Boss Monster Card Game Review

The coolest thing about Boss Monster: Master of the Dungeon, the fast-playing, “dungeon building” card game designed and published by Brotherwise Games, is the theme.

In the game, 2-4 players take the role of legendary, soulthirsty monsters with names like Xyzax, Progenitor Lich; Gorgona, Queen of Medusia; and Seducia, Sorceress of Sexiness. Your goal? Build a deathtrap dungeon filled with enough glittering treasures to lure the hapless heroes (who appear in town at the start of each turn) to their demise, so that you can add their souls to your knickknack shelf. Specifically, you have to have the right kind of treasures to lure the specific kind of heroes who are milling about town this month — legendary weapons for fighters, spellbooks for mages, moneybags for thieves, and holy relics for clerics — and you have to have more of that specific kind of treasure than any of the other boss monsters, all while keeping your dungeon deadly enough to survive the second wave of epic heroes who appear in the later rounds. Once a hero appears at your doorstep, if you don’t manage to kill them before they reach your boss chamber, they’ll become a wound (and a stain on your reputation). First to 10 souls wins, but 5 wounds has you eliminated from the game.

Cerebellus, Father Brain, a mage-type boss monster. If you can’t spot the reference, you need to play more vidya.

Actually, the coolest thing about Boss Monster is the art style. You see, you aren’t just any boss monster, and your dungeon isn’t just any dungeon. You’re the ultimate villain of an 8-bit sidescrolling video game in the vein of Castlevania and Super Ghouls ‘n Ghosts. True to its premise, the game is packed full of some of the most deliciously authentic and charming pixel art I have seen. References to video games, both classic and modern, exist alongside movie scenes (look for a Princess Bride reference), winks at tabletop gaming, and a digitized Alex Trebek wearing devil horns (the “Jeopardy” spell card, which is a double reference to the “Wheel of Fortune” card from the classic trading card game, Magic: The Gathering). Even the cards that aren’t referencing something (if there are any) are crammed full of tiny details, like the adorably inebriated goblin in the “Monster’s Ballroom.” Want to know a true sign of quality? When you have several cards in the game that are identical in name and function, and each one has unique artwork.

Seriously, it would be impossible to include all the best cards in this review, because nearly every card is great. However, here are a few highlights:

The 8-bit conceit is marvelously consistent, and it flavors every aspect of the game. The box art is rendered in the style of a certain well-known Nintendo game. The “Instruction Booklet” is filled with “Pro Tips” that will set you on the fast track to playing with power. Kickstarter backers of the game even received a gold-sleeved “Legendary Edition,” pictured below; a handful of hefty gold Boss Monster arcade tokens; and a digital package including a chiptune soundtrack mp3 and “Boss Monster Strategy Guide” (done in the style of a retro Nintendo Power issue). While none of these goodies is essential to enjoying the game, they are a testament to Brotherwise’s devotion to their genre.

Classy.

But how does it play? As seen in the card images above, each of the game’s room cards features one or more “treasure icons”: either a sword, book, relic or bag of gold. In addition, each room has a damage indicator (the number within the black heart) and a special ability. Similarly, each hero has a treasure icon and a health value (the number within the red heart). The hero takes damage for each room in your dungeon, and if you can equal or exceed its health value, you win the hero’s soul.

The 8-bit art style is more than cosmetic, however. True to its roots, Boss Monster is Nintendo Hard — for the heroes, that is. Don’t mistake this for a cooperative, play-against-the-game type of experience. You can build up to 5 rooms in your dungeon at a rate of one room per turn, so after the third or fourth turn, ordinary heroes won’t stand a chance against a decently constructed lair. The real competition is against your rival boss monsters — before you can devour their souls, you’ll need to lure the heroes to your dungeon, and that means having more of the indicated treasure type than any of the other players.

And that’s the coolest thing about Boss Monster. Rather than give the heroes special abilities based on whether they’re a thief, mage, or whatever, each treasure type is associated with a particular style of gameplay that matches the environments most likely to be traversed by the hero it lures. The sword icon, irresistible to fighters, is usually associated with high-damage, low-complication Monster Rooms. The book icon, a lure for mages, are less damaging, but they tend to allow you to draw powerful spell cards, which are the main way the game allows you to foil your opponents’ plans or weaken heroes in your own dungeon. The relic icon, which draws clerics, tends to allow you to “resurrect” cards from the discard pile. Finally, the moneybags icon, quite popular with thieves, is often associated with Trap Rooms. These are the trickiest type of dungeon chamber, weak on their own but able to be destroyed (removed from your dungeon) for a powerful onetime benefit, as seen in the image to the right.

