John Sherman, a local designer to us, first approached us at Beachhead in 2024 and upon discovering our support of small indie publishers, pitched his initial idea to Alex. Through various discussions and subsequent attendance at our monthly board game meets, he kindly gave us a prototype copy of his game ahead of it's kickstarter campaign.
This is not the first game he has designed, however it is expected to be the first game he gets published. This review and images are of the prototype game and not of the finished product. The final production of Entombed may look different and have different rules.
Premise of the Game
Entombed is set in the 1920's at the height of Tutamania where a buried pyramid has been discovered by Professor Abiana Lawanda. Excited and oblivious to her surroundings, she enters, closely followed by 3 other explorers before the door closes behind them and the ancient curse of the Gods is unleashed. Realising they are trapped and not alone, the 4 explorers must now survive until the exits open, with little knowledge of the inhabitants of this centuries old structure.
Game Play Overview
The game is played over a series of rounds, determined at the start of the game to vary the game length and complexity. Each round is made up of 4 phases: Explorers, Lost Souls, Inhabitants and Advancement. During the explorers phase, each player takes it in turn to move their explorer up to 3 spaces in any direction, ensuring that they don't backtrack over spaces passed through this turn or move through walls/characters. (A character being an inhabitant/lost soul/explorer). If you move over a wall movement token, you may rotate 1 wall 180 degrees or 2 walls, 90 degrees each. Once the explorers have moved, it's the lost souls turn. Turn over the top card of the lost souls deck to determine the movement for any player that has become a lost soul before moving onto the inhabitants turn. During the inhabitants phase, flip over the top card from each of the who and where decks; these determine which inhabitants are moving and how many spaces they can move. Each player then moves their assigned inhabitant the requisite number of spaces. Once all characters have been moved, prepare for the next round by moving the cube 1 footprint closer to the exits open space on the turn tracker, pass the turn one card to the player on your left along with the extra inhabitant card when playing a 2 or 3 player game. Repeat these phases until you reach the exits open space. The game then becomes a race to the exits with the first player who's explorer reaches an exit being declared the winner.
Our Thoughts
I thoroughly enjoyed this game at 3 players and at 4 players, however I did feel that at 2 players it could have done with a couple of minor amendments to give it the pressure feeling and strategic depth that the 3 and 4 player variants had. The wall movement element to the game had a slight Quoridor feeling to it but with more options to block movements, readjust based on the games development and line up paths for future turns. The deck reshuffle and inhabitant reshuffle cards I felt were great additions to keep players on their toes and change up the strategy as you're waiting for the clock to countdown to the exits opening. It's a unique puzzle based game with a decent amount of variety offered, however if you're not keen on open ended set ups, this may not be the game for you as the choice in game length and wall placement may overwhelm you. That being said, this was something I particularly liked about Entombed, as it gives you a suggested set up and game length and even gives suggestions on alternative set ups, some helpful tips on gameplay for new players and 3 variants for solo play to give you plenty of options. I'm excited to see where this game goes and hope to see it on shelves soon!
If you're keen to see Entombed make it to your shelf, follow this link to view the kickstarter:
Comments