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"Five to find, three are one. One gives access, the Bladed Sun.
The Silver Orb, to banish below. The Staff of Ages, to vanquish the foe. Joining two, the Golden Thorn. The last to invoke, the Platinum Horn."
You have heard this prophecy many times – one regarding the chosen hero that will save the Westland from a great and rising darkness. Those days are now before you, for Talimar the Starless – the Warlock Lord – is once again moving in this world. He has descended far below Castle Shadowgate, ready to release a creature of immense power upon the world and bring it into chaos!
Shadowgate: The Living Castle is a 2-4 player board game based on the Macventure, Kemco NES and 2014 remake video game, Shadowgate. In it you'll explore Shadowgate, the Living Castle, discovering relics and spells and completing legendary quests. Players can choose between eight characters that have their own unique class, traits, and abilities, then use these characters to compete for XP (experience points). For each item you equip, each quest you complete, each djinn riddle you answer, and each monster you defeat, you gain XP. Compete against other players to piece together the fabled Staff of Ages – It is only then will you be able to confront the Warlock Lord, fulfill the prophecy, and be crowned High Lord of the Westland!
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- it's a brilliant train game system
- every map brings in completely new mechanics
- the Wisconsin map is excellent
- I love the fact that this is a system you can play so differently from one map to the next
- this game exists in that space between Cube Rails and 18xx
References (from this video)
- Severely disappointing
- Phoned in design to claim an IP
- Terrible dice rolling mechanism
- Does not do the source material justice
- Point-and-click adventure game
- Myth
- Zork
- Dream Factory
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Dice Rolling — Terrible dice rolling mechanism for doing actions which can hose you up and leave you without resources.
- Set Collection — Collect items with symbols for comboing up requirements on quests.
- Worker Placement — Bounce around to different locations doing different quests.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- it really did not do any I mean it's one of the worst games I've played
- The board game division of Games Workshop has just fallen off a cliff lately
- When I sit down to play a game or listen to music or watch the movies or something like that I want to have a dialogue with the designer with the artist with the writer with the actor you know
- if you start like plugging in a computer to generate this stuff it turns me off immediately
- The most important part of this is going to be transparency about what is and what isn't this generated thing