First of all, a few disclaimers!
I own, and am a big fan of Small World and many of the expansions, and have played the orginal game numerous times
The review is based upon a purchased copy of the game (thanks <PERSON>!) - not a review copy
This review is based upon a single 5-player game of SW:Underground at my local Games Club, the Isleworth Boardgamers. I chose to publish this now due to the lack of reviews / session reports here on BGG, and to give a ‘first impression’ of the new game.
Although this is technically a brand new, stand-alone game, it is so similar to its sister that I felt that there was no need to go into the rules in detail, as the basic rules are identical.(Players new to Small World, should check out one of the many reviews under that game's entry on BGG). Any extra or different rules are helpfully identified in the rulebook with a “SW New” symbol, which is helpful for seasoned players when starting out with SW:Underground. The purpose of this review is to try to identify where this new game differs from the original, and how this affects the gameplay.
New Maps
The first thing that has obviously changed are the maps. Gone are the muted rural colours of the overground Small World – greens, browns and yellows – to be replaced with the blacks, browns and purples of the Underground World. Whether you prefer this new pallette will be entirely a matter of taste. Some will see it as a lively, vibrant board, whilst others may find it a little dark or garish.
(A comparison of part of the 3-player boards from SW and SW:U)
The types of terrain within the regions have changed entirely – we now have Abysmal Chasms (instead of seas / lake), Mystic Crystals, Mining, Mushroom Forests, Mudpools, and Black Mountains (instead of mountains). There is also a river (made up of several regions) which runs down the centre of the map, and adds a nice new element of gameplay (discussed later). 581
Essentially though, the map functions in much the same way as in the previous game – basic conquests occur between neighbouring regions, and the different terrain types provide bonuses for certain races or special abilities.
From my single play, a word of advice would be to make sure that you are playing under very good lighting, otherwise the Chasms / Mountains and Mudpools / Mining may become a little difficult to distinguish from each other, especially once the board starts to fill with lots of tokens.
The River
As mentioned above, there is now a river (which is divided into several regions) that runs down the centre of each map,. This river cannot be occupied at the end of a turn (except by the Kraken) but it can be crossed – at the cost of a single token, which is redeployed at the end of the player’s turn. The river can therefore be used as a semi-defensive line, as it will cost any player to cross it, although this cost is not prohibitive.
Because the river regions are quite long, it also gives players the opportunity (if they have enough tokens) to stretch out across the map to attack opponents who may have felt that they were safely out of reach. This is a nice, simple addition to the gameboard, and certainly gives options for future races and special abilities.
Monsters
Lost Tribes from the original game have been replaced by Monster tokens. Fewer regions are occupied by these at the beginning of the game, but instead of being on their own, they are always stacked in 2’s. However, once conquered, these regions reveal a randomly-assigned Righteous Relic or Popular Place, which stay on the board for the rest of the game, and confer a bonus of some description to their current owner.
Righteous Relics
Along with the Popular Places, these are probably the greatest change from the original game (unless you include the 15 new races and 21 special powers of course!) As previously mentioned, these appear when a player conquers a Monster-infested region, and they initially become the property of that player. Their power can be utilised once per turn (as long as the race is not in decline), in whichever region the owning player chooses, but they are then left in this region at the end of the turn. This leaves them vulnerable to being stolen by any other race that conquers the region containing the relic, and may swap hands several times during the game.
A selection of their bonus powers are:
Stinky Troll’s Socks (! 349