Warhammer Quest — kinda like D&D for the iPad

For 2013, one of the most anti­cip­ated iPad ver­sions of a tra­di­tion­al (and fairly expens­ive) tab­letop game 2013 is War­ham­mer Quest. The ori­gin­al came out in 1995, but the iPad ver­sion was released this week and, of course, I had to grab a copy and see what all the fuss was about.

I’m only about 2 hours in, but it’s hella-fun! Quite like the D&D exper­i­ence… and I haven’t actu­ally played the tab­letop ver­sion of War­ham­mer Quest so I have noth­ing to com­pare to, so you’ll have to believe me when I say I’m enjoy­ing the iPad ver­sion of the game.  

Here’s the gist of the tab­letop game, from Board Game Geek’s over­view:

In War­ham­mer Quest each play­er takes the role of a war­ri­or, one of four brave adven­tur­ers will­ing to test their cour­age in the search for wealth and glory. Each hero comes from a dif­fer­ent people. The Bar­bar­i­an has traveled far from the sav­age north, a land of bit­ter cold and fero­cious war­ri­ors. The Wiz­ard hails from the cit­ies of the Empire, the largest and most import­ant of the realms of men. The Dwarf is drawn by the gold­lust for which his race is fam­ous. Dwarfs are grim and rather abrupt, but they are good fight­ers and loy­al friends who remem­ber debts of grat­it­ude as read­ily as debts of coin. The Elf comes from the green woods of Loren where his kin spend their days hunt­ing and mak­ing merry, pro­tec­ted from evil by the strange magic of their land. Elves are incred­ibly quick and agile, and they are also the best arch­ers in the world.

In the War­ham­mer Quest game the play­ers enter a dark and for­bid­ding dun­geon. Togeth­er they must face the hor­rif­ic dangers that wait for them. They will be attacked by mon­sters such as Orcs, Gob­lins, Skaven and Minotaurs. Oth­er per­ils lurk in the dark­ness: scur­ry­ing venom­ous things like spiders, deadly pit traps, and decayed tun­nels that cave in at the slight­est touch. If they com­plete their quest the play­ers will be rewar­ded with gold, treas­ure and arte­facts of magic­al power. The more gold and treas­ure you can dis­cov­er the bet­ter.., and the play­er whose war­ri­or amasses the greatest for­tune has done best of all!

And here’s what the iPad ver­sion looks like. iPhone too, but it’s such a tiny screen I’m not sure how the game­play will work out.

Yep, fun, a bit dif­fi­cult (which is good), and when played on Hard­core dif­fi­culty, you’ll be exper­i­en­cing perma-death for your her­oes. Bet­ter get good 

Though I’m only a couple of hours in, I’ve already noticed a few rough edges that will likely be knocked off in upcom­ing updates — such as story text call­ing a quest item both a blade and a shield in the same sen­tence — just a bit more Qual­ity Assur­ance work needed here.

Now, back to my dun­geon! You can grab your own copy of War­ham­mer Quest here. And there’s a more com­plete review of the game (do check out the com­ments for fur­ther detail) here.