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The mysterious Dragon Cave

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Authors:
Carlo Emanuele Lanzavecchia
& Walter Obert

Publisher:
Drei Magier Spiele
2015

No. of Players:
2 - 4

EVALUATION

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Gamebox author Ralf Togler writes about the game:

Every year the new big children game by DREI MAGIER SPIELE is one of the highlights in my reviewing life. A lovely story, surprising elements and a great design are the features of nearly all of their games in the last 10 years. So it should be no surprise that my marks for their new game are again very high. Indeed, The mysterious Dragon Cave has all attributes of a modern, compelling game for the younger players. I would say that the perfect age is 4 to 5 years, but even eight years-olds willingly join the one or other game. But what is the secret behind?

This time DREI MAGIER SPIELE takes us in a volcanic cave, in which a young dragon, called Edgar, is looking for colourful gemstones. With the help of hidden magnets under the gameboard, Edgar breathes fire when he enters certain fields on the board. This is nicely implemented by a small red light that illuminates a rhombic plastic in front of Edgar's mouth. So it really looks like Edgar is breathing fire and it is a great fun for the children whenever Edgar`s fire is triggered. The board is divided roughly into six different areas, each of them stands for a specific colour of the gemstones you can find there.

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Now, at the beginning of the game each player draws two cards that give you the colour of gemstones you should look for in your turn. Then, when it is your turn, you throw a die and move Edgar along the paths over the board as many fields as the die shows you. If however you roll a dragon symbol, you may fly to any field you like. If Edgar, triggered by the magnet, breaths fire and you have the card of the same colour Edgar stands on, you place this card in front of you and immediately pick a new one from the stack. The first player who has collected six cards in this way wins the game.

The game is simple but clever, and so DREI MAGIER SPIELE once again succeeds in whipping up enthusiasm in the children. My four year old at once was fascinated by the fire and for fifteen minutes did nothing else but pushing Edgar from one place to another just to let him breath fire. Of course, after that he knew which fields would trigger the fire, but DREI MAGIER SPIELE had thought of that, too. By simply rotating the board that lies on the box with the magnets, all fields are at a different position again and so no one knows where the magnets are. Moreover you can also flip the board and have other routes, fields and areas as a result.

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The mysterious Dragon Cave is not fully in the same league as my favourite children game, The Enchanted Tower, but it is definitely close up. With this quality, it is nearly too bad that my children are growing faster every year (my older son already plays Dominion with his friends without my help). So in a few years, I will probably have to convince my wife to play children games with me again...


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