We're Doomed Review

July 24, 2019 at 2:24am
By Jason Stettner

Well, things aren’t looking good. It’s the end of the world, and time is extremely limited. You’re a group of world leaders that have gathered to decide who exactly gets to leave, and if any of you actually get to. This is We’re Doomed, a game where everything feels grim and the stakes are definitely higher than usual. One element of this experience that I really loved was the set time, there’s a sense of panic and not everyone at your table may fully understand that.

You get a really great looking sand based hourglass timer, and it’s a hard time for your match. One aspect that is annoying, is waiting for the sand to fully even out. Somewhat funny, but during setup it should be ready, just make sure you handle that first. This is a simple game, it’s about betting and handling resources. There are a finite amount of tokens against a strict time. You’ll need to contribute to the main project, while also getting enough influence. The game is broken into turns, where players pick their initial type of government and then choose which policy from that card they’d like to enact.

You’ll get options such as generating resources, gaining influence or even nuking players out of the game entirely. It’s ruthless, as are the event cards that come into play. It’s tough to get things built, especially when people are battling against one another. It’s certainly a great option for larger groups, perhaps rather tense for the smaller parties. Not to say it can’t be done, but folks do not cooperate well and that can most certainly lead to doom for all that are involved in the world’s leader group. We’re all generally selfish, that’s for sure.

The Board/Pieces
I really love the look of this board game, it’s a bright orange with a brown complementing color. That theme is carried throughout the design, and that sand hourglass is wonderful. The tokens are straight forward, there’s not a whole lot to this, yet it’s still complex in how things go.

It’s not hard to understand, and I really enjoyed their video instructions. We typically read things out in my group, but found the instructions humorous and a good way to get everyone going in a hastened fashion. There are nice pouches for either the influence, or resource tokens and a nice event pack. The government type cards are clean, and the whole thing has a really neat artistic style to it that I definitely enjoyed.

It looks clean, is easy to understand and features some neat debate type situations as everyone tries to get out alive. It can be hard to get those resources, and the events certainly don’t aim to make it a cake walk for your survival group of scrambling world leaders.

The Conclusion

We're Doomed is a really interesting game that takes debate, and patience to survive in. It provides a uniquely colored outer packaging, and a really clean interior. I was impressed by this and had a lot of fun playing. It has a set play time which is nice, and it doesn’t stray from its core focus.

This keeps the action going, as does the time limit since it’s always shifting away slowly. It can be hard to make it out alive in this, and that really depends on how well mannered your group of players are. You could get nuked out at any point, and this really does feel like it’s meant to be played multiple times in a row. That’s fine, as it’s a good time to get in there and try to actually get things going. It’s easy to see those resources dwindle, even harder to build them back up afterwards.

Unless you’re a friendly group, I find it highly unlikely that too many folks will be granted a seat and a safe passage of this doomed rock that we find ourselves stuck on. Will you be doomed? Suppose that depends on your table, and the influence you gain while battling it out with others to survive.

We're Doomed Review
Review Sample Provided by Breaking Games

Rating Overall: 7.8