#208 MB - SPACE CRUSADE (1990)

This game was designed by Stephen Baker in 1990, and published by MB with Games Workshop’s figures. One year earlier, the same team had developed HeroQuest, and the game was so successful, that they simply redid the whole game with a few changes, for example the usage and range of weapons. The new game was re-themed in a futuristic spaceship were men fight against robots, cyborgs and aliens, instead of dungeons filled with monsters.

This second game is rarer to find, I think it simply had to share the market with HeroQuest that at the point was better known, and already had some expansions, and shortly before, a very similar game (both in type and theme) named “Space Hulk” had also been released. Personally, I don’t know which one do I like the most, they are both great.

As you can see from the pictures, the game is 100% complete, with all cards, accessories and tiles, and it looks amazing. The board is divided in four parts with cardboard walls, and this is probably the weakest point of the game, these walls sometimes move or fall down, when moving the figures or the table, despite of the plastic parts that fit them together and to the board. The game can be played by 2 to 4 players, one of which is always the “evil forces”, and the other three, Space Marine Squads.

The three men squads are “Blood Angels” (red), “Ultramarines” (blue) and “Imperial Fists” (yellow), although all of them are really the same. These names do not sound good in most European languages, so they were changed to more neutral names, for example in German, the teams are: “GSG-Musketeers”, “GSG-19” and “GSG-Tiger” while in Spanish, they’re simply “Red Detachment”, “Blue”, and “Yellow Detachment”. The teams are formed by 5 men/marines each, one of them is the commander (depicted in the picture in the middle).

Let's check the figures, one by one. First, the Space Marine Squads and their weapons (interchageable). As said before, the commanders are different figures. The main differences are in the head of the figure, and some details in the armour. All figures are carrying a removable backpack.

"Imperial Fists" Space Marines Squad

"Blood Angels" Space Marines Squad

"Ultramarines" Space Marines Squads

These are the commanders of the squads.

The evil forces are a mixture of robots, aliens and other creatures maybe another weak point of the game is that some of these miniature figures do not “suit” very much in a spaceship, but in a dungeon. The game is so clearly a “modified” HeroQuest, that the creatures are very similar to the Skeletons, Orks, Chaos-Warriors and so on, just take a look yourself and compare them with the pictures in this entry. 

CHAOS ANDROIDS, similar to HeroQuest's Skeletons.

GRETCHINGS, similar to HeroQuest's Goblins

GRETCHINGS (detail)

SPACE ORCS, similar to HeroQuest's Orcs

SPACE ORCS (detail)

Please note that, although all Gretchings and Space Orcs look the same, there’re slight differences in the weapons they’re carrying.

CHAOS COMMANDER (front) with CHAOS MARINES (back), similar to heroquest's Chaos Warriors, but here, they're a squad, just like Space Marines Squad (1 leader + 4 marines)

CHAOS COMMANDER (front) with CHAOS MARINES (back) (detail)

 

GENESTEALERS - Great concept, and great sculpt

DREADNOUGHT, the most dangerous enemy, also an amazing figure

DREADNOUGHT back

In HeroQuest, players had to note down in paper the strength and the wisdom of their characters, as well as the items found during the game. In Star Crusade, each team has one of these "control panels". The "buttons" shown in the squad pictures (lower right corner) are used with this panel. The rank badges and medals (showr later) also have place here.

Control Panels

As in HeroQuest, we need doors. When one of the "heroes" opens a door, the master of the game places the monsters that are in that room, and they can then play their turn too.

Different types of doors, gates, hatches.

All the other elements of the game: cards, tiles, markers, are beautifully illustrated, the artwork for the box and cards is really amazing. Note that most cards are different! Even the rule and mission books include some great artwork inside.

Complete set of cards for the yellow squad

...And these are the back of the cards in the previous picture

The cards for all three squads are almost exactly the same 12. Each team has "exclusive" equipment.

These are the "alien events". Open the picture in a new window (or d/l it) to see the artwork more in detail.

The figures in the pictures are unpainted, but in the box, we can take a look (below this lines) at how do they figures should look like after their designers… I have also seem pictures of painted figures (painted by people who know what they’re doing), and they’re amazing! I won’t paint them, because I am quite sure I wouldn’t do it well.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: SPACE CRUSADE
• Alternate Names: STARQUEST (German, Italian), CRUZADA ESTELAR (Spanish) CRUSADE: DET AFGØRENDE MØDE (Danish), Σταυροφορία στο Διάστημα (Greek)
• Year: 1989
• Company: Milton Bradley (MB) (U.S.A.)

#163 HERO QUEST – WIZARDS OF MORCAR (1993)

This article pretends to be a short update to my most successful entry to-date. Surprisingly for me, the article I wrote about Hero Quest is the most visited in the (short) history of this blog. Several weeks ago, I found Wizards of Morcar in a flea Market, and bought it, unfortunately without the box.

In that article, I already talked about some of the expansions that were released in the early 90s. This one was the last expansion released only in Europe, what makes it a complete rarity, and very difficult to find (as you can notice from this image, also shown in the first Hero Quest article).

