Deckscape (System) Review

Who out there has ever gone to an escape room and not enjoyed themselves? I know nobody (though if that’s you, it’s okay). I have only been to one in my life (eek!) and I absolutely loved it! I have watched videos of celebrities tackling escape rooms and have been riveted. I like the shows you can now find streaming of similar type activities and am always glued to the screen. Heck, I have played the EXIT and Unlock systems of board games and enjoyed them as well. So having the experience I have and never having played the Deckscape system, how did it fare for me? Decent. Read on.

Imagine yourself trapped on a jungle island after your plane crashes. Or being locked within a pyramid whilst visiting Egypt. These are the settings for the pair of games we reviewed and I really cannot and will not be going further into a lot of detail so as to avoid any spoilers as best I can.

DISCLAIMER: We were provided a copy of both The Curse of the Sphinx and The Mystery of Eldorado for the purposes of this review. These are retail copies of the games, so what you see in these photos is exactly what would be received in your boxes. I will describe the overall game flow and major rule set so that our readers may get a sense of how the game plays. For more info, you may purchase a copy online or from your FLGS.  -T

To setup a game of Deckscape, open the box and take out the cards. You are now ready to play. Seriously. No rules to read. Nothing to teach others. Just read the top card and do as it says. You have now begun your adventure!

Playing the games involves players (or a solo player) encountering cards in the 60-card deck in order to solve puzzles and use items found to best finish the scenario. There are no turns in these games, and players are encouraged to discuss possibilities before committing to answers to the puzzles. Randy from Dora and the Lost City of Gold would be so happy to be figuring out “Jungle Puzzles” and “Pyramid Puzzles.”

Each card is either a puzzle or an item and each card will more than likely be encountered throughout the game. Players are trying to figure out the puzzle clues and best solve them. Incorrect guesses will result in costly errors that affect endgame scoring. Sometimes correct guesses will allow the players to erase errors or give other positive clues.

Once the players have made their way through the game solving puzzles and riddles they will consult the table at the end to see how well they scored. Usually time is of the essence, and finishing the games sooner is better than later. Once the game is over and the score tallied the game owner may gift the game away as the final result is known and replaying is kinda cheating.

Components. Okay, these games are small boxes full of large cards. There are 60 cards in each game and the cards are beautifully illustrated and laid out well. We had no problems reading anything or deciphering any part of the games, so thumbs up on components from us.

Gameplay is a little polarizing, we found. I like the flow of the game and puzzles within. My wife, however, couldn’t stand them. But she later admitted to now understanding that she just does not enjoy escape room styled board and card games. That said, these games play more like Choose Your Own Adventure games than the typical EXIT/Unlock style games, as most (if not all) cards in Deckscape require players to complete them before moving to the next card in numerical order with either a success or penalty. This can rub players the wrong way if they are used to the other style of escape room games. It was no problem for me, and I enjoyed my plays.

What I liked most about these games is that the story is easy to follow and the puzzles mostly make logical sense. A few of them stumped me, but luckily players may find helper cards to give clues to puzzles in the game. We relied on these helpers a few times, but I did not feel like we were consulting them for every puzzle. So that’s a definite positive. I also liked the thematic immersion. For a card game I felt drawn into the stories and wanted to complete them as well as I could.

What I disliked most about these games is the fact that you end up encountering every card or nearly every card. The intrigue of other escape room games I have played is wondering what was on some of those other cards. Or what did I miss on a card that I should have noticed? While you get SOME of that here, I found Deckscape to be more entry-level in difficulty. That is certainly not a bad thing for most gamers. We were expecting something different than what we played, and I think that unfortunately immediately put us off at first.

However, I played the second game solo and I liked it quite a bit. I think I mostly liked it because I didn’t have my wife around to figure out the puzzles with me and I was truly all alone. This added to my anxiety to finish well, or finish at all! I definitely cannot see myself playing these games with the full compliment of six players as I feel I would be too overwhelmed with people shouting out their guesses and trying to parse everything. But that’s just me. I prefer these with low player counts.

All in all these games are pretty good, and a decent something different from the other games in the same style. If you have yet to try Deckscape and like escape room games in general, I reccomend you give them a try. They are quick (and even quicker as your goal is finish in a short amount of time for the best scores), easy to play with zero teaching and setup time, and gives a great amount of puzzles to decipher. Purple Phoenix Games gives the Deckscape system of games an unsure-but-you-seem-confident-about-your-answer-so-let’s-just-go-with-yours 6 / 12. If you see them on the shelves pick one up and try it out. Add these to your growing collection of escape room games for show, or play them and pass them along, as I intend to do.

(Note: I usually add a messy components photo at the end of my reviews, but I don’t want to spoil anything, so I’ll just throw some cards down that won’t really ruin anything at all.)