Primal: Legends Review by Jazz Paladin

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Quick Look: Primal: Legends

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Designers: Tommaso Mondadori, Alberto Parisi
Publisher: Reggie Games
Year Published: Coming in Q1 of 2027 (PRE-ORDER today, link at bottom of review)

Review:

Primal : Legends seems to be doing something that I generally don’t see a lot of ; namely, taking a core big-box board game and shrinking it down into the basic elements that made the original game successful while still trying to maintain the essence of the “Prime” experience.

As such , Primal: Legends is highly derivative of Primal : The Awakening in terms of familiarity and being set in the same game world.

Keep with me and bear in mind that I have virtually zero experience playing The Awakening, and as such have no basis for a direct comparison to Legends, but it does need to be said that I was already aware of The Awakening when agreeing to undertake a review of Legends. And while there were (and still are) some prospects of The Awakening that I found promising when coming across it in the past, I remember also having some concerns about it should I ever ponder getting a personal copy for my shelf.

I remember that one of the big conundrums facing me at the time was space : The Awakening does indeed seem to take up a lot of real estate, and also utilizes some minis that would unfortunately force me to break a promise to never, ever get minis again, because that inevitably means I will feel compelled to paint them. 

And consequently, one of the reasons I reached out to review Primal : Legends was that it resides in a very small box and utilizes just cards instead of minis.

 

 

What remains similar to the game engines, in my reading comes down to this :

—Both games are still cooperative fights against an ultimate boss

—Both systems are set in the same world, 

—Bot utilize cards (though perhaps in different manners)

 

My understanding is that the differences between Legends and The Awakening reside in streamlining the complexity in favor of portability. So some things may have ended up being trimmed down during the transition. As to exactly what was reduced or eliminated cannot be absolutely clear to me, but judging from pictorial comparisons, there may indeed be some elements “missing” after the transition.

 

But expecting everything defeats the purpose of slimming down. So this is where the trial of Primal : Legends begins.

Primal : Legends actually consists of not just one, but three separate (though interconnectable) games :

—Voice of the Earth

—Voice of the Storm

—Voice of the Flame

Each of these are completely standalone encounters that include both a unique hero and boss in their respective box, along with card sets for each, and tokens. That’s about as trim and slim as it gets folks, and just what it needs to be if solo gaming is your thing.

 

 

Each hero gets a deck of roughly 24 cards that will be randomly drawn each round and played in sequences to try to maximize (or even minimize) your attacks and defensive maneuvers. Card types include light and heavy attack cards (with unique modifiers per hero) as well as light and heavy defensive cards and abilities.

Enemy Bosses / Monsters include a fair portion of Stance, Behavior, Attrition cards that dictate the enemy AI’s health, attack patterns, and reactions to your behavior, all in an ever-changing and evolving field of play. 

You need to get through three or more various “stages” or stances of bosses, and taking down the enemy health bar will alter the way the enemy responds to you. If you hit an enemy too hard, it may trigger them, and likewise if you don’t utilize enough of the appropriate defensive actions, you may find that you are unable to withstand the force of their blows when it comes time for them to counterattack…

Play will essentially continue until either the player or monster is dead, and there can only be one survivor.

Lastly and worthy of note, you can also combine up to three of the Primal : Legends boxes (Earth, Storm, Flame) to have each player utilize each boxes’ respective Hero and take on one of the game bosses together for a fully cooperative experience.

 

 

The Review :

Okay, now that we have a summary of gameplay out of the way, here are our thoughts :

—Firstly, wow, the form factor for Primal Legend’s solo mode is one of the books. Having just got off of a cruise ship this summer, this would have been perfect to bring for what it manages to achieve. And let me phrase it this way, I DID in fact bring a much smaller boxed board game that is designed similarly for solo play fighting monsters this summer. But, the catch is , I had no desire to play it on the cruise. Despite being smaller, it also was more complicated, needlessly so for its size. The complexity was a deterrent for me. With Primal : Legends, it hits a sweet spot of being “just right” in this regard.

