Peel away the thematic elements and the excellent storytelling and what you're left with is, simply put, a semi-cooperative worker placement game. If you've been burned on other worker placements, though (I'm looking at you, Agricola!) don't hit the back button just yet! Dead of Winter somehow manages to take two things that I'm sick to death of--worker placement and zombies--and combine them into a game that is one of the top ten in my board game circulation.
Here's why the game works so well:
1) It's semi-cooperative--emphasis on "semi." One problem with fully cooperative games like Pandemic is that it's really easy to have one player quarterback the entire game while the rest of the table sits back and waits for the (usually unelected) team captain to tell them what to do. It takes a lot of the fun out of it if, when it finally gets to your turn, you go to perform a certain action only to be told, "NO! That's wrong. Don't do that." In Dead of Winter, everyone *might* be on the same team, but there's the possibility of a traitor. So people will often bite their tongues and watch what their alleged allies do so they can identify the traitor. BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE! In addition to having one possible traitor, everyone in the group also has a secret objective. That's critical. If you've played other hidden-traitor games, you know that it's often easy to sleuth out the traitor. Just watch for the person who is making questionable choices. But if your table has to get four fuel resource cards or else face dire consequences, and one of you also has a hidden objective to end the game with three fuel cards in-hand, you might make suspicious decisions even though you're ultimately still on the good-guy team. It's unreal how well this mechanic helps mask the actual traitor!
2) Exile is not game over. Speaking of traitors, it's really nice that, in this game, you can still play if you're found out. In fact, you'll trade in your initial secret objective for a new one, so your enemy players can't try to play keepaway using what they already know about you! The gameplay shifts when the traitor is exiled, and it's really fun.
3) Crossroads cards are so fun! It took some getting used to, but these things do SUCH a great job of creating an immersive gaming experience. In addition, there are about a gazillion of them, and a lot of the time you won't end up activating the ones that you encounter during your playthrough, so we're still experiencing new crossroads after literally months of play
4) The worker placement mechanic is actually enjoyable. Maybe it's the excitement of the RNG. Maybe it's the individual character abilities. Maybe it's just the cooperative element--for whatever reason, I love the gameplay of this game, where I've hated it in other games.
All of those combine into a magical bundle of replayability and family fun. This game is an absolute blast to play and no two ever seem to shake out the exact same. I won't quite call it a universal must-have, because there are some downsides, but it definitely earns its place on our shelves.
Downsides:
1) Open the box for the first time and your eyeballs will be assaulted with over a dozen teensy ziplocs, which bodes ill. Setup can easily take 25 minutes your first few times, and then you're still left to rummage through baggies every turn for the various pieces that you didn't take out. This is a game that benefits enormously from an insert. Amazon sells one by Broken Token. Broken Token Box Organizer for Dead of Winter. I am cheap, so I looked up the Order of Gamers insert plans on Google and made one out of foam core. Took about 1.5 hours. Worth every second/penny.
2) It's intimidating for newbie gamers. This isn't the game to play with your mom who "sort of enjoyed Settlers of Catan that one time." This is the game for you and your core game group. The insert helps lower the sheer terror factor when we bust this out for first-timers, but there's no way around it: there are a ton of rules and components, and it's going to take a while to get the hang of it. I don't think it's a particularly difficult game to grasp, but it's a mental psych-out factor that's hard to overcome. Don't buy this as a gift to get your loved one hooked on board games.
That's about as exhaustive as I can give you while leaving everything unspoiled for your gaming pleasure. Please leave a comment if you have questions!
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This item: Dead of Winter - Post-Apocalyptic Survival Strategy Board Game for 2-5 Players Ages 13+, by Plaid Hat Games
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Product information
| Product Dimensions | 2.8 x 11.6 x 11.6 inches |
|---|---|
| Item Weight | 4.1 pounds |
| Country of Origin | China |
| ASIN | B00HFKITJC |
| Item model number | PH1000 |
| Manufacturer recommended age | 12 - 15 years |
| Best Sellers Rank | #99,206 in Toys & Games (See Top 100 in Toys & Games) #2,697 in Board Games (Toys & Games) |
| Customer Reviews |
4.7 out of 5 stars |
| Is Discontinued By Manufacturer | No |
| Release date | July 30, 2014 |
| Language | English |
| Manufacturer | Asmodee |
Warranty & Support
Manufacturer’s warranty can be requested from customer service. Click here to make a request to customer service.
