Welcome to the newest blog series from Rollacrit: Games We've Purchased But Never Played. In this series, we finally take the games off our “display only” shelves for the first time, play a round, and then talk about our experience. But first, to dwell in our shame, we talk about why we’ve never played it.
To kick things off, we’re talking about a Kickstarter game that isn’t Heroes of Barcadia — Batman The Animated Series Adventures: Kickstarter Edition by IDW Games. This baby is a whopping FOUR boxes of content including Shadow of the Bat, Arkham Asylum, All In Big Box, and Stretch Goals and Exclusives. To be honest, just unboxing it was an experience (but completely worth it).
Why We Never Played It
Please don’t be mad at us, IDW Games. It’s nothing personal. The main reason this game sat on our shelf for so long was purely because we didn’t want to mess it up. Batman: the Animated Series played a large part of our respective childhoods and helped influence our Chief Wordsmith and Content Manager to write his dissertation about superheroes (we’re proud of him).
In addition to wanting to preserve this game forever, another concern was trusting friends enough not to bend the cards or destroy any of the pieces because some of our players get very… passionate about games. There’s one more thing though… a secret shame, if you will.
The owner of this particular game lacks the confidence to paint the pieces. So even when we played together, they were all unpainted. We're not going to publicly shame him because we get it. It's a commitment! But maybe we'll get to pick up this game again and be greeted with vibrant color one day.
The Experience
WHY DID WE WAIT SO LONG TO PLAY? Even with unpainted pieces, this board game was a blast! The perfect blend of “90s kid” nostalgia mixed with great mechanics. The battle sequences felt balanced and engaging (a pleasant surprise when dealing with "super" villains). And although there is a learning curve (as with any new game), things felt cohesive and intuitive after a round.
The custom dice for the different characters gave each of them a different playstyle (especially Batgirl’s rerolls). And since we got all the Kickstarter content, there are plenty of other stories to play through. We will definitely be playing this more regularly!
VERDICT
10/10. This game is a must-play for any fan of Batman TAS.
For waiting so long, we sentence ourselves to two years in Arkham Asylum.
About the Author:
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Michael Baker is the main content writer at Rollacrit with a flair for haiku. He previously wrote for ThinkGeek (and a bunch of other places). In his spare time, he enjoys playing tabletop games, writing about comics and pop culture, and cultivating his dog’s Instagram presence. |