I’ve put a genuinely embarrassing number of hours into the video game, so I sat down with the board game version braced to be disappointed, the two mediums usually want different things from a deckbuilder. Instead I was hooked from the first turn, and the way the co-op layer adds actual table talk without diluting the core deckbuilding decisions is the thing that won me over, my one honest critique is that it stays this faithful to the source rather than carving out new cards or bosses of its own, which is also, weirdly, part of why it works.

Setup for the very first play is a real chore, you’re sleeving a genuinely large stack of cards before you can even start, but once that’s done, teardown and re-setup between sessions has been very manageable for us. Base attack and defense values landing on clean numbers, one point each, keeps the actual arithmetic light even as the deck gets more complex, which I appreciated more than I expected to going in. The scaling story is a real thing to know before you buy, it plays noticeably easier the more people are at the table, and it can drag a little at four when the “weakest link” slows the group’s pace, our sweet spot has ended up being two, close enough to the tight risk-reward feel of the original.

Component quality earns every compliment it’s gotten online, the insert genuinely keeps maintenance between plays easy, and the presentation as a whole feels like a real occasion to bring to the table rather than just another box on the shelf.

Four stars, not five, mostly because at one player it can’t help but make me miss the instant feedback loop of the screen version. As a social alternative to staring at a phone though, this earns its spot in the rotation.