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From the manufacturer
Dead of Winter: A Crossroads Game, the first game in this series, puts players in a small, weakened colony of survivors in a world where most of humanity is either dead or diseased, flesh-craving monsters.
Dead of Winter is a meta-cooperative psychological survival game. This means players are working together toward one common victory condition - but for each individual player to achieve victory, he must also complete his personal secret objective.
This secret objective could relate to a psychological tic that's fairly harmless to most others in the colony, a dangerous obsession that could put the main objective at risk, a desire for sabotage of the main mission, or (worst of all) vengeance against the colony!
Dead of Winter is an experience that can be accomplished only through the medium of tabletop games. It's a story-centric game about surviving through a harsh winter in an apocalyptic world.
Each player leads a faction of survivors with dozens of different characters in the game.
Certain games could end with all players winning, some winning and some losing, or all players losing. Work toward the group's goal, but don't get walked all over by a loudmouth who's looking out only for his own interests!
The survivors are all dealing with their own psychological imperatives, but must still find a way to work together to fight off outside threats, resolve crises, find food and supplies, and keep up the colony's morale.
Dead of Winter has players making frequent, difficult, heavily- thematic, wildly-varying decisions that often have them deciding between what is best for the colony and what is best for themselves.
Dead of Winter: A Crossroads Game
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Dead of Winter: The Long Night Expansion
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Dead of Winter: Warring Colonies Expansion
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Mice & Mystics
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Forgotten Waters
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Gen7: A Crossroads Game
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| Customer Reviews |
2,277
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744
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| Price | $53.67 | $49.99 | — no data | $63.99 | $59.99 | $18.99 |
| Type of Game | Board Game | Board Game | Board Game | Board Game | Board Game | Board Game |
| Number of Players | 2 to 5 Players | 2 to 5 Players | 2 to 5 Players | 2 to 4 Players | 3 to 7 Players | 2 to 4 Players |
| Average Playtime | 1 to 2 Hours | 1 to 2 Hours | 1 to 2 Hours | 90 Minutes | 3 Hours | 90 Minutes |
| Recommended Player Age | 13+ | 13+ | 13+ | 7+ | 14+ | 14+ |
| Game Objectives | Survive the harsh winter in an apocalyptic world. | Fight off bandits from another colony, build improvements to your colony and unravel the mysteries of the new Raxxon Pharmaceutical location. | Prepare for an all-out war between surviving colonies. | Mouse heroes work together to save an imperiled kingdom. | Pirates sailing together on a ship attempt to further their own personal stories as well as a common goal. | Solve a mystery and build an exciting narrative with your friends. |
| Number of Characters | 30 | 20 | 15 | 6 | 7 | 5 |
| Strategy Game | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Cooperative Game | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Hidden Roles | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | no data | no data | no data |
| Expansion(s) Available | ✓ | is an expansion | is an expansion | ✓ | no data | ✓ |
Videos
Page 1 of 1Start OverPage 1 of 1
This game is awesome!
Pro * Video rules online * Random events * Different objectives * Good story * Good Re-Play Cons * Not enough zombie standees * Lots of things to remember * Setup and cleanup I hate zombies, I am not a zombie fan, in fact, I am sick of the whole zombie craze. THIS GAME IS FREAKING AWESOME! Wow, where do I begin with this game. Things you need to do in the game: - Worry about your secret objective - Find the person that is the betrayer (if there is one) - Deal with the Crisis each round (bad things happen if you don't) - Deal with the trash building up - Deal with the main objective - Deal with the Crossroad Card if it gets played - Deal with feeding all the helpless survivors - Deal with moveing and rolling the exposure die - Deal with the zombies Like I said, there is a lot in the game, and it really keeps you on your toes. I've played with 1, 2, 3, and 4 player games of this, and it is fun with all of them. I like 2 and 3 players better, mainly because it seems easier, it may not be, just seemed like it. Many of the main objectives and most of the Crisis cards say something to the effect of needing say food cards for every non exiled player x2. So if you have 4 players, and nobody has been exiled yet, you need 8 food cards, but you also need food to feed your people. If you only play with 2 people, then you need 4. The exposure die SUCKS! Every time you move unless your character says otherwise, or you use a card, you need to roll for exposure. This can be anything from nothing happens, to getting a wound (3 kills you), getting frostbite (1 wound each round), or getting bit. Getting bit kills you, if you moved to a location where there are other survivors, one of them is infected, and you can either kill them, or roll the die. If you roll the die, and get anything other than nothing, they die, and another survivor gets infected. Every time someone dies you loose a morale, if morale goes down to 0, you loose. If you are good at keeping track of things, and can deal with the pressure, and anxiety, this is an awesome game! If you are thinking of getting this game, get Dead of Winter: The Long Night instead, it is just as good, better in some ways, but worse in others. Still a better copy to get.
