I know I kind of got out of doing tabletop game reviews, but I recently acquired some more appropriate games, including another edition of the Horrified board game that started it all. So here we go, teaming up with the Paranormal Investigators… American Monsters Edition.

This game plays pretty much like the original, so I’m not really going to go into playstyle. It’s still collaborative, which I love, and still involves rescuing hapless citizens from certain doom by monster attack, Hollywood style. It still feels like you’re executing a campy B-rated movie script, and boy some of them can play out to be pretty lousy, definitely not blockbuster material.

But this version has a more ’70s ’80s vibe and touches on the whole men-in-black government cover up conspiracy thing in its own way. The city setup and monster feel are decidedly more All-American star-spangled-banner blaze-of-glory crazy, or perhaps “blaze-of-gory” depending on the plot twists. It’s definitely the “Home of the Grave” as the box suggests…

New monsters include Bigfoot, The Jersey Devil, The Ozark Howler, Mothman, Banshee of the Badlands and Chupacabra. Each has different abilities and play styles and each are horrifying in their own unique ways. I really enjoy some of the differences in strategy and interplay between some of these new critters. The Jersey Devil in particular is really complex and the monster motives and how they affect game play are well thought out. We wanted to play with Mothman for this demo since our house is overrun with the critters right now (so many so so many moths…)

My biggest complaint is that this game is just not quite at the same level of development and execution as the first. There are some inconsistencies, such as the Police and Sheriff Station unclearly being one and the same (it seems as though there was a name change in development somewhere and not all of the components were affected). The printing isn’t quite as good and the monster cards are not of the same quality as the original version. And the bag from which you are supposed to hide and draw items is just a stiff plastic-fabric-velcro hot-mess like it’s trying to be a miniature shopping satchel, and not a very good one at that. I replaced it with a Crown Royal fabric sack because those are still the go-to for my cheap-swanky game storage needs and I haven’t had time to sew one specific to the game or acquire something more tasteful.

That said, I do love this version and am glad I got it. I give it 4.5 Cthulhus, like the original. (4.5 / 5)

The art is gorgeous and perfectly suited to the theme. The new monsters are fun and their miniatures are just as well produced as the originals. The game mechanics are generally good. And the production quality is still better than a lot of things out there, with nice thick gloss cardboard cutouts (it is produced by Ravensburger after all). And there are animals to be found, like goats. In fact, the whole town can be overrun with goats, and your goal to defeat the Chupacabra involves saving them. How can this not be awesome?!!! And I adore the in-game logo for all that there aren’t actually any Roswell-style aliens. (I totally wish that there were, that’d push this review to a 5.0, but then again I’m still swooning a bit from my recent trip.)

If you want to purchase the game for yourself, you can find it online at Amazon here. Remember, Haunted MTL is an Amazon affiliate and gets a kickback when you purchase through us, so Dark Lord Cthulhu says shop away.