Play review of the cooperative card game 'The Crew' that challenges the mission by predicting the hand of a friend from limited information



' The Crew ' is a cooperative card game in which all the participants cooperate to complete a number of missions in order to aim for the 9th planet of the solar system. Predicting each other's hand from a little information, you can enjoy the mission that the strategy changes every time you play, so I actually played and checked the game.

The Crew --Quest for Planet Nine --Kosmos Games

https://www.kosmosgames.co.uk/games/the-crew-quest-for-planet-nine/

The package of 'The Crew' looks like this.



The target age of 'The Crew' is 10 years old or older, the number of players is 2 to 5, and the play time is assumed to be 20 minutes.



There are four types of cards in the box: 'playing card', 'rocket card', 'reminder card', and 'task card'.



The back of each card looks like this. The reminder card has the same design on the front and back, but the other cards have planets floating in space.



Playing cards and task cards come in four colors: blue, yellow, red, and green, and each color has a number from 1 to 9.



In addition, the number 1 to 4 is written on the rocket card.



In addition, 'commander piece', 'rescue signal piece', 'wireless communication piece', and 'task piece' were also included.



A 'logbook' is available on the back of the manual. As a crew member of a spaceship heading for the mysterious 9th planet, you will take on a number of missions listed in the logbook.



The contents of the logbook look like this. Missions from 1 to 50 are prepared according to the story aiming at the 9th planet.



Each mission has a short story, and on the right side is the number of tasks required to complete the mission. For example, you need to complete one task to complete Mission 1. In addition, you can record the number of turns it took to clear the mission in the frame prepared at the bottom of each mission.



'The Crew' is a game in which you cooperate to complete 50 different missions in order to investigate the 9th planet, which is located at the edge of the solar system. In order to complete the mission, you will repeat a mini-game called 'trick' and aim to complete the specified task.

The trick is simple, just put out a card of the same color as the card that the start player put into play clockwise. However, if you don't have cards of the same color, you can put cards of different colors into play. And the trick ends when all the participating players put out one card at a time. The player who puts the card 'the same color as the one played by the player on the first turn ' and the ' highest number ' into play is the 'winner of the trick'.



Also, the rocket card is a card that you can always win if you put it out, and it is a trump card that can be used only when the start player does not have a card of the same color as the card that came into play. If multiple rocket cards come into play, the player with the highest number of rocket cards in play will be the winner.



Once you understand the rules, get ready to start the game. First, give each player a playing card, a reminder card, and a wireless communication piece.



Next, we will discuss and decide on a mission to challenge. The difficulty level increases as the mission progresses, so it is safe to challenge in order from mission 1. This time I decided to challenge Mission 2 which requires completing 2 tasks.



Once you have decided on a mission to challenge, randomly select a fixed number of task cards and put them into play. This task card looks like this.



Next, the player who owns Rocket 4 becomes the commander and receives the commander piece. The commander has two basic roles: 'choose a task card first' and 'start the first trick of a mission'. There are also missions that give the commander a special role.



Once the commander is decided, the commander chooses the first task card. The second and subsequent task cards will be selected clockwise from the commander.



The task card selected by the commander this time is green 1. Keep the selected task card close to you.



In 'The Crew', it is prohibited to discuss the contents of each other's hand during the game, but each player uses the wireless communication piece only once during the mission to transfer the information of his hand to other players. I can tell. The information to be conveyed is ' This card is the largest of the same color cards in your hand' ' This card is the smallest of the same color cards in your hand ' 'One card of this color in your hand There are only three types. This time, the player who chose the blue 6 task card used the wireless communication piece to tell him that 'the largest blue card that blue 9 has'.



The task can be achieved by 'the trick that the card with the same color and number as the task card is in play' and ' the player who has the task card becomes the winner of the trick '. In other words, in order to clear Task Blue 6, the ' player with the Blue 6 task card ' must win in the ' Trick with the Blue 6 playing card in play'. ..

The commander thinks that 'having Blue 9 means that if the playing card of Blue 6 comes into play this turn, you can definitely complete Task Blue 6', and put Blue 3 into play. Did.



The result of this trick is like this. As the commander expected, Blue 6 came into play, and the player with the playing card of Blue 9 became the 'winner of the trick' and was able to complete Task Blue 6.



Turn the completed task card face down.



The winner of the trick will be the starting player for the next trick. The start player puts Green 4 into play, and when Green 1 comes into play, the commander with the task card of Green 1 puts Rocket 4 into play and becomes the 'winner of the trick'. With this, task green 1 is also achieved, and the mission is cleared. Everyone's thoughts came together and I was able to complete the mission with two tricks.



If the communication by the wireless communication frame is successful, you can clear the mission smoothly as described above, but communication may not be successful when you are actually playing. For example, one of the players sent a communication saying 'Yellow 8 is the largest among the yellow cards' in the following scene. A player with a yellow 5 task card thinks, 'Yellow 8 is the maximum means that you also have a yellow card with a small number, so if you give a yellow 6, you can win this trick.' I put Yellow 6 into play to accomplish my task Yellow 5.



The other yellow card that the communicating player had is yellow 7. The reading was off and the task could not be completed. In this way, the trick is that the same playing card as the task card is in play, and if the player who does not have the task card wins, the mission will fail.



The difficulty of the mission increases as you progress. For example, in Mission 10, you have to complete 4 tasks.



The four tasks look like this. I thought, 'There are times when you can't clear even two tasks, but if you have four tasks, you can't clear it,' so I decided to use the rescue signal piece to request rescue from the earth.



By turning the rescue signal piece face up, we request the earth to rescue.



When requesting rescue, each player can give one playing card to the player to the right or left. We will consult and decide whether to pass it to the right or the left.



Even if you request rescue and exchange cards, it is extremely difficult to complete the four tasks. I repeated mission failures many times and managed to clear the mission in the sixth challenge.


When I actually played 'The Crew', it was a game that required a high degree of strategy for all the participating players because it was necessary for everyone to read the intentions of other players from the cards put into play. When it comes to difficult missions, it is quite chewy because you need to remember all the cards that have been put into play. This time it took 5 hours to complete missions 1-10, but 50 missions are available so you can enjoy it for a long time. This is a very difficult game, so it is recommended for those who are accustomed to trick-taking games and advanced board games who want to enjoy games of various genres.

'The Crew' is available at Amazon.co.jp for 3800 yen at the time of writing the article.

Amazon | The Crew Cooperative Card Game Full Japanese Version | Board Game | Toys

in Review,   Game, Posted by log1o_hf