Creatures and Caverns

A solo game consisting of just 18 cards designed for the 2022 BGG In-Hand Game Design Contest.

The aim of the game is to journey through 3 levels of pathways and caverns, overcoming creatures and other obstacles to gain treasure and useful items... and to make it out alive!

A little background

During a New Year's sort out of storage boxes I came across a game I designed in my teens (a few decades ago ). It was a dungeon type adventure featuring the usual suspects and a modular board of pathways and caverns. It was only ever played by myself and my younger sister. All the components were hand-drawn directly onto coloured card ('borrowed' from the school art department) and the text was rub-down Letraset transfers (a trip down memory lane!).

This got me thinking as to whether the theme and artwork could form the basis of an entry into the contest. It would be fun to give some of my teenage ideas and artwork a new lease of life.

A character card gives you the choice of 4 adventurers with different strength and skills. As you lose health, your character card is pushed down into the deck to show a lower value.

The cards feature caverns on one side (and a dice mechanic used for resolving encounters). To explore the caverns, you slide the top card in your chosen direction to reveal the continuation of the path on the card below. This can lead to a large or small cavern, or a dead end.

Should you enter a cavern then the top card is flipped to show the encounter, as well as any skills that may help you and the treasure and items you can gain (all these are different depending on the size of cavern and the level you are on).

Cards can be used to show held items, treasure gained, recycled for the next level or discarded, all of which is done in hand.