Having never played the board game Loot and Scoot, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. All I had to go on going in was the description which included dungeons, looting, recruiting heroes, and killing monsters.  That’s the kind of description that gets my attention. Read on to find out of it delivers.

How the Game is played:

Loot and Scoot is a game for 2-4 players. Each player starts the game by recruiting 2 heroes to go along with their initial two hirelings. Players cannot start the game with the same hero combination. The four available hero types are squire, thief, priest, or wizard. After the heroes are recruited each player sets up their dungeon with monster cards that are drawn and placed in the corresponding room. Monsters range from level 1 to level 6. Each player has one level-6 monster to place in their dungeon. The game is over when any of the level-6 monsters is defeated.

Monster placement is part of the strategy as other than the level-6 monster you never know what level monsters you will draw to place in your dungeon. If you put a level-1 monster in a level-4 room your level-1 monster is much weaker than if you place it in a level-1 room. Each dungeon consists of two level-1 rooms, two level-2 rooms, two level-3 rooms, two level-4 rooms, and four level-6 rooms. There are also poison and treasure cards that you can place in your dungeon. Any unclaimed treasure in your dungeon when the game ends is added to your final score.

Each player starts their turn at the inn and is given two action points each turn. These action points can be used to recruit another hero (you can have up to four), beg for gold (takes both action points), build upgrades, train a hero, or go looting in another players dungeon. Except for looting a dungeon actions cost some of that hard-earned gold you acquire while looting dungeons. When you go looting you flip over a card from the lowest level room that has not been cleared. When you flip over a card you must fight the monster in that room. If you fail to kill it you do not have to fight that monster upon entering that same dungeon but you will not be able to progress further in the dungeon until it is killed.

Monsters are killed by rolling a 6-sided die. You must roll a six to defeat the monster. Each monster card displays which type of hero can attack. For instance a monster might show that one priest and two squires can attack it. That means that you can roll up to three die if you have one priest and two squires in your party. If your party consists of one priest, one squire, and one thief you will only be able to roll two die to try and defeat the monster. If you fail to roll a six on your first attempt than the monster attacks your party based upon their attack value. Lower level monsters only attack one member of your party while higher level monsters attack two or more. You choose which member of your party takes the damage. Hirelings are killed when attacked and heroes are sent back to the inn.

As an app:

Loot and Scoot is a universal app so you are able to play it on your iPhone and iPad without having to pay for different versions. I am a big fan of that so Loot and Scoot gets bonus points with me for being universal.

Graphically, Loot and Scoot is not much to look at. The character art is decent enough but the fonts and menus look pretty generic when compared to the top-tier board games available on the app store. The animations also seem a bit generic as does the sound. Outside of that the game functions very well on the touch screen and there are no frustrating moments where you cannot do what you are trying to do. You can definitely tell this is a low budget game but that’s not to say there is no fun to be had.

Loot and Scoot offers single-player and multiplayer modes. You can play up to three computer AI’s in single-player mode with Easy, Medium, and Hard difficulty levels available. Multiplayer mode is restricted to pass-and-play but works well.

Final thoughts:

Loot and Scoot’s fast pace makes it a great game for a mobile platform but at the same time it really limits the strategy involved in the game. With games ending so quickly, even with 4 players, it hardly seems worth investing gold in building upgrades or leveling up your heroes knowing that you will need that gold in your coffers to boost your score at the end of the game. This game would benefit greatly from having bigger dungeons where the game would be extended and player strategy would be allowed to unfold. You can extend the game if there are more than two players by choosing “Last Boss Standing” mode where the game doesn’t end until all but one level-6 monster is slain but it still isn’t long enough to really get any strategy going. As it is Loot and Scoot is fun in quick stretches but nothing that will scratch the strategy itch.

Grade: C+

Loot and Scoot

Victory Point Games LLC

$2.99

iPhone/iPad universal

Link: Loot and Scoot