Nature of the Beast, from Eye-Level Entertainment: Unchained and Lovable.

Nature of the Beast, from Eye-Level Entertainment: Unchained and Lovable.

Mike Eaton, Play Unplugged

Nature of the Beast from Eye-Level Entertainment lets you play out the touching story, among 2 or more players, of animals turf-warring for dominance. It’s a deckbuilding game, playable out of the box or through collecting multiple boxed sets, and the various decks have different themes and styles to keep the animals in all of us entertained.

What marks each deck — each card — and the manual, right down to the animals’ personality blurbs — is the amount of love Eye-Level has put into the game. Stylish and glossy, the different types of cards have a wonderful handmade quality. Text boxes and icon areas match up from card to card, but if the precision is the only thing that seems computer-enhanced. Every bit of the game, from the box through the booklet, bears the wit and narrative voice of the creators. Learning to play the game was as much of a pleasure as playing it — and that’s just what a new game needs to get players interested. Kudos to Eye-Level for understanding the audience! I feel loved.

We played one of two possible deck options, the City vs. Suburb deck (MSRP $17.95), using its out-of-the-box setup. On one side, we had the aggressive, combat-heavy City animals, paired with the Resourceful strategy deck; on the other, the more calculating Suburban animals, with their complementary Tricky deck. Each player has his or her own playing field, which amounts to an imaginary 4 x 4 grid. The animals inhabit up to 9 of these squares, taking over space on the field as their movements let them, with filling all nine as your goal. There are several variants of play, including a combined-field model with a supply line theme, offered for advanced players who would like to get more variety out of the game. The fact that Eye-Level playtested so many different scenarios increases the playability for the foreseeable future — and getting more games in one box can never be bad.

The way the animals interact with one another is very fun, if you’ve always liked the idea of animals scheming together in cartoons and movies (or in everyday life); there are Leader archetypes for each deck (ex: “The Propogandist”; “The Schemer”), and there are Legend creatures, of whom you can have only one per deck. (Two of the legends in the Suburbs are Arco and Rex, two dogs that complement each-other’s powers. They must have been loyal companions; the game is dedicated to them.) Animals have various scores that represent their power, their craftiness, and their ability to recruit other animals, among other things. One good leader can recruit enough animals to take over the yard, as long as it can hold its own against the enemy and its human helper cards. There are also locations you can play into the grid, and these also affect animal interaction. If your animals cause too much trouble in the streets, humans can shut down your show for good — so keep a low profile!

The creativity and wit extends beyond the art, and into the Troop and Trick cards. One of my favorite troops is the Abandoned Kitten. It can latch onto another animal, where it can use its Clout (recruitment ability), added onto that animal, but is free from any real danger. Because she’s SO CUTE, why wouldn’t you want to join her team? A favorite Trick card is the human helper Taxi Driver. You can use him once per turn to move one of your animals to any unoccupied space in your field, regardless of movement restrictions. The art on both cards is hand-drawn, full of detail, full-color and perfect. The flavor is impeccable. As in most of the game’s cards, Eye-Level did everything right.

If you’ve ever played the Magic: the Gathering card game, some concepts will be easy to pick up. I don’t mean to say they’re that similar, but it’s kind of like comparing checkers and Chinese checkers — if you know how to do things in one, you can apply them to the other. For example: To use cards in this game, you can “tilt” them, which is a more literal version of “tapping” in Magic. The Tricks deck functions like playing spells, and there are restrictions on when cards can be played; some can only be played on your turn (like Magic’s sorceries), and some can only be played on your opponent’s turn, or at any time. The defensive and offensive card strategy is a little like combat trick timing in Magic, and it will help to be experienced with luring your opponent into doing something, only to pull out a Trick card and change the game.

The rules took me a while to figure out — I took the booklet with me to work and read it on my break two days in a row, and kept it beside me at all times during the game. I definitely learned as I played, and the several different cards, actions, piles and grids take a while to get used to. As an example: The rulebook tells you of a 3×3 grid for the animals, but from an illustration, you can see that you will need to expand that to incorporate your new animals, your humans, and your Trash pile. This is all kind of implicit. There is a glossary of terms in the back in case you get lost, and the battle and gameplay examples they provide were very helpful in understanding the applications of the rules — in fact, I’m not sure I would have figured it out correctly if not for the examples (but that’s why they’re provided). The gameplay isn’t complex once you work out all the details, but the learning curve for the game was steeper than I expected from an out-of-the-box game. I would suggest playing a few times, not worrying whether you got everything right at first; if an action doesn’t seem to make sense, look over the rulebook again, and you’ll probably figure out how it works, and everything will click.

In one example, we got confused at first, playing some location cards on our opponents’ turns because they featured the Opposite Turn symbol and were in the Tricks deck. However, these cards were only meant to be played as one of the main turn actions, with their abilities usable otherwise. Combinations of timing like this were probably the hardest thing to get right on the first try — but like I said, it seemed weird, and then we looked up locations again to clarify. I want to stress that all of the rules are properly exhibited by Eye-Level at various stages in the manual, but there’s a lot to comprehend before you start playing.

The Breakdown

Positives
+Bursts with flavor, character, and creativity
+Customizable; you can mix-and-match any of the eight possible decks (4 Troops, 4 Tricks)
+Provides lots of strategy options and choices for harnessing your own play style
+Pace of the game depends on what you put into it; options for aggressive and timid play styles alike among all the cards

Negatives
- Clarity is sometimes sacrificed for flavor in the rulebook, creating a mid-level learning curve
- You only need one box two play, but you will need to purchase both if you want all the options
- Pre-made decks are tweaked to certain play styles; some players might not find some decks as fun until they are able to customize their own, by adding more product

Eye-Level Entertainment’s Nature of the Beast simulates anthropomorphic, lovable, deadly animal warfare, where humans are either pawns or unwanted interlopers. If you thought Charlotte’s Web was what life should be like, or Watership Down moved you to tears, you’ll love the flavor of this game, and you might want to play all four decks at once. If you just happen to like strategic card games, Nature of the Beast gives you a wealth of unique character abilities and combat combinations to set up your best-laid plans (though this game features both mice and men; I’d watch my step). Perhaps the best part is that it’s well worth the price; if you play it as often as I think you will, that $17.95 will come out to about a penny per day.