A Game Every Week #3 - Gremlins Inc

A Game Every Week is a series where I take a look at a game every week. I'll try to find games that aren't that well known. This won't be an full review, just a general overview and my experience playing the game.If you want me to take a look at a game, put it in the comments below.

Gremlins Inc is a digital board game, where you are a corrupt, greedy capitalist who battles with other corrupt, greedy capitalists to get the most amount of resources. Now I'm not the biggest fan of board games so when I heard of this game, I wasn't too enthused. But as I looked at gameplay videos, I became more and more interested in this game and eventually decided to try it out.

The main thing to remember with this game is that it's not a physical board game that was ported over to digital. It's a board game built from the ground up for playing on a computer. This means that the gameplay is different from basically any other board game.

Gameplay

Perhaps the most important thing about the gameplay is that a dice is not used to move around. Instead, each card has a a set number of places that you move by when you use that card to move. But anyway, we'll talk about that when we come to the cards. First, we'll look at the players, which are displayed on the left of the screen(i have blackened out my username in all screenshots).

Players

The main aim of the game is to score the most number of points(those are the numbers written in big font besides each player). There also are other resources written in smaller fonts to the right of the player's images. Those are Gold, Votes, and "disapproval points" (i don't know what it's actually called, it isn't written anywhere. The tutorials and in-game messages use a lot of symbols). Gold is generally the main currency in which you pay or earn fines/income. It is also the currency that is used to use a card. The Votes are used in elections for the governor. Elections are (usually) held every 20 turns. Becoming a Governor gives you various advantages(the primary one being that you don't have to pay fines). The 2 numbers to the right of the score determine how much you earn/pay when you get income/fines.

Cards

Now to the cards. As you can see in the top left of the card, this card can be used to move by 3 places. Each card, in addition to movement, has a special function. In this example, the card can only be used at The Plant as shown by the icon in the bottom left. Using this card requires 300 Gold, as shown in the top right of the card, and this card gives you 5 points, as shown at the bottom of the image inside the card.

The important thing to understand is that you CANNOT use a card to move and use it's special function at the same time.

The board

As you can see, each spot on the board has an icon. Spots are of 3 types - Regular Spots, Spots that affect the player when they pass through them, and Locations. Regular Spots are just that, spots. The second type of Spots are spots which affect you when you pass through them. They have a small icon on the lower right of the icon indicating the effect. Locations are the house shaped icons, and each of them are unique.

The special function of each card can only be used on it's spot. Sometimes cards have 2 spots where they can be used. Of course, you also have to have the resources needed for that card.

Misc

There are elections held for Governor every 20 turns. The player with the most number of votes becomes the Governor. Governors don't have to pay fines at any point.

There also is Jail. If you are unable to pay a fine, you go to jail. You have to roll a dice, which determines the number of turns you have to spend in Jail. Inside Jail,for every turn you can choose your behavior, between bad, neutral and good. Then, you choose one of 2 cards, which can contain good or bad things. You can be set free early, or earn money while in Jail. Alternatively, your sentence can also be increased.

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My Experience Playing the Game

One of the best things about this game is the AI players. While there also is multiplayer and that's where the real fun is, the AI can be pretty amazing too. All the screenshots I've posted are of games with AI, and they are generally pretty smart. For example, once while playing a game, a bidding war was posted, where every player bets some amount of money. The player that bets the least amount of money loses a point. The thing is, I had the least amount of Gold. So the other players bet one Gold more than the Gold I had, and I lost the bet. They also are reactive in that, if you have more points than them, the AI will try to use cards where the special function gives it points and thus eliminate the lead.

My tip for this game is to get as many votes as possible, and become the Governor. Most cards require Gold to use their special function, but the thing is, there are a lot of Bribe spots, which drain a lot of your Gold. If you become Governor, you don't have to pay bribes, which means you can save your Gold, and use it for the special functions.

Negatives

I think the main negatives of this game are -

1. You always have to be online, even when playing against AI. I don't think the AI is powered by their servers, so I don't know why you should have to be online at all times.
2. The Board design - Some parts of the board could be designed better. For example, the only path out of the Jail has a Misfortune spot in it. That means you can spend a few turns in jail, get out, and then get thrown back in Jail. Obviously, this can get annoying.

Conclusion

Overall, the game can be very unpredictable and somewhat stressful. You constantly have to be on your toes, looking at what other players are doing, and trying to predict their actions. There also are a lot of big things that happen unexpectedly. For example, during a game, I was trying to move towards The Court because I wanted to use a Card there. But suddenly, I faced a Misfortune, where I lost all my cards, and got new ones. This meant that i had to think of an entirely new strategy.

If you love strategy board games, but want something new and unique, something that is built for playing on a computer, then this game is for you.

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Thanks for reading this post. I'm trying to spend more time playing these games, so I can better describe the game for you.I hope it reflects in the quality of the post.

If you found this post to be helpful or interesting, please resteem it so other people can see it as well.

Sources

• Screenshots all mine
• Footer animation by @malos10