T.I.M.E. Stories Review

If you guys haven't read my Game Crazy blog then let me talk a bit about my recent obsession with board games. Growing up, I was never a board gamer. None of my friends played them and none of them owned any. Of course we had Monopoly but I loathe Monopoly utterly and completely. Anyway, I've been playing "Mysterium" and "Pandemic" but "T.I.M.E Stories" is an incredibly unique game that I just have to discuss in this blog post. Here we go!

"T.I.M.E Stories" I'm sure among the board gaming community is probably considered overrated but seeing as how I'm new at this (board gaming) "T.I.M.E Stories" is amazing. Here's why. The story of "T.I.M.E Stories" is that you and your friends play as agents of T.I.M.E Organization and you travel to other time periods or other universes to prevent temporal faults from occurring. Sounds simple enough however the game is literally told like a story. It's half RPG and half board game but 100% awesome. The draw back to "T.I.M.E Stories" is that for starters, unless you care about spoilers you really can't watch a walkthrough on how to play and second the mechanics of the game take a lot of getting used to before you get it 100%.

Another draw back but awesome thing is that once you play through a scenario, you really can't do it again, BUT the other stories are expansions to "T.I.M.E Stories". With that kind of set up, "T.I.M.E. Stories" can create unique stories ad infinitum, while organically providing a reason for you to want to purchase expansions, which is a gold mine for businesses and a valid answer to the "Why should I buy the expansion?" question. "T.I.M.E. Stories" plays a lot like an old survival horror video game in a sense that you have to travel from place to place, pick up objects and consider the worth of performing a task and if it'll be worth it in the long run.

While "Betrayal At House On The Hill", game play wise is far more superior, "T.I.M.E. Stories" is much more immersive an experience and far more impressive at the aspect of telling stories. What I mean is when you investigate a location, it genuinely feels like you're investigating a location and not merely standing on a tile or a space on the board. The narrative structure helps you navigate and figure out just where exactly you should go next. This game is largely a puzzle as you have to make the right decisions at the right time or risk losing time.

Not to mention the game makes provisions for failure, depending on how you fail (by either running out of time or dying) you'll get a different response for your superior and another opportunity to try again, this time with more information. And considering the motif of the game is time travel, having to re-do the game is built into the narrative as well. I consider this game incredibly ingenious but again it's mechanics are daunting and take some getting used to. I'm ashamed to admit that our (my wife and I's) first time playing it, I cheated and refused to move the time counter...I got incredibly frustrated. But on The Marcy Case & Expedition Endurance we did it by the book.

The Marcy Case, my favorite thus far

With "T.I.M.E Stories" the possibilities are literally endless and it would suck if they decided to stop making expansions, this game warrants as many expansions as possible as the reply value of these games goes to 0% the second you finish. But that's part of it's charm and what makes it so unique. Anyway I'm done gushing about "T.I.M.E Stories", if you've played it, tell me about your favorite scenario, if you haven't and are looking for a good time gaming, check this one out, you won't reget it.