Edge of Darkness

Edge of Darkness is an uncomfortably large object. The cube tower explains the size of the box, though not the quiet despair it causes on an already crowded shelf. Beneath that production sits D. Clair’s familiar proposition: Mystic Vale-style card crafting, but with rather more ways to configure the surrounding game. If the constant sleeve-and-unsleeve routine of Vale wore you down, stop there; if you liked the mechanism but found its pools static, solvable, or uneven, there is a proper case for reading on.

Each game begins by building a city from ten of the 34 available locations, each bringing its own card set. On a turn, players draft through a Rochester-like system, improve one card, then play cards for resources or, more often, move agents around the city to claim abilities and permanent statistics. The interesting decision is which improvement belongs in your own engine, and which city action gives you the timing you need.

At the end of each round, the cube tower determines whether the monsters come calling, and the apparently toy-like apparatus proves surprisingly effective at setting the pace. More importantly, the chosen locations alter the game’s character: one city can be a clean engine builder, another can make take-that so prevalent that it feels like Lunch Money with Orcs. It is Mystic Vale’s card crafting, wearing different overalls and much more willing to rearrange the workplace.

This is not a bad game; it is comfortably above average, and the range of setups is its chief strength. But setup and teardown are out of proportion to the length of a session, while the price and physical bulk keep it firmly in try-before-you-buy territory.

Updated session

A more combat-oriented setup confirmed that the configurability is not cosmetic: the session leaned much closer to Thunderstone Quest and demanded entirely different priorities simply to stay alive. The judgement did not change, but it became clearer: the base game is above average; the radically different cities are what make it worth returning to.