The Hobbit: There and Back Again

There are many games inspired by Tolkien’s books, from the co-operative challenge of sweeping epic Fate of the Fellowship to the head-to-head brinkmanship Sauron v the good guys in The Confrontation. The Hobbit: There and Back Again takes a gentler approach than both, offering you 8 games in one as you travel with Bilbo and the his companions from the bucolic Shire to the lair of the dragon Smaug. Whilst the game is competitive, however, everyone is – quite literally – choosing their own path…

This is a roll-and-write game, where dice are rolled and their results are shared between the players. In this instance the writing – or drawing – takes place in each player’s own book, with each double-page spread representing a part of the story, from the beginning (-the dwarves and Gandalf arrive at Bilbo’s home) to part eight, where your goal is to defeat the fire-breathing Smaug as he terrorises the town of Esgaroth. The structure of the game remains consistent, however: each round the starting player rolls all the dice, and then in turn everyone chooses an unclaimed die and uses it in their own personal book, either as a path, or to gather a resource of some kind. For example, in the first game, the goal is to connect all the dwaves to Bag End by drawing paths for them to follow, and the game will end as soon as any player connects the twelfth and final dwarf in their own book.

But it’s not just a spatial puzzle, because also shown on the dice are bread, swords and witches hats! In the first game, having bread ready for when each dwarf arrives means they will score more points, so it’s worthwhile trying to get the stuff (and marking it off on your book) before connecting the dwarves to Bag End. The swords in the first game just reward you with points (more swords = more points) so having lots of them is helpful. And the witches hats can be used to trigger little bonuses such as extra paths or extra bread. There are also bonuses for connecting Gandalf and Thorin to Bag End as well, and big points if there’s bread waiting for them! The Fellowship are big lovers of yeast, it seems.

In game one, that’s pretty much it. It takes around 15 minutes per player (as long as someone can teach it clearly) and strategically you can rush toward a quick endgame or go for a more bread-based victory. Turn the page and the next game asks you to navigate the tricky path to Rivendell, where the swords are more important, as they’re used to fight off threats along the way. And as you continue through the book, following Bilbo’s famous tale, the game gets a little more complex but without straying into crazy-complicated territory. In each instance, there’s an endgame trigger but no guarantee that the player who triggers it will be the winner.