Sit Down, Magic Maze, Strategy Card Game, Ages 8+, 1-8 Players, 15+ Minutes Playing Time

Product Information

So what makes this game so special and so different that it has managed to be nominated for the coveted award? Players may perform their actions whenever and as many times as they want using whichever adventurer they want. Whenever you flip the timer, you may talk freely for as long as you’d like or until any player touches a piece. I think they chose to use pawns because they’re easy to pick up and put down, but it would have been great if the characters actually looked like characters. Magic Maze has a punctuated rhythm to it that combines periods of intense silence with moments of raucous frantic discussion.

One sheet of stickers to stick on the Hero pawns (if you wish) which allows people with altered colour perception to recognise them. Codenames at least manages to convert silence into something that can later be the grist for more refined conversation after the fact. I think the key in each of these examples (and in the examples of other cooperative games I like) is that I like cooperative games with a strong hook, as well as a strong corrective for the problem of “quarterbacking” (or one player taking control over the game, making the other players superfluous).Since the entire game is played silently (with the occasional moment to strategize), you may not feel like you’re playing a game that’s going to be a lot of fun. There’s a sticker that goes on both sides of the timer, as well, but you don’t have to do that, yet, unless you want to be thorough. Find them and then find the exits; that’s right there’s a second part – once you found your weapons you need to get out.

Give each player a tile (I’ll explain what the tiles do later), and have players with tiles with the same symbol sit across the table from each other, rather than adjacent. Magic Maze is a cooperative real-time game where everyone collectively controls four characters: a Barbarian, Mage, Elf, and a Dwarf.The box is large enough to accommodate expansions (and one is already in the works), which will cheer some and exasperate others. It would be one thing if you could all talk about what it was that was needed – but the problem here it’s often not just the means that you don’t see, but the overall goal.

In ideal circumstances you’re not so much sacrificing the social side of the game as you are boiling it until the lid blasts off and kills someone. Take that as you will but consider that I have a cyanide capsule installed in one of my back molars as a safeguard against someone bringing Settlers around to game night.This leads to some unintentional cheating, and makes your victory feel cheap, or makes the group feel a bit daft that they didn’t see the time run out. I’ve played it four players with two separate groups and the most enthusiastic anyone has been so far is to say, ‘I don’t know – it’s okay!