The Haunting House
From: Twilight Creations, Inc.
Reviewed by: Ron McClung
The Haunting House is a new tile board game from Twilight Creations, Inc..
The Haunting House is a tile board game where you are racing your friends through a so-called haunted house.
From the back cover: “It’s Friday Night…. You’re bored… The Old Breitenstien place is just screaming your name!”
The game is fairly simple. For as large a box as it has, there is very little to it – cards, tiles and figures. Setup involves setting up the house tiles. Each tile has different hallway pictures, going in different directions, some with trap doors and others with ghostly images in the hallways. There is also an entrance and exit tile. When the house is laid out, the hallway tiles may mot match up perfectly but that is OK, it is supposed to be that way.
Each player chooses a pawn and matching 10-card deck. The cards are action cards. There are cards used to effect movement of your pawn – Move One Space, Move Two Spaces, Switch Places, Secret Passage, Trap Door, and Hall of Mirrors. There are also cards that move tiles – Rotate 90 degrees, Rotate 180 degrees, Switch Two Tiles, and Move Exit.
Oldest player goes first. A play round starts with a Random card round and then a Chosen card round. The goal is to get your pawn from the entrance to the exit before your opponents. The random cards are four random cards drawn from your own deck laid out in front of you. All players then perform the actions they have pulled. Following this, they then choose four cards and perform those actions. The Move Exit, Trap Door and Hall of Mirror can not be chosen however in the Chosen Card round.
Play is fairly easy but can be methodic. It can be frustrating during those random actions because your character can go way off target at times. Tactics behind the game is to simply slow your opponent down while giving you the shortest route to the exit. There is a considerable amount of back stabbing at times, misdirecting, and moving opponents, but that is the fun part. Your strategy is helped by predicting your opponents’ moves and blocking them while helping yourself out. When I played it with three other friends, game time was longer than we expected as you meandered through the maze.
In conclusion, this is a cute little game, but I was left wanting a little more out of it. I think that was the intent of the designers because I found out that there 3 other expansions that you can buy. Of course there are!. I was hoping for a little more “supernatural” elements (aside from the moving halls and exits). There are pictures of ghosts on the tiles but they have no game effect. That was left for the expansions. I’d imagine that adding expansions, however, would increase the play time and complexity of the strategy.
For more details on Twilight Creations, Inc. and their new Tile Board Game “The Haunting House” check them out at their website http://www.twilightcreationsinc.com and at all of your local game stores.
The Haunting House
From: Twilight Creations, Inc.
Type of Game: Tile Board Game
Game Design by: Kerry Breitenstein
Developed by: Kerry Breitenstein
Cover Art by: Dave Aikins
Additional Art by: Todd A. Breitenstein
Number of Pages: Type Number
Game Components Included: 38 Board Tiles, 60 Cards, 6 Custom Sculpted Pawns
Retail Price: $ 22.99 (US)
Number of Players: 2-6
Player Ages: 10+
Play Time: 30+
Item Number: TLC 3100
Website: www.twilightcreationsinc.com
Reviewed by: Ron McClung