Arkham Noir is a solo card game “inspired by the stories of H.P.Lovecraft”. Here’s how the publisher describes the game:
“Walpurgis Night, May’s Eve, is always a nightmare in witch-haunted Arkham. There are bad doings, and a child or two frequently goes missing. This year, Miskatonic University students engaged in occult studies have been turning up dead. Arkham Police, in deference to your unusual expertise, have asked for your help to get to the root of the matter. Time is of the essence because after Walpurgis Night, the trail will grow cold and the culprits will retreat to the shadows until the next Witches’ Sabbat, when the next cycle of deaths will begin.
“As private investigator Howard Lovecraft, you will investigate events based on the stories “The Dreams in the Witch House” (1933), “The Thing on the Doorstep” (1933), and “The Unnamable” (1923).
“Arkham Noir is a solitaire card game inspired by the interconnected stories of H. P. Lovecraft and other authors, re-imagined as noir detective stories. Each case stands alone.
“Gameplay consists of adding cards to open cases, creating lines of investigation in an effort to solve them. The ultimate goal is to score five “puzzle” clue cards in order to piece together the big picture before running out of time or mental stability. Each newly shuffled deck is the start of a unique challenge, with adjustable difficulty levels to accommodate all level of players.”
The game is also quite cheap compared to the likes of Arkham Horror. I bought my copy for under £12.
I’m new to role-playing board/card games. I bought this game because I loved Arkham Horror The Living Card Game (AH:LCG) and hoped it would be something similar.
Obviously, the experience was going to be on a smaller scale: Arkham Noir is much simpler and consists of purely cards, no tokens or other items.
In terms of production quality, the product is A1: the box is extremely strong, the cards are well-designed and the black & white artwork is good. The art doesn’t try to copy that of AH:LCG, but is of a style of its own.
In terms of gameplay, the rules are well-designed, though it did take me a little while to get used to them (I’m a newbie after all). But here’s where my problem with the game lies… In theory, I’m role-playing a detective solving murders. Yet when playing the game, I didn’t feel like I was investigating anything. I was matching cards. There was no real immersion. In AH there are details on the cards to read that create the role-playing atmosphere – in Arkham Noir, the few words on a card mean nothing: “Superstitious Rumours” or “Fresh Rat Holes” for example. There is no story being told. I soon found I stopped reading the cards, just looked at the symbols on them which told me what to do. You could literally change the pictures and text on the cards, play almost exactly the same game and have it be Batman Noir, Disney Noir, etc.
Basically, the game didn’t work for me. I didn’t feel like I was in a Lovecraftian world, that I was a Noir detective, or in danger, or doing anything other than matching cards. However, for someone else, the game could be perfect. It’s certainly well thought-out and of high manufacturing quality (I wish the Arkham Horror Expansions came in boxes of this standard!).
If you’re looking for a complex solitaire card game with a mild Lovecraftian flavour, that is hard to beat, this is a great game for you.
If you’re looking for something that truly feels Lovecraftian or lets you play detective, you might be disappointed.
Overall Score: 3/5