Gloom: Unhappy Homes

by Atlas

Product Features

• This is an expansion for Gloom - you need that game in order to use the expansion
• Adds depth and complexity
• Lots of replay value

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 3.8 x 2.5 x 0.8 inches ; 4 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B000I87LUQ
• Item model number: AG1252
• Manufacturer recommended age: 12 - 15 years
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #14,741 in Toys & Games (See Top 100 in Toys & Games)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)

Product Description

From the Manufacturer

In the Gloom card game, you make your eccentric family of misfits suffer the greatest tragedies possible before helping them pass on to the well-deserved respite of death. Just mix the 55 transparent cards included in this set together with your copy of Gloom to add morbid new Modifiers, Events, and Untimely Deaths, and a new family -- the artistes of Le Canard Noir, whose creative endeavors always end in disaster. When art lets you down, the Black Duck is there for you. This dingy cafe is home to a motley assortment of washed-up bohemians. Here the tormented painter Rosseau buys drinks for neurotic models and destitute poets, while a troubled actress and sickly courtesan compare notes across the way. Also included are five Residences with a light blue background behind their central illustration. These are each placed next to their related family at the start of the game. New cards called Mysteries, which have a dark blue effects bar at the bottom, are also shuffled into the deck before play. A Mystery is the only card that can be placed on a Residence (and only a Residence), and can be placed on any Residence as either of your two plays. It gives that Residence's player a special effect and Pathos points that count toward his final Family Value. A Mystery remains even if the requirements for playing it are lost. You may discard a Mystery from your hand as a free play.

Product Description

In the Gloom card game, you make your eccentric family of misfits suffer the greatest tragedies possible before helping them pass on to the well-deserved respite of death. Just mix the 55 transparent cards included in this set together with your copy of Gloom to add morbid new Modifiers, Events, and Untimely Deaths, and a new family -- the artistes of Le Canard Noir, whose creative endeavors always end in disaster. When art lets you down, the Black Duck is there for you. This dingy cafe is home to a motley assortment of washed-up bohemians. Here the tormented painter Rosseau buys drinks for neurotic models and destitute poets, while a troubled actress and sickly courtesan compare notes across the way. Also included are five Residences with a light blue background behind their central illustration. These are each placed next to their related family at the start of the game. New cards called Mysteries, which have a dark blue effects bar at the bottom, are also shuffled into the deck before play. A Mystery is the only card that can be placed on a Residence (and only a Residence), and can be placed on any Residence as either of your two plays. It gives that Residence's player a special effect and Pathos points that count toward his final Family Value. A Mystery remains even if the requirements for playing it are lost. You may discard a Mystery from your hand as a free play.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Residences bad, new modifiers good, December 5, 2009

By 

Kyle Felker "Technologist, reader" (Lexington, VA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Durability:3.0 out of 5 stars  = Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars  = Educational:2.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Gloom: Unhappy Homes (Toy)

Gloom is fantastic, but this expansion is only so-so. The idea of residences is interesting, but in rules terms, they're simply family members who can't die, which makes them a lot less dynamic than the other cards. The mystery cards that you are supposed to play on them often require three icons and a laundry list of other conditions in order to get them into play, so that we often found them impossible to place. Nine times out of ten, we simply discarded mystery cards to get cards that were more useful and easier to place. The benefits mysteries offered were often out of proportion to the difficulty in placing them. Many have benefits that are all but useless or require that you fulfill another laundry list of conditions to take advantage of. As a result, we found residences often had almost no effect on play.

Still, residences and mysteries are the smallest part of the expansion. The rest of the cards are new modifiers, events, and untimely deaths that add welcome variety to the game. The expansion is well worth it, but not because of the residence mechanic.

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars gloom rocks, January 21, 2011

By 

C. Donelson - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Durability:3.0 out of 5 stars  = Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars  = Educational:3.0 out of 5 stars 

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Gloom: Unhappy Homes (Toy)

Gloom is an amazing game. Very good for a intellectual activity with that certain special nerdy girl you may like. Great also for groups of gamers for a nice relaxing party atmosphere card game. It requires a bit of imagination to really appreciate it. If you have a brain and a quirky sense of humor and you like games. Get Gloom!

0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Need more of these kinds of expansions!, June 9, 2008

By 

Deven M. Niles "Midian" (Coralville, IA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Durability:2.0 out of 5 stars  = Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars  = Educational:3.0 out of 5 stars 

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Gloom: Unhappy Homes (Toy)

I bought Gloom as a pass-time while not in scenes when playing LARP (I played a Giovanni PC). Unhappy Homes for sure was a wonderful find and I was disappointed to find out that there are no other expansion packs (sniffle). On the other hand tools have been made available via the producers home page to create custom cards! NOTE, unless you know of a way to produce the cards like the manufacturer...plan on only getting a nice digital representation of the card you create. Hopefully there'll someday be a service that will produce the cards for us. Nonetheless, don't think - just buy this expansion set; your deck will be incomplete without it.