If you want to try and get your family into gaming, do not, ever, under any circumstances start with Smash Up.  This game almost single handedly destroyed my families desire to play board games before it even started.  Now wait, hold on!  Before you assume I am saying this game is bad, let me now say that since the time of our first play through we have purchased all of the expansions.. with the exception of the latest titled It’s your fault.  See?  Times change.

Smash up was the first from my recently acquired board game collection and I decided to try out with my 2 boys.  It seemed like a good fit because we will often play Hearthstone together on the iPad, and this seemed like a similar crazy card game but one that existed in physical form.  In fact, I was so positive they would love it, I ended up buying 3 of the expansions to give them for Christmas before we had even played the base game.  Monsters, Sci-Fi and Awesome Level 9000 … um, yes please!  We sat down, read the instructions, and gave it our first go.  About an hour later, and we barely completed our first game.  There was a lot of arguing, a lot of re-reading of the rules (along with looking online for further clarification) and honestly not a lot of fun being had.  I asked my two boys what they thought of it, and they gave a lukewarm response.  I asked if they wanted to give it another go, but I knew what their answer would be before they even said anything.  “Maybe some other time.”

Smash up is a card game where the goal is to score 15 points before the other players.  You score these points by placing minion cards on top of a set of base cards, which all have a different value that must be met before the base blows up and is destroyed.  Each minion card has an attack value, and the cumulative total of all of the minions attack values are added together to see if it is a higher or equal value to that of the base card.  As an example, the base score is 15.  Opponent one places a 7 attack minion on the base, player two places a 5 attack minion, and then player three puts a 4 attack minion on the base, which then blows the base and the 3 players score the points listed on the base card for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place.

At it’s core, the goal of the game is rather simple and straight forward.  The difficulty comes into play in trying to understand and remember how exactly card actions resolve and in what order.

A couple of days later, feeling that I may have just wasted money on this and the expansions, and knowing they would be less than thrilled to get more Smash Up on Christmas morning, I decided to breakout a couple of the expansions early and see if they wanted to give it another go.  They did, and it went much smoother than the first game.  It was still a little rough, but things were definitely much clearer than they were the first time we attempted to play.  A couple of days later my oldest son, who is 10, asked if I wanted to play a match with him completely unsolicited.  I jumped at the opportunity.  We played several quick matches and now regularly play it using all of our expansions (in our big geeky box no less).

If you want to give Smash Up a shot, then commit to playing at least 3 games of it.  At that point, you will either be excited about trying out your Zombie Alien or Robo-Wizard combo the next game, or happy you don’t have to play it anymore.  If you have a chance to play your first game with someone who has played before, then do so without hesitation.  For me and my kids, we have grown to love the craziness, but my wife will always give an authoritative “No” whenever we ask if she wants to join us when it hits the table.