I’m a medium-to-heavy board gamer. I don’t turn my nose up at any game, but if I had my way, I’d be chompin’ on an intense, complex, multi-hour battle for first place. That said, short, snappy games have their place, especially depending on who I have over. 5-Minute Dungeon contributes nicely to a shorter experience, as one would assume, while also requiring a high degree of focus and communication.
Ostensibly, many consider short games to be simple and luck-based. Nuanced or complicated rules don’t make for a breezy experience. But what if a game could require skill and last a mere five minutes? Enter 5-Minute Dungeon, a completely cooperative game with leveled bosses where time is the limiting factor. To win, players have to hack their way through a set number of enemies in less than five minutes so that they can beat the big baddie.
With a hand of three to five cards—depending on how many heroes are delving into the dungeon—players flip over an enemy card with a funny title and artwork and the all-important symbols players need to spend to beat it. Magic, speed, arrows, swords, and shields are wonderfully colored so that all players can easily understand what to play and quickly say, “I don’t have any” or “I have three speed, don’t worry about it.” Eventually, players will learn a form of short-hand, as just saying a couple words eats up precious time.
To add some strategy, players pick a class at the beginning, like paladin, barbarian, wizard, or huntress. Each player board has an opposite side with a similar character, such as thief and ninja on the reverse. Usually a male and female variant, the only real difference between genders is their special ability, like discarding three cards to automatically defeat an obstacle for one, and discarding three cards to let another player draw four cards for the other. Each class also hosts a different deck, with leanings toward some symbols (e.g. paladin has more shields, barbarian has more swords, etc.) In addition, each deck has a few special abilities that can dramatically help players, such as a holy hand grenade to automatically beat a mini-boss or tricky event, or the ability to completely donate one’s hand to another player. You can even stop time for some lengthy communication before playing another card and resuming time. Decks don’t reshuffle, so wisely spending cards is key to victory. Players can freely discard to find the card they need, but doing so can knock a hero out before reaching the villain.
Starting out with the Baby Barbarian with a measly twenty enemy deck, players will likely have a pretty easy time with the first and second boss. The third and fourth boss can definitely thwart players with some slow play, while the fifth and final boss will require strategy and thoughtful, snappy play. The game ends after beating or losing to a villain. Continue play or move on with your day: it’s that simple.
The wonderful thing about 5-Minute Dungeon is that it’s not only quick, it feels meaty. By virtue of injecting urgency into the simple gameplay, most players will have a fun, intense time, win or lose. While 5-Minute Dungeon certainly fits RPGFan’s coverage and that’s why I’m talking about this title, I’d be negligent if I didn’t mention that designer Connor Reid also developed 5-Minute Mystery, another fantastic title we got to demo at this year’s Origins. So, get shuffling, heroes, because the griffin-door and rather unpleasant pheasant aren’t going to beat themselves in a matter of seconds.
