{"id":12013,"date":"2021-09-10T10:00:32","date_gmt":"2021-09-10T14:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/?p=12013"},"modified":"2021-09-04T17:32:48","modified_gmt":"2021-09-04T21:32:48","slug":"games-lovecraftian-board-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/2021\/09\/10\/games-lovecraftian-board-games\/","title":{"rendered":"Games: Lovecraftian board games"},"content":{"rendered":"

After posting on Call of Cthulhu<\/a><\/em>, the classic role-playing game set in the world of H.P. Lovecraft<\/a><\/strong>, it’s proper that I move into related board games based on this world. And all of them come from the same company, Fantasy Flight Games<\/a>, if you can believe it, under the general heading of the Arkham Horror Files<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"Arkham<\/a>Well, sort of. Chaosium<\/a> had released the board game Arkham Horror<\/em> in 1987. I got the game at the time, though I can’t recall if I played it.<\/p>\n

After being available for awhile, it sold out, and Chaosium never reprinted it. Instead, the rights moved to Fantasy Flight Games where it was revamped and the second edition came out in 2005. And they released eight expansion sets, which added new scenarios and sometimes additional boards.<\/p>\n

In 2018, a third edition came out. FFG encorporated elements from the AH<\/em> card game as well as another board game, Eldritch Horror<\/em>. It can be played by one to six players. As it’s pretty new, they have only released three expansions for it so far. I wonder if further ones will be based on some of the expansions from the prior edition?<\/p>\n

In 2011, FFG released a different game that is set in the same world, Mansions of Madness<\/em>. In this game, two to five players are involved, one playing the keeper, similar to what is seen in role-playing games. A storyline is picked, and the boards are setup. The keeper controls the creatures and encounters. There were a few expansions. In 2016, a second edition was rolled out. Probably the biggest change is the creation of an application that now fills the role of the keeper, which allows for single player games. At this point, several expansions have been released.<\/p>\n

The best way I think to separate Arkham Horror<\/em> from Mansions of Madness<\/em> is that AH<\/em> is set across a town (Arkham, Innsmouth, etc), while Mansions<\/em> is set within the confines of, well, a mansion.<\/p>\n

In 2013, FFG released Eldritch Horror<\/em>, which was more similar to AH<\/em>, but unlike AH<\/em>, it has a world-wide setting. Thus instead of running around a town, the players are running around the world. This one can be played by one to eight players. So far eight expansions have been released.<\/p>\n

There is also Arkham Horror: Final Hour<\/em>, which doesn’t have any expansions for it, and I wonder if there will be. As its scenario is that the Elder Ones have broken through and the players need to stop them, hence the name, I can’t see there being expansions.<\/p>\n

And most recently, FFG released Unfathomable<\/em>. This game is set on a steamship crossing the Atlantic in 1913 for three to six players. The players are either humans working to get the ship to port or “others” who are trying to stop it from reaching port. And the players don’t know who is who.<\/p>\n

So depending on the type of game you want to play, you have a variety of them. Another they have is Elder Sign<\/em>, which is more dice based, with several expansions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After posting on Call of Cthulhu, the classic role-playing game set in the world of H.P. Lovecraft, it’s proper that I move into related board games based on this world. And all of them come from the same company, Fantasy Flight Games, if you can believe it, under the general heading of the Arkham Horror […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":12583,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_has_post_settings":[],"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"The Pulp Super-Fan takes a look at Lovecraftian board games. #pulpmags #boardgames","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_wp_rev_ctl_limit":""},"categories":[151],"tags":[517,536,520,514,201,519],"hashtags":[],"class_list":["post-12013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-games","tag-arkham-horror","tag-board-games","tag-eldritch-horror","tag-fantasy-flight-games","tag-h-p-lovecraft","tag-mansions-of-madness"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/files\/2021\/07\/arkham-horror-featured.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3eLo8-37L","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12013"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12013\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12591,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12013\/revisions\/12591"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12013"},{"taxonomy":"hashtags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/pulpsuperfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtags?post=12013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}