Over its history, Disney has made a lot of hit animated films with some beloved characters.
Much like Wreck-it-Ralph 2 and the Princess line Chronicles of Light brings four Disney heroines from four different decades of animated films together as crystalized forms of light to battle darkness in this cooperative adventure game for one to four players aged eight and up by Pam Walls and published by Ravensburger.
Upfront disclaimers: I work for the Walt Disney Company in a role unrelated to gaming and Ravensburger provided this copy for review. I have a positive bias towards the IP but, as always, will provide my honest impressions of the game.
Gameplay Overview:
The goal of the game is to defeat all the shadow tokens on the board and then the Vortex which moves around the board. Players lose when the team health track reaches zero or at the start of a round when there are no more darkness cards to draw.
Once the map is randomly assembled and populated with quest tokens the first darkness card is drawn, spawning shadow tokens, and then heroes take actions by using one of their initial four action tiles.
The team can use six actions on their turns and the players can discuss and plan out their moves (although this is not a programming game). The player with the leader token gets to make final decisions for the team.
All heroes have an identical move 1 or heal 1 and move 2 or heal 2 action tiles. The other actions are unique to each heroine. Several are variants for moving (while taking another character with them) while others are combat-related skills making shadows easier to defeat or the ability to block incoming damage.
Each heroine unlocks a fifth ability when they complete one of four randomly selected personal quests unique to each character.
When a character enters a space with a shadow token they can battle it. Battling has each hero in the space that wants to contribute roll their dice. If the sum of the stars on the dice (1-3 successes per die) equal the shadow’s strength, they’re defeated and their token is flipped over. Meanwhile, the heroines will take one damage for each damage symbol rolled. Characters can opt to reroll one or both dice once. Other than potential health loss, there’s no immediate penalty for failing and the players can try again immediately. If a heroine’s health is reduced to zero the team track is reduced by one moving the team closer to that loss condition.
Once all the shadow tokens have been flipped over and all character quests completed, all the heroines must attack the vortex to defeat it. Players that succeed have saved the realm and if they don’t, darkness will envelop the world and then you can introduce your kids to Massive Darkness or Chronicles of Drunagor Age of Darkness. Or try again.
Game Experience:
This is a very good gateway cooperative adventure game. Every game I’ve played of this has come down to the wire with one of those games’ last battles against the Vortex requiring one of heroines to not roll any damage. And always removing one darkness card gives imperfect information so you can’t accurately predict the Vortex’s moves. Overall, its rules light and accessible.
In terms of gameplay, each of the characters plays a little differently which encourages cooperation as the players leverage different characters’ strengths and makes each combination, along with their personal quests, a puzzle to efficiently solve. Allowing for a free reroll makes the game far more forgiving than many similar games but I generally found I wanted to travel with a friend to improve our chances of success. Meanwhile, the team health track keeps players from being paranoid about being KO’ed and allows for the freedom to take some risks without any real consequences. However, there’s enough healing for characters to boost themselves assuming there’s an action or two left over towards the end of a turn.
The role of the leader to help guide the actions was an interesting choice. When I first read about it, I was wondering if that person was supposed to make the decisions but as my family played, we used them as the tiebreaker for disagreements. At worst, it allows for a different alpha gamer each turn, and at best, it’s a very cool way of encouraging cooperation. Overall, because of the engagement, having a turn where you may spend zero or one actions doesn’t feel as bad as it might seem because you were engaged in the process. Sometimes there’s multiple ways to get to the same point, which while taking game time, is a neat lesson for kids to learn.
The game scales well based on my plays at two and three as the board expanded and the number of turns (and game length) increased. Getting all the heroines to the Vortex might be a challenge at four (since the special moves only allow for one other hero to come along) but defeating the Vortex gets easier with additional heroes. I was a little surprised the value needed to defeat the Vortex wasn’t scaled to two successes per character in the game.
That small nitpick out of the way, the only real complaints I have are about how streamlined and accessible the game is. Which in itself is fantastic for its target audience (families and younger kids) but I think it hurts the replay value and engagement for more experienced gamers (like the guy pointing to himself with his thumbs while awkwardly typing this review). I’d love more leveling options, some different scenarios, or even a campaign mode I would probably never finish. And while I’m kind of grumbling about these omissions, I honestly think not having them is the right call. I have no concerns about giving or recommending this to a non-gamer or a very casual gamer with younger kids because they can play and have some fun with characters they know and love (as well as a fox with a badminton racket/rimshot).
Part of the draw for my family is that we love the characters included in this game so it’s easy to want to play as them against the forces of darkness. But being so light, I can see this, like a lot of Monza games, just being something my kid, and presumably others, just age out of. Some people might complain there’s no male characters to play as, and I guess that’s a valid point, but as a counterpoint, there are plenty of games with minimal to no female representation so I guess now you know how it feels.
Final Thoughts:
Is Chronicles of Light a forever game for me? Absolutely not. But I’ve enjoyed my time with it and expect it’s going to be around my household for another year or two and is a game I’ll happily play if asked to and might suggest when time is tight. My final score is considering this as a family-weight game as well as a game to bridge people to that next-level game (like Chronicles of Avel, Robin Hood, or the Storybook games by Ravensburger). But if you like heavier adventure games, this may leave you wanting a little more depth.
Final Score: 3.5 Stars – Chronicles of Light captures the magic of Disney heroines battling back darkness in an accessible way that keeps everyone at the table engaged in the decision-making.
Hits:
• Cooperative nature of turns keeps everyone engaged
• Moldular setup gives a lot of replay value for a simple game
• Well balanced and the end game is tight.
Misses:
• Streamlined rules and limited advancement won’t excite experienced gamers
• Components are largely just okay
• Someone is going to complain about there not being any male heroes
