80 Tabletop Games, Ranked - #80: Secret Hitler
80. Secret Hitler
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/188834/secret-hitler
Genre/mechanics: Social deduction, hidden roles, team vs team
Rules complexity: 5/10
Game length: 25-45 minutes
Player count: 5-10
Experience: 10+ plays, from 6 to 10 players
First played: 2015
In Secret Hitler, you play as a legislator, and each round of the game, you elect a President with his Chancellor. But while the majority of legislators are liberal, some of the legislators are secretly fascist, and one of those fascists is Hitler. The President and Chancellor then enact one "policy" - liberal or fascist - before another leadership team is chosen. The game ends when a certain number of liberal or fascist policies is enacted.
Maybe in a vacuum I'd enjoy Secret Hitler - it has a lot of mechanics I really enjoy - but it's a knockoff of another game I absolutely love. Along with the retheming to the 'oh-so-edgy' Cards Against Humanity designers' sensibility, SH actually drastically worsens that game by diluting the deduction of it with a constantly short ticket, an inane rule about not repeating leaders, and a randomized policy deck that includes a rubber-banding mechanic. I won't pretend that I'm not extremely bitter about the changes - the template is already there, but SH then takes the mechanics and theme and tangibly worsens them.
Past enjoyment: My playgroup got a little played-out on SH's parent game, and I was at least somewhat interested, so we turned to this. Now in fairness, I've had some fun experiences with friends who are not as into social deduction games (where people try to figure out your hidden role), but I almost always wind up in situations where either the players don't grasp what it's like to play on the other team with asymmetric information, or they do (and in such a case I'd rather be playing the better game.) With strangers it has never gone well.
Game design: I find that the two-leader system can result in incredibly swingy games for liberals. On the other hand, the randomized deck punishes a team for getting ahead - pass too many liberal policies and that last liberal policy becomes that much harder to pass, even if you've identified the fascists. Additionally, in my experience, the chancellor has almost no agency about lying when passed a blue and red card from the president. It's a very clumsy sort of finger-pointing, which is what makes it somewhat more accessible to casual gamers - and also considerably less fun for me.
Next play: Sadly, SH is mind-numbingly popular. I'll probably wind up playing it again at a game night because someone will bring it and I showed up too late to get into a better game. I'm already feeling bad about myself.
Bonus question - What are your least favorite copies/re-skins of games? (Or any other form of media?)
Hint for #79 - A free-for-all of a ball
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/188834/secret-hitler
Genre/mechanics: Social deduction, hidden roles, team vs team
Rules complexity: 5/10
Game length: 25-45 minutes
Player count: 5-10
Experience: 10+ plays, from 6 to 10 players
First played: 2015
In Secret Hitler, you play as a legislator, and each round of the game, you elect a President with his Chancellor. But while the majority of legislators are liberal, some of the legislators are secretly fascist, and one of those fascists is Hitler. The President and Chancellor then enact one "policy" - liberal or fascist - before another leadership team is chosen. The game ends when a certain number of liberal or fascist policies is enacted.
Maybe in a vacuum I'd enjoy Secret Hitler - it has a lot of mechanics I really enjoy - but it's a knockoff of another game I absolutely love. Along with the retheming to the 'oh-so-edgy' Cards Against Humanity designers' sensibility, SH actually drastically worsens that game by diluting the deduction of it with a constantly short ticket, an inane rule about not repeating leaders, and a randomized policy deck that includes a rubber-banding mechanic. I won't pretend that I'm not extremely bitter about the changes - the template is already there, but SH then takes the mechanics and theme and tangibly worsens them.
Past enjoyment: My playgroup got a little played-out on SH's parent game, and I was at least somewhat interested, so we turned to this. Now in fairness, I've had some fun experiences with friends who are not as into social deduction games (where people try to figure out your hidden role), but I almost always wind up in situations where either the players don't grasp what it's like to play on the other team with asymmetric information, or they do (and in such a case I'd rather be playing the better game.) With strangers it has never gone well.
Game design: I find that the two-leader system can result in incredibly swingy games for liberals. On the other hand, the randomized deck punishes a team for getting ahead - pass too many liberal policies and that last liberal policy becomes that much harder to pass, even if you've identified the fascists. Additionally, in my experience, the chancellor has almost no agency about lying when passed a blue and red card from the president. It's a very clumsy sort of finger-pointing, which is what makes it somewhat more accessible to casual gamers - and also considerably less fun for me.
Next play: Sadly, SH is mind-numbingly popular. I'll probably wind up playing it again at a game night because someone will bring it and I showed up too late to get into a better game. I'm already feeling bad about myself.
Bonus question - What are your least favorite copies/re-skins of games? (Or any other form of media?)
Hint for #79 - A free-for-all of a ball
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