About game:

Love Letter is a game of risk, deduction, and luck for 2–4 players. Your goal is to get your love letter into Princess Annette’s hands while deflecting the letters from competing suitors. Seems trivial? Maybe from the topic perspective, but definitely not mechanically. From a deck with only sixteen cards, each player starts with only one card in hand; one card is removed from play. On a turn, you draw one card, and play one card, trying to expose others and knock them from the game. Powerful cards lead to early gains, but make you a target. Rely on weaker cards for too long, however, and your letter may be tossed into the fire!

This is game number 4 in the Tempest: Shared World Game Series. Tempest is a world that is home to a series of games that share themes, characters, and more. The City-State of Tempest is a lively metropolis—some say the largest in the world—yet behind the city’s cultured exterior, age-old cabals vie for power, fighting one another for dominance in a society ripe with political and economic turmoil. Led by shadowy figures who command a small cadre of loyal followers, these secret societies work in concert to seize the wealth and power of the fabled City-State of Tempest.

Would you stand-up to the task and convince princess you are the best suitor?

Number of players:

The game is designed for from 2 up to 4 players, but definitely is best played with 3 or 4. The amount of interactions, bluffs and way to surprise opponents grows in such case enormously.

Playing time:

A very-short filler – you should finish in 30 minutes. When playing couple of first games that can be longer – especially with 4 players – but other than that this will be most probably add-on to the boardgame evening rather than the main dish. Of course, if you do not succumb to the “one more game please” syndrome…

Complexity:

The game is not complex at all – after couple of sessions you will know all the base-game cards by heart. However, to master it and be able to outwit your opponents will definitely take more time.

What I like:
  • Exciting – yes, the game-play can get really interesting and the level of interaction is very high. You will be witness to tons of laughter but also unbelievable feats / situation changes as well as some curses for bad luck too!
  • Quick – as already wrote, one session should not take more than 30 minutes, with each successive game even shorter. A great game to play between larger titles but also suitable for travels.
  • Thematic – well, I might not be too much into the topic of seducing the princes 🙂 but the way game is produced, components and rules really make you feel you are part of the court!
What I do not like or would like to see in the game:
  • Sometimes can be too much luck-dependent. One dimension is of course card-drawing. Another is guessing the cards values. But if you approach it with appropriately you may find it as a game advantage.
  • Limited replayability – with the base game, after 10-15 sessions you would feel need to enrich the set of cards. This is fortunately possible, because there are many add-ons plus extended edition (with full, second deck of cards).
For whom?

Without hesitation I can say this is a good position for everybody who would like to enrich his/her boardgames collection with fast-paced, interesting and exciting short card game. 

More about the game:

And now let us have a look at the components and pictures from the game:

The game box
All cards from base game version

VERDICT:

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I was planning to write about that title for some time, as I really deem this a good card game – despite what might seem an uninteresting theme. But with the Valentine’s Day what a better review one could create than this of Love Letter!

Enjoy the game! See you in another game review!