Board Game Break Time: After The Virus

Board Game Break Time is a new feature we're bringing in, where we play board games and review them.

Title: After the Virus 
Publisher:  Fryx Games

Release Date: 2017
Designer: Jacob Fryxelius

Game Mechanisms: Cooperative Play, Deck Building, Hand Management

# of Players: 1-3   Best: 1

Ages: 10+

Play Time: 30-90 Minutes

  

Average Rating: 7.2

Average Rating: 4.3

The zombie apocalypse is here! After The Virus is a cooperative deck builder in which you and your friends band together to survive and complete different missions. The 15 included missions form a storyline if played in sequence, but don't expect to survive that easily because the zombies will attack you in ever increasing numbers! Your deck is invaded by more zombies each time it is reshuffled, so you need to search the area deck for useful weapons and other things to help you. Some stuff can be added to your deck while others will stay in your play area, and still other things will be usable only once in the game. To manage your deck and play area well is critical if you are to complete the mission before you are overwhelmed by the zombies!

This was a pretty fun game, it was a little difficult to understand at first. But it was a lot of fun. 

Also really difficult. Like really difficult. At first it was okay and pretty easy. But then BAM it got harder because we had to bring more and more zombies out.

Zombies kicked out butt.

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This was a strange game from the beginning for me. First off it was strange to see that it's 1-3 players. I usually see 2-4 or 3-5, or something in those lines. 1-3 is odd and it's hard to find the right amount of party players for this game. It worked well for John, Ash, and I.. but if my hubby would have been home, there would have been an odd man out. I am not sure why they couldn't make the game 1-4 but oh well. I guess 1-3 works.

The cover was strange for me too. I didn't know quite what to think of this game.  The artwork is fun and quirky. It has the right tone and feel for the game. So once I played it, the cover made sense to me.  I really love the artwork and the components. The cards are nice, the rule book is nice. It's done well.

The artwork isn't the only thing that is unique though. This game play isn't really unqiue as it's a deck builder... but the game play had elements that made it feel unique to me. I didn't feel that it was like all the other deck builders or all the other zombie games. It had a bit of a legacy feel too as the game story can continue over many game plays.

The game play was pretty easy to learn. We had a few questions with some of the game play that we had to inquire help with... but for the most part it's pretty easy to learn. The game play itself is not easy. I am all for hard games but this one was very hard and I think it will be very hard to beat. Now we have only played this once so maybe with some practice we can get it down to a smooth run through and beat the game. The game does play fast and that is a good thing. So it can be played over and over in one setting if you feel like fighting til you win.

The few things that put my rating on game play and length of play is the fact that it is hard, some players will be out before others and I feel just as I was getting the hang of the game, it was over. So if it was a bit longer it would make it less hard maybe and it would be better if the game didn't eliminate players to sit and wait...now with a short game it isn't that big of a deal, but still not nice for the first one out.

I wonder how difficult and fun this would be on the solo play. Maybe one day I will find out. For now I will play this game again, I did have fun with it, and I do need to practice so maybe I can kick some zombie butt!

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