Robo Rally

Well, another year has passed and this was unlike any other year. I became a father, COVID-19 rages on and I started this blog all in the past year. I turned 41 last week and typically in the fall sometime between labor day and the end of November I throw a party and invite folks over to game all weekend. I call it Bertcon. This year was fun, however it was not as big as past years. I got to role play on Friday with my gaming group and on Saturday we played a couple of board games.

The first game up on Saturday was Robo Rally. This is a great board game that dates back to the mid 90s. Had several expansions and Wes reprinted again in 2016. The game has a bit of a cult following, I have seen it played at Gencon with large robots that you actually program and the move across the game board under their own power. I have played this game (the original version of the board game) a bunch in the past.

It’s an open design that lets you design your own style of game.

One of the best parts of this game is it’s flexibility to change the experience based on how many players, the time you want to play and the skill level. It’s an open design that lets you design your own style of game. We started up a session on Vassal Engine and in this game we decided on a team battle Adam and I would take on Rick and Chris.

We used two game boards and two flags. Each team would race to the other teams flag and back to their own. This would give us some good cross fire as we race straight for each other. Robo Rally takes place on a factory floor filled with conveyor belts, endless pits, and lasers. Each turn you program your robot with 5 move and turn cards. Each phase all the robots reveal one card and preform the action. If you end up facing another robot without a wall or another robot you fire your laser and damage that robot. If you get 10 damage your robot blows up. At 5 damage you start locking in your moves. That means the card you have in position 5 is now there until you repair your damage. After the 5 phases are complete and you have moved along the board you draw up to 9 cards minus how much damage you have taken and discard the 5 cards you have programmed.

This game is super fun and you can run it as a battle or a race through as many checkpoints as you have time. You can play as teams or everyone for themselves. the games teaches some basic programming (order of operation) and really helps develop spacial thinking. I recommend this for your game library.

Designed by: Richard Garfield

Players: 2-6

Published by: Avalon Hill (Hasbro)

Year Published: 2016

Recommended Ages: 12+

Time to Play: 120 minutes