Robotech: Force of Arms

After the Robotech RPG Tactics fiasco and the money that disappeared into it, I was already three times as wary of anything carrying this IP—especially with Harmony Gold getting involved and causing its usual problems. I stayed away from the Kickstarters; I simply waited for a cheap chance to see what this was actually about.

Force of Arms, like its bigger sibling Crisis Point, is a filler for two players. Each player has a fixed deck of units and, over a few rounds, secretly places cards along the axes of a matrix. Here the board is 3x3, so the idea is direct and free of ornament.

The aim is to score the cards in the matrix through the sums at its edges. The players’ choices meet in the hidden placement and in trying to read where the other player wants to go, but the game never manages to give that simple confrontation any tension.

On paper it sounds simple, spare, and austere—and it ought to be interesting. Instead, the decks’ complete symmetry drains every bit of character from the experience, damages the fluff as well, and leaves a dry, “meh” result. Two games, two 8–8 draws: congratulations, we managed to make Robotech feel like a spreadsheet. Stay away.