This review contains no spoilers, but will contain how to play without being in depth.
2019 English First Edition
Published by Pegasus Spiele
# of players 2 to 6 (Can be played as a larger group in my opinion)
Published by Pegasus Spiele
# of players 2 to 6 (Can be played as a larger group in my opinion)
There have been lots of movies about traveling back in time to change the way certain events happen and change the future. Undo: Cherry Blossom Festival (will be called Undo for rest of the article) has a group of players take the roles as Fate Weavers. Fate Weavers are in charge of traveling of changing the outcome of a certain event by traveling to different times that could affect the timeline. Each Undo game will have a new story to change the outcome. For this review I will be using general knowledge that contains no spoilers. The events of the Cherry Blossom Festival take place in modern day Japan, but will go back to early 1900's. You will have to figure out what was going on to cause the event and try to change it for the better. Can you and your team change the events of this story for good, or will you make things worse? Will you retrieve the 2 whales and bring them to your time to stop Skynet from destroying all Mutant kind? Okay, I am pretty sure that second question does not happen in this box and would make an interesting movie or 2. Join me as I vaguely take you on a journey to explore Undo: Cherry Blossom Festival.
Components and Gameplay
Undo contains almost no components. All of the components are large cards and small cards that can be seen in the photo before this section of the review. The rules for Undo are explained by the cards as they flipped over. Normally this may seem tedious, but in Undo this allows for the whole group to learn at the same time. The large cards explain the rules, 13 time events, and the outcome of your journey. The small cards contain time travel cards, outcome of what happened by your choice during a specific time event, clues for each time period, and 3 clue pick cards. The cards are all text with a Japanese theme border.
The gameplay of Undo is fairly simple. The rule cards will explain how to play during the game and will set the story of the events you are about to explore. There will be 13 specific times that you can jump to during your game to change the events taking place. You will only be able to visit 9 points in time. This includes the time that starts the game during the rules, so you will only be choosing 8 other times. The times range from 1900's all the way to a few days after the events occur. Each time has a clue card that you can use to help make a decision for that time event. You will have to be careful as you can only see 3 clue cards for the whole game. Each time card will have a explanation of what you are seeing and 3 options on how you want to change the event. Once a decision is made, you will select the appropriate small card that will tell you if you earned positive points (changed for the good), no points (event is unchanged), or negative points (changed to make it worse). After finishing a time event, you can discuss as a group to decide the next the time you want to go to. The final say is by a specific player and will go the next player at the table for the next time event. Most of the time everyone agrees, but in the chance a group can not come to an agreement, it will be up to that player to make the final decision. You will do this 8 times, then you will go the cards set aside for the outcome of the game. Depending on your points, you will have 1 of 5 scores and 1 of 3 outcomes. You can make things worse, the same, or change for the better based on the decisions you made. You may be asking, do changes happen immediately after each time event? No, the game explains that only after all time travel has been completed will the time line change. After the game, you will put all the cards in order so that another group can play the game because each group can only play the game one time.
The gameplay of Undo is fairly simple. The rule cards will explain how to play during the game and will set the story of the events you are about to explore. There will be 13 specific times that you can jump to during your game to change the events taking place. You will only be able to visit 9 points in time. This includes the time that starts the game during the rules, so you will only be choosing 8 other times. The times range from 1900's all the way to a few days after the events occur. Each time has a clue card that you can use to help make a decision for that time event. You will have to be careful as you can only see 3 clue cards for the whole game. Each time card will have a explanation of what you are seeing and 3 options on how you want to change the event. Once a decision is made, you will select the appropriate small card that will tell you if you earned positive points (changed for the good), no points (event is unchanged), or negative points (changed to make it worse). After finishing a time event, you can discuss as a group to decide the next the time you want to go to. The final say is by a specific player and will go the next player at the table for the next time event. Most of the time everyone agrees, but in the chance a group can not come to an agreement, it will be up to that player to make the final decision. You will do this 8 times, then you will go the cards set aside for the outcome of the game. Depending on your points, you will have 1 of 5 scores and 1 of 3 outcomes. You can make things worse, the same, or change for the better based on the decisions you made. You may be asking, do changes happen immediately after each time event? No, the game explains that only after all time travel has been completed will the time line change. After the game, you will put all the cards in order so that another group can play the game because each group can only play the game one time.
Final Thoughts
Undo is basically a choose your adventure game. The story was interesting and the choices can sometimes be a real shot in the dark, while others will be fairly obvious. I am not a biggest fan of games you can only play one time, but I like to GM this game to other groups. Undo is a perfect series for when you have dinner parties or when you have a small group over that may not be interested in board games. Pay attention to the dates and times because they may line up with what you know in our actual history. The components and rules were fairly simple, but work good for the gameplay. I would have liked a little bit more art, but understand due the amount of text on each card. Everyone at the table that played the games had a great time, I just wish there were more than one story per box. I would love to play the other stories available and have been told that lots of stories are being put out each quarter or so. Do not go into this expecting Time Stories or an exit room type game. This is a laid back game to play with friends and families. Undo is perfect for that type of play style. The rating below is for all games I play. For this specific type of game I would give it very high marks, but due to the fact of being a one off game and not much in terms of gameplay, the general rating will be lower. I really enjoyed Undo and I hope you are able to explore the events that take place during the Cherry Blossom Festival.
Taco gives Undo: Cherry Blossom Festival a rating of...
*Please note this is for all general games and not for this specific game type
Pros:
+ A relaxed game for a group of people
+ Interesting story
+ Like how the point system works
+ Low price point due to simple components and one time game
+Easy to learn
Cons:
- Not a big fan of games I can only play once
- Lots of text and no pictures (it could have benefited from some pictures)
- Some choices were very obvious, would have preferred more difficult answers that you had to think of from the other events you visited
- Would like a harder version that maybe you couldn't view previous cards you visited or tougher choices based on those previous events
+ A relaxed game for a group of people
+ Interesting story
+ Like how the point system works
+ Low price point due to simple components and one time game
+Easy to learn
Cons:
- Not a big fan of games I can only play once
- Lots of text and no pictures (it could have benefited from some pictures)
- Some choices were very obvious, would have preferred more difficult answers that you had to think of from the other events you visited
- Would like a harder version that maybe you couldn't view previous cards you visited or tougher choices based on those previous events
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