Fire Tower Review

It's like reverse firefighting; so arson.

Fire Tower is a game where players are attempting to spread a forest fire in order to burn the other players fire towers down. That sounds kind of messed up in writing but hear me out. At the beginning of each turn, a fire piece is added to the map depending on the wind direction. Then play a card or discard any amount of cards and refresh your hand. Playing a card for its action can range from changing the wind direction, putting down more fires, and removing fires or putting down firebreak tokens which act as a block where a fire can't be spread. When you play fire cards, they don't need to follow wind directions, this is how you'll move them to your opponents. Players also have a bucket card that they can use one time as a free action to remove fire from their areas. The last player standing will be the winner.

The Good: Fire Tower is a really fun card driven game. It's incredibly tense. Especially when a fire starts getting closer to you and your hand of cards sucks. You can try and play as defensive as possible when it gets near you by playing firebreak cards or hopefully water cards to completely get rid of fires if you can. On the flip-side, it's really exciting when you're the one on the offensive and planning how to burn down your opponent(s). I also loved the little fire gemstones you place on the map. Watching them spread across the forest is really satisfying.

The Okay: The game itself can become very one sided for some players. Especially if they don't have the cards and have bad draw luck. In my one game I was actively stretching the game out longer to try and make it more exciting. I did, but also almost lost so I should stop doing that.

The Not So Good: I can see this game being a little too light for some people. Since there's essentially only 2 actions you can choose from each turn it's very simplistic. However, it's a spectacular starting game for a night. It really gets the competitive juices flowing but it's not going to be your staple game of the night.

Final Thoughts: Fire Tower, to me is everything I can ask for in a lighter game. It's competitive, pretty, and full of tension. I was able to teach it to my wife and play it in about 30 minutes. I didn't speak much on it but the overall tactical chess match factor of the cards you play to counter other players is really great. Overall, I highly recommend Fire Tower. There's also multiple expansions that you can implement into the game but I haven't played enough at the time of writing this.

Thanks to Runaway Parade Games for providing a review copy.