Duelosaur Island is Pandasaurus Games’ Dinosaur Island for two. It moves from being a worker-placement game to a hand-management game but retains the fun of creating your very own dinosaur-packed theme park where thrills are balanced against your main attractions gobbling up your customers.
You’ll be using randomly rolled DNA to build dinosaurs and cash to build attractions like food, merchandise, and rides. Dinosaurs increase both the danger and excitement of your park. Food grants you extra income while merchandise allows you to draw more park cards. Each park card has a dinosaur on it and an attraction.
The player who rolls the DNA dice puts five of the six dice next to a bonus (the last gets no bonus) and lays out two specialist cards. Then the other player gets the first pick of any of the dice or specialists placed by the first player. Specialists can be added to your park for ongoing bonuses, or burned for an immediate effect. Each player can only have three specialists active in their park. You can use your DNA to build dinosaurs or sell it for additional cash. Finally, you’ll spend cash to increase your park’s security.
Players will only pick seven of the dice and specialists set up; any dice not picked up add to the danger level of all parks. If your threat level exceeds your security, some of your visitors get eaten by your dinos. If all of your visitors get gobbled up, you earn a lawsuit (worth -5 victory points at the end of the game). When one player has reached a pre-determined number of visitors, you’ll add up all your victory points, which are equal to all your current visitors plus additional bonuses provided by cards in play, plus an addition four victory points for each complete set of the three different attraction types.
Duelosaur Island can be a more intense game than the original Dinosaur Island, as you’d expect from a two-person, head-to-head game. Each item in the game gives you multiple options; do you use your cards to create dinosaurs, build attractions, or swap around your DNA? Do you use your DNA to build dinos or raise cash? Do you use your cash to create attractions for ongoing bonuses or increase your park’s security? Do you use the specialist cards for ongoing bonuses or short-term boosts? Every stage gives you interesting choices to make, and seeing the strategy of your opponent creates more interesting choices. Do you seek to secure the DNA they want for their dinos? Do you sabotage their riskier strategy by forcing up the dangers?
The game can take up to an hour to play, though you can tailor how long the game lasts. If you’re a fan of the first Dinosaur Island and want a more head-to-head experience, or you’ll looking for a new two-player game to experience with that someone special, talk to the good folks at your local Dragon’s Lair Comics and Fantasy® today about Duelosaur Island.
