Enormity: Honest & Precise Prototype Review. AT:O meets Event Horizon, and we love it.
“Enormity” – A Dark Dungeon Crawler Filled with Intense Atmosphere
“Enormity” is a cooperative board game that transports players to the gigantic spaceship Shepherd, where the fight for survival combines with exploration, crafting, and intense boss battles. This is not your ordinary dungeon crawler – Enormity blends elements of exploratory gameplay, tactical strategy, and a story full of suspense and mystery. The game draws inspiration both from the previous title Into the Unknown – Aeons Trespass, especially in terms of mechanics, and from genre classics like Alien and my personal favourite sci-fi horror, Event Horizon. It’s the dense, dark mood that constantly maintains a sense of danger and madness, drawing players in from the very first minutes.
Players take on the role of astronauts, known as Spacers, who explore the ship, searching for resources and uncovering dark secrets. The campaign offers gameplay reminiscent of Legacy games, meaning every decision impacts future sessions. This means we will discover new elements, locations, items, and storylines. Some elements, such as stickers, will be placed on specific pages of the book, representing parts of the ship. Notably, these stickers are reusable, meaning the game is not a one-time experience. None of the game’s elements are destroyed, allowing it to be played multiple times. The game enables both single sessions and a full campaign with nonlinear narration.
Inverted Combat Paradigm (ICP) – The Stronger You Are, the Closer You Get to Death
One of the most distinctive features of Enormity is the ICP mechanic, which adds a unique dynamism to combat. Instead of gradually weakening characters through damage and stress, players become stronger as the situation becomes more tense and dangerous.
Each character uses three stats: adrenaline, health, and stress. Most actions we take involve raising the character’s adrenaline – for example, when attacking enemies. Higher adrenaline means more bonuses, but it’s a double-edged sword – the higher the adrenaline, the closer we get to a heart attack. Stress is spent on rerolling dice and in crises that can severely affect our character. If a character’s stress reaches its maximum, they may experience a nervous breakdown. Health is, of course, lost when we take damage.
Maintaining Tension and the Constant Rise of Monster Power
Intruders also grow stronger – their attacks become more destructive, and their abilities more deadly. In the case of bosses, escalation often leads to a phase change in combat, resulting in the discovery of new, devastating attacks. The strength of enemies increases with the length of the scenario. The longer we explore the ship, the stronger our enemies become. The goal for players is to skillfully balance between thorough exploration, mission objectives, and quickly reaching the extraction point, which will allow them to finish the mission. But be warned – reaching the extraction point is one thing, the second thing is surviving the extraction, as monsters will be crawling everywhere.
Hard Co-op
Enormity emphasizes strong cooperation, utilizing a unique Spacer Pool system. Players share resources in the form of three types of tokens:
- Discipline: Used to modify dice rolls and ensure successes.
- Confidence: Allows rerolling dice, increasing the chances of success in difficult situations.
- Expertise: The cost of performing special actions and reducing damage from attacks.
Tokens are collected in a shared pool and moved between two sections: active (available immediately) and incoming (available in the next round). Managing this pool requires strategic thinking and group coordination. Tokens added by one player will only be available to the next player, making the planning of actions and deciding which character activates first crucial. Fortunately, players have full control over the order in which characters activate.
Metroidvania in Board Game Form
The game takes place on the dynamic map of the Shepherd ship, which functions as a massively interconnected labyrinth. All maps are in the books, so instead of setting up a board, you simply open the appropriate page, and the map is ready for exploration. Additionally, it is on these pages where we place stickers representing new locations that unlock passages to unexplored parts of the ship. If you’ve played games like Metroid or Blasphemous, you’ll recognize a similar atmosphere in Enormity. The game allows for the discovery of new ship sections, progressing through various areas with unique biomes and challenges. While exploring, heroes will face “blips” – moving points on their radar that reveal their monstrous forms when they get close. So even if on the map your crew is the only visible living thing, that doesn’t mean that alien monsters do not surround you.
Continuous Hero Development
Each Spacer is a combination of a character card and a unique spacesuit, which creates a personalized set of abilities. Characters have their special abilities and stats such as Intelligence, Dexterity, Strength, Willpower, and Perception. Spacesuits are equipped with unique abilities, a scouting flashlight, and additional equipment slots.
In addition to the spacesuit, characters have access to a range of weapons and gadgets that help during exploration. The spacesuits we find during gameplay will directly impact our character and the unfolding story. Throughout the game, heroes will not only fight monsters but also gather resources that will be used in the transition phase between scenarios, where they can enhance their characters, acquire new items, and develop their skills.
Simple Character Activation Mechanic
Each character receives a set of 6 cards, sleeved in 3 pairs so the players have 6 cards to choose from, but they will only play 3 of them. The cards describe all the available actions, forcing players to decide which actions to forego in each round. Action cards evolve during the game, especially those tied to the currently worn spacesuit. While the mechanic is simple, it provides great satisfaction and fun.
Ship Exploration and Boss Battles
Into the Unknown brought one of the best elements of Aeon Trespass to Enormity – boss battles. Each boss uses unique cards that create one-of-a-kind, thrilling encounters. To fight a boss, we prepare the appropriate arena, select the boss-specific cards, and face off against a powerful creature. If you’ve played Aeon Trespass, you’ll quickly feel at home in these battles – they are surprising, emotional, and utterly unique. And be ready to get equipment characteristics for specific bosses.
Continuous Noise Rolls
Almost everything we do in the game causes noise. This noise moves the “blips” on the map towards the player. While this mechanic is atmospheric and makes sense, the frequency of noise dice rolls can be a bit too much in longer games. We hope the authors modify this mechanic to reduce the frequency of these rolls.
Too Many Elements on the Table
The game requires playing with four characters. Each hero has a character card, spacesuit card, equipment, and a panel to track stats. Additionally, there are stacks of cards and activation instructions for enemies. There’s a lot of stuff, and the lack of a double-layered organisation tray for each hero makes it difficult to maintain order. Cards slide around, and elements can easily fall out of place. We hope this topic will be addressed during the campaign, but knowing Into the Unknown, we can count on it.
Verdict
Enormity promises to be an exceptional game. It offers a dark dungeon crawler with a deep atmosphere that keeps players on edge. The game balances mechanics with narrative perfectly, without overwhelming players with a wall of text. It combines challenging tactics with a brutal world full of dangers and monsters. Enormity is a title that will appeal to fans of deep, atmospheric games. Into the Unknown already showed us that they know how to make complex games with amazing stories by publishing Aeons Trespass. Let’s hope the same is going to happen with Enormity.
– David
Hype & Hopes: 9.5/10
