Spy Club (Foxtrot Games)

When I think of famous characters in children's literature, I think of such names as Nancy Drew, The Hardy Boys, The Bobbsey Twins, Encyclopedia Brown, The Boxcar Children, and The Baby-Sitters Club just to name a few. What do all these names have in common? They are all detectives. Yes, when you think about it, mystery series are a staple of children's literature (and adult literature too)! Drawing on this popular genre, Foxtrot Games developed the game Spy Club. Spy Club is a cooperative game for 2-4 players, ages 10+.  It takes approximately 45 minutes to play and retails for $45. In this game, you and your fellow detectives will work together to unlock the five clues necessary to solve the case. Let's learn how to play!

Setup
1. Situate the Board and Supply - Assemble the puzzle pieces to form the Central Board. Determine the difficulty level you want (standard or advanced), and flip the Central Board to that side. Place the Escape Marker on the bottom space of the escape track of the Central Board. Place all 18 Idea Tokens (light bulbs) within reach of all players.
2. Create the Movement Deck - Take the 25 Movement Cards and divide them into 3 stacks (daytime, sunset, and nighttime). Shuffle each stack and remove one card from each stack. Form a single deck in the proper order of daytime, sunset, and nighttime and place this deck in its spot on the Central Board.
3. Create the Clue Deck - Shuffle the 54 Clue Cards, making sure to cut and flip the cards to create a thorough shuffle. Place this deck in the card tray, and place the tray next to the Central Board. Then, deal out a number of clue cards to the right of the tray, based on the number of players. These are now known as incoming clues. Place a Placard over each incoming clue according to the table in the rule book.
4. Prepare the Player Areas - Give each player two puzzle pieces to form their Player Board. Randomly determine a starting player (I usually go with the youngest!), and deal one card from the top of the clue deck over each empty slot on the players' boards, starting with the first player. This forms a player's hand. Each player places one Focus Token (magnifying glass) on their Player Board below their rightmost card. Each player also receives one Idea Token.
5. Position the Suspect - Place the Suspect Pawn over the rightmost card of the starting player.
6. Select and Name Characters - Have each player select one of the eight Character Cards. Take a blank sticker, writing the name you created for your character on it, and affix it to the lower part of the Character Card.
7. Case 1 Only - Reveal cards 3 and 4 from the Campaign Deck and set them aside. You will flip them when the instructions on the card tell you to do so.

Game Play - The game is played over a series of player turns, until an end game condition is met. On a player's turn, they will perform the following three steps:
1. Use Actions - There are four actions you can take. You may perform up to three, including the same one multiple times.
a. Investigate - Flip any of your Clue Cards (one at a time) in any order. You decide after each flip, whether you want to keep flipping or not.
b. Shift Focus - Move your Focus Token to one of your other Clue Cards. Gain one Idea Token for each Clue Card that is the same aspect (color) of your new Focus Card.
c. Confirm - Move one Clue Card from your hand to the center row. (Note: Doing this will require you to spend Focus Tokens. )
d. Scout - Draw one Clue Card from the incoming clues. (Note: Doing this will require you to spend Idea Tokens.)
*Teamwork Bonus - You may also do bonus activities such as trading cards or taking Idea Tokens from other players.
2. Refill - Fill any empty slots in your hand. Then, fill any empty slots for the incoming clues.
3. Move the Suspect - Reveal the top card of the Movement Deck, and place it face-up on the movement discard track to the right of the previous card.
a. Advance the Escape Marker - If the revealed card has an escape icon, move the escape marker one space. If the marker reaches the "Escaped" space, the case ends immediately!
b. Move the Suspect Pawn - Determine what number on the previous card is connected to the suspect icon and move the Suspect Pawn that number of spaces. An event is then triggered depending on the color of card that the Suspect Pawn ends their movement on.

You will solve aspects of the case by having five cards of the same color in the center row. Of these five cards, the solution card is identified by the symbol in the center of the most recent Movement Card. The game will end in one of five ways with only one resulting in a win. The end game possibilities are : 1 Succeed by solving all five aspects of the case. 2. The Escape Marker reaches the "Escaped" space. 3. You do not have enough ideas to remove from the game when required to do so. 4. You do not have a movement card to draw at the end of player's turn. 5. You do not have enough incoming clues to fill all players' hands.

Note: There are campaign rules where you will be required to solve five cases to win. This adds a newer wrinkle in difficulty and creates a fun way to unlock new rules, change the way you play, add story that will carry forward from one case to the next, and create a wealth of replay value!

Review
Foxtrot Games isn't a publisher that cranks out 20 games a year. Instead, they take their time focusing on one to two games a year, and making those games excellent. This started with Relic Expedition, moved on to Lanterns, World's Fair 1893, Sundae Split, The Fox in the Forest, and has ultimately led us to Spy Club, arguably their best game to date. Each game is thoughtfully and meticulously crafted in terms of art and game play, making the games visually appealing on your table and welcoming for players of all experience levels. I don't just dole out this praise lightly either, as I own the majority of their catalog, it is well-deserved. However, let's focus primarily on Spy Club.

Spy Club on the surface is a box of colorful double-sided cards that you are trying to match into a five of a kind set in order to solve an aspect of a case. It sounds simple enough, but you are having to manage resources to make these matches happen and also going against a timer in the form of a deck of cards that is going to frustrate you to no end your first couple of plays until you and your group get used to the various actions and bonus actions you can take to match the cards and solve the case. If you master the art of a single game, you can play five separate games to make up a game, and this is where the game really shines.

The campaign mode of Spy Club elevates this game to an 11 out 10 ranking. Yes, you read that correctly. Starting with Case 2, you will unlock new content based on which aspect of Case 1 that you recorded. This will then instruct you which card (from two giant decks of cards) to reveal, read, and alter the way you play the game. I won't go into details how, but it added new challenges to an already great game. What I like best about the campaign mode is that it is not a legacy style format, meaning that nothing you do during the campaign will destroy any cards or components. Instead, it is called a "mosaic" game, meaning that rules and elements of each case will change each time you play. There are 40 different modules and each you only use 4 each game. That means, at a minimum, it will take you 10 games to discover all the modules. In reality, it will take you more as sometimes you will face the same module more than once. That's a lot of replay and value for $45!

This is my #1 family game of the year and a game that I believe belongs on everyone's shelves. There are a lot of cooperative games out there, but they generally fall into one of two camps - 1. Very childlike with no real depth or 2. Doom, gloom, and the end of the world. Spy Club breaks the mold by creating a light and captivating theme. Once you have finished a game, you are then encouraged to make a story out of the five aspects of the case to further immerse yourself in the experience. This help foster imagination in your younger players and gives you a satisfying end to a job well done. I can think of no family game currently that offers the depth and replay that this game does for this price. And while I have not been through every module in this game, I look forward to experiencing them all and hope that there will be an expansion down the line that adds even more modules for us to unlock. Can't recommend this game enough!