HARRY POTTER CLUEDO (2008)
CLICK ON THE THUMBNAILS TO OPEN THE LARGER PICTURE
2008 has been a very good year for CLUEDO. In June I got the VIMTO version & in July along came CLUEDO 2008 - Discover The Secrets. Although the latter was a mite disappointing, a new CLUEDO is always welcome so three in one year has been brilliant!
I am not a fan of Harry Potter and have never seen a film or read a book so character wise I don't have a clue, but this is a really great little version of CLUEDO with some interesting extra features. One of the first differences is the board with wheels rotating underneath the board closing doors, opening passages & giving out dark magic. This sounds more high tech than it actually is of course.
Games used to come prepared ready to play. Nowadays you have to set them up yourself.
Above are two push out sheets containing the four wheels, one of each which is affixed underneath to a different quarter of the board & the Suspect, Spells & House Points tokens. On closer inspection of one of the wheels you can see around the edge secret passages to various places on the board, some black shapes, the dark mark &, in the centre, the name of one of the four Houses at Hogwarts.
The Dark Mark
Next is the board. If you look closely, you will see a small crest in each corner room. Going round the board The Hospital Wing has the Ravenclaw Crest represented by a Bird, The Potions Classroom has the Griffindor Crest represented by a Lion, The Divination Classroom has the Hufflepuff Crest represented by a Badger & The Defence Against The Dark Arts has the Slytherin Crest represented by a Snake. These are the four Houses of Hogwarts.
The four wheels are now attached to the underside of the board placing each wheel under the corresponding quarter of the board, so in the example above, the Ravenclaw wheel would be attached underneath the Hospital Wing. The board also has push out pieces & once these are pushed out you will find the wheels can be read through the board. This means that as the wheels are rotated the secret passages change, doors open & close (A closed door is represented by a black line. Check out The Owlery picture below. The top door is open but the door to the right is closed) & The Dark Mark may appear.
The Owlery
So on to the actual gameplay. The game is set for 3 - 5 players only. This is because one character has vanished and it is up to you to discover who did it using which spell in which room. This means that, like the great Swiss version, you are a sleuth rather than a suspect in the game. The six character cards are shuffled at the start of the game and one removed face down. This is the character who has disappeared and takes no further part in the game. The other players then adopt one of the 5 remaining characters.
There are 3 dice in this game. Two normal ones for movement & the special Hogwarts die. Once again you have to make up the special die yourself as the game comes with a blank one and six stickers. The stickers are one each for the four Hogwart houses, one dark mark & a star. More about this die further down.
As stated above, you have to discover who made the character vanish, which spell they used and from which room the abduction occurred.
The suspects and spells come on round card discs that are placed in rooms as accusations are made.
So, now ready to start the game. As usual, one of each suspect, spell & room card are placed in the solutions envelope and placed at the centre of the board, the square marked as Dumbledore's Office. Any odd cards left after the deal are placed here and any player can go in and look at one of these if they move into the room. This is also the square you have to reach in order to make a final accusation.
There are also two extra packs of cards in this version. The HELP & DARK DECK Cards. The HELP cards contain Allies, Spells & Items to aid you in your quest. Each player starts with one of these and can add to them by either stopping on a STAR square on the board or by throwing the STAR on the Hogwarts die. The DARK DECK contains Dark Magic cards and can rob you of house points unless you have a HELP card that can negate the effect. These cards must be drawn if the dark mark is thrown on the Hogwarts die or if the dark mark appears in a room during the turning of one of the wheels. Wheel turning occurs when one of the four house symbols appear on the Hogwarts die. When this happens, the appropriate wheel is turned clockwise until a new set of instructions and/or door closures appear.
Right, you've heard them mentioned a couple of times - house points. You start with a number of these which come on small discs that you keep in front of you. In a 3 player game each player starts with 60, 4 players with 70 and 5 players with 80.
Unfortunately, these get diminished by the DARK DECK and if you lose them all, you're out of the game. This means that, like the 2008 CLUEDO, all players could actually lose the game in which case the dark forces win!!!!!! That's all there is to it as they say. Definitely one of the best themed versions and the thickest wad of detective notes ever i think!! One of which is reproduced below with the rule book and next to that, the bottom of the box.
Don't delay - get out and buy today!
◄ CLUEDO 2008 HOME BACK Vimto CLUEDO ►