Each type of room is designed to synergize with other rooms of its type, and there are some killer combos waiting to be unlocked. However, if you focus only on one type of treasure, you’ll miss out on luring other kinds of heroes, and your dungeon’s entrance will be gathering cobwebs while everyone else is piling up the bodies. There are some rooms with multiple treasure icons, but these rooms aren’t usually very good at doing the actual killing. Spread yourself too thin, and you’ll find yourself easy prey for the epic heroes that appear in the latter half of the game. Remember when I said that the heroes aren’t a real threat in Boss Monster? Wait until you have a 13-health epic fighter knocking down the door to your five-room dungeon.

The real tension in Boss Monster comes from deciding when and where to build your rooms. Because many rooms have abilities that affect adjacent rooms or only trigger when the hero dies in that room, room order is huge. Additionally, you’ll need to weigh when to capitalize on an early lead and when to start preparing for the coming of the epic heroes (who deal double wounds but yield double souls), when to take a wound to prevent an opponent getting a kill, and when and how to play your spell cards or destroy your rooms. Do you play this card now to lure in the mage, even if it would weaken your dungeon in the long run? Any room can be built on top of any other room, but there are certain advanced rooms that can only be built on top of other rooms, and only if they have the same treasure type. Are you willing to cover up a room with a fantastic special ability in order to have the more tempting dungeon this round? Will you be able to destroy this new room later on in case you need what’s underneath? Although the game plays in only 15-20 minutes and is accessible to both casual and hardcore players, the decision space (once you have grasped the basic flow of the game) is intriguing and, dare I say, addicting.

All this in a standalone, compact $25 game box.

If you do find yourself wishing for more of an uphill challenge, the rulebook features suggestions for a Hard Mode, in which the weakest heroes are removed before the game begins. What this means is that regular heroes are more likely to wound you and epic heroes are more likely to appear before you’re ready. Although it seems like such a small change, it really alters the feel of the game, and you’ll often feel like you’re battling on two fronts at once, trying to survive the heroes while snatching up whatever points you can. On top of that, there’s a mini-expansion, Tools of Hero-Kind, in the works that centers around hero-buffing items (that become monster-buffing items if you manage to kill the little blighters). There’s also a standalone, sci-fi themed expansion, Crash Landing, that will be getting its own Kickstarter sometime in the future.

By the way, did I mention that every single hero has its own unique pixel art and backstory, and that the majority of these were created in partnership with backers from the game’s Kickstarter campaign? Yes, the coolest thing about Boss Monster is undoubtedly the community surrounding the game, and the lengths to which Brotherwise Games have gone to foster that creative community. If you’re worried about the game being filled with pointless “Vanity Cards,” don’t be. Brotherwise’s quality control has ensured that event the fan-designed cards adhere to the retro, tongue-in-cheek tone of the rest of the game, as seen in the backer-created cards below.

Burninating!

Yes, that hobbit’s name is Wallbanger Basketweaver. Why do you ask?

The community interaction has extended beyond the Kickstarter, however. Boss Monster already has a lively wiki and, thanks to a custom card creation kit released by Brotherwise, a growing library of player-created cards to play with. What’s more, the Instruction Booklet helpfully directs new players to BoardGameGeek, where fans are cooking up variant styles of play, including solitaire and 5-6 player versions. Indeed, Brotherwise Games has gone above and beyond in including the community in every facet of their game’s design.

Pop quiz: what’s the coolest thing about Boss Monster: Master of the Dungeon? Is it the community, the retro art and winking nods, the fast-paced gameplay, or the theme? The answer might be different things for different people; for me, it’s “all of the above” crammed into a box that’s the perfect size for throwing in your book bag, the perfect length for a quick, pick-up-and-play game, and the perfect complexity for explaining to your friends in 5 minutes while leaving room to explore new strategies on your 20th play. And at only $25 MSRP, it’s a ridiculous amount of game per dollar — cheaper than pumping quarters into Ghosts ‘n Goblins for sure. For retro charm and breezy-but-not-brainless gameplay, Boss Monster achieves a perfect high score.