While on vacation, I listened to fellow travelers trading stories about amazing hikes they had done or were planning: fifteen miles in the Black Hills, backcountry hiking in Yellowstone. Stories like this always excite me, and my heart says, ‘I want to do that!’ Then my knees, hips, and back remind me that they have been with me for <cough cough> sedentary years doing nothing more strenuous than turning book pages or moving a meeple. Fifteen-mile hike? Not happening.
The Peak Team lets you scratch that outdoor activity itch from the comfort of home. This game sends you hiking or climbing through the wilderness to document wildlife and complete missions. I can scale a mountain and rescue eagles while sipping hot chocolate. That’s my kind of fifteen-mile hike! So strap on your favorite (figurative) hiking boots and let’s see what The Peak Team is all about.
Soundtrack for this game – ‘Musical Trip through our National Parks’ from Your Classical website.
Gameplay Overview:
The objective and rules are simple. Complete all missions (a total of 22 per game, three to start and others assigned over six rounds) and document all animals. Missions are marked with a flag when it is assigned to the ranger/player. The mission is completed when the ranger meeple reaches their flag. Movement is controlled by supply cards with icons for the various modes of travel: hiking, paddling, driving, snowshoeing, or climbing. Supply cards also have animal icons. If you are in the correct environment, you can trade in the appropriate supply card to ‘document’ the animal. That’s it, those are all the rules.
In the cooperative version, you have a limited hand of cards given to you by the other players without communicating at the start of the round.
In the solo version, you are a Ranger Captain in charge of three rangers. Twelve supply cards are laid out in three rows of four, with the middle row face down. Only the bottom-most card of each column can be used. Face-down cards are revealed once the one below is used. Cards are replenished each round.
Despite the simple ruleset, this is not a simple game. New missions are added each round, and only two missions can be assigned to a single ranger at a time. If all missions aren’t assigned before the next round, they stay on the board and remain incomplete; you lose. If all animals aren’t documented, you lose.
The game has five levels total. Each level adds a challenge:
- Level 1 – complete all missions and document animals
- Level 2 – path blockages
- Level 3 – special missions and final mission
- Level 4 – additional special missions
- Level 5 – weather events limiting resources
Game Experience:
This is based on solo play only.
I thought it would be similar to PARKS, maybe with scenarios. It’s so much more. The nature theme is about all it shares with PARKS. It’s more strategic and requires a great deal more planning. You also have to balance the needs of three rangers while planning ahead for round goals and endgame goals.
I have only played this solo, and truthfully, I don’t know that I want to play it multiplayer. I am not certain that distributing supply cards without communicating adds anything substantive to the game. In solo, you have a limited set of cards to move three rangers, and it really feels like you are coordinating the efforts of a team. Every time I play this, I feel like I am in one of those movie scenes where the grizzled team leader is marking up a paper map while guzzling coffee and barking into a radio: ‘Joe, there are downed trees ahead, you’ll need to divert south a half click. Sandy, what’s your status on those beaver dams?’
I love games that add levels. Levels encourage you to learn the base mechanics, then throw in one or two complications at a time when you feel confident. Levels make it easy to select how complex a game you want at any given time.
Which brings me to my one real complaint with this game. Official solo rules have you setting up and playing with the rules for Levels 4 or 5. Which means solo players are thrown into the deep end. The rule book is structured by level and doesn’t repeat earlier rules. So you don’t know what you’re building off unless you read through all of them from the beginning. This is great when you are playing from Level 1, because it’s not dumping a lot of rules on you all at once. It’s rough if you’re starting at Level 4 because you are flipping through three previous levels just to set up. Also, it’s a pain when you are confirming a rule added in Level 2 while playing 4. There’s really nothing in the rules that requires any massive changes to the play structure as a soloist in Levels 1 through 3, so I just played them using the communal cards. Still awesome.
Final Thoughts:
Every time I play The Peak Team, I like it more than I did last time. Every time I reach the end of round 6 with incomplete missions or animals undocumented, I am convinced I can do better next time. I can start easy and work up to complicated, or I can skip right to the most challenging, depending on what kind of mood I am in. Everything in it feels like a natural part of the game, from the missions to the animal zones to the movement types. Definitely going to be a frequent play for me.
Final Score: 4 Stars – This game has the perfect amount of tension and theme-driven actions. You can feel like an outdoors champion without ever leaving your house.
Hits:
• Theme and integration
• Leveling – I love leveling
Misses:
• Official solo starts too complex
• Rules division by level can be a pain
