Welcome Back To The Dungeon

WThe Game

Welcome Back to the Dungeon – the game that teaches us that adventurers really don’t learn. Masato Uesugi returns with Antoine Bauza to provide a new twist to an excellent little card game. Like its predecessor, Welcome to the Dungeon, players will take a character with assorted items into a dungeon full of monsters. Simple enough? Well, there’s a bit more to it than that…

How To Play

The gameplay is identical to the original game, Welcome to the Dungeon, which a review is available for here. 2 to 4 players choose a single adventurer each and their gear, then prepare for exploring a dungeon. You then enter the Bidding Phase. Each player takes a turn picking up a monster card, choosing to include it in the dungeon or not. If the player chooses to remove a monster from the game, they also remove an item. Alternatively, they can choose to forego any chance to gain a treasure and pass, introducing the press your luck mechanic for the game.

Once all but one player has passed, the Dungeon Phase begins. The remaining player gathers the gear and starts flipping cards. This continues until they either defeat every single monster in the dungeon or die. All you must do to win is survive a dungeon twice or be the last player standing. If you lead your character to death twice, you’re eliminated.

What’s New?

The box taunts us – “We knew you’d be back!” Yes, Box, we’re back. But if you want to keep us around, you have to show us something new. The immediate thing that stands out when you open the game is the characters. Gone are the barbarian, rogue, mage and warrior, now replaced by four new adventurers. The box says, “Meet the new options!”

(Disclaimer – box doesn’t actually talk.)

Bard; Ninja; Necromancer; and Princess now join the adventuring party. Complete with their own set of equipment.

“But with new adventurers,” the box taunts, “must come new foes.” (I really must stop putting my games next to my mimics!)

The original eight monsters are still available, but now six new foes step up to make things more difficult. The fairy, ally, mimic, gelatinous cube, count, and shapeshifter are shuffled into the deck, making the game a little more deadly. “But don’t worry!” that pesky box pipes up. “I have something to help you keep track of how much I’m wounding you.” A Health Point Board?! Thanks, Box! Yes, the slightly more fiddly aspect of Welcome to the Dungeon was the mental maths to keep track of the hit points as you went along. We could use a piece of paper and a pen, but the board and Dragon Token are both pretty decent quality (card and wood respectively). It’s nice to see it have the same art style as the rest of the game.

Likes & Dislikes

Like: Humour is a big plus in games and when I revealed the items for the bard, the Fancy Hat gave me a chuckle. In addition, the items are very thematic for the characters. A smoke bomb for the ninja, a zombie pet for the necromancer, and a… chaperon for the princess…. Hmm. Which brings me to a dislike.

Dislike: The choice of items for the princess feels a little… dated. The existence of Mr Charm and the Chaperon to bolster her hit points where other characters have armour, potions and pets doesn’t feel particularly good. They are saved by their slightly comical artwork, but the princess herself is a badass – dual wielding greatswords like there’s no tomorrow. When you consider this is the only female character and compare her to the rogue in Welcome to the Dungeon, some of the equipment options could have been chosen a little more wisely.

Like: The artist (Paul Mafayon) could have rested on his laurels and kept the artwork from the original game for the monsters. However, the fact they went to the effort to create new artwork for the same monsters is commendable. In several cases, the artwork is better now than the original. I love that the box art clearly shows that someone tried to board up the original dungeon. Unsuccessfully.

Dislike: Player elimination is a personal pet peeve of mine. Partly because I’ve had it happen to me a lot, but the possibility of having players removed from playing can push some players away.

Final Thoughts

Welcome Back to the Dungeon brings a new challenge to the classic game and is a nice twist to the dungeon crawler mechanic. I like that the artwork has been revised for the new edition and that you can combine the two games together to create your own unique dungeons. The replay value is great because the game can be played with a varied number of players and a mixture of monsters included. The only downside to combining the monsters and characters from one deck to another is that the little icons in the top right of each card do not necessarily match, but this isn’t a huge problem. This is well worth including in your game collection if you like a tidy micro-game you can play rapidly and repeatedly. Now if you’ll excuse me, my box has requested a snack. I think a necromancer will probably do…