The Best of Champions of The Galaxy Review

I have been a fan of champions of the galaxy for a long time and for full disclosure, I received this as a review copy.

From the publisher (revised)

With Champions of the Galaxy, you have a chance to run your own wrestling federation of the future in the role of the main promoter and booker. Game action is fast and furious and moves in real-time. The game is easy to learn and play and still packs a real punch! It’s Star Wars meets WWE and you’ll love it!

The focus of Champions of the Galaxy is your imagination. There are hundreds of incredible sci-fi fighters the including humans, aliens, monsters, creatures of the night, vampires, female warriors…you name it! Each character and alien race is described in detail in-game handbooks.

How to play

You can find a full description here. But the basis of the game is pretty straight forward. You will select two characters (or a tag team) and you will use two 2-6 (1 for character each) You will roll the dice for offensive and defensive moves. The move will lead you to have the ability to perform better moves and eventualy lead to various endings for the match. There are several charts that will aid (or hinder you) in your quest for galactic wrestling domination.

The 50th Set?

Yes true believers the game started in 1986 and has been going strong since then. Filsinger games have tons of sets for this game (including actually wrestling leagues which you check out here) each set for champions of the galaxy has a built-in storyline for that year but you can combine any sets or characters you wish. I myself had an insanse draft once where I took the first 20 sets and pulled 50 random wrestlers out and started a league with them. The 50th anniversary set is a complete set with everything you need to play, but it also includes the movers and shakers, the wrestlers that are significant to the history of the league. That is also what this game comes with, history.

The time shift and fandom

They did a really interesting thing in this game. They made a brand new storyline (which I won't spoil here) to bring each wrestler from the various eras together and make this stand-alone edition. Another extra they added is rather than give you the current scnario for each wrestler this version gives you an overview of why they are included in the set.

There is something else in this collectors set that you never see in a game, a fan's perspective. There is a nice ode to Filsinger games from a longtime fan and that in a nutshell is what keeps the game going for all these years, The fans. Champions of the galaxy/legends of wrestling have some of the most fanatical fans I have ever seen in any board game community. The game matters to them and they matter to Tom and everyone that works for the company.

The takeaway

This game shines for me, but not in a standard way. The thing that makes this game great is the spaces in-between. Maybe you read comics or graphic novels, or at least maybe at one time you did. When I read them I don't just imagine the action on the pages, I think about the panels that are not there. Maybe you elaborated on the story a little. Maybe you did not buy the next issue and you thought "well this is what happened next". You literally get to do all that with this game. Do you want to make a league where only one guy is a heel and everyone is a face? Done. Do you want to have every match as a deathmatch and someone gets hurt every time someone wrestles? Done! You get to create your own storylines. You get to do everything. The matches don't always turn out how you think they will and you will have to adjust accordingly. There a dozens of fan made charts for all types of special matches, or just go ahead and make your own. It's a perfect blend of RPG and a dice game. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a tournament of champions to run.