What is it?:
Evil Spares None is a cooperate horror
board game that I helped Kickstart a few years ago.
The setting:
It's based on the typical “slasher
flick” type movie we remember. You take on some high school
students trying to get away from the slasher while trying to who's
behind the mask. The victims, I mean students, are forced to flee ,
running through the town, passing by those killed by the Psycho and
those yet to be killed. and collect evidence to discover who the
killer is.
The system:
The system is a bit of a mess. At the
start, you get 2-3 characters to start with. But, you can only
activate one to begin with and hope you get the chance to put the
rest in play. Or just activate them as your other characters die.
During your turn, you get three actions with your characters, but you
have to burn an action to switch to another character if you have
more than one in play. Characters have a Health stat, a Combat stat,
and Brains stat, in addition to a special Active ability and a
special Stand-by ability. They seem to have a huge amount of variance
between them and I haven't played enough to see how balanced they
are.
In between player turns, the Psycho
gets to move one space and draw cards. These cards usually let him
move more, so he can catch up with you before you get a chance to
even move your first character.
When it comes to drawing Action cards,
you have to be in the right spot on the board to get the chance to
draw them. And you need those Action cards. You also need to make it
to the right spot to reach a Stranger before the Psycho gets there
first. Strangers can become Townies, who you can sacrifice to save
your own skin, or can become another Character. And, for even more
fun, you need to reach the bits of Evidence left around so you can
solve the mystery... And hopefully use it to survive when the Psycho
comes calling.
When it comes to placing new parts of
the board, you're suppose to do it randomly, but that's really hard
when the tiles are double sided. Draw the wrong one, and everyone is
fucked. Hard.
The one thing that goes smoothly is
combat. It's simple dice rolling and comparing Combat stats between
the Characters and the Psycho. Weapons and other Action cards can
help the players, and Evidence and Townies can be “thrown at” the
Psycho to avoid the combat. But, as the Psycho increases in power, he
becomes harder and harder to defeat... Well, slow down, really, in
combat.
As you play the game, there are a few
score boards you have to keep track of. The first is the
Stalk-O-Meter, which tracks who's the Target of the Psycho and who's
going to be next. Being the Target is bad. Very bad. Then, there's a
Psycho score board and a Player score board. The Psycho score moves
up based on what the Psycho cards do. And some Psycho cards are
conditional upon the Psycho score is. The Player's score moves up by
finding Evidence and hurting the Psycho. Thankfully, it's pretty easy
to get those all figured out.
Is it worth it?:
I hate to say it, but...
No.
I paid $25 for the game and I don't
know if it's something I really want to play again. As one of my
friends who played with me said “These rules are way more complex
than they need to be.” That sums up my feelings. I think it could
have used a bit more playtesting to simplify it. The idea is sound,
but the execution was fumbled. Now, I do feel like I got a good
amount for what I paid for, but I wouldn't have bought it blind like
I did.
While I did have to put the game pieces
together (which means putting stickers on things), I didn't mind
that. My only real compliant was that the character pieces are wooden
things with “Minecraft Avatar” versions of the characters. Why
not just have a profile picture or just name instead? Minor, but not
something that really sold me.
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