Who Goes There?

While we do spotlight many different RPG and comic Kickstarters on Tessera Guild, we don’t tend to focus too much on board games. Mostly that’s because (at least for me), I don’t end up buying very many board games through the platform. However, last year I saw a game that intrigued me to the point that I had to contribute:

Who Goes There?

If you’ve seen John Carpenter’s The Thing or the original The Thing From Another World then you should know that the story originated from John W. Campbell, Jr.’s novella: Who Goes There? The novella sets the stage of researchers in Antartica who come upon an alien creature who has the ability to consume and replace those it comes in contact with. Paranoia runs rampant. And the big question is who do you trust?

 

That’s what the game is focused on as well. That idea of having a game begin to capture whether or not you can trust the other players or if perhaps you are the only human still alive. I watched some of the play videos where players were having to make game decisions based on whether one person or another could be trusted or not.

And for the first time since it arrived, I was able to break it out for a few friends.

While I don’t want to get into a full play by play of the game itself, the breakdown is that each character has different strengths and weaknesses. McCready is better at surviving the cold. Kinner (the cook) is able to subsist on snacks as opposed to full cans of food. Others might have a dog companion or be able to heal injuries sustained in the game. Throughout your turns, you are gaining items (cards) to build weapons and other supplies to help you survive.

And through it all, you have to be on the watch for The Thing. Up until the first person has to draw from the “Vulnerable” card pile, everyone is human and can be trusted. But as soon as that first Vulnerable card is drawn, you no longer are able to know if that person might be infected or not. It takes the game from a cooperative love fest to a game where you might just be on your own until the end game – where you have to board a helicopter and hope you haven’t allowed any infected to go with you back to humanity!

On this first go through, we actually didn’t get to play a full game (ran out of time and had a prior engagement). However, even playing about 1/2 a game, we could all see the potential for certain strategies and how we might end up playing on a second time through.

In addition, we couldn’t help but talk about the inspiration for the game. Which intrigued my wife (who hasn’t seen any of the versions). Which leads us to tonight. While we hand out candy, we will be watching Carpenter’s The Thing. I’m hoping that we haven’t built it up too much for my wife. Fingers crossed.

To learn more about the game Who Goes There? click here.

In addition, if you want to read the original novella, there is actually a Kickstarter for the original full-length novel that was trimmed down into the story we all know. You can find Frozen Hell here.

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John McGuire is the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. The Trade paperback collecting the first 4 issues is finally back from the printers! If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Want to read the first issue for free? Click here! Already read it and eager for more?

Click here to join John’s mailing list.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow EmpireBeyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

 

 

About John McGuire

Writer of comics and novels. In 2006 his first short story "The God That Failed" was published by Terminus Media in their debut comic Evolution Book 1. Since that time he has had stories published in Terminus Media's Evolution Book 2 and Evolution Special, Kenzer and Company's The Knights of the Dinner Table, and Four J Publishing's The Burner #3. Currently he is eagerly awaiting the digital publishing of his first creator-owned comic The Gilded Age #1 to be published online as well as his first novel The Dark That Follows later this year.
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