AwSHUX, this year's big digital board game convention, ended earlier today. I had the privilege of "going", and even played some games with their creators. Though, so did everyone who was even a little interested. Turns out it's easy to get a lot of a board game designer's time if they get to do it all while laying in bed, instead of slowly wilting in an overcrowded convention hall.
SHUX, digital or not, is run by Shut Up and Sit Down, my personal favorite board game reviewers. Their quirky skits and comedy help introduce a lot of new people to the hobby. I definitely suggest you check them out.
One of the games I got to play at AwSHUX was The Night Cage. It's a fully cooperative spatial puzzle, similar to games like Pandemic, Forbidden Island, and Burgle Bros. Just like in all of those, players have pawns in different locations on the board, and gameplay revolves around working together to solve a problem by running around, finding items, running back to your friends, trading, et cetera.
Unlike in all of those, instead of running around on a map of the world or the floorplan of a building, you're inside The Night Cage, which is a trippy place that's basically just an allegory for being trapped in a solipsistic existence. Inside The Night Cage, terrain only exists if it's being observed. If you turn around and walk away, then immediately turn back, something else will exist there now. The only thing holding it in solid reality was your character's eyeballs. This is represented with tiles. Your pawn can see one tile in each direction, and, of course, the tile they're on. Get out of range, and the tile is discarded. Come back, and you draw a new one. The deck of tiles has plenty of fun shapes of hallway, but it also has gates, keys, and monsters. If a monster shows up, you'll have a bad time, but everyone simultaneously turning a key in the same gate is how you win. So, players run around, avoiding monsters, picking up keys, and awkwardly playing will-they-won't-they with gates. Is it worth standing here in place just to keep the gate tangible, or should they go do more important things, and hope a different gate shows up later? These are fascinating decisions to make.
It was incredibly fun to play it on Tabletopia with one of its designers. Unfortunately, right now, that's the only place you can play it, since it's still a few months away from hitting store shelves. When it does, I recommend picking it up if the idea of the game interests you even a little. For me, I was excited for the idea of it, that idea delivered in spades, and therefore I couldn't have been happier. I've already pre-ordered a copy.
The puzzle itself is very clever, but when you break it down, all it adds to the genre is the gimmick of how the shifting terrain works, and the gloomy psychological horror aesthetic. Heck, there's already a good, cheap, entry level cooperative game where the terrain collapses as you play, and I've already mentioned it - Forbidden Island. Perhaps give that a shot if you want a similar concept, but don't like The Night Cage's theme, or don't want to wait for its release date.
If, like me, the theme and mechanics get you excited, it's free to play on Tabletopia right now, with anywhere from one to five players. That's right, one! It plays really well solo, so if you aren't very sociable, I honestly recommend this game to you even more. It kind of fits the theme better to be all alone, in this dark, terrible place, as your candle flickers in the darkness and illuminates your own personal version of reality.
Note: The first image in the article belongs to thenightcage.com, and the second is a screenshot of me playing the game digitally on Tabletopia. All other images I use are personal photography, but since this game doesn't physically exist yet, I had to make an exception.
