The Hobbit - There and Back: Rapid Review
Information:
Player Age: 10+
Player Count: 2 - 4 Players
BGG Weight: 1.89
Time to Play: 30 Minutes
Year Published: 2025
Disclaimer: A review copy for the game was provided by the VR Distribution
Rundown:
The Hobbit There and Back is mainly a roll and write game that focuses on the players completing a central goal, while gaining numerous other points through side quests or being the first to clear an objective (as shown by the points in the golden sunburst symbol).
After the players select which map they are playing, the game will continue in rounds until one player abruptly ends the game by completing the main objective. At the start of each round the dice are rolled (most of the time just the white dice). Three of these dice contain a path where the other two contain either a sword, bread or wizard hat symbol. The bread and sword will have various effects based on the maps (the player often gains a token of that type when the die is selected). When a wizard hat is selected the player will cross off one wizard hat square on their board gaining the bonus action if that selection is fully filled. The paths are how the players move and connect or surround their goals. The players often start at bagend and each new path has to connect to an exisiting path. To make this connection sometimes players will have to go over exisiting paths to make it connect to another side of the square.
On a turn the player will select and take one of the dice in the centre of the board. They will either draw the path, gain the symbol on the die or take the die and instead mark off an alternative action shown on the bottom of the player's left-hand board. Once all the dice have run out, they will be re-rolled and the player whose turn was next will have first selection, then continued clockwise.
Alteration:
This is not a scenario or campaign based game. Except it is more similar to games like welcome to the moon. This is eight different maps, that grow on past learnings using concepts in later maps introduced in earlier maps, like activating certain elements based on the black die rolls; or regions ending that once passed players cannot return to that side of the map. This allows for a great blend of more welcoming maps and more challenging maps catering for many different players. There are also variants in the rulebook creating harder rules for each map, these maps truly are endlessly replayable.
The maps also feel drastically different from each other. The maps use the same concepts, how drafting path/icon dice works, how sorcerer hats are used for added benefits, or how sword and bread tokens can be gained either physically or purely as a point track. Each map however has a set of several rules that change how the map may work, like storm clouds that are created as the game is played forcing the player to avoid them or lose points; trolls need their sides surrounded by spending swords to score large points; or lastly a seperate path that is created via eagles to help free dwarves.
There are even two maps in the game that are vastly different to anything else and instead use a polyomino puzzle. There are no path dice in map 4 and map 6. Instead the black dice is rolled, all players selects one shape of that value or lower. Each value has three of the same shape. When they are all used in that value they award bonus points at the end of the game. This creates an interesting mini game of trying to use all of one value to unlock bonus scoring while focusing on the larger polyomino puzzle for surrounding the sides in certain spaces. These maps are my favourite way to play.
Production:
The production is great in this game, as someone that isn't the biggest fan of the hobbit franchise. The whimsical art completely distracted me from the source material and instead felt like its own fantasy world. The other amazing element of the game, is instead of having numerous sheets for each map it is instead collated into a roll and write book which I have never seen done before.
The choice of physical tokens for the bread, swords and pinecones (only used in one map) was also a great touch instead of merely keeping count on a track.
Interaction:
This is a game that ends immediately when a player reaches the end of the map (or goal). It's a race game, about the points you make along the way. The goals are obvious, but the challenge is knowing how long to spend on the various side quests of each map. Carefully keeping an eye out on your fellow players to determine the best time to rush for the end of the game is, to make sure they don't catch up on your points; or how to best scrape through various points as the end of the game is imminent.
Determination:
- The game is not a campaign game the maps are endlessly replayable.
- Tangible feeling of the tokens instead of just keeping these symbols on a track.
- Whimsical art.
- Easy to understand the core game, but intricacies for each map.
The Hobbit There and Back has left me pleasantly surprised. As someone who is not a fan of the franchise, I was willing to try it due to being a large fan of roll/flip and write game. Since the game has such fun whimsical art it doesn't feel like a Hobbit game for me, instead it feels like its own theme. In this game there are eight different highly replayable maps in a clever bound dry erase book. The maps share the common mechanisms of using either the white dice, black dice or both dice. As well as the bread and sword tokens. But the goal and side-objectives of each map feel very different. This combines the great level of making the game easy to teach but feeling widely different per map played. The other crucial element players have to understand is this game concludes like a race, when one player meets the objective the game will end and everyone will score. To be good at the game (which I am not) it is important to know when to rush towards the end objective and when to gain numerous points doing the other side-objectives. If you're a fan of roll and writes this is a beautifully produced package with plenty of maps creating an array of replayability. If you are new to roll and write and enjoy the theme, these maps go through the story of the hobbit, so I think there would be a lot to enjoy from that perspective. This is gaining a Go-To Golden Seal and I will be doing several posts explaining the different maps.
Comments
Post a Comment