From No Name Games and Shouting Crow comes Wands & Laserguns, a rules-lite solo game about a series of ridiculous fights. In W&L, you’re a wizard trapped in an anti-magic future with a lasergun to defend yourself. To find your way in this new future, you’ll need your wits and weapon ready at your side! To play you need a d10, and a standard deck of playing cards (jokers removed). I would also suggest something to take notes with as your stats will be changing throughout. The Ashcan edition of Wands & Lasers is available on Itch as a PWYW product [here].
You play with three key stats: Health, Wands, and Laserguns. Health is health, it’s the measure of blood still in your body (a delightful way to describe it, honestly). Wands measure your mental powers, while Laserguns measure a more physical approach. Both Wands and Laserguns have the potential to change as you progress, offering modifiers to your dice rolls as you fight your way through town. To begin, split your deck of cards into two piles: Numbers and Faces. For each encounter, you draw one of each and then consult the tables to see what challenge awaits.
I really liked the layout of this game, it felt flashy and fun with bold layout choices. The prompts associated with each fight were as ridiculous as advertised, and the sense of “uh-oh, I’m in danger” persisted throughout – especially when boss fights came up! Gaining modifiers to Wands and Lasgerguns definitely, absolutely, made me feel like my character was getting stronger. It also by no means meant I was out of danger as even with my modifiers there were boss fights I just could not beat. And that felt good, it felt fitting for ‘I just got dropped into this world and am trying to keep my head down and survive’.
The first time I played, I died. Quickly. This was in part because I was forgetting the ‘you won a fight and so gain X’ mechanic. Don’t forget that mechanic if you intend to live! The second go around I won! I ended the game with 3 Health, +1 Wands, and +4 Laserguns. It’s incredible what using all the game mechanics will do!
I was confused, at first, about whether Face cards were meant to be shuffled back into their deck if they didn’t trigger a boss fight. I figured out after my first playthrough that they aren’t, unless the text states otherwise. The fact that you’re drawing a new face card every encounter, and that running out of encounters is a way to end the game should have been clues to this, but my brain was truly puzzled over the lack of specific instruction on that point.
While this is a solo game, I think it would be hilarious to run someone else through if only to give your friend the opportunity to tell you how they’re creatively getting out of the absurd and entertaining scenarios Wands & Lasers presents them with. This is a fun and quick game that’s easy to hop into and, while ridiculous, nonetheless builds a strong sense of the world you’re inhabiting through its prompts.
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