Mille Bornes
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Summary
Based on the popular board game of the same name, Mille Bornes is a fun card-based racing game that’s perfect for the entire family. Featuring a unique card-based, snake-and-ladder-styled gameplay, you’ll need to do what you can to race towards the finish line while using hazards to force them to slow down or to stop them from moving at all. There are plenty of exciting tiles on the map that you can land on which may grant you an advantage over your competitors or penalize you instead. Best yet, the game is completely kid-safe. Sounds like a game you’ll like? Well, do read on!
Gameplay
Mille Bornes is a really interesting digital board game that combines the best of the traditional Snakes-and-Ladders and infuse it with the sort of competitiveness which is the hallmark of the game UNO. The objective in any Mille Bornes game is simple – be the first to reach the finish line and win the game. However, how you’d get there is an entirely different, and can be pretty messy, affair.
To start playing, you simply need to choose a map, customize your avatar and input your name. You can also add more players to the game, be it human players (no multiplayer mode so you’ll need to play with the people around you by passing the mobile device around) or AI bots. You can even choose one of the 2 card backs to use. Once done, you can dive right in. However, if you have not played this actual board game before, you might want to try the tutorial first. It doesn’t really explain things in detail but through the first map and the second map, you’ll gradually learn things as you go along.
Now, you’ll start a game with 7 cards. In Mille Bornes, there are several different types of cards, namely movement, hazards, remedy and safety. Movement cards are the basic cards you’ll need to move your car. It comes in various distances and these distances show how far you can move on the board.
Hazard cards, on the other hand, are a lot more interesting. Like movement cards, they come in many forms, but the most important thing you should know about them is that they will cripple your movement, either by forcing you to slow down (such as the Speed Limit card) or completely stopping your car (for example, No Fuel). Thankfully, each hazard card has its own counter-card – the Remedy card. So, if you were hit with a Flat Tire card, using a Spare Tire remedy card will be able to fix the problem and get you moving in the next round.
What if you don’t have the counter card? Well, you generally won’t be able to move until you do, except in the case of the Speed Limit where you can still move as long as you keep below the speed limit. You will instead be forced to discard one card from your hand just so you can draw a card for that turn. The chances of drawing a card you need is pretty high though since there aren’t a lot of cards in the game, so don’t worry.
However, if you are really unpopular among you competitors (especially if you’re leading the race), you can in fact be hit by multiple Hazard cards making it really tough for you to fix all of the Hazards. Your car will effectively be grounded for quite some time.
Lastly, the safety cards. These cards, such as Emergency Services, are incredibly rare in the deck and if you happen to get it, you’ll basically be protected from the majority (or all) of the Hazards other players can throw at you. All that’s left for you to worry about is getting enough movement cards to move your car.
In terms of variety, the game does lack maps. Aside from the tutorial and the starter map, you will get 1 free map with the game and another one only after you’ve signed up. These 2 maps are very different from the first 2 maps, mainly because the maps aren’t as “barren” – they are occasional special tiles which will give you some extra advantage such as an extra move or let you go through a shortcut. There are even random event tiles that will grant you either an advantage (Double Moves or Heavy Rain that will stop everyone from moving for a turn) or penalty which will force you to return to your original position.
The maps are quite fun and all, but having only 2 maps on a digital game as opposed to a physical board game seems to be a bit too few, especially for a paid game. It might be best if the developers add in more maps on an at least a monthly basis. The transition from tutorial to your first game can be sometimes confusing too since you’ll see some cards that you aren’t familiar with such as Flock of Sheep, and hence, you may not know what that card does. It would be nice to have a tooltip that players can tap into to read what each card does.
I really like that at the end of the game, you’ll get to see an overall statistic of the game, such as how far each player has managed to reach along with all the achievements gained. Some achievements are easier to get than others and as such, they are graded in terms of quality, ranging from bronze to gold. Getting achievements doesn’t really give you anything special though, it’s more of a collection thing.
As interesting as all of these sound, they aren’t the cherry on top! In fact, the most interesting aspect about Mille Borne’s gameplay is the strategic part where you have to predict what cards your competitors may have and decide whether to use your turn to deal a Hazard card on your competitor or use a Movement card on your own car. Some players may even purposefully slow down their movement on the board just to avoid getting hit by any Hazards and use a 200-distance card to quickly overtake everyone else and reach the finish line first. Of course, there are many more different playing strategies that I’m sure you can come up with, and you may be surprised how sneaky the AI in this game can be.
Community
As Mille Bornes is not a multiplayer game, it doesn’t exactly have any online community to speak of. However, if you enjoy the game, know that you can play the game with other friends in real life (and not online). It’s a pity though – the game does seem to have the perfect gameplay for a multiplayer mode.
Graphics/ Sound
The cartoonish graphics in this game is amazingly appealing to both adults and children, making it a suitable family that you can play while on the go. The catchy little background tune helps to enhance the overall atmosphere of the game as well.
Conclusion
As with its physical board game, this digital version of Mille Bornes is trying to carve out a new and unique niche for itself in the mobile market and I daresay, it is definitely the best card racing game out there despite the lack of content (maps, avatars, etc). The gameplay is very easy to grasp and yet has that human and luck factors which made the game so unpredictable and entertaining even after hours of playing the same game.
However, be warned that this is a game with a gameplay that may make you as unpopular among your friends and your family, especially if they are the competitive sort, as with the game, UNO.
Mille Bornes Blog
New Game Added: Mille Bornes
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