Intro
I will never forget the first time I had sushi. I went out to dinner with my wife and mother-in-law and they ordered some monstrous eel and raw something-or-another. I was offered to try it, so I popped a piece in my mouth. Man… not the ideal first dish. Spirit Island is a ‘raw fish and eel’ kind of board game - it can’t be the first board game you try, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try it in due time! You just have to be ready for it!
What is Spirit Island?
Spirit Island designed by R Eric Reeuss and published Greater Than Games, LLC is a fierce cooperative game for 1-4 players. You must take on the role of one of the asymmetric spirits of the island and defend your home from the colonizing Invaders! Turns are played simultaneously but everyone is working together to minimize the expansion of the invaders, protect the island natives (the Dahan), and prevent blight from spreading. The game escalates turn after turn as you grow stronger and use your powers more effectively, but the Invaders’ colonization is equally as unrelenting!
Gameplay
Spirit Island is played over a series of rounds. Each turn starts with the Spirit Phase, where each player chooses their growth strategy (adding Presence to the Island, adding Power cards to your hand, or refreshing your hand by picking up your discard pile), gains Energy, and determines the cards they’ll play this round. Then Fast Powers are utilized from those cards and from the Spirit’s unique Innate Power if applicable. Player’s turns are largely taken independently and simultaneously. Communication isn’t outlawed, but there’s no required shared decision making as you choose cards to play, apply powers, and decide where on the board those actions take effect.
The Invaders fight back next, flipping Events cards then following the progression of the Invader deck. First they Ravage any lands they’ve built upon, potentially spreading Blight (Blight is bad!) and attacking the native Dahan people. Thankfully, the surviving Dahan can fight back for the Spirits, and they’re quite helpful when levied correctly! The Invaders move on the Build on explored lands, then conclude their actions with an Explore phase where they move onto even more of the Island. The terrain cards progress through each of these three phases, so you have an idea of what to expect on future turns with the exception of the
Explore phase
The Spirits can then use their Slow Powers. As before, there’s as little or as much collaboration as each player is willing to entertain. The round concludes with time passing as played cards are discarded and the next round is prepared.
Scoring and Game End
Spirit Island is completely co-operative, so all players either win or lose together. There are several ways to do each! At the beginning of the game the Spirits must destroy every single little tiny Invader, Settlement, and City on the board. Yup, every single one. HA! Thankfully, Spirits can accrue Fear through card actions or by destroying the Invader’s Settlements and Cities. The more Fear, the easier the victory condition becomes. As more Fear is accumulated the Spirits only need to eliminate all Cities and Settlements, then subsequently all Cities. Accrue enough Fear and you just win! The Spirits can lose if any Spirit is destroyed, if the Island is overrun by Blights, or if the Invader deck runs out before they can achieve a victory condition.
Replayability
This game is LOADED with replayability options. For starters, the plain and simple version of the base game comes with “Power Progression” cards so you’re set up with compatible new powers. Then you can add in Blight effects cards, Events cards, or even Adversaries that alter the Invaders’ actions and abilities in increasing difficulties. There’s a ton of Spirits also with increasing complexities and unique Innate Powers. There are plenty of Power cards and Fear cards to keep things fresh and interesting. And folks, that's just the base game… We have the Branch and Claw expansion and the Jagged Earth expansion. They each provide new Spirits, new Powers, and even new components that further expands (aka complicates) the base game. You could bring this game to the table time and time again for a brand new adventure!
Game Components
This game is not small. The base game box is heavy as is, and I think any kind of organizer is an absolute must. There’s Power cards, Fear cards, Event cards, Invader cards, Fear tokens, Presence tokens, Energy tokens, Adversary boards, Spirit boards, Invaders, Settlements, Cities, Blight… You NEED an organizer! We initially used a foam organizer but I repurposed it to organize the expansion box and 3D printed a new base game insert to make setup a breeze. The components are definitely high quality cardboard and punch out cleanly. There’s also a “Premium Token Upgrade” that replaces the cardboard tokens with wooden ones, as well as a metal upgrade that includes Energy and Fear tokens. I can’t say no to metal coins…
Likes & Dislikes
The rule book is 31 pages. Yes, 31 pages. It is intimidating; we got the game to the table at least half a dozen times early on in the pandemic and we were not ready for Spirit Island. BUT after playing several other more complex games we finally got through the rules and understood the game. The rule book is FANTASTIC. The way it clarifies literally everything is super helpful when learning and just as a reference as we continue playing. It just looks scary.
I can’t stand a co-op game where the loudest person gets to quarterback everyone else’s turns. Spirit Island is fantastic at balancing individual decision-making with shared group goals. Cards offer interaction and encourage working together, but one person can’t possibly dictate every aspect of every player’s turn and that’s so so beautiful to me! The theme and components of this game are also exceptional. It’s not difficult to immerse yourself in the narrative of the Spirits, make friends with the Dahan, and hate those pesky Invaders.
Unfortunately, Spirit Island isn’t for everyone. It has a big table presence and a lot of moving parts. There are a ton of cards to read and symbols to understand. You definitely need to like complex games to get through the basic version of the game, and you need a little masochism to accept sitting through 2 hours of gameplay only to lose. There is a “Horizons of Spirit Island” introductory version for 1-3 players that can help introduce the concepts in a scaled-down version if its complexity is too daunting!
Conclusion
I don’t like when co-op games are easy to win. I don’t like when one person gets to dictate how a group plays together. And I don’t like when games throw a theme together to make a mechanism work. Man, I don’t like a lot of stuff… Thankfully, Spirit Island is a beautiful, thematic, well-executed co-op game where everyone gets to use their own brains and work together to destroy the Invaders! It’s nestled securely into my top ten list, and I’ll lug the heavy box out of the house any day I can convince my friends to play it with me.
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