Spin Master Games Goonies, The Goonies Game Retro Vintage 80’s Family Movie Board Game, for Kids Aged 10 and Up

Product Information

Prospero Hall games are known for quality production value and game design that captures the spirit of the story. Funko Games delivers that once again in this game. The game plays a lot like how D&D plays in terms of having a GM (Games master) and having a bunch of stories and adventures that the rest of the players travers through in the aim to defeat a final boss or get to a specific goal. The main difference though would be the fact that this game is a lot more structured out for you already and there is a limited amount of things that both the players and the GM can do. Now this may put some people off if you’re more of a die-hard adventure board gamer and can’t deal with the limitations of such a game, but to the others who don’t mind this at all, this is a great introduction to adventure games and D&D as a genre. There’s loads of player interaction throughout making it fun and different with each group of players, and with each adventure/level of the game there is a story to follow alongside it making players fully immersed into the world of the Goonies and thus make their decisions within the game seem more dire and important. But why was it fun? It was fun because it told the story of the movie and added just enough complexity to make it interesting but not bogged down in rules. It’s a family RPG in a Box. Then, the GM will draw and play cards, most of which involve spawning new enemies or making rooms more hazardous. There are also cards that relate to the specific adventure being played as well as reaction cards that can be played during the Goonies turn if a certain event occurs.

Final Score: 4 Stars – The Goonies: Never Say Die is a light but tense adventure game with great artwork and exceptional theme integration that will surely satisfy people who grew up wishing they could go on a treasure hunt with their favorite group of fictional friends. On my first playthrough I did it solo. None of my family have the same love for The Goonies that I do. So, I thought I’d step through a game to see how it played. The game plays very simply and is easy to understand. It’s a Dungeon Crawl game which makes perfect sense. You move from room to room, searching for “rich stuff” encountering hazards (pit traps and cave-ins) and creatures (mostly bats and rats). Defeat them and move on to the next room. The Goonies start each adventure with a basic goal that typically involves finding a specific room or item, but they will have limited information on how to achieve this and not know which direction will lead them to their destination. If you are a player or group who loves deeply complex RPG-style games like Gloomhaven, this will seem light to you and may not keep your attention as well. But then, that’s not the target audience. The world's favourite family board game brings you another exciting edition of MONOPOLY – The Goonies!After we got rolling, I could see all the fun details and mechanics that represent the movie so well. In the second scenario the players encounter the Bone Organ. To play it correctly they have to get at least one success on one die of each type. This is where the Teenager characters do have a small part. The Teenagers can be used as either a one-time use to get an extra die based on their character’s ability (Brand is Strength, Andy is Dexterity, Stef is Search) or as an automatic success in certain situations. In the movie, Andy was the one to play the organ, so if her card is still available she can count as one of the successes. It also allows the game to stay streamlined and light on rules while still creating the moments of wonder that the movie is most remembered for. It’s not a perfect game—not by a longshot—and many gamers might find it too simplistic or, considering it’s one versus all, not tactical enough. When I realized it was essentially an “RPG in a Box” I had conflicting thoughts. The veteran RPG player voice said, “That’s it? You don’t even level up your character.” But, at the same time that little 80’s kid voice said “Yeah, but what did you expect it to be? It was fun!” The game is an adventure game that allows for 2-5 players with the age range of 12+. The play time shown on the box is 50 minutes although it’ll definitely take you longer to play on your first few playthroughs just to be able to learn the gameplay and to allow for set-up time as the map has a different set-up for each adventure/story. Overall, I’d have to say the time to play would roughly be anywhere between 1.5-2 hours depending on the players understanding of the rules. D&D, But Not Really.. There is a pit trap with many nostalgic property based games that look enticing but fall flat once you play. The nostalgia isn’t a pirate’s treasure hoard but just a bunch of counterfeit fifty dollar bills. In other words, it is superficially that property but once the gameplay is examined it could be any other game. The Goonies Never Say Die is not that. The treasure is in the details and you should explore those unknown tunnels with kids to discover it.

So, I grabbed my two boys who are pretty close to the age of The Goonies and played through that scenario again. This time with me as the GM and them as The Goonies. We had a blast! At the start of the game, the GM will use their secret adventure guide to prepare the board depending on which scenario is being played. Whenever a Goonie enters a room during the game, the GM will have to populate the room with new items to search through or spawn specific enemies. The GM will also reveal secret information only if certain events are triggered by actions the Goonies take. (Succeeding at a type of skill test, for instance.) Players will be rolling a lot of dice during their Goonies adventure. The character placards and GM screen do most of the heavy lifting in terms of “frequently asked questions,” but players will need to keep the rulebook handy for the first game or two. It’s not a major problem but it does mean that more experienced gamers will need to be the GM for at least the first few adventures. (I was the GM the first time I played and made a mistake that told the Goonies exactly which room they needed to get to. Mama Fratelli would have made me walk the plank for this blunder.)Each of the kids and Sloth (no playable teenagers in the base game) have their own abilities and strengths which help everyone move on to the next goal. Dice are rolled to resolve conflicts and everyone has tokens (Wishes) that can be turned in to increase their chances. The heroes I watched were brave, but still easily frightened. Smart, but still easily fooled. Rude, but somehow still friendly. I was invested in what I was watching because these heroes reminded me of me. And all I had to do once it was over was wait for the VHS to rewind and I could go on the adventure with those heroes once again. Similarly, the game is also objectively easier with more Goonie players since the GM only gets a single turn after every hero has gone. It’s not necessarily broken, but the game doesn’t scale very well in terms of its difficulty even if the fun remains the same regardless of player count. (The game comes with five playable Goonies but is not meant to played with more than four of them at a time.) The game works in 2 teams, the GM vs the rest of the players who will represent their chosen Goonie. The GM’s main goal is to gain points by defeating goonies and stopping them from completing their secret goal which only the GM knows. The Goonies’ goal is to try and complete their secret goal and to keep the GM from gaining points along the way. To complete these goals the GM follows a story set for that adventure and the Goonies traverse through the map trying to gain loot and defeat enemies and ultimately try and get clues for what their secret hidden goal is.