PUBLISHER: LUCKY DUCK GAMES/ USAopoly | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
Star Wars is a franchise that has spawned a lot of board games and some them are pretty niche – from complex strategy games such as Rebellion to push-your-luck Bounty hunting fun in Outer Rim there’s a lot of great games set in the galaxy far far away available to gamers.
However, they aren’t as many games that appeal to the family crowd as you’d expect. They’re either quite complex or are so simple that they might as well be Monopoly. What you want is a game that elicits the thrill and excitement of the movies whilst still being straight forward enough to let a disinterested sibling or parent also have fun. Star Wars Dark Side Rising is one of those games; mechanically interesting enough to appeal to none Star Wars fans, but yet interesting enough to keep wannabe Jedi engaged.
Dark Side Rising is a co-op game, which means you work together to win. Each of you picks a team; for example you might be Luke, Leia and friends, or you might be the heroes from Rogue One or Rebels. Each team jaunts around the galaxy, gathering resources and allies in order to complete missions. Stopping you in Darth Vader himself in the form of a rotating model in the centre of the board; if Vader’s gaze is on you, things get tougher. Because it’s a co-op you need to talk to each other to figure out what to do, but the game presents enough options and ways to do things that everyone will be able to contribute.
Dark Side Rising is a re-skin of sorts of the game Thanos Rising: Avengers Infinity War & The Batman Who Laughs Rising, almost as if this is a game that can be easily re-imagined to fit in various franchises. The thing that makes this version unique is the look of the game. In Thanos, you’re trying to prevent the Infinity Gauntlet from being completed. In Dark Side Rising, it’s the Death Star. The ever present Darth Vader just makes the game more oppressive.
Having the Death Star as an integral part of the game’s mechanics sets a clock on the game; if Darth Vader builds his fully functional battle station then you all lose the game. Also, if 10 characters dies, you lose.
Over all this is a fairly thrilling game which is just complicated enough to be fun and yet straight forward to keep everyone in the house-hold involved. Fun, and recommended.
