Cube Quest: Clash for the Crown is chess as snooker. Armed with a handful of plastic cubes and your most accurate digit – you can take your pick as to index or middle – you and another player take it in turns to flick cubes across the game’s board to push each other’s king cube off the neoprene mat. The first to do so wins.
It’s not just about the flicking, mind. There’s also a dash of strategy in the mix. You have two different types of units: a dozen orc-like grunts and four armoured strikers. (Variant rules introduce more complex units like healers.) The difference between the two – other than their appearance – comes into play once they cross into enemy territory. Any cube that successfully lands on the opposite half of the board with a picture of its unit face-up is safe and stays where it is. Any cube that lands with a silhouette showing, however, is captured by the enemy and must be rolled like a die. A face returns it to your own castle ready to be propelled back into the fray, while a silhouette sees it removed from the game for good.
This means that playing it safe and trying to tactically slide your cubes into battle like particularly awkward curling stones can be just as viable as going for broke with full-force shots aimed at smashing through your opponent’s defences and scattering their cubes across the table – your own fingertip accuracy permitting, of course.
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What makes this back-and-forth of plastic projectiles even better is the way you have the chance to construct your own defences during setup, arranging your cube attackers and defenders however you like around your king in their castle. Playing with seasoned Cube Quest players inevitably sees more and more elaborate layouts emerge, with the simple rules giving way to hilariously ambitious formations and attempts to bend the rules of physics to your advantage. Why not try arranging multiple cubes into a shotgun-like blast propelled by a single flick? Or using other cubes as a cannon to keep shots on target? It’s still technically within the rules! Or sending a warrior soaring over a wall of defenders, like a pinpoint free kick in football?