Unlike this one, mine is the german version, not so expensive as the English version

The Wizards of Morcar expansion comprises two great new modules for the game.

The first one is already known from the “Hero Quest – Master Edition”, and is the 12 Henchmen figures with interchangeable weapons, which help the heroes in their quests (plus the cards to play with them).

The second one is the four magicians of the title, which are evil and have to be defeated. Each wizard has his own spells cards and characteristics, but all of them are evil and have to be defeated. The new card plates are also related to the magicians, like different types of blockades, mist or crevice.

The base game rules turn quite complicate when playing with such an expansion, and not to mention, if this expansion is combined with some more… this game is really only for experts.

The instructions and adventure book comes again with great artwork. Sorry for the pictures of the magicians, I should have taken a different background colour.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: HERO QUEST WIZARDS OF MORCAR
• Alternate Names: MORCARS MAGIER (German), DE MAGIËRS VAN MORCAR (Dutch), LOS HECHICEROS DE MORCAR (Spanish), LES SORCIERS DE MORCAR (French)
• Year: 1993
• Company: Milton Bradley (MB) (U.S.A.)
• Size: I do not own the original package

#83 MB – HERO QUEST + EXPANSION SETS (1989)

Hero Quest was at the time the most complex board game ever. Profiting from the fashion of the role-playing games (many of which are set in this ancient age of Warriors, Dwarfs, Elfs and Wizards), MB launched a game together with Games Workshop (a figure manufacturer, worldwide famous for series like Warhammer 2000), which was partially inspired on those.

The four heroes...

...and their abilities.
Also in this pic, the block to keep control of the events happening during the game.

Each player takes the identity of one character, and controls him the whole time, fighting evil creatures and looking for secret doors and corridors. All 4 characters were different in strength and intelligence, and had specific abilities. 

There is a story behind each adventure, which is narrated by the Gamemaster, who, at the same time, controls the evil forces and sets the dungeons as the heroes go by.

Adventure and rule books, plus master edition's adventure number 13 "The Black Guard" (keep reading)

The difference to real role-playing games, is that the action is limited to the board, and not to your imagination, and the second difference is that your characters have simple and fixed values that you cannot change, so you cannot “design” your character.

I remember when it came out in Spain, and the commercial shown on tv, which was amazing. At the time, it was mandatory that toy commercials showed a label indicating if the toy was over 5.000 or over 10.000 pesetar (30 or 60 Euros), and this toy was over 5.000 pesetas, that in 1990 was extremely expensive! (game was edited in Spain one year later).

Nowadays, it’s even more expensive: collectors and players worldwide search the old games to play again with their children, or people who sold their games want to recover it, because it is so much fun. It has become a boardgame classic, and since there seems to be problems with the copyright of the name “HeroQuest”, it doesn’t seem probable that the game will be released again.

These are the monsters included on the basis game, plus the cards for the gamemaster to control them.

A complete set of cards in included in the box, to make the game more exciting. Otherwise it would just be a dice game. The cards above are magic spells, the other ones are Book, Armour and Treasure cards. Gold is used to buy equipment; sometimes heroes find gold or weapons in the rooms they are exploring.

There was a second version released with 12 extra miniatures and 1 new adventure (huge one!) named “Master Edition” or “Advanced Quest”. In these pictures you can see the cover and the additional figures.

Master Edition Box: So amazing looks the game

These are the extra-figures in the "Advanced Quest Version", there are 12 of them, with interchangeable weapons. I photographed four of them, each one with a different weapon, plus a 5th one unarmed.

And these are their abilities.

This is the 13th adventure, only for experts!

After the great success of the basis game, numerous expansions were released. I own two of them:

-“Return of the Witch Lord", a expansion that doesn't include any new figure, but 8 skeletons, 4 zombies and 4 mummys, apart from a few tiles and some new features, like the twisting room.

Contents of the expansion: "Return of the Witch Lord"

Back cover illustration of the adventure book included in the expansion "Return of the Witch Lord"

-“Against the Ogre Horde” includes 7 new figures, and new playing possibilities, since the Ogres can be enemies, or can be hired as unpredictable mercenaries. It was only released in Europe, what makes it a complete rarity, and also very expensive.

Contents of the expansion: "Against the Ogre Horde"

Close-up of the 4 different types of ogres included in the expansion

These expansions, and all the other that I do not own, are extremely valued by collectors, who pay over 100 Euros for each of those packs (some are so rare, that can go up to 200 or 300 Euros). Maybe it’s because of the miniatures, that were made exclusively for the game, or maybe it’s just they are really scarce.

If you want to read more about Morcars Magicians, click here.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: HERO QUEST, HERO QUEST ADVANCED QUEST, RETURN OF THE WITCH LORD, AGAINST THE OGRE HORDE
• Year: 1989, 1990, 1991, 1993
• Company: Milton Bradley (MB) (U.S.A.)
• Size: approx. 51 x 32 cm or 20 x 12,50 inches (basis game box)