Burncycle promises an action-packed robot Ocean’s 11, but at times it feels like drudgery
The quiet hum of servers and whirring of sentry drones is broken by the clicking actuators of your robotic team of infiltrators. Through a maze of corridors and corporate offices, you will avoid detection and break into rooms seeking access to the company’s secure operations in order to shut them down.
This is Burncycle, the newest release from publisher Chip Theory Games, a small studio known for their sophisticated designs and chunky components that include signature plastic chips and miles of neoprene mats. It’s a fully co-operative experience that has up to four players working together in a complex, stealth-based, tactical game.
Polygon had the chance to preview the game ahead of this year’s Gen Con in Indianapolis and, much like Chip Theory’s previous title, Cloudspire, we found an elaborate game with a massive scope. The various scenarios will have you traversing one to three floors, each analogous to a small dungeon in breadth. This can be quite the commitment, as the longest of options take three or four hours to fully complete. There are, of course, shorter missions, but even these provide a cerebral challenge of juggling multiple sub-systems and processes.
Internalizing the ruleset will take several plays and a strong shot of devotion. Players take turns performing actions which are restrained by the eponymous burncycle. This is a series of chips on a sideboard that you will draw from a bag and manipulate over the course of the game. Each represents an action, with certain chips enhancing specific action types such as terminal or move. This approach heavily influences the tactical approach you construct each round, and how you tackle the obstacles on your current floor of the building you’re trying to
Read more on polygon.com
