Nige got hold of this while he was on holiday and, as none of the rest of us had played this latest incarnation of Heimlich & Co, we were keen to see whether it was much different. Not much is the answer but I didn’t feel it improved on the original. The game play is identical with the exception of players also holding action cards that they are free to play on any turn. These gave various effects but mainly involved moving pieces away from the squares they were occupying to other places, or moving the safe. You start off the game with 4 or 5 cards and can acquire additional cards by moving a playing piece onto the graveyard. Once the deck of cards is exhausted, cards already played are shuffled to form a new draw deck. This is all good in theory, but in my view moved an elegant 20 minute bluffing game to a more cumbersome 1 hour plus bluffing game, and at that length it outstayed its welcome. The reason for the extra time is that every time the safe was landed on, it was too easy to prevent a scoring by moving the piece off again or moving the safe. I believe it would have been much better if the action cards were not recycled, so limiting the opportunities to play them. But I feel that the original was great for what it was without the cards and these just act as padding.

Anyway, after many stalled scoring attempts, we eventually got a piece across the finishing line, Mark K’s piece, and with him correctly guessing all the player’s pieces, he extended his lead to win easily.