Top reviews from the United States
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- Reviewed in the United States on November 30, 2015
- Reviewed in the United States on January 14, 2025
- Reviewed in the United States on November 17, 2014
Top reviews from other countries
- GiffGathReviewed in the United Kingdom on September 20, 2016
An immersive, well polished game, well worth the price!
GAMEPLAYGiffGathAn immersive, well polished game, well worth the price!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 20, 2016
This game involves you controlling a group of survivors in a post-apocalyptic zombie wasteland in the harshest of winters, hunting for supplies and killing the undead (and sometimes each other) in a fight to survive. You are housed in a makeshift colony and spend each turn either going to one of six locations (Garage, Police Station, Hospital, School, Grocery Store, Library) to look for items, or staying put, fighting the endless hordes of zombies that come your way wanting to ruin your home. Doing this is often a fine balance; players have to send the survivors they control out to look for enough supplies to meet the food requirements of the colony but can't do this too often as they also have to make sure they kill enough zombies every turn; if a location receives more zombies than there are places for it becomes "overrun", meaning it can no longer be accessed and anyone there at the time instantly dies. And if this wasn't hard enough, players also have to deal with "crises", which are certain themed events which require players to stockpile a stated number of a certain resource (tools, medicine or possibly additional food) in that round or otherwise face a cruel punishment which can be as severe as two survivors dying! Whilst doing this, players have to work together to complete a common goal (such as "collect 20 zombie samples" or "survive 10 rounds") as well as their own secret objective (such as "all your survivors must have one item equipped"). However this is not as straight forward as you may first think, as there is a small chance there is a traitor in your midst, which has a secret objective that the common goal must fail... They must go about this subtly though as to avoid getting "evicted" from the colony, forcing their survivors to be confined to the six other locations and fend for themselves...
REVIEW
I only played this game a couple of times before I wanted to buy it for myself: It's so much fun due to its in-depth gameplay mechanics: As there are so many decisions you have to make every turn, often quite difficult ones, it makes it quite challenging and fun, unlike some board games which follow a very linear decision process every time. This tied in with it's immersive design, with all the items following the zombie/post apocalyptic theme along with loads of narrative listed on the cards (a prime example being the crossroad cards, which are cards read out to each player before their turn, which poses you with a difficult decision with unknown consequences based on a short zombie/apostolic setting/scenario), gives the game a lot of character and your decisions more meaning. The game is also very well balanced; there are dozens of items and characters and combinations of the two to play with, and yet none seems ridiculously overpowered. Furthermore, players which may appear to be losing and have a lot of bad luck go their way can actually still do really well: Just the other day I had someone who was down to their last survivor and last bit of health, only to reveal that they had completed their secret objective regardless, whereas the rest of us with three survivors each and much better items had not! This makes such a refreshing change as some other complex games I've played, where if you don't get off to a good start it's very hard to get going, making it feel like you've lost the game before it's even begun. Due to the fact that you can have a different objectives, both common and secret every game you play (with the objectives being quite varied in nature, from killing certain amounts of zombies, to collecting items of a certain type and so on) the game has a lot of re-playability: I've played several games now and each has been rather different! Admittedly the game is more expensive than most, but it is well worth it. Not only are you getting an awful awful lot of cards, tokens and items for the price (see photos attached) but the game in general is of very high quality. None of the pieces feel flimsy or like they're going to break, with all the cards and tokens being made out of thick durable card: You even get given several plastic resealable bags to sort everything into! My only downside to this game is it can be quite confusing at first, especially to newcomers who haven't played this sort of game before. Having said this however, there is a very informative (albeit long) rule book, and even a video tutorial on the makers website for you to look at if you get stuck along the way. And believe me, taking the time to learn this game is most definitely worth it: Would highly recommend!
Pros:
# High amounts of re-playability.
# Well polished, balanced and thought out gameplay mechanics.
# No items or characters are ridiculously overpowered.
# High quality board, characters and cards.
Cons:
# Quite complex for beginners
# Can be slightly on the long side, especially if you have several players playing.
Images in this review
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ToadReviewed in France on November 3, 2016
Yes it's a zombie game, but it's great! / Oui, encore un jeu de zombie, mais il est génial !
