Stats:
No. of players: 1-5
Amount of time to play: 90-180 min
Age requirements: 14+
Set-up time: 5-10 min

Tales From the Loop is a cooperative board game in which the players are kids in an alternate 80s reality. You must investigate strange happenings and solve mysteries in your town to meet scenario-based goals and win.

Tales From the Loop Rules Description:

Once the board and cards are set up for the scenario you want to play, you must pick which kid you want to play. There are 8 different kids to choose from with different strengths and weaknesses. You take that kid’s player board and iconic item and you are ready to go. The starting Diary card gives you a condition you must meet to move toward winning.

The game takes place over one or two weeks depending on the scenario. Each round is a day and the weekend is combined into one longer day. At the start of each week you get a chore you must accomplish by the end of Friday. Not completing the chore has negative repercussions. The rounds are broken into three phases; School Phase, Adventure Phase, and End Phase.

During the School Phase the first player draws a school card. This card describes an event for that player (possibly with help) that they will need to overcome. It also details how the machines will move and the number of Rumor cards you add to the board. Since there is no school on the weekends you skip the event that round.

In the Adventure Phase there is no real turn order. You can travel to locations, investigate Rumors at your current location, trade items with other kids, or hack a machine. All these actions require you to spend Time Cubes and some require you to roll to pass a test in order to complete them. If you are exhausted or injured it slows you down and you will have less Time Cubes to spend until you rest (which takes time). Another thing that can affect your Time Cube pool is getting Home before the End Phase. Again moving Home will require time.

After players have spent all their Time Cubes the End Phase begins. In it you discard down to four items, check their favor, and heal. You can have a positive, neutral, or negative favor. If your kid is home, your favor moves one spot towards positive. If your favor goes to negative you are grounded and remove two Time Cubes from your pool for the next day. You automatically heal at night. You move the Time Cube on the injured track one space to the right and if it moves off the board it returns to your pool. Before beginning the next day you check for success of the diary card or mission.

Tests are resolved with dice. You create a dice pool based on your skill used for the check, items, and possibly conditions. You only succeed if you roll a six on any of the dice in your pool. You can push yourself to reroll but this will cost you an unspent Time Cube. Other kids at your location can help, adding a die to your pool (up to two may be added), but will suffer the same fate as you for a failed result.

What you do and where you go is determined by the current diary card (and at times your chore). But you need to investigate and resolve Rumors. These require unknown skill checks unless you Scout them which costs a Time Cube. Succeed at a test on the Rumor and you gain an Insight, but fail and gain an Enigma. Every round one or more Rumor cards are added to the board and if there is no space for a card you raise Enigma by two. Enigma and Insight can trigger different effects depending on the scenario.

Diary cards progress the story and once you complete the last one the scenario is over. If you run out of days of the week, you lose. You may also lose from the results of a diary card.

Quick Review of Tales From the Loop:

Tales From the Loop is an immersive, thematic, cooperative board game. It feels like a lighter version of the award-winning roleplaying game. I am an 80s kid so I love the theme and that era. This game has lots of things that will be nostalgic for clothes around my age.

The components for this game are great. There are some things that could be improved but overall the game looks great on the table. The machines look cool and the standees of the kids are decent though minis are always cooler. Everything is thick, durable, and made with quality. I wish the card types looked a bit different. You get used to it but early on making sure you were looking at the right card was a bit tricky. Lastly, the rule book is pretty bad. There is a lot going on in this game with many small rules to remember.The rule book is missing some things or has important rules tucked in hard to find places. There is an updated rule book coming which should help but we spent a lot of time on google getting answers to our questions.

Tales From the Loop does a great job marrying theme and mechanics. The above overview doesn’t go into all the rules or mechanics but some are perfect. Like when you move you can get to any unrestricted location by getting a lift from your parents. This is great as it can save Time Cubes, but your favor with your parent’s will move down one. Even how you have to go to school before you can adventure and must do chores that will take up your adventuring time. If you get grounded, you lose time. There is no school event on the weekend which grants you three extra Time Cubes, and there are more. All great mechanics that mirror what is happening.

There is a learning curve with this game and unfortunately the rule book only makes it steeper. Some people might also think it is fiddly (though I only heard that comment once). It is not perfect and if the rule book was better written I would have rated it higher. Maybe if an updated rule book is released the rating could go up. I like this game but want to love it.

If you like cooperative board games Tales From the Loop is a good one that could be great. Give it a try if you get the chance or wait for a reprint or updated rule book and pick it up.

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