by Scarlett_O
Battleball: The Most Fun I've Ever Had Playing Sports!Components:
The Box: The box for this game is a pretty good sized box, it's thin, but fairly long, so takes up a little bit of room on the shelf, but it's not unnecessarily large. The front cover of the box is okay, but the back... well, the back is simply awesome!
The Board: The board for Battleball is very nice. It is a huge board (the size of a football field, if you can imagine!) and it comes as a set of 3 board tiles that fit together like puzzle pieces, which i thought was pretty cool.
The Miniatures: The minis for this game are so awesome! Who doesn't love minis? Especially pre-painted minis!? They are very nice. And they are colour-coded so that you know what dice to roll to move them-- so awesome!
The Dice: The dice for this game are excellent. There is a different kind/colour dice for each differently moving player. It definitely makes it easier to play when everything is cohesive like that. Plus, dice are cool and the more the better, I say!
Rules: The rules for this game are fine. Simple. The game is easy to learn, easy to play.
While, the game is a blast on it's own; Mr. Bistro made a set of variant rules for the game that seem like they would make it absolutely amazing! See here: http://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/53645/battleball-advanced-...
These rules seem like they would give this game much more replayability than it would otherwise have, while making it even more fun (can you believe it!?)
Setup: Set up for this game is super easy. All you do is put the board together, each player places all their players behind the 20 yard line, anywhere they want as long as no two players are in the same hex (which, I don't see being possible anyway?) and then rolling a die to see who goes first. Done.
Area Required to Play; This game takes up TONS of room to play because the board is gigantic! But, it is a football field, so one really can't complain too much about that.
Game Play: The game play is simple, but fun.
You can move by rolling the corresponding die for the colour player you want to move and you may move up to whatever number you roll, but at least one space.
You pick up the ball by landing in the same space.
You can hand off the ball by rolling a die when you are adjacent to another one of your players.
You can pass the ball in the "Advanced Game."
You can fumble the ball by rolling doubles with a heavy tackle, or by both dice being the same number when you roll for a hand off.
You can tackle by moving into a hex adjacent to another player. Tackling them successfully (determined by die roll) causes that player to be removed from the game.
The point of the game is to get 2 Touchdowns to win. You get a touchdown by making it to the other player's Endzone with the football. Once this has been done the first time, you re-set up your players behind the 20 yard line and begin again.
Storage: Storage isn't much of an issue. Everything fits nicely in the box and the box is fairly long, but thin, so it's not too much of a bother to find a spot for it.
Theme: Theme for this game is very high, and very awesome! To be honest, when my boyfriend brought this game over, I wasn't particularly excited about it. Neither of us care for sports, so I had little to no interest in the game. Lucky for me, he didn't give me a choice, nor did I put up a fight (I'll play anything once, almost anything twice.) So we played, and I absolutely loved it. So, even though the theme may not be appealing to everyone right off the bat, it works in a way that will force you to enjoy this game, even if you don't like real football.
Fun: The fun for this game is off the charts, for me. I think I had more fun playing this game than almost any other game that I've ever played. Is it the best game that I've played? Absolutely not. But, one of the most fun? Yes! Here are pictures from the first game we played... tell me that doesn't look fun!?
Replayability: The replayability of this game (especially with Mr. Bistro's rules) is very, very high. I hope to someday soon have a Battleball tournament ... what is that called in football? A season? Or something... I don't know.
Accessibility: This game is very accessible. The Manufacturer's Suggested Age is 8 and up, and according to the BGG page, it is recommended for 6 and up, so it is a game that is simple enough for very young players, but fun enough for us "adults" too.
***Please click on the pictures that I borrowed for this review and give them a thumbs up for the people who took them! (except for mine, you don't have to thumb it unless you just want to.)