Hell of a Deal review - One Stop Co-Op Shop
Transcript
Hey everybody, this is Mike with the OneStop Co-op Shop and today I'm doing a review of Hell of a Deal. And a disclaimer that I got a review copy of this one. I previewed this game before, but if you didn't see that, Hell of a Deal is a one-to-four player boss-battling poker game. Uh, each of the players is using poker cards to create hands Texas Hold'em style while the boss is doing the same. But as you bet to stay in the hands, those bets are letting you mitigate your luck, draw new cards, trade things out, other kind of effects. And the bosses themselves also have bonus powers and minimum hands you have to beat. And if the players can successfully face off against Nick House, who transforms into the devil himself, they win. So let's discuss five key things to know about Hell of a Deal. So starting with my number five point, the least important to know but still important enough I wouldn't mention it, I'm looking at the boss variety. And this is a pro. There are a bunch of bosses in the game, each one has a different minimum hand, they each have a power that'll influence the play. And there was a lot of good variety here.
Now, the reason this is my number five and not higher up is because sometimes their powers don't actually affect very much or are a bit minimal. And you can almost just ignore them. Also, I'm not 100% sure about the balance sometimes, some feel way tougher or easier often based on what their minimum hand is. But these are minor complaints, they still work really well. And a big shout-out to the fact that they have harder versions of every boss in the game because then their powers become incredibly impactful and will really change up your strategy. Although the game's already quite hard sometimes, so not sure you always want to play with them, but still uh, the bosses work very well. Next at number four is the solo play and cooperative play in the game. And this is a mix for my taste. On the solo side, it's basically a full-on pro. This is something that was not in my preview, but they added these little solo allies that first of all will have extra cards in their quote-unquote hand that you can trade with and reveal. But then they also have these tokens you can spend to enact various effects that can help you out a lot in the game. But if you spend all of an ally's tokens, they go away and you won't have them in future hands to potentially trade their cards with.
So yeah, the solo mode is great. Love what they did for this. The co-op mode is a bit more of a mix. You're all just separately playing against the boss, making your own hands with not much communication. You do have abilities to reveal cards in your hand and then swap with a player, so you can help each other improve your hands, but it's pretty expensive. It's going to take several of your betting chips, so we don't do it a whole lot. And then at higher player count games, you're sometimes awkwardly fighting for who gets which discard, who uses which devilish offerings. So, don't get me wrong, co-op is still fun. My family certainly enjoys it, but it comes with equal parts getting in each other's way and actually cooperating, so it's a mixed bag for me. Next at number three are the favor and curse cards, and this is a full pro for me. So, effects will let you draw these favor cards to your hand. Most of them will have a cost to play them, often increasing your temptation, which can automatically lose you the game if it goes too high. But, they can let you mess with the bosses' hand, let you mess with the board, draw more cards for yourself, change up how your hand is evaluated. Lots of cool and fun effects to give you mitigation, especially if you're able to save a bunch of them up for the biggest bosses at the end. And then similarly, these curses will come in if you lose bets generally, and they'll give you limitations on which cards you can use or whether you can fold or not, other effects. Again, nice and varied, but they only last for one round, so even if they're pretty devastating, you can usually just fold and move on. Next at number two point, and honestly my favorite design element in the game is the betting. So, as I mentioned, uh each time you have an opportunity to bet, you have to pick one of these chips. Uh the basic ones will earn you a soul that will let you survive losing the bosses more, but you can heal other players, you can use a variety of options, you can get more favor cards, you can reveal cards to cooperate with people. But,
each tile you bet is going to have a negative effect on the back if you eventually fold or lose in the hand. So, you have to weigh your options, weigh the strength of your hand, especially after the flop when not too many cards are coming out. And yeah, it gets to the heart of poker, the coolest decision, when do you hold them, when do you fold them? Uh if you fold, you have to roll this die, which could be negative, could be positive, but still a folding with a single chip out and one die effect is almost always going to be better than folding with a ton of stuff. So, the betting is where the most interesting choices and the most tension in the game is achieved. But, I am back to a mix of my number one, the most important thing to know about the game, and I think the thing that could potentially push players away, and that is the luck of the draw. I mean, not too surprising, it is a poker game, so you expect card draw luck to be pretty impactful. But, the big thing here, and I think I mentioned this back in my preview, too, is that while you have tons of effects to mess with your own hand, you can draw cards from the discard, you can draw cards from the deck, you can use favor cards to get a lot. Generally speaking, you are only able to use two of those cards, and there are very, very few, just a couple of favor cards that let you mess with the actual board and the options available to all the players. And since the bosses always have a minimum hand that's going to get them at least two pair, sometimes a straight, sometimes three of a kind, they don't necessarily care if the board that comes out is complete trash with no good combos to speak of. I mean, I guess here we could potentially get a straight, but that's about it. So, yeah, sometimes the cards are going to be nice to you, and sometimes they aren't, and there isn't really enough mitigation of at least the board to be able to change that consistently. But, there's only a mix,
and the game's still quite fun, because to be fair, it is incredibly quick to play, even with six bosses. If everybody knows the game, you can crank it out in 20 to 30 minutes. So, the heavier luck element doesn't bother me that much. So, overall, you might want to check out Hell of a Deal if you like poker games, if you like quick-playing cooperative card games, and this one is pretty accessible. My family was able to play it very easily. But, on the other hand, you might want to avoid this one if you don't like card draw luck, it can bite you pretty hard. Or, if you're looking for a ton of cooperation and table talk, again, your options are pretty limited on that front. And if you want to see the game in action, my preview play is basically identical to the final game, but I'm also doing a Patreon bonus play of the true solo mode, which didn't exist back when I previewed it. Thanks for watching, everybody. Good gaming, and I'll see you at the next stop.