Pyramid Review
Battle of the Bands: The Rock and Roll Card Game
Produced by D.S.I.
Created by Dan Smith
103 cards; $5.00
Dan Smith is well known to gamers as an illustrator of SJ Games products, Sparks paper miniatures, and so on. Now he offers a game that he has both illustrated and designed. Priced at $5, it would be hard for Battle of the Bands not to be worth the money. Every player gets to play out their dream of starting a Rock and Roll band and making a go of it in the music business. Some band members come and go, but the music goes on. At least, it goes on until one of the bands achieves superstardom beyond the ken of all the others.
Game play is simple and easy to learn. Each turn, players draw enough cards so that they have six in their hand and then play or discard one of them. There are several varieties of cards.
Players play Band Member cards to add to their band. Everyone begins with themselves as a member (in the form of a card labelled "Me") and can add up to three members from a varied lot including such rockers as the voluptuous Kym, a grinning Mr. Death, a gorilla named Fella, and Santa.
By playing Instrument and Reputation cards, players can make band members more or less hip. In game terms, this means that the member has more or fewer Hip Points, an attribute abbreviated HP. Of course, HP are just a measure of the band member's coolness, and may not translate into commercial success.
There are also Hit Single and Gig cards, which give a player Superstar Points. Although . . .
This article originally appeared in the second volume of Pyramid. See the current Pyramid website for more information.
Article publication date: November 10, 2000
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