Stop thief board game review

Players shuffle the criminal cards and reveal the top one. Players boot up the Restoration Games app and start a new game of Stop Thief! The app will choose a starting player. The app also discloses the general location, e.

The thief always follows the footpaths on the board and always moves from one number to an adjacent number, skipping empty circles. The player then chooses a movement card and moves up to that number of spaces. One card also allows the player to pick up all played movement cards. If the player has enough money to retire, that player wins!

Otherwise the app starts a new burglary for the players to investigate. In some ways, Restoration Games is banking on nostalgia by bringing back beloved yet bygone games for a new generation of players. Because Stop Thief! Yet it is more than the sum of its parts and somehow manages to catch the spark that reminds us why we play games in the first place. The app integration here is well done.

The app allows for some customization, offering multiple difficulty settings and, in the future, different game modes for example, co-op. One of the mechanical updates in the restoration of Stop Thief!

I think this is great as it adds another layer to the game. Players have to listen carefully and remember well in order to catch the thief, and they will have to apply their theories to multiple paths on the board to see which one works.

The criminal cards allow for some randomization in the way the thief behaves and the incentive to catch him or her. While these cards are not usually game changers, they do add flavor to the game—something that is very important in Stop Thief!

One thief, for example, might get extra rewards when breaking windows; another might cost you extra for a private tip or a wrong guess. I mentioned that each investigator has their own deck of movement cards, which is neat on paper, but a little more frustrating in actual gameplay. After a thief is caught, the next thief might spawn right next to your location, ready for you to catch them. I once caught two thieves in two turns. I caught the criminal that gave me an immediate extra turn, and the new thief spawned right by where I had caught the last one.

There might be three paths where the thief could be, and you attempt an arrest at one and happen to be right or wrong. But, truthfully, Stop Thief! Content Guide The theme of the game is about catching robbers. Fortunately, the players are the good guys in this scenario. On a positive note, Restoration Games is very intentional about including people of color in their games, and I am incredibly thankful for the diverse set of player characters.

However, after seeing the excellent artwork and components for Stop Thief! Stop Thief! Boy, is it refreshing to not play a game with 17 ways to score points. Sure, you score money in this game, but you do it one simple way: catch the bad guys!

And you do that simply by moving your dude around the board, deducing where the bad guy is at the right time, and calling the cops. Board games these days have become all about mechanisms and finesse and new genres—deckbuilding, pool building, dice building, etc. These are all good things, but Stop Thief!

Yet, Stop Thief! Instead of dice, players have a hand of movement cards and a particular card they need to play to get their cards back up into their hand. In a great twist, these cards are different for each character, and have special abilities such as: getting extra private tips, moving through windows, or a little take-that, like moving another player or stealing money from them. Of course, Stop Thief! The new version uses an extremely intuitive app, and just as importantly—a customizable app.

Both of those things,and much more,are completely adjustable on the app. On top of that, the app is slated to update with solo, cooperative, and 1 vs. Talk about thorough! It can also happen that the next thief robs right near the place someone just happens to be, and that can feel a little unfair.

Jacobson , and it is published by Restoration Games. Regardless of which Stop Thief! The first thing you do each turn is get a clue from the app. The sound that the app plays will tell you the type of space the thief is currently on. For example, if you hear a door opening, the thief is on a door space. Each investigator has a unique deck of six movement cards. These cards have numbers representing how far the investigator can move and some also have special abilities that can be used.

Some cards will allow you to get a private tip. If you decide to get one, the app will give you some information about where the current thief is. In the solo, co-op, and One vs. At the end of your turn you can optionally attempt to arrest a thief in your space or an adjacent space.

The thieves move around the board by going from numbered space to numbered space, including window spaces.