Game Review: The Goonies: Escape with One-Eyed Willy's Rich Stuff by The OP

The Goonies: Escape with One-Eyed Willy's Rich Stuff--A Coded Chronicles Game designed by Jay Cormier and Sen Foong Lim and published by The OP

The Goonies is a kids' adventure film from the 1980s where a group of misfits go in search of treasure to save their homes from foreclosure by evil bankers who want to make a golf course/country club of their small town. This game puts the players in the roles of the kids as they follow an old map and various clues to find a pirate's hidden plunder. The narrative of the game mirrors the film's narrative, giving to players who have seen the movie only a small advantage but a larger portion of satisfaction as little callbacks and other bits from the movie show up. There's even the villains of the film, the Fratellis, chasing after the players. The game does a good job embodying the film's spirit of adventure.

The game plays like a narrative-driven escape room, with a lot of puzzles to solve as the players move forward. In the Coded Chronicles system, each character has an ability (like Explore, Pick Up, Use) that allows them to interact with items and locations on the slowly built-up map. A journal with various numbered entries describes what happens or what changes when the character do things. The character's number is added to the item or location, giving the right number to look up in the journals. More map tiles are revealed and more adventures happen, all the way to finding the treasure (it's a kids movie from the 1980s, so obviously it turns out all right in the end). The table I chose to play on was not quite big enough.

The game in progress

In the picture above, Data's gadgets (which get used periodically) are on the left with the main map in the center. Below the map are a bunch of items picked up during the game. At the top is the "treasure map" which is used in solving some of the puzzles. It's laminated so the dry-erase marker can both write on it and clear it off for the next puzzle that uses it. 

The game system works smoothly, though with eight characters, that means eight journals and some overlapping abilities. I played it solo and had to switch often between journals to look up stuff. Many wrong combinations lead to flavor text, which gets a little tedious for just one person. Occasionally the narrative ricochets around from journal to journal without any choices being made, which would be okay if I'd been playing with a group. The characters with Use and Explore did most of the action during the game. Mouth, whose ability was to Translate, has a noticeably slimmer journal, though he was given a side mission to decrypt images on the walls, so a player could be working on something on the side while the rest of game was progressing.

Like most escape games, the puzzle are a variety of deciphering visual clues and combining the right items to get the job done. Also like most escape games, some were obvious, some were fun challenges, and some were incomprehensible. Again, if I'd had a group that might have been easier with more eyes and more perspectives. I used the hint system and was able to reverse-engineer a couple of puzzles to see what they wanted me to do. That was sort-of satisfying. I've played enough escape-room games to be used to the occasional dip into the hints. The hint numbers are listed in the rule book and refer to paragraphs in the journals. I did accidentally read hints for problems I wasn't even working on while reading one of the journals!

Overall, I thought the game was just okay. The puzzles are engaging but a bit difficult and the story, which is broken into three acts, moves a little unevenly. The second act moved much faster than the first and third. The Fratellis are supposed to move forward if the players make an error which I ignored after a while since I wasn't so concerned about getting a score (and I already had plenty of characters to play). I am the type of escape room player where I ignore the timer (in this case, the Fratellis) and just enjoy solving the puzzles. The art is good and fits the theme and the components are high quality.

Mildly recommended.