—Both a plus and minus. The game can also feel a bit like a traditional game of solitaire when played in solo mode. The strategies that you utilize can sometimes feel a bit “meta” in this regard, optimizing things in such a fashion that it can feel almost anti-climatic. While engaged in a thick, head-on battle, it can seem like you can have too much time to think and optimize what you do. But, on the plus side, there is strategy involved…

 

If you maintain the analogy, in solitaire one of the biggest challenges faced is when you decide to move cards from one column to another ; doing this at the wrong time can seal your fate into failure. In Primal : Legends, I honestly felt that this vibe carried over ; during a player’s turn, they must lay cards out in a sequence of up to 5 cards hoping to deal damage, defend, or trigger some other effect. The effects of these cards in and of themselves often are not often the main points to consider, but often the timing and order of which to play them (such as healing). If you make the wrong move at the wrong time, it will often come back to haunt you, and you can only blame yourself for the oversight…

—The themes work exceptionally well for each respective game pack. The Earth series focuses on a Boss that is highly resistant to physical attacks and has damage reduction, for example, while the Flame Boss, living up to the phoenix in likeness and abilities, can experience a form of “rebirth” through regeneration. This keeps things unique.

 

 

—Moreover, each respective hero also matches up nicely to the themes of the boxes. For example , living up to the “Earth” theme, the boxes’ respective hero can dig and delve through their discard pile, while the Flame hero may employ a form of Shamanic foresight to see into their future hand and alter it. 

—Components all of superlative quality. Especially nice are the foil layers on the Boss and Hero main cards, adding a nice bit of flair.

—The ability to play with three players and pile onto a Boss that scales in health appropriately with player count is a blast. The fact that there are some cards that can be situationally used to help other players during their turns is also a welcome addition.

—This is very easy to teach and learn, but nevertheless is not what I would call a shallow game (even though it is obvious where the game could benefit from more depth, more on this later). This keeps the game perfect for what I presume its intended purpose is, namely gaming on the go, trying to maintain the feel of the much larger “The Awakening” in a more modest fashion.

—I love the Boss ability to counterattack. The best part of this game’s puzzle is trying to mitigate damage while still managing to dish out enough.

 

 

Negatives : 

—It can be easy to overlook triggering conditions from Bosses sometimes. You may inadvertently give yourself an unfair advantage. Likewise, you may forget to apply extra damage to your foe that you neglected to account for!

—The difficulty will probably be easy after a bit. The Nightmare modes and above will likely be necessary to keep the feeling of pressure up after you get used to the game.

—It is fantastic that you can play this game in co-op mode. However, it can take up a large amount of space with 3 players.

 

 

—Now for probably the biggest downer…

Primal : Legends can leave you wanting more, especially in terms of customization and advancing a character over the course of a game. 

That is not to say you can’t “get stronger” in Primal : Legends ; you can via accruing a small in-game resource under certain conditions. While this is helpful, it just isn’t the same as in “larger” games, and nevertheless feels a tad shallow. 

So this inevitably begs the question, “What exactly is Primal : The Awakening like in comparison to Legends?”. For a newcomer to the series, it leaves me scratching my head wondering what the “Big Box” version of Primal is like, because I feel that they clearly are doing something right with Primal : Legends, even if it does feel scaled back.  I can only imagine that for players of the original “The Awakening”,  Primal : Legends is made to evoke the same feelings while on the go. 

Now, I am sure sacrifices have been required in this transition, and this is both desirable and understandable for the small medium the game occupies. It feels like it must be designed to satisfy a particular itch, but at this junction, I am not exactly sure as to how well it replicates the feel of the original…

But in summary…that is ok. 

 

 

Because Primal : Legend also stands out very well by itself. For what it does, it is probably the best game I have tried in my solo card-based games for being both streamlined and requisitely simple for traveling, while still allowing for both strategy and combat in the same medium. 

So not only does one get a good solo (or potentially 3 player) game but, unlike solitaire, they also get to use similar strategies to bash a monster. What more could you possibly ask for?

 

Keeping in mind that while I still wish the game could have more depth, I would still rate it a 9/10 just for hitting the nail straight on the head for portability.

High marks on this one!

Thanks to Reggie Games for allowing me the privilege of trying these three boxes out!