew Fisher and published in Italy by Asmodee.
Fallout Shelter: The board game: unboxing
Let's start by analyzing the packaging of the product and its contents. The Fallout Shelter box: The board game is very original despite the generous dimensions (22.3 x 16 x 7 cm) and is made of tin as if it were a lunch box with an organizer inside it.This particular construction gives it lightness, strength and resistance to accidental knocks and falls, therefore it also offers excellent portability thanks to the hermetic seal which does not allow the game elements to escape. The graphics shown are extremely accurate and captivating thanks also to a sort of 3D effect given by the bas-relief images. Aesthetically, the images on the package are also quite funny with the representation of Vault Boy in many curious and extravagant poses.
Components
Internally there are a good number of game elements, well-preserved inside a box in which all spaces are optimally managed in a dashboard made of black plastic. The content is the following: 1 regulation, 30 rooms, 5 lifts, 31 objects, 18 threats, 2 dice, 4 counters resources, 72 cubic resources, 28 inhabitants in different colors and with different poses, divided into 4 groups, 42 coins happiness, and 1 first player token. Some of these, like the inhabitants and the resource cubes are stored in convenient bags in clear plastic , others, however, are arranged in bays and compartments provided for this purpose.The game elements present in the Fallout Shelter: The board game are not few, and all of great build quality . Tokens of happiness, the first player token and the resource counters are made of a nice card stock, green fluorescent 2.5 mm for excellent strength and durability. The cards are made of card stock pieces with the exception of the cards in the threats, which are in transparent plastic. The first, however, give a good feedback to the feel that is in the middle between the rubber effect and the roughness of the telatura. Finally, of equally fine workmanship of the pawns of the inhabitants, the resource cubes and the two nuts that are well-carved and of great aesthetic impact, both for color and for design.
Preparation
the Fallout Shelter: The board game will allow us to drive the inhabitants of the Vault after the death of the superintendent. The one who will be able to manage the delicate situation will be the winner of the election will be held to appoint the new superintendent. For this, players will need to increase the happiness of the inhabitants that live within the structure, constructing new rooms and eliminating the threats that creep inside, represented mostly by the classic and iconic monsters radioactive as the Ghoul.The game is recommended for audiences over the age of 12 years and each game will have a duration of approximately 60-90 minutes for a number of players from 2 to 4 . Now is the time to go inside of the Vault, discovering the mechanics of the game that are divided basically in three steps: Generating the Threats (except in the first round), Place the Inhabitants and to Call up the Inhabitants .
The growth of the Vault between resources, population, hotel rooms, and threats
After you have completed the quick and immediate preparation of the table of the game , will start the actual game, either for those who have already tried the title on a mobile for the first time, it will be quite easy to understand. The difficulty level is not, in fact, very high, and the structure of the gameplay is linear and very well coordinated. As mentioned above, the steps are three, and should be followed in order for a certain number of rounds is indefinite.Being a management survival , the main resources to be taken into consideration will be food, electricity, and water, each of which will need to be produced in special facilities the players will have to build and that will require the assignment of inhabitants to make them productive. The construction of the new rooms and the increase in productivity will lead to a growth in happiness.
Initially, the plot of the game consists only of six rooms of departure, always the same in every game, but the players will have the total control of a new level of the structure with the possibility to expand it to your liking. Each player also starts with two characters, round after round, he can gain other. The process is both simple and important: in turn, starting from the first player, each person must have their own worker on a box in the Vault and taking into consideration that each room accommodates two boxes. In this case there are two values: one is red that indicates how much we have to pay to place in that point the employee and one green, which indicates the reward of production .
The green values, however, increase only the three main resources mentioned above : food, water, and electricity. Thanks to these, we can also build new rooms, to further increase the resources and draw cards object with its permanent advantages. The latter are useful as consumables and skills exhaustible at every turn, or will it affect the score at the end of the game. The objects , moreover, are also very important to be able to defeat threats that, at the beginning of each round (except the first) will enter in the Vault, positioning randomly in the rooms after a roll of the dice.
These threats, if they are not immediately eliminated, will prevent you from using the actions box in which they appear . To die, the player must posizonare a character in the relevant room (if not already present) and pull the two dice must match or exceed the value of the threat card (may need to be added to the object cards). If you fail to defeat a threat, this could affect negatively on the final results regarding happiness.
The building of the rooms and resource production are the primary activities of the gameplay. The first, however, sometimes, it even requires actions that may svantaggiarci. For the rule of “give to get” some times it will be necessary to injure the inhabitants and render them unusable (at least until they are treated) to gain some resource. In addition, each player can build up to 6 rooms in your level, but will also have the chance to move into the rooms of the other players to acquire resources, producing bonuses for that particular player.
Finally, some of the rooms are also vital to the growth of the inhabitants: these are the iconic skills, S. P. E. C. I. A. L. that, for those who know the franchise Fallout, you certainly will enjoy it very much. In specific rooms, in fact, the icon of Training with a specific letter that goes from S to L, and when a resident is placed in this point, it will get two times the rewards of that box. In fact, the training is useful to ensure that the inhabitant is trained I can produce more resources , but will render the same inactive for at least a turn in which will be, in fact, the training.
Goal: to have more points to happiness and become the new overseer of the Vault
The number of rounds is not fixed , but the game will end when one of the players manages to build at least 6 rooms or at the end of the deck of cards and threats. At this point, count the points of happiness and who will be the winner, as well as the superintendent of the Voult. In case of draw will win who has the most resource cubes, the more inhabitants, or the most number of objects. If still equal, the supervisors will simply be two or more.Game suitable for...
the Fallout Shelter: The board game is a game with mechanics that are simple, but not banal, which allow a good gameplay and replay value, even with the novices of the genre and of the franchise . This last aspect is benefited from the simplification of some of the peculiar features of the brand such as, precisely, the growth system S. P. E. C. I. A. L., which is practically reduced to the bone with respect to the other party in video games.it Is a choice that helps all the players, however, this could annoy lovers of the franchise who happen to play for a title incredibly inspired by Fallout, but also very simplified. It is, therefore, a game recommended to both the casual gamer and for those who love challenges, who appreciate very much the titles of tactical and management.
