Godzilla vs Kong. Jaeger vs Kaiju. Do you know what all these huge monster clashes are missing? Yahtzee. That’s the premise of King of Tokyo at least!
I was super excited when I saw King of Tokyo on Board Game Arena. A random dice game where you battle everyone was a great way to end the gaming day!
Rabbit had never played King of Tokyo, but she got the gist super quickly. Alpal and I spent a couple of minutes explaining the basics. Sure, you can win with victory points.
Or you can be the last monster standing!
It’s possible telling Rabbit that was a mistake. Clear goal combined with amazing dice rolling ability, multiplied by first-time play luck. Alpal and I never stood a chance!

You ‘hit’ Tokyo to enter it, and get a point for entering the city. If you start your turn in Tokyo, you get two points. If you attack while in Tokyo, you hit everyone else. The downside is everyone else hits you, and you can’t heal in Tokyo!
If you get hit by someone else, you can concede Tokyo forcing them in the middle. If they don’t have much health, this can be an effective way of thinning the competition.
The second time around I worked out how to let us pick our own creatures. I thought Rabbit would enjoy Cyber Bunny, even with Cthuhlu being on offer.
And Cyber Bunny wasn’t there. I didn’t realise with the second edition, Cyber Bunny and the Kraken couldn’t be used for legal reasons. I suppose my old copy is even better now?

At the end of the day, King of Tokyo did what it does best. We each managed a win, we all ‘yelled’ at each other for rolling dice we didn’t want them to, and we all had fun.
If you want a light to medium weight Kaiju game with more ‘game’ to it, King of New York is a great game. If you want a light casual experience anyone can jump into, King of Tokyo remains one of my all-time favourites.