Anachronism Review

Anachronism is a pseudo-collectable card game in which players each take control of a different historical warrior in a fight to the death. If you've ever wondered who would win in a fight between Genghis Khan and Spartacus, now's your chance to find out!

The starter set for Anachronism comes with two warriors, a playmat and dice. There is a promo set (which is the one being reviewed here), which contains Beowulf vs Miyamoto Musashi. The first series starter set contains Achilles vs Spartacus, the second series starter set is Ramses II vs Genghis Khan - and a third series is on the way. Each set also contains several cultures, each with their own set of warriors. These warriors come in packs, much like traditional CCG booster packs, but with a fixed set of five cards in each. So a big selling point is that the usual money pit effect of CCGs is avoided, as you buy only the warriors that you want to buy and you are guaranteed to get the same cards as someone else with the same warrior. Each warrior pack contains the relevant warrior and his or her four equipment cards. These cards can be weapons, armour, quests etc. and each one can have a different effect on the game - weapons can be used to enhance or change the warrior's attack area, armour add to defensive rolls and so on.
The object of the game is to either get your enemy's health down to zero or to be the warrior with the highest level of health at the end of Round 5.

Anachronism is easy to learn and very quick to play - a typical five round game will last no longer than ten minutes, and often it can be over in five minutes. Each player takes a warrior and places it in their starting row on the 4x4 grid. They then take their 4 equipment cards and place them face down in the order they choose, to be revealed one at a time during each round. Once this is done, Round 1 begins and each player reveals their first card. 'Reveal' effects are enacted as necessary (this will be noted on the card), and then the player whose card has the highest initiative acts first. In event of a tie, the warrior with the highest experience level acts first.

A warrior's Speed determines the number of actions he or she can take in a turn - therefore a warrior with a Speed of 3 can take 3 actions. Actions can be taken as follows:

• Movement can be taken (1 space and facing adjustment per action)
• Change facing without moving out of the current space
• Perform a basic attack
• Perform a weapon attack
• Use an 'action' ability from a revealed card
• Pass

Attacks are resolved simply and quickly - each warrior has an attack grid displayed on their card (used to resolve basic attacks) and each weapon also has an attack grid. This shows the spaces around the warrior in which they can make an attack, along with any dice modifiers that are applied. Two six-sided dice are rolled, and modifiers applied (eg if the attack grid shows -2 in the square being attacked, 2 is subtracted from the total rolled). The defender then rolls two dice (applying any modifiers from armour or other special cards or abilities they may have). If the attacker rolls higher, damage is subtracted from the defender's health (the value is taken from the warrior's damage value as noted on the warrior card in a basic attack, or from the weapon's damage value as noted on the weapon card in a weapon attack). Last man standing wins!

The mechanics are simple and clean, and there is very little room for confusion in the rules. Also, there is far more depth to Anachronism than at first appears. When first playing, it is all too tempting to just use the first actions to move next to the enemy and then both players spend the rest of the game just rolling dice to attempt to hit each other. However, it soon becomes clear that, when facing a warrior whose attacks do more damage, other strategies can and should be employed - for instance moving away and letting the other player move closer before moving in for one hit and moving away again. Warriors can also seem hideously unbalanced, but once you learn that each warrior must be played in a different way, this feeling is somewhat alleviated. Combat is a little unsatisfying - for a game based on evoking the theme of two legendary warriors battling to the death, simply rolling dice to resolve combat is a bit of a cop out, and adds a huge element of luck to the proceedings. Only the brevity of the game makes this part of the game bearable - in a longer game, the endless die rolls would be tedious in the extreme.

However, the main problem with Anachronism is the very thing that should be it's selling point - the cost of collecting the game. Due to it's pseudo-collectable nature (ie no random cards, but only what you want), in theory it should be a much cheaper game to actually collect than other CCGs. However, a Warrior pack of just five cards has an RRP of £4.99 - which works out to just under £1 per card. It has to be said that the production values on the cards are incredibly high - they really are gorgeous cards - glossy, tough and nicely illustrated, but in order to have a selection of warriors it is still a ridiculously extravagant expense. The starter set - containing just 10 cards along with dice and a folding paper playmat - is only marginally better value for money. Other CCGs, despite the prohibitive cost of collecting lots of cards, offer far more scope for strategy and deckbuilding than Anachronism will ever be able to provide.

Also, Anachronism is a joint venture between The History Channel and TriKing. Given that The History Channel are involved, you would think that the game would be rather educational. However, very little historical information is actually included, which is a rather wasted opportunity.

While Anachronism is fast, simple and reasonably good fun, it is not an essential purchase. The cost of a starter set and a few warriors to go with it is just too high for the amount of 'game' that is provided. If you consider that the starter set plus three or four warriors costs around the same price as a game such as The Settlers of Catan, it is obvious that Anachronism is very overpriced. Compare further with other CCGs, in which 60 card decks can be bought for less than £10, and Anachronism seems like even less value for money. The theme itself is appealing but isn't terribly well implemented, there is little atmosphere and the flavour of the game is lost when making roll after roll of the dice for combat. Recommended only for players looking for a very fast, light card game with quite a bit of luck and some costly expandability.

Summary

Presentation: Hard to fault, presentation wise - gorgeous cards on very sturdy stock, which are a far cry from the plain cards of the average CCG. 9.7/10

Clarity of Rules: A simple game with very few rules - however, a few questions on gameplay do arise, and there isn't a lot of clarification available. 6.8/10

Game Length: Incredibly short, allowing for multiple battles as desired. 8.8/10

Value: Not a lot here for the money - the content itself is very low for what is a very pricey game. 3.4/10

Overall: Anachronism fails both as an educational tool and as pure entertainment, although the lack of collectability and the gorgeous components go a small way to making up for its deficiencies. More historical information and gameplay depth would have helped it considerably. 5.5/10 (not an average)

Review by Jason M. Brown