Puzzle Strike Reviews
Wednesday, February 9, 2011 at 2:36PM My Puzzle Strike inventory is getting a bit low, and recent reviews are getting people pretty interested, it looks like!
Drake's Flames
First, check out Drake's Flames review of Puzzle Strike. What's notable and kind of mindblowing is that I think it's the most positive review that is even possible for something to get. I thought Ken B. at fortressat.com giving his personal game of the year award in 2010 was about as good as can be hoped for, but somehow Drake's Flames loves the game even more! Ha, thanks!
Wired.com
Next, wired.com liked the game too! Here's GeekDad's review from wired.com.
Drakkenstrike
Drakkenstrike is known in the board game world as having incredibly well produced videos that show the components of games, to go along with his reviews. Here's his spiffy Puzzle Strike video review:
If you're interested in buying Puzzle Strike, remember that you get the print-and-play version for free when you get it from my store. Thanks everyone!
Reader Comments (13)
I wonder if there would be any changes in balance or manufacturing process for the third printing?
The next run of Puzzle Strike will be identical to the current one, except maybe an update to the rulebook with clarifications. The current stock is getting kind of low, so I'll have to get a new run going in the next few days or something probably.
Nice work, David.
As for Drake, he's a good friend of the Fortress, we cross-publish his articles all the time.
This really was an incredible 1-2-3 punch you put together. Look for the official Fortress: AT review on Yomi very soon (hint, it's a good one.) I have a strong feeling Michael Barnes' Gameshark review will also be pretty glowing. All the accolades are well deserved.
Now...what for an encore? :)
Awesome Ken. B! Feel free to wait until the next run of Yomi is almost here to post that stuff too, if you want!
A new version of Flash Duel is next (with quite a few enhancements), followed by expansions for Puzzle Strike and Yomi. Beyond that, I have some things in the works. ;) Will take a long time.
Any chance we'll see accessories for Puzzle Strike and/or Yomi? I'd love playmats for Puzzle Strike. I'd even...wait for it...pay for them.
I'm trying my hardest to finish a new version of Flash Duel, and it's taking a long time because there is so much in it. Also working on Puzzle Strike expansion, Yomi expansion, and a new game. I think playmats for Puzzle Strike are a good idea, it's just a matter of finding the time to make it happen. I am looking into it, so eventually I think they'll exist.
I'm a huge fan of Dominion and fighting games and Puzzle Strike looks great. Although Puzzle Strike was created and balanced for 2-4 players, is it possible (or fun?) to play with 5 or 6 players? If possible, how much longer would a game take in those cases? Also, do players generally end up sticking with one character (after trying out each one) b/c they identify and like that character's playstyle or is random character selection equally enjoyable? Thanks!
No, it can't be played with 5-6 players. There is a specific amount of each chip that people are free to buy. For all puzzle chips, there is only 5 of each. If it gets sold out, no one can buy anymore. 5 is only barely enough for a 4 player game and would never be enough for a 5-6 player game. Also, certain chips would be broken in a 5-6 player, and you have to go through a lot of down time between your turns waiting for everybody else.
As for characters, generally, people like to stick to 1-3 characters for anything serious. In casual matches, random select is popular because it's fun to play a variety of different characters. That's not to say sticking with only 1 character isn't fun, you might be the guy who likes to fully explore everything your character can do, it's a preference.
We've played with 5 and 6 players quite frequently. You have to get a bit creative, and red-chips are ridiculously overpowered, but it can be done.
I recently bought and played a LOT of puzzle strike. The game kind of evolved for us as we played it and it was really cool that way and really fun. However, we had some issues with the game, and I'd like to know if anyone else was having them as well. It could be we are just doing something wrong.
We found that all but 5 or so of the the 24 different puzzle chips were always, and I do mean always, worse than a combine. Less than half of the remaining were useful in some special circumstance. Generally the problem was that by the time you could afford, buy, then finally draw it, it was that point in the game where not crashing a gem each turn would later result in a loss. A puzzle chip without a black arrow or purple arrow was like a wound chip in your deck. After a few games, we never had an issue that there were 'only' 5 of each chip since usually only 1-2 each of 1-2 puzzle chips were actually purchased.
The strength of the characters was incredibly dependent on the chips in play. Argagarg(sp?) was fail without the really annoying chip, and he's got a flawless record with both really annoying and knockdown on the table. None of us has ever concieved a way to actually win using DeGray(sp?), as all of his special abilities require you to neglect crashing a gem on your turn. None of that really matters though since the chromatic orb character nearly always won, and she didn't care about what chips were out.
If you think only 5 chips are ever worth buying, yes you're definitely doing something wrong. It's common intermediate player thing to only buy purples, apparently. Try playing on fantasystrike.com/dev to see several other successful strategies. Or check out the forums here.
Setsuki can double-take a whole bunch of puzzle chips for good effect (Risky Move, Sale Prices are a couple common ones). Gem Essence is generally good, and Roundhouse, One of Each, and 1-2 Punch are basically always good. A red chip strategy can work (Sneak Attack actually helps you win and Stolen Purples can be devestating) and Self Improvement is good against red chips. Master Puzzler should win if you can get it. When low on money, It's a Trap is good even without its text. It cost no action and doesn't dilute your deck because it self-trashes. Trapping something the opponent(s) want is just a bonus. Let's throw in Really Annoying which you already seem to know how to use, and that's half the puzzle chips already.
I didn't mean my post as a troll, and I didn't say the chips were not worth buying, just that they weren't as good as buying a combine. Thank you for referring me to the forums. I didn't know about them. We were in fact doing something wrong.
I read through the forums and there were some things that didn't make sense, so I downloaded and read your most current rules. I don't know how I got it confused, but we did not negate when counter-crashing. We sent the counter gem to the sender. Gems never actually left the table so the games were shorter than they should have been. I think our longest game was 13 rounds, but most ran to 9 or 10. All of the combos you mentioned I had explored, but given our mistake it was essential to crash every turn starting around round 6-7 to stay in the game, so chips that did not give additional actions were very difficult to actually play. Crashing 4 gems was critical near the end because the counter-crash could make you lose.
Oh wow yeah, if counter-crashing doesn't cancel out gems then games end too quickly. So that would have really messed up your games!