Style: Cooperative
Players: 2-4 [Solo capable]
Ages: 10+
Appx time: 30 minutes
Contents: 6 Adventurer Cards, 6 Adventurer Pawns, 24 Flood Cards, 24 Island Tiles, 28 Treasure Cards, 4 Treasure Figurines, 1 Water Meter, 1 Water Level Marker
Publisher: Gamewright
https://gamewright.com/product/Forbidden-Island
Legend speaks of an ancient civilization known as the Archean Empire said to possess the ability to control the elements through four sacred treasures: the earth stone, the ocean's chalice, the wind statue, and the fire crystal. Recognizing that such power held within any one of these treasures falling into the wrong hands would be catastrophic, they kept these treasures hidden on Forbidden Island. In the centuries since the collapse of the Archean Empire, the location of Forbidden Island and its secrets had been lost and remained undiscovered...until now.
Can you and your team be the first to breach its borders, discover the treasures, and make it out alive?
Introduction
In addition to just being a really fun game, Forbidden Island is a great introduction into cooperative style games. As a cooperative game, the players must plan together, and work together, and everyone wins or loses together. Also, by playing multiple adventurers, the game can be played solo since there is no competitive aspect.
This game has a slight Indiana Jones feel to it as you seek ancient, legendary, relics said to have great, magical, properties while you race against time to survive and escape.
Description
The premise of the adventure is that your team has discovered the location of Forbidden Island. You all helicopter to the island together to search for the legendary treasures, however once the helicopter lands, a final measure left in place by the Archeans to protect the treasures is sprung - the island begins sinking into the abyss!
The players have a choice (or random assignment) between 6 different adventurers: the Pilot, the Engineer, the Navigator, the Messenger, the Explorer, and the Diver. Each adventurer has their own special and unique ability to utilize.
The island itself is made up of 24 double-sided island tiles, each representing a different location on the island such as Lost Lagoon, Cave of Embers, Bronze Gate, and Whispering Garden. On the face-up side of each island tile is a vibrantly colored representation of the location. On the face-down side is a blue-hued version of the same image indicating that it is flooded under water. During set-up, these tiles are shuffled and laid out face-up to create the island so each game will have a different location arrangement. Some creative individuals have also designed unique layouts for the island that are readily found at BoardGameGeek.com or with a simple Google search.
The Flood Deck consists of cards that match each of the island locations. These are used to determine which island tiles are flooded. To start the game, a number of cards are drawn and the corresponding island tile is flipped to the flooded side.
On each turn, the adventurer may choose to move about the island, to interact with other adventurers if able, to shore up a flooded portion of the island, or to discover a treasure if they have acquired enough clues. There are two island tiles for each of the treasures with a representative image of that treasure. These are the discovery points at which an adventurer is able to collect the treasure if they have sufficient clues (4 cards of that treasure).
After taking their actions, the adventurer then collects resources or clues regarding the treasures in the form of special action cards and treasure cards from the Treasure Deck. But watch out! Collecting clues and resources may trigger an increase in the rate of flooding (through Waters Rise cards).
After each adventurer's turn, the island's trap activity is also manifested. The results are either the flooding of more locations, or the complete submerging and destruction of locations already flooded. If an island tile is already flooded and is activated to be flooded again, it is submerged and destroyed so that both it and its corresponding location card are removed from the game.
There are a number of different ways in which to lose the game. The adventure is a loss if at any time the helicopter's landing zone tile (Fool's Landing) is completely sunk, if both of the discovery location tiles for the same treasure are completely sunk and that treasure has not been collected, if any adventurer is eliminated, or if the rate of island sinking reaches critical (indicated by a traditional Skull & Crossbones).
To win the game, all of the winning conditions must be met. The adventurers win if all 4 treasures are collected, all of the adventurers are assembled back at Fool's Landing, and one player initiates airlifting the team off the island by playing a Helicopter Lift card.
Wrap-Up
Forbidden Island is a great game all around. It's theme of an Indiana Jones style adventure is not immersible and not intended to be, but it is enjoyable and exciting none-the-less as you face portions of the island sinking around you (and sometimes under you!) at an increasing rate of speed forcing you to not only try to keep up, but to keep pathways for travel open and treasure discovery locations in play. It isn't overly complex, but it can be difficult and tricky, and it can swarm you into a loss pretty quickly.
The components of the relics are of no real consequence to the game that tokens could not have sufficed, but they are a nice touch of flare. The tiles are a good thickness for handling for all the repetitive flipping, and the cards are a standard size for protective sleeves. The artwork on the tiles and cards are aesthetically pleasing in general. That each adventurer has a unique ability makes playing with various combinations fun and interesting to figure out ways in which they can work well together.
The rules are pretty simple and straight forward. A helpful addition is that the back of each adventurer card shows the order of play sequence and the player's available actions per turn. While the game is not necessarily a children's game, my 11 year old nieces had no trouble understanding or remembering the rules. Since it is a cooperative game, teaching them strategy by asking what they thought we should do, proposing tactics, and letting them decide the course of action was fun for them too.
Another wonderful point of this game is that it is relatively inexpensive. It averages around $20 and is often closer to $15 from online vendors.
Original posting: April 10, 2020
