Pyramid of Pengqueen First Impressions

Pyramid of Pengqueen gives you Penguins, Mummys, Magnets and tension behind a dividing wall…

Also, a satisfying ‘Click’ when a Penguin is caught!

Pyramid of Pengqueen is a game with asymmetrical goals. While one player as the Mummy tries to catch tomb raiders, the other players try to secure as many treasures as possible from the Pyramid.

This is a brief overview of the rules of Pyramid of Pengqueen followed by my final thoughts.

Pyramid of Pengqueen Summary

Brain games manage to make these cute, ‘kids’ games that are great for adults to play.

Ice Cool is a dexterity game and everyone likes those. getting that perfect flick is always satisfying and catching a Penguin is a lot of fun.

King Frog is a phenomenal game of racing Frogs which looks exactly like a kid’s game should look, but adults LOVE it. It’s fun, simple and EVIL.

Reef Route is very much a kid’s game but I was forced (and of course I wasn’t FORCED but was happy to play again) to play this 3 times back to back when I first brought it to a game day. It’s a basic roll-and-move game enjoyed by all the players who were all at least 30 years old. Again, fun, simple and evil.

Pyramid of Pengqueen falls into that category. Sure people will always probably prefer Letters from Whitechapel or Fury of Dracula for hidden movement, but not me!

Production & Mechanisms

The production values are great. The way the board is set up and the way it all folds back together is very clever. The penguins themselves are a little on the tiny side and I’m sure there is a magnetic reason for that.

The dice mechanism is good. Reroll all the dice you like. But lock too many dice and the Mummy will get a nice bonus move.

The balance the Penguins have is pushing for Artifacts to win the game. of course, that’s their main goal. But if they give the Mummy too much to go on that they get easy captures. The Penguins WANT to get there first, but without just handing the win to the Mummy player.

A tense and fun kids’ game that’s not a kids’ game at all. (But it is :))

Jesta ThaRogue

Note: The copy I played was a review copy generously provided by Brain Games, big thanks to them for this game.