Knight Fall Review

Knight Fall can be played in 3 different ways; competitive, cooperative, and campaign modes. The core of the game is knights vs demons. The knights are trying to protect the elders of the abbey and the demons are trying to kill the elders. If you're playing competitively, then one team is knights and the other is the demons. Turns are extremely straightforward, play cards and do 3 actions. Each team has a deck of cards and a hand of 3 plus a basic action card. The cards themselves have multiple uses. Either a main action, a secondary action, or a basic action printed on the back. The actions boil down to move, attack, heal, and defend. There's more to it but that's the gist of it. Each team is trying to make it to the end of the scoring track and the first one there wins. What's interesting here is that they score differently. Demons get points for killing knights and elders. Knights get points for killing demons and surviving the rounds.

If you're playing cooperatively, it's still knights vs demons but you're only controlling the knights this time around. Objectives remain the same but you're at the mercy of an ai deck. Some of these cards can be absurdly powerful and some can be complete duds. You'll draw 2 cards and play the top, main action and then the second card is flipped and you'll do its secondary action. Some of the card combinations can completely ruin your game. In my one game, I was so close to winning but I made the mistake of leaving two elders and the demons were able to get a bunch of actions at once and it was game over from there.

The campaign mode gives you even more depth to the game. The maps take different shape and there are new intricacies added to the game such as relics and villagers which provide more depth. I'm not going to dive in too much on the campaign to avoid any spoilers, however.

The Good: There is a lot to love here. The overall aesthetic to the game is fantastic. It looks dark and grim but the knights and demons all look badass and there's a lot to choose from. I wasn't sure if I was going to like the standees but they're very nice and non obstructive for the most part. I like that both factions are really fleshed out. They all have big decks of actions cards and their own dedicated special abilities. I feel like one faction is preferred over the other in games like this usually.

The Okay: The map tiles are really cool and it's nice to always have a different setup when you play but one minor issue I had with them is that the text is a little small on the tiles or can be completely glossed over by the standees. Especially if there is a lot of them on a single tile which can happen in this game, often. The tiles are double sided as well for added variety but I would have liked to see more of them so you'll get a completely randomized setup every time instead of having the exact amount.

The Not So Good: I feel like the rulebook was too big for how much game there is here. It's actually a fairly simple game after you get going and I felt like I was able to get it going after reading the first section. Most of that afterwards was just reference. It's pretty well written but I just felt like it could have been less. I mentioned it in the cooperative section as well but you're really at the mercy of cards here. One player can have an insanely productive turn where they do a lot of damage or score a bunch of points and you're turn might consist of moving once or twice and maybe attacking. You can play a 5 card hand instead of 3 but there's not much else you can do to mitigate that luck factor.

Final Thoughts: Knight Fall is good. It's really good. You need to carefully calculate where you need to be on the map to take advantage of the situation and not get totally overwhelmed. The artwork is really nice and the gameplay itself is as smooth as you can ask for from something like this. Having multiple game modes and several different characters on each side provides a ton of variety and replayibility. I would highly recommend this if you're looking for a really solid tactical arena battle game.

Thanks to Red Raven Games for providing me with a review copy.