This is a game that you can definitely judge by its cover. That is to say, it’s amazing.
Of course, board games have given us plenty of reasons not to trust a pretty box. There are the Stepfordly anodyne pretty varieties…perfectly pleasant, lovely, but you can’t remember much about them a week later.
And then there are the sexed-out train wreck femme fatales. Minis everywhere, foil, deluxe components, and maybe even a dragon. They are going to ruin your life and they would like $249 plus shipping to do it.
Realm of Reckoning belongs to a third category. The darkwave punk grunge archetype. Strange, cool without seeming to try very hard, with meeples that look like they’ve been through something. It kind of has the vibe of an obscure band you feel cooler for knowing.
And, thankfully, it’s also very good.
The basic premise is that the afterlife has fallen apart, which is definitely a bummer. The Queen of All Souls is gone, the Five Pillars have been scattered, and five factions are now running around trying to get control of what’s left.
You play over three ages, drafting cards that let you put acolytes around the board, get money, recruit wardens, draw mercenaries, etc. All pretty normal stuff. The interesting part is what happens after you use a card.
You tuck it underneath one of the five pillars on your player board, gaining influence there and leaving different symbols visible. Those symbols might eventually score OR they might be completely useless. Because you don’t actually know the scoring conditions at the beginning of the game. You have to make them. A bit Arcs-esque, if you will, but with 17 options to choose from.
Throughout the game there are reckonings, which are basically bidding wars where everyone throws whatever they can spare into the pot. Acolytes, coins, influence, mercenaries, wardens. You secretly decide how much you’re willing to give up, then everybody reveals at the same time. And one of the big prizes is getting to place a monument.
The monuments decide what scores, and this is the part I was always thinking about the most afterward. Because if I have spent half the game accumulating some particular thing, obviously I would very much like the world to know that this particular thing is the mark of excellence. And conveniently, I may be able to build a monument saying exactly that.
There is something very funny about being allowed to help decide the standard by which you are going to be judged. We all like objective standards right up until somebody hands us the pen. Then suddenly it turns out that the truly important qualities in life are exactly the ones we happen to possess.
I have six influence on this track? Well, surely civilization itself depends upon influence on this track! I have a ton of mercenary cards? At last, someone has had the courage to recognize the importance of mercenary cards!
It’s maybe not the most subtle observation on human behavior, but Realm of Reckoning makes a whole game out of it. The problem is that once you build a monument, everybody gets to score it. You establish the value and then everyone else gets to live under it too. Which means another player can look at the scoring condition you very thoughtfully created for yourself and just steal it out from under you.
And the monuments that come out earlier score more often, so you’re also trying to figure out when to commit. Put one out early and you have more chances to score it, but you’ve also given everybody else plenty of time to start chasing it.
The reckonings themselves are probably my favorite part of the game. They force you to actually spend all the stuff you’ve been hoarding, and because the bids are hidden, there’s always that awful moment where you’re wondering whether you just spent way too much or are about to discover you didn’t spend nearly enough.
The bidding isn’t complicated, although I did find myself counting and recounting what I could bid and trying to keep it straight in my head. Different resources convert into bid strength in different ways, so it takes a little mental math. Not a huge deal, but definitely a thing.
There’s a fair bit going on in Realm of Reckoning, but I never felt like I was drowning in systems. Most turns are pretty straightforward: choose a card, do the action, decide where to tuck it, and try not to make some decision that Future Me will resent. On top of that, each game has been dramatically different. This one’s got plenty of voyages in her yet!
But maybe the best endorsement I can give it is that I loved this game and my husband, who doesn’t love all games, did too. That matters to me because there are plenty of games I can appreciate while knowing full well that I am going to have to drag him back to the table for a second play. Fortunately, this was not one of them. We both wanted to play again, and I kept thinking about it afterward, which is usually the better sign anyway.
The decisions are interesting, the production is fantastic, and I’ve just had a really good time with it. This game is compelling and fun and it made me feel, as a lazy back-cover blurber might write, spellbound. So go ahead and judge this one by its cover. Sometimes the obscure band really is that good!
Thank you to IV Studio for that review copy!
