My First Impression
Being a lover of cute cryptids I have been following this game on social media for way too long and placed my order on release day. After much waiting, pacing a hole in my carpet and an email to tell me that my order was delayed it finally arrived!
As soon as I unwrapped the packaging I knew that I’d fall in love with this game quickly, for me to fall in love with a game it’s not just about the game play, it’s about the presentation, the attention to small details and the love the either has or hasn’t gone into making the game overall.
My First Impression
Being a lover of cute cryptids I have been following this game on social media for way too long and placed my order on release day. After much waiting, pacing a hole in my carpet and an email to tell me that my order was delayed it finally arrived!
As soon as I unwrapped the packaging I knew that I’d fall in love with this game quickly, for me to fall in love with a game it’s not just about the game play, it’s about the presentation, the attention to small details and the love the either has or hasn’t gone into making the game overall.
The first thing that I saw was the beautiful holographic outer sleeve, cleverly switching the cryptids on the colour from cute critters to ominous silhouettes when I moved the sleeve back and forth, this isn’t necessary to the packaging at all but it’s one of the small details that tells me that the studio are passionate about what they put out.
As my excited unboxing went on (Picture a bear tearing into a picnic basket and you can imagine the scene in my house!). The next thing that impressed me was the quality of the tokens. These were basic card tokens like most games but they were thick and popped out of the sheets incredibly easily with no snagging or tearing of the token like I’ve had with previous games.
The last detail that really impressed me was the storage and layout inside the box, most people probably won’t even notice and definitely won’t get this excited by it but everything has its place and fits perfectly into the box. The layout for the cards, meeples and tokens has clearly been meticulously planned even with two slots moulded into the plastic underneath the card slots for two one off tokens to sit in. so nothing rattles around.
Now that I’ve got the really nerdy stuff out of the way let’s talk about the artwork. Twisted Cryptids is exactly what you’d expect from the creators of Unstable Unicorns, the artwork is the exact same style as all of their other games and it’s hilariously adorable.
What’s in the box?!
In the base pack you’ll receive
52 Action cards
12 Event cards
10 Hidden trait cards
1 Starting player token
1 Sinkhole token
12 Hiding spot tokens
30 Human tokens
12 Double sided myth tokens
4 Cryptid meeples & matching tarot sized cryptid cards
Aim of the game
As humans roam the wilderness you’ll have to outsmart them and your fellow cryptids to build your myth and earn your status as a true legend! To do this you’ll need to pull off the perfect elaborate hoaxes, deploy your decoys and lurk like a pro.
Playability
If you’ve played any other game from Unstable Games, you’ll already be familiar with the formula. Cards are drawn, meeples are moved, and points are gained through a mixture of plotting and chance. However, while the formula is the same as their previous games (see my happy little dinosaurs review) the fresh Cryptid coat of paint makes a surprisingly big difference! The inclusion of hoaxes, decoys and the different types of human in the game keep the game interesting and increase the replayability. There are also 2 expansion packs available to add 4 extra players (2 per pack) and new cards.
Set up and gameplay
To set up, open the board and lay it flat in the middle of the table, it might lay completely flat the first few times that you play it but don’t worry it will eventually.
Next make 3 rest areas to the side of the board (it doesn’t matter which side) 1 for each type of human. Then place the remaining human tokens on each site with the corresponding human symbol.
Now onto the cards!
Shuffle the Action deck and place it next to the board (leave an area next to the deck for the discard pile). Now do the same for the event deck leaving space next to it for a current events deck (events cards that have been drawn).
The last step of the set up is to choose your cryptids. Each player receives their chosen cryptid meeple, matching card, 9 matching cryptid sighting cards, 3 hiding spot tokens and 2 hidden trait cards.
Each player will create 3 piles in front of them using their 9 sighting cards and place their meeples on the 5th section of the myth track.
Finish by giving the starting player token to the last player who visited a park and off you go!
Game play
To start the game, each player (starting with the starting player and moving clockwise) will place their first hiding spot on the board, the starting player then passes the starting player token to the person on their left and this continues until the 2nd and 3rd hiding spots have been placed for all players.
There are some things to note when placing your hiding spots:
● You can’t place more than 1 of your hiding spots on a site
● When playing with 4 players, no more than 3 players can have a hiding spot on 1 site
Now deal 5 action cards to each player, these cards will be replenished back up to a total of 5 each round.
Gameplay is split into 4 phases:
● Dawn phase
● Day phase
● Dusk phase
● Night phase
Twisted Cryptids lasts for a total of 5 rounds.
Dawn Phase
At the start of the dawn phase the starting player turns over the top card off the event deck adding it face up to the current event pile, the effects of the event will then be resolved top to bottom (if an effect can’t be fully resolved, do as much as you can and move on).
Day Phase
In the day phase the aim is to lure humans around the wilderness to where you want them to be. In player order carry out one of the below actions:
● Play an action card from your hand
● Play the action at the bottom of your cryptid card
● Discard an action card from your hand
● Pass on your turn
Dusk Phase
This is where a human encounter will occur, the site of the encounter is the site with the most human tokens on it that has at least 1 hiding spot. If sites tie, the first player chooses between them. Be warned sites can get extremely crowded!
For players who have a hiding spot on the encounter site, in player order reveal the top card of the stack that corresponds to the number on your hiding spot. Gain or lose myth points depending on the effects listed on the card, then place your card next to your stacks. Lastly remove your hiding spot from that space. (if one of your hiding spots is used 3 times put that hiding spot token back into the box).
Night Phase
The night phase is where the scheming happens!
In player order:
● Either place your token back on the board (it cannot be the same spot as last time) OR if you weren’t involved in the Dusk phase encounter you can move one of your hiding spots to a different site
● You can discard any number of cards from your hand and draw fresh from the action deck
● Finish by passing the starting player token to the person on the left
End game
Once 5 rounds have been completed flip over any remaining sighting cards in your player area and your hidden trait card.
You gain 7 myth based on the level of completion shown on your hidden trait card.
If there is a tie once all myth points have been counted the player who has a hiding spot on a site with the most humans wins, if this doesn’t resolve the tie then congratulations! You’re both winners!
Final thoughts
I love this game, the art style is beautiful, the game play is simple but random enough to keep every playthrough unique and it’s a great little game for when you don’t have hours to spare.
My biggest gripe with this game isn’t actually with the game at all but with Unstable Games themselves. Not every game needs multiple expansion packs! If you go to their website you’ll see their games have multiple expansions that introduce new cards and more importantly up the player count for the game. This is the bit that really grinds my gears, it’s not necessary, just make the base game 4-8 players to begin with. If your business model requires you to sell expansions for every game then make them interesting, don’t lock the ability to play with more friends behind a paywall!
I had a problem with the quality of the pieces in Unstable Games previous game which has 100% been fixed with this release, the pieces are nice and sturdy, don’t rip and the instruction booklet is better quality and easier to manage.
With games running up to an hour this is a great game to get stuck into but not lose a whole evening, I will personally be playing this a lot and hope that you enjoy it as much as I did.
