Reader Reviews

HeroQuest - the Board Game

by Killerbee

The fantasy role-playing genre has always attracted a certain sort of person. You can still see them in Games Workshop on a rainy day: hunched over a table they've painted green and stuck dyed bits of sponge onto for bushes, wearing fancy dress and calling themselves 'Zagarorg the Magnificent' or 'Dagolas - Slayer of Orcs'. Whatever your views about the relative merits of spending your Saturday afternoons pretending to wield spells of unimaginable power over mortal men (strange you don't see many girls there...), it's clear that this sort of thing remains a fairly niche activity.

But equally, Lord of the Rings is one of the most popular stories ever told, and Harry Potter has drawn thousands of children (and adults) into its magical world, so clearly there is some scope for the mainstream to embrace this kind of pastime. Well, that's obviously what Games Workshop and MB Games thought when they developed HeroQuest way back in 1989.

Set in a fantasy realm of dungeons, elves, orcs and sorcery, HeroQuest took the basic ideas of role-playing games and simplified the 200+ page rule books of Dungeons & Dragons and Warhammer into something that would more comfortably sit alongside Monopoly and Trivial Pursuit in your games cupboard.

Players donned the mantles of a typical variety of fantasy characters, each with their own attributes - the Barbarian was physically strong and great in close combat, but had no magical powers; the Dwarf was tough and could deactivate the traps that littered the dungeons; the Wizard was weak, but could cast a variety of attacking and healing spells; and the Elf sat snugly in the middle with good close-quarters combat ability and some magical power. For me though, the role to play was that of the bad guy - the evil Wizard Morcar, who sat behind a cardboard screen, directing his minions of evil. Bwahahahaha!

The straightforward game board consisted of a number of rooms and linking corridors - but what brought it vividly to life were the pieces of 3D furniture, doors and floor tiles to flesh out the dungeons and make every game a different experience. The playing pieces themselves were typical Games Workshop models in coloured plastic. But where this game really came into its own was when you (or a willing friend or relative) took the time to paint the models - designing colourful uniforms for your army of Orcs, or a dazzling cloak for the Wizard. Honestly, anyone who owns this game and hasn't taken the time to bring the game's models up to the level of design that was illustrated around the edge of the box is simply not seeing it the way it was meant to be seen.

Character development took the form of collecting money from the dungeons and buying weapons and armour with which to do battle in future dungeons. Searching for treasure might also reveal handy healing potions or a spear to extend your attack range a little, but you also risked being attacked by a "Wandering Monster" if the turn of the cards proved unlucky! With enough cash, player characters could even buy a Crossbow to make ranged attacks. Play consisted of dice-based movement and attacking/spell-casting or searching for traps or treasure and each quest had specific objectives to fulfil, thus not only keeping things varied but also allowing the game mechanics to develop and progress in complexity and challenge as the characters grew in strength.

In the years following the release of the original game, a number of expansion packs added new missions and monsters to the fray. The Ogres were this bad guy player's favourite - huge, hulking beasts with multiple hit points and powerful attacks to really punish that cowardly sod with the crossbow who never dared get into a proper fight at close range. "Wizards of Morcar" introduced four new evil wizards - each with their own set of spells - for the baddie to get his teeth into; whereas the good players could now spend their gold hiring men-at-arms to help them out - turning the party RPG into a squad-based tactical adventure!

Just to justify this review being here, computer versions of HeroQuest and the 'Return of the Witchlord' expansion were produced by Gremlin Graphics for a range of platforms - but they didn't let you be the bad guy and, honestly, tabletop was always where it was really at.