King of Tokyo

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King of Tokyo
Deskohraní 2012 - 6869.JPG
Game data
author Richard Garfield
graphic Gabriel Butik u. a.
publishing company Iello
(Distribution: Heidelberger Spieleverlag , Hutter Trade )
Publishing year 2011
Art Board game
Teammates 2 to 6
Duration 30 minutes
Age from 8 years

Awards

Dutch Games Award 2013

King of Tokyo is a cube - board game of the American game designers Richard Garfield from the year 2011. The game for two to six players aged ten and takes about 30 minutes per game. It is a dice game that is based on the mechanism of dice poker games (such as Yahtzee or Kniffel ) and is thematically based on the Japanese Godzilla films. The aim of the players is to conquer the city of Tokyo with a gigantic monster .

The game was published internationally by the games publisher Iello and received the Dutch game award in 2013 ; in Germany it was first distributed by the Heidelberger Spieleverlag and later by Hutter Trade . In 2014, the successor King of New York was developed and published based on the game .

Theme and equipment

The game King of Tokyo is thematically based on the Japanese Godzilla films and the goal of the players is to conquer the city of Tokyo with their own gigantic monster . You can do this either when you reach 20 victory points (stars) on your player board or you injure all other monsters to such an extent that they no longer have any life points (hearts).

In addition to the instructions, the contents of the game box consist of:

  • a game board with the locations Tokyo and Tokyo Bay
  • six monster figures (Gigazaur, Meca Dragon, The King, Cyber ​​Kitty, Space Penguin, Alienoid)
  • six player boards for the corresponding monsters with victory and health point display
  • six black and two green six-sided dice
  • 66 cards
  • 50 chunks of energy
  • 28 tokens (3 × smoke, 1 × imitation, 12 × shrink and 12 × poison)

Style of play

At the beginning of the game, each player chooses a monster figure and the corresponding tableau. The game board is placed in the center of the table and the shuffled cards are placed in the center of the table. Three cards are turned up from the deck and placed next to the game board. The players enter 0 victory points (stars) and 10 life points (hearts) on their tableau.

The starting player is determined and he rolls the six black dice. The dice each show the numbers 1 to 3 as well as a heart, a claw and a lightning bolt. Each player has three throws per round and, similar to the trick game, can choose any number of dice and set them aside. Then he rolls the dice two more times and selects the dice that he would like to score.

Dice icon Rating
1 , 2 and 3 If a player succeeds in throwing the same number three times, he receives the corresponding victory points. Each additional die with the same number gives you an additional victory point.
heart The player receives one health point for each heart symbol (not applicable for the player in Tokyo).
lightning The player receives one energy block for each lightning symbol.
claw A player outside of Tokyo deals 1 damage to the monster in Tokyo. If the player is in Tokyo, he deals one point of damage to all players outside of Tokyo. The damage is deducted from the health points (not applicable to the starting player).

The results of the throws are evaluated and the player receives life points according to the number of heart dice, victory points according to the number dice, chunks of energy according to the lightning dice and damage points according to the claw dice. The energy chunks can be used to buy cards on display, which enable various special actions and evaluations and, depending on the card type, can either be used directly (“discard”) or as a permanent option (“keep”).

With the exception of the very first round, there is always one player with his monster in Tokyo (and with 5 and 6 players, one each in Tokyo Bay). In the first round, the starting player must go to Tokyo after scoring the dice. A player who goes to Tokyo receives one victory point for this and if he stays there long enough to start his next round in Tokyo again, he receives two more victory points. As long as he is in Tokyo, all other players can cause him damage by their throws and he himself can injure all other players - unlike these, however, he cannot use healing points (hearts) while he is in Tokyo. If a monster in Tokyo is damaged, the player can decide to leave the city at the end of the round. In that case, the player who distributed the damage must conquer Tokyo.

A player running out of health points loses his monster and is eliminated from the game. The winner is the player who reaches 20 victory points first or is the last to remain if all other players have been eliminated.

Power up!

King of Tokyo: Power up! appeared in 2012 as the first official expansion for King of Tokyo . In addition to the new monsters Pandakai, it contains a set of eight evolution cards for each monster, with which the player can upgrade his monster. This happens when the player has three hearts at the end of his die roll and wants to use them for evolution.

In 2016, a Power up! Was released for the game King of New York . -Extension that contains, in addition to the new Monster Mega Shark, evolution cards for all monsters from King of New York as well as corresponding cards for these monsters for use in King of Tokyo . This extension was published again in German by iello in 2019.

New monsters: Halloween , Cthulhu and King of New York

2013 saw the release of King of Tokyo: Halloween, another addition, called “Collector Pack 1”, which contained Pumpkin Jack and Boogey Woogey, two new monsters and a set of eight Power-up! Cards for each. This set also includes six orange dice and 12 new power cards.

The successor game, the independent King of New York , released in 2014, contains its own monsters that have been adapted to New York as a location, but can also be used for the game King of Tokyo . As a result, other monsters appeared as promos and additions for both games, for example from Heidelberger Spieleverlag and Dice Tower. In 2017, Cthulhu appeared in the Monster Pack - Cthulhu , another monster with corresponding Power-up! Cards, which was issued for King of Tokyo and King of New York .

Promos

In 2011, the first promotional set was a set of 11 new power cards, which were published in English and French. In 2012, Richard Garfield distributed cards individually described and signed with rules at the international game days (SPIEL '12) in Essen, which are all unique. Another promo card was released in 2014 as a bonus during the kickstarter campaign for the game Zombie 15 ' as The Horde Promo Card ; this card, which unleashes a horde of zombies, causes each monster, including your own, to suffer one point of damage at the end of the round. Another card was distributed at SPIEL '15 with the Fishmarket Promo Card .

Expenses and reception

The game King of Tokyo was developed by Richard Garfield , who is best known for the card game Magic: The Gathering , and published in several languages ​​in 2011 by the games publisher Iello and in numerous new editions in the following years. In Germany it was distributed by Heidelberger Spieleverlag and later by Iello himself through Hutter Trade .

In 2013, the game received the Dutch Game Award , and it was also nominated for numerous game awards such as the As d'Or in France and the Juego del Año Tico in Costa Rica. 2014 was developed and published based on the game King of New York . According to the publisher, the game had been sold around one million times worldwide by 2017.

King of Tokyo was also included in the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction , where it is described as "the absolute opposite" of Garfield's earlier invention, the trading card game Magic: The Gathering . So it is a good “gateway game” that is deliberately designed to be easy to learn and play.

supporting documents

  1. ↑ a b c d e game instructions King of Tokyo  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.hutter-trade.com   , 3rd edition 2016
  2. ↑ Expansions by King of Tokyo in the board game database BoardGameGeek (English); accessed on July 21, 2017.
  3. ↑ Versions of King of Tokyo in the BoardGameGeek game database; accessed on July 21, 2017.
  4. ↑ The monsters are on the loose! , Iello / Hutter Trade press release , May 9, 2017; accessed on July 21, 2017.
  5. ↑ a b King of Tokyo in The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction , March 27, 2019; accessed on May 17, 2019.

Web links