Designed by: Prospero Hall
Is it a game, or is it a story?
It’s both. House of Danger is a new imagining of the 1980’s Choose Your Own Adventure stories, in a slightly gamified package. Rather than a book, this adventure takes the form of cards – five decks of Story cards (one for each chapter of the story) each with an attendant deck of Clue cards that represent either equipment to take with you, or smaller branches of the story. We can’t review the game itself of course without littering the text with spoilers, but the experience is very kid-friendly – as long as the kid in question is of an age where the subject matter won’t faze them.
Over the course of the five chapters, each decision you make takes you to a new story card, and as your progress you’re trying to keep your Psychic level high, and your Danger level low: both relate to challenges (sometimes optional, sometimes not) you’ll face on your journey, where a die roll decides success or failure and the current danger level (or higher) is the target of the roll. Pyschic power and equipment can help you meet the challenges, but if you fail it’s ok – there’s usually a way out of trouble.
After the fifth chapter is complete the game is ended! There’s no ‘losing’ because even when you die in the story, you can pay psychic points to travel back in time to save yourself… really, it’s designed for one player but can be played as a team.
None from each other. The game may destroy in a variety of inventive ways.
None.
Minimal at best - often the best decision is made by luck alone.
The game has more than one route to success, but could only stand a couple of plays really before you know the vast majority of cards.
1-1
Players
10+
Years
30-60
Mins
Sam says
Ah, it was fun to play with my boy. That's the scenario I can see this working best in, or indeed just kids playing sans grown-ups. It's not really a game adults are going to wring a huge amount of fun out of, unless you're particularly nostalgic for the Choose Your Own Adventure books of yore. I imagine there'll be more coming out in the same style.