What is Casting Shadows, and what type of game is it?

Casting Shadows is a game built of seven different hex tiles. The different hex tiles act as the battleground for you and your fellow players. You are given an enchanted and magical creature. Spend magical resources to build up your spell book to attack and defend yourself. You also gain resources called “Shadow Fragments” to evolve your creature to its final form. Once, you evolve your creature you gain a fellow companion and gain another special ability to terrorize your enemies with.

Casting Shadows is a competitive and strategic board game with an aspect of resource management. Balancing spells and counter spells so that you can both defend and attack at a moment’s notice.

How does Casting Shadows differ from other board games?

I can’t think of many other games like Casting Shadows. It’s different in the way that you feel like you’re playing as this animal character, and you have to navigate around the map to try and strategically acquire spells. The only other game I can think of that’s similar to Casting Shadows is a game called King Of Tokyo. Here is a link to the latest Amazon prices in case you’re interested in checking it out. King Of Tokyo Link (Honestly another great game that has similar aspects)

General Information
Play Time: 30-60 Mins
Publisher: Unstable Games
My Recommended Age Group: Age 12+
Player Count: 2-4 Players
Difficulty 1-10: 5

Can you give me an overview of the gameplay mechanics of Casting Shadows?

In the original game, you play as one of four magical animal characters. Each character has special abilities you can use once in your final shadow form. You have six actions to choose from and only four action moves can be made to go around the map collecting spells and counter spells to help you defeat your fellow magical animal enemies. You have a limited number of spells you can hold in your spell book. Which makes you have to pick and choose wisely.

What is the objective of Casting Shadows? How do you win the game?

The objective of casting shadows is to be the last player alive. Everyone’s gunning for each other. The only way to win is to collect spells and attack your foes. 

Are there different modes of play or variations within Casting Shadows? 

I went looking online for some player-made variants, and and I could not come up with anything. It looked like some people tweaked the rules for their own set of personal rules, but other than that I didn’t see any other variants.

Can you describe the theme and setting of Casting Shadows?

The theme and setting are all based in a fantasy world, where each character has their own hex, which is their own personal type of region. The region ranges from the desert to wasteland to underground mushroom caves. The art style for each hex is very cool and personalized for each character and that’s something I personally really enjoy.

How many players can participate in a typical game of Casting Shadows?

Typically the game is only played with 2 to 4 players. Most of my gameplay experience of casting shadows has been between 2-players. But the game still flows really well with only two people in my opinion.

What components are included in the Casting Shadows game box?

The game box comes with: a Rules Booklet, Hex Tiles Pamphlet, Hex Tiles, Character Boards, Main Spell Cards, Counter Spell Cards, Companion Cards, and Meeples for each character.

Is Casting Shadows suitable for players of all ages, or is it geared towards a specific audience?

I think the game is suitable for most ages. But specifically the ages between 14 and 25. I feel like a 14-year-old would be able to get the concept of the game and be able to enjoy it and I feel like it’s also just generally geared toward younger adults. Obviously, others can probably enjoy it and this isn’t an exact science but you get what I mean.

Casting Shadows Expansion

The next expansion is called “The Ice Storm Expansion.” This Casting Shadows expansion introduces 2 new playable Characters and 3 new Hex tiles, allowing you to play with up to 6 players on an expanded map. With this expansion, you can Freeze and Stun your enemies to limit their movement and Resource Pools.

Includes:

• 34 cards
• 3 Hex tiles
• 10 Status tokens
• 2 double-sided Player Boards
• 2 Meeples
• 1 Hex tile Reference Sheet
• 1 rule book.

Here is a link to Amazon for the latest price on “Ice Storm Expansion” in case you’re interested.

What kind of strategy is involved in playing Casting Shadows? Are there different tactics to employ?

Of course, with a competitive and strategic game like Casting Shadows, there are tons of different tactics to try and create and choose from. One of my personal strategies is to always make sure I have at least two counter spells in my spell books at all times. Another one of my personal tactics is also to try and get the third tier of spell cards as soon as possible. They do a crazy amount of damage and compare really well with your evolved special ability.

How long does a typical game of Casting Shadows last?

A typical game of casting channels lasts between 30 and 60 minutes. Based on the games that I played, this is pretty accurate.

What has been the reception of Casting Shadows among players and critics?

On Kickstarter, it raised $4 million and was backed by around 37,000 fans. When the game was released and had been out for a while, a lot of gaming websites were ranking, casting shadows at around a 6.5 out of 10. Personally, I like the game. I like how they did the spells, and I like how the characters and the hex tiles are all set up. The artwork is clean, appealing, and interesting to look at. I do think that after playing the game for a little while I would probably want new characters to try out. If I was only playing this game with two players, I’d probably get bored of it faster. Overall, I think the 6.5 out of 10 rating that most websites give it is a very fair evaluation of the game.

Can you share any memorable moments or experiences you’ve had while playing Casting Shadows?

So recently, me and my wife have been playing this game a lot. We were trying to go through all the characters and see what kind of spells they have in the game. We got down to the end of the game and we were both really low on health. I foolishly jumped the gun and thought I had the win, so I left the safety of my hex tile to try to attack her without realizing that the tile that she was on negated all the damage I was about to deal to her. After realizing my mistake, it was already too late. It was now her turn, and she hit me with the final spell to defeat me and win the game.

Are there any tips or advice you would give to someone interested in trying Casting Shadows for the first time?

Generally, the obvious advice is to enjoy yourself. Don’t take the game too seriously and try to have fun and try to help others have fun. Casting Shadows, is a board game that seems to me to be a mixture of keeping things light and enchanting while adding a bad-ass, competitive side to the game. For some people, this is going to be exactly the kind of board game that they’ve been waiting for.

My Wife’s 2 Cents

Hello everyone! My husband wanted to start adding my own part to his blogs since I am the one he typically plays all these games with. So my “2 cents” as he puts it, is this is a really fun game, that I enjoy playing because of the artwork and the competitiveness of it.

I am a big animal lover, so getting to play a cute magical creature makes me really happy. Not to mention the companion that you get is also an animal and they usually have some really neat actions and artwork as well.

The last thing I will say is that the only downfall I can see of this game is if you play it a lot you may get bored of it because of using the same characters, spells, companions, counter spells, and hex tiles over and over again. I’m hoping they will continue to make more expansions for this game because it really is overall a good game.

MORE GAMES THAT I RECOMMEND

Game	Price	My Review	Why It Made My Current Top 3 (Changes Regularly)
CATAN	Check On Amazon	Here	Great game for brainstorming and fun. I have literally passed out laughing from this game. I even wrote about it in my review of the game. Go check it out!
FIRE TOWER	Check On Amazon	Here	Clean, simple, and fun. I love the way the game was designed around such an obscure topic. Such a unique game that will make you want to have everyone play with you.
KA-BLAB	Check On Amazon	Here	Great game for brain storming and fun. I have literally passed out laughing from this game. I even wrote about it in my review of the game. Go check it out!

Thanks for taking the time to look over my review. I hope that it brought you some kind of value. God Bless.