Stats:
No. of players: 1-4
Amount of time to play: 60-90 min
Age requirements: 14+
Set-up time: 5 min

Hellboy is a cooperative miniatures skirmish game. You play as the BRPD heroes and must complete scenarios to defeat the villains.

Hellboy Rules Description:

The first decision you must make when starting Hellboy is which Case File you want to play. This is the scenario and will include set up instructions for the heroes, minions, map tiles, and cards you need for the game.

Once you know the available heroes you choose one and take their player board and any starting cards they have. Heroes have character-specific abilities some cost extra action cubes and others trigger during certain game phases.

A Case File might have a few different cards. You’ll flip through them and advance the story when certain triggers have resolved. Mostly you’ll be fighting monsters and fining clues to help you defeat the final boss.

Each round of the game is broken into five phases; Enemy phase, Agent phase, Rest phase, Doom phase, and End phase. Enemies move and attack during their phase. Each unit type’s card tells you how they move and when they attack.

On your turn you may move, fight, shoot, or examine a clue. Each of these actions costs you one of your three action cubes. The above actions require you to roll a test to see how successful they are. You roll three dice plus the effect die to resolve a test. Each test has a skill and colored dice associated with them. For example Hellboy rolls three red dice plus the effect die when he takes a fight action. The effect die can add successes to your result, let you re-roll dice, or force you to discard your highest result. The colored dice from worst to best might be yellow, orange, red or black. You or your teammates can spend an action cube to upgrade a die. And sometimes situations will downgrade your dice.

I mentioned the enemy attacking during their phase. When they do you roll a defense test and compare the result to the enemy’s attack value. The difference is the damage you take. Damage tokens are placed face down on your player board until you are out of slots. Then they are turned over a symbol on the token indicates what type of injury you have. Injuries can downgrade dice or make you lose an action die. If all your tokens show injury and you need to apply any more damage, you are knocked out.

During the Rest phase heroes can heal, investigate clues or move around the explored areas of the map. But this doesn’t come without a cost. If you choose to take time to rest, the Impending Doom token advances on its track. Once it reaches a certain point the Confrontation with the final boss begins.

The Doom phase reveals the top card of the Doom deck. These have different effects, but they are rarely good for the players.

In the End phase players get their actions cube back, resolve board effects and get ready for the next round.

The Information Gathered track advances as the heroes examine clues. Getting to certain points on the track grants you an Insight Marker. These give you a bonus depending on the scenario, but usually help you defeat the final boss.

Quick Review of Hellboy:

Hellboy the Board Game is a fun, cooperative dungeon crawler. It is on the lighter side but plays quickly and is not overly fiddly. It is great you can play it with friends or solitaire and enjoy both experiences.

The components for this game are great. The miniatures look awesome the art is fantastic and everything is durable and well-made. There is a short tutorial you can play through to help you learn the rules which is helpful. Though I do wish the full rules were a bit better organized or had an index.

There is a lot to like about this game. The combat system is straightforward and moves quickly. This game makes a great intro to cooperative dungeon crawlers. The items and hero abilities add theme, flavor, and some fun combos. The Impending Doom and Information Gathered tracks add tension and make you feel you are racing against the clock.

I have the retail version and wish there was a bigger variety in minions. It might get old fighting frogmen all the time. I am also not sure on the replay value once you run through all the Case Files in the box.

If you like Hellboy and board games this should be on your list to try or buy. If you are looking for a fun cooperative dungeon crawler to play with newer gamers, pick this one up.

Score and synopsis: (Click here for an explanation of these review categories.)
Strategy 3 out of 6
Luck 5 out of 6
Player Interaction 4 out of 6
Replay Value 4 out of 6
Complexity 4 out of 6
Fun 5 out of 6
Overall 5 out of 6