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Purple Phoenix Games (2266 KP) rated Jetpack Joyride in Tabletop Games

Jan 8, 2020 (Updated Jan 8, 2020)  
Jetpack Joyride
Jetpack Joyride
2019 | Puzzle, Racing, Real-time, Video Game Theme
It should come as no surprise that I love to play board games. Hence my involvement in this wonderful group! But besides board games, I also enjoy my fair share of video games too. These two worlds of gaming occasionally collide when a classic from one realm is transferred over to the other! Is the adaptation as fun as the original, or does it leave much to be desired?

Originally a mobile game, Jetpack Joyride follows our main character, Barry, as he attempts to escape a top-secret lab with a stolen jetpack! He must avoid being hit by zappers, annihilated by lasers, and blown away by missiles in the process. If Barry succeeds, he escapes with not only the high-tech jetpack, but also with as many gold coins and other top-secret gadgets as he can get his hands on! So the risk is definitely worth the reward. But if Barry is unable to escape, he will face the consequences for his unauthorized joyride… In all honesty, I had never heard of Jetpack Joyride before I Kickstarted the board game version, so I downloaded it on my phone to see how it plays. Do you remember Flappy Bird? The mobile version of Jetpack Joyride is kiiiinda like that, but more exciting and way less infuriating. It’s free to download in the App Store and Google Play Store, so check it out if you’re interested! Anyway, back to the board game version. The premise is the same as the app – you have to create a path for Barry to use for his escape from the lab, utilizing the gadgets available to you and collecting gold coins on your way.

DISCLAIMER: We are using the Kickstarter Deluxe version of the game. We do have the expansions from the KS campaign, but will not be using those for this review. Also, we do not intend to cover every single rule included in the rule book, but will describe the overall game flow and major rule set so that our readers may get a sense of how the game plays. For more in depth rules, you may purchase a copy from the publisher directly or from your FLGS. -T

Jetpack Joyride is a real-time game of tile placement in which players are racing to see who can complete their run (path through the lab) the fastest. The game lasts for 3 runs, and points are earned throughout all runs. To setup, each player receives a set of 4 lab sector cards and sets them on the table in front of them in numerical order, 1-4. Three mission cards (cards that score points at the end of the run) are revealed and available for all players. Players may also have gadgets, available only to them, to help score extra points. When a run begins, all players grab translucent polyominoes (like matte versions of bits from Blokus) from the common pool and place them on their lab cards to create an unbroken path through the lab. There are specific placement restrictions that I will leave for you to discover in the rulebook. The game has no set time limit for each run, but it is a race to complete a path before your opponents. At the end of the run, points are tallied for completed missions and gadget cards. Easy, right? Here’s a small twist – before starting the next run, all players pick up their lab cards and pass them to the player on their left. So each run, players are looking at new cards and must find new paths through the lab! New mission cards and gadgets are revealed before subsequent runs as well. The player with the most points at the end of all 3 runs is the winner!

Jetpack Joyride is a fast-paced, exciting, and surprisingly strategic game that keeps all players engaged and entertained. And that’s what I love about it. First of all, real-time games are always high-energy, at least in my opinion. It’s nearly impossible to stay calm and collected when you’re literally racing against your opponents! Jetpack Joyride is definitely not a passive game, and there’s so much action and excitement that you sometimes forget you’re literally just laying tiles on cards. The next thing I love about this game is how deceptively strategic it is. Laying tiles to form a legal path across cards is not complicated, but doing so while also trying to earn extra points by completing missions (like placing 3 tiles of the same shape in a row, for example) adds a strategic element that you don’t expect. You’re not only trying to finish your run the fastest, but you’ve also got to fulfill the requirements for multiple mission and gadget cards too. One misplaced tile could decimate a run for you, so you’ve always got to be thinking several tiles in advance.

Going along with that, another neat thing about Jetpack Joyride is that all players are drawing tiles from a common pool. There is a finite number of tiles, and a specific number of the different shapes, so if the shape of tile you need is gone from the pool, you’re outta luck! You have to think and move quickly, otherwise you might get knocked out of a run, and that costs you valuable end-game points. For such a simple game, Jetpack Joyride also has a lot of variability. All lab cards are double-sided, and can be mixed and matched in any combination, as long as they are in a numerical set of 1-4. There are so many possibilities, chances are you won’t ever play with the same card combo twice….and if you do, chances are you won’t remember it 😛 All of these aspects elevate this game from a simple party game to a strategically fun game that can be played with any player count.

Overall, I think Jetpack Joyride is great. After my first play, I rated it a 4+, but after a few more I’ve changed my rating to a 5. As you can see from our scores above, Travis and our guest judge Luke enjoyed it as well. It’s a nice, light game that can be used as a filler between heavier games, or as a main-event game all on its own. Definitely a game I will use with newer gamers, and the strategic side will keep me coming back for more. I think Jetpack Joyride will get a lot of playtime from me, and it was worth my investment on Kickstarter. Purple Phoenix Games gives it a jet-powered 15 / 18.
  
Buffalo '66 (1998)
Buffalo '66 (1998)
1998 | International, Comedy, Drama
2
4.5 (2 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Characters – Billy Brown has just been released from prison, he has had his own problems which led to him being in prison and it isn’t long before he goes to the extremes to impress his family. He is painted as an aggressive man that believes that woman are just objects and has built his world in lies. Layla is the tap dancer that gets kidnapped, she starts to play along with what Billy wants and even enjoy his company the more time they spend together. Jimmy and Jan are his parents that have both been either distracted or strict in raising Billy, as he wants to impress them now. The Bookie is the man that put Billy in jail as a result of the debts he owed him, he gave him a choice with jail being the only one that didn’t hurt anyone.

Performances – Vincent Gallo doesn’t bring us a very interesting character, it isn’t written well or directed to make us interested in him, he just can’t make this character work. Christina Ricci was trying to break out of the child star roles by now, this is different to what we had seen before, though she does look bored through the film. the rest of the cast struggle too, it is just poorly written to give the actors a chance.

Story – The story follows a gambler that had paid the price for his addiction and now is free, he wants revenge only he spends the time with his kidnap victim as we get to see the difficult life he has had which led him to the life of crime. Well I think that is what we are meant to be seeing, the story does drag along at an awfully slow pace with nothing much happening, trying to make us believe the two could be falling in love, though he is abusive with his actions and spends more time running around looking for a toilet than showing any sort of emotion.

Comedy/Crime/Romance – If this is meant to be a comedy, the jokes miss big time as you will struggle to get a laugh out of this film, while the crime only seems to focus on the kidnapping, which she could have escaped from with ease plenty of times, so that never feels like a threat, the romance just feels awkward for the most part of the film because there is zero chemistry between the two.

Settings – The film is set in the Buffalo area, which is meant to be about the passion of the locals, it could easily be any town with a big American football team.


Scene of the Movie – The first look at the dinner table makes it a clever shot, until it gets boring.

That Moment That Annoyed Me – We spend more time looking for a toilet.

Final Thoughts – This is just a dreadfully dull movie that has no direction in anyway, it fails to capture any attention from the audience with a truly unlikeable main character.

 

Overall: Dreadfully boring.
  
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