Button Men: Beat People Up is a game by James Ernest, published by Cheapass Games. It is for 2 players.
In this game, players take on the role of a gangster from a 1950’s era town on the Gulf Coast, known as Fight City. They will be trying to knock out the other player through hand to hand combat, capturing their dice. If they’re able to beat up the other player a total of 3 times first, they will be declared the winner.
Game setup is fairly straightforward here, players choose a character. They will take the character’s card and the corresponding dice for that character. Characters will have an X on their card, this will note what is called a swing die in the game, A Swing Die can be any size die and is chosen by the player before the first round. The player with the smallest die on their character card chooses first.
You will be playing the game in 5 rounds, and the best 3 out of 5 series of rounds, is the winner. Each player starts off by rolling all of their character’s dice. It’s best to roll and place the dice in the middle of the table, so all players can see the dice that have been rolled.
On your turn, you can make an attack which comes in different forms, power, and skill. To perform a power attack, the player must capture one of the other player’s dice. This is done by using one of their own dice that shows a number greater than or equal to one of their opponent’s dice. The opponent’s captured die is then set aside near the attacking player, who then rerolls the attacking die that they used. To perform a skill attack, the player must use two or more dice to capture one of their opponent’s dice. The numbers on the attacker’s dice must add up to exactly the number of the die that the player wishes to capture from their opponent. The captured die is set aside near the attacking player. The dice used to capture are then rerolled. If a player is unable to make an attack, they must pass.Scoring will then take place.
Scoring is done for each player. Each dies that a player captured will earn them a number of points equal to the size of the dice. They will also earn half points for each die of their own that they kept. Players add up their points and the player with the most points wins the round. A new round will then begin. That’s Button Men in a nutshell, easy to learn, fun as hell to play.
COMPONENTS
The game is comprised of dice and cards, the dice are two colors, white and black, you get a full plethora of dice here, 4 sides all the way up 20 sided, and you might use them all. The dice are good quality and roll nice, easy to read numbers, overall I have no complaints about the dice you are supplied within the game box.
The cards are of good stock, and have some amazing artwork on them, I can’t talk enough about how much I really do love the artwork style here, it’s got a slight cartoon feel but not enough to make it feel like it, if that makes any sense, it’s got a serious, yet whimsical style to it.
The rulebook, like most other cheapass games, comes in the form of a long double-sided sheet of glossy paper, easy to read. No complaints with this, as you know what you’re going to get with a cheapass game.
Final Thoughts
Fast, fun and easy to learn and teach, Button Men Beat People Up, is a fun game for all ages, there is a lot of luck, but it’s not all luck, so you will learn some strategy here, you will quickly learn how to best your dice you have, the dice is where the “luck” comes from you at the mercy of what you roll, but this did not bother me at all, as it’s fast and fun. Most games will last about 10 mins or so, so this is a great game to break out when you are waiting for your game group to show up. It’s got a fairly small footprint as well, so you can take it with you and play it almost anywhere.
A fast fun game of luck and strategy, that’s a blast to play and good fun for all.
For more information on Button Men Beat People up head over to Cheap Ass Games website.
You can purchase your own copy via your FLGS or via Amazon.
A speical thank you to Cheapass Games for sending the review copy, this in no way had any outcome on the effect of the review.
The amazon link found above is an AFFALITE link, DDO Players will reveice a samll percent of your purcahse, this is a small way you can help to supporte the site.
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