Game Review: Unsurmountable by Button Shy Games

Unsurmountable: A Scott Almes Solo Game published by Button Shy Games

Unsurmountable challenges the player to build a continuous path up a mountain. The game only has eighteen cards, so resources are limited (one of the cards is a rescue helicopter). Play starts with a "base camp" which is a row of five face-up cards. The rules are simple. The player can either place the leftmost card of the base camp on the mountain or use an ability listed on the other cards (the card with the ability gets discarded, so use wisely). The mountain is built up as a triangle--cards can only go on higher levels if there are two adjacent cards beneath it. The bottom row has a limit of four cards, the next a limit of three, the next a limit of two, and only one on the top.

A completed mountain with base camp

As the cards are put down, the paths don't have to connect. It's okay to have dead ends or cards that are not part of the ascent. The path has to start from the bottom edge of the mountain and go all the way up to the middle of the top card (the top card does not need the path exiting on the very top). The helicopter is set aside as a one-use ability--the player can take a base camp card and put it on the bottom of the draw deck. The challenge of the game is to plan ahead in using the cards to build the path or switch things around with the abilities.

Once a player is more familiar with the cards (both the types of paths and the various abilities), the game offers higher levels of difficulty, e.g. starting with a four-card base camp or having no repeating features on each level or each edge. The cards have a feature icon at the top of the ability, an image of either a yeti, a mountain, a lake, a camp, or a tree. See the samples below.

Click to enlarge

When I bought the game, I also purchased two expansions: Big Climb and Dual Peaks.

Expansions!

Big Climb adds six cards with new symbols (flags and seracs, which are icy crags). The player has to build a mountain with a five-card mountain base, adding an extra level and thus more challenge.

Finished, even with a four-card base camp!

Dual Peaks provides two extra cards and a different challenge, starting with a five-card mountain base but finishing with trails connecting to two different peaks. The trails can overlap but don't have to. The solution below has both trails ending unnecessarily off the top of the peaks. Also, each trail could start at the same point and use the second-row, third-from-the-left card to connect both mountain tops. It's okay to go down and then back up to get around!

A Dual Peak solution

The game plays quickly (in about ten minutes) and is a lot of fun, especially trying to plan ahead with the cards. Making a trail isn't too hard until you start using the other limitations (like only one type of card per level or per side), adding more things to plan ahead for. I found myself not using the helicopter. It's nice thematically but the base camp would have to have be a bad combination to make it feel necessary.

Recommended for some solo gaming fun!