Wits and Guile — A Crystallo Review
Free the creatures, defeat the dragon, and become the legend you’ve been training for!
Game Attributes Block
Publisher: Light Heart Games
Designer/Artist: Liberty Kifer
Initial Year: 2018
Expected Play Time: 20–30 min
Age Range: 8+
Number of Players: 1
Game Type: Pattern, Set Collection
Unboxing
Theme and What Is It?
Set free captured creatures and defeat the Black Dragon in Crystallo by arranging your cards and crystals to unlock their bonds and trap the dragon in its cave. This is an abstract game of resource management (cards and crystals) and solving the puzzle of accumulating the crystals and items before you run out of cards to play.
Initial Impressions
With so little to the game, it was quite deceptive. Before you know it, you’re halfway through the deck and not sure if you can free all the creatures and still defeat the dragon. You’re second-guessing yourself to see if you can make the best play for the moment or if you need to manage for a few turns down the road.
Gameplay Mechanics
Goal
The goal of Crystallo is to free the trapped creatures and defeat the Black Dragon using as few cards as possible. while acquiring items to improve your score.
Setup
Separate the Black Dragon and creature cards from the deck. Shuffle the remaining cards. Deal nine cards face down and set aside with the Black Dragon cards for later. Place the creature cards face up at the top of the play area.
Turns
In Phase 1, lay out the creature cards and place the colored gems on the symbols at the bottom of each card according to their color. Draw one card from the deck and play to the middle of the play area. Continue to draw cards, placing them down such that one of the crystals is next to another crystal.
By making a square of 3 crystals (in one of the approved patterns) and a creature symbol, you acquire a crystal from the creature denoted by that symbol — this is showing the bonds are loosening around the creature. Do this three times for a given creature and it is free.
Once all of the creatures are free, you move on to the Black Dragon in Phase 2. Clear off the table of the spent cards and creatures, placing the crystals to the side. Place the Dragon cards at the top of the play area and add the 9 cards to the remaining deck from the first phase. Place the cards face up in front of you and play them like before, creating the squares to acquire gems that will trap the Black Dragon.
The game ends when there are no more cards available to play or the Black Dragon is trapped.
Game Build Quality
The game is made up of cards, gems, and a bag. The cards have a slick finish and a decent core. The creature and dragon cards have a special finish (UV, I think) that makes the art pop. They really should be sleeved because you will shuffle/deal them a lot. The gems are somewhat large multicolored plastic objects. The bag is a soft, cushy bag with a drawstring; it is not used as part of the game, more for storage purposes.
Artistic Direction
Most of the cards have gems and creature symbols on them, not all that special. The creature cards on the other hand are quite well done and as mentioned before, the special coating on the cards really make these cards all the more special.
Fun Factor
This is a solo game so this is a race against yourself and your best score. The randomness of shuffling and drawing cards make this game a unique puzzle every time.
Age Range & Weight
Age range is 8+ and the weight of the game is low but I think that works alright for them to learn the rules, but the older the player, the more experience and maturity in decision making in reaching higher scores.
Conclusions
Crystallo was a good time and quite a unique solo game. Like most solitaire games, it is the same puzzle you try to solve but each time you’re working with new scenarios that make the game just different enough that it isn’t the same each time but close enough to give you hope that you’ve cracked it. I think this is a game that even those who are ardently against playing alone very well may change their minds.
I will say though you might run into scenarios that aren’t addressed in the rules such as running out of cards to draw before the creatures are all released, what happens if, or are you even allowed, to complete squares for creatures already freed, etc. They aren’t game-breaking but can make it uncertain as to how to proceed in optimizing your turns.
Theme & What Is It — 3
Initial Impressions — 4
Gameplay Mechanics — 4
Game Build Quality — 5
Artistic Direction — 4
Fun Factor — 4
Age Range & Weight — 4
Conclusions — 4.0
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