Doctor Who

The Game of Time and Space

Review by Matt Costello

Games Workshop
Released: 1980
Catalog No. 102102
Price: $16
Complexity: Beginner
Solitaire Suitability: Good

Doctor Who mania seems to be reaching its peak. From his quiet beginning on British TV, the time traveller with the long scarf has grown into a major merchandising phenomenon. In the United Kingdom the show has run for 21 years and PBS has been carrying the more recent episodes. There have been five Doctor Whos, a movie, magazines, comics, countless conventions, books, and yes, games. Doctor Who, the boardgame from Games Workshop, was an early entry in the Who sweepstakes, capitalizing on the hordes of fans who apparently fill the English countryside, FASA Corporation's imminent release of Doctor Who, the roleplaying game, will give every admirer of the good doctor a chance to play at being a Time Lord.

And just who is, er, Who? A renegade Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey, Doctor Who has rejected his people's doctrine of non-interference. instead, he travels through space and time interfering in everything from murder mysteries to robot invasions. He is over 700 years old and has regenerated his body five times. In the Doctor Who game, each player is an incarnation of Doctor Who, past, present, or to come. The Domain of the Time Lords is threatened by invaders and Doctor Who must seek out the six parts to the Key of Chronos, an extremely powerful defensive weapon. The winner of the game is the first Who to return to Gallifrey with the Key

The components are attractive but not exciting. There are 76 Alien Tokens that represent a list of baddies ranging from the Anti-Matter Monster to Kleptons. Need I point out that Kleptons will relieve you of a Key part, should you have one. There are also 76 item Tokens depicting blasters, laser screens, bio-suits, and a variety of other handy gadgets. The 36 Mission Tokens are used for each player to select his six Key parts. The 95 Key counters, most of them blank, are what Doctor Who searches for.

The mapboard is a large grid with 60 squares depicting planets that Doctor Who can visit. Each player also receives an Alien and Item File to discover the special abilities of whatever he stumbles across. And stumbling is what this game is all about. Doctor Who seems to meander through the grid looking for his six parts among the blanks, fighting aliens, and picking up Items. In short, the game lacks fun, flavor, and interest.

There are three activities to a game turn. Move (Doctor Who can move up to two grid spaces), search (look to see if an alien is guarding a space), and fight (if you want to examine a guarded Item or Key part). That's it! And though the winner is the first Who to get a Key of Chronos back to the Domain of the Time Lords, there's little real competition in the game.

The only area of interest is the Doctor Who Alien and Item File that describes the various powers of weapons, defenses, and Items, as well as each alien's unique combat ability. They are all interesting, and if the basic game design was intriguing, they'd be fun to play with.

As it is, the game is much too random. There's no sense of goal or purpose other than blundering around and fighting until a player gets the proper six key pieces. Apparently the game was designed to appeal to Whophiles who aren't necessarily game players, but I doubt anyone could play this game with much relish. There's just too little to do. There's very little decision making involved, save what weapons to carry, and ther6 no room for strategy.

Doctor Who is not a new game. In the years since its release, Games Workshop has produced a number of fine games. Talisman, for example, is a brilliant, easy-to-play fantasy boardgame. Even a Doctor Who outsider can see a lost opportunity Perhaps Games Work-shop could lift a page from the Doctor himself and try to generate another, different boarclgame based on the Time Lords adventures. It couldn't help but be better.

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