CV Review

When you talk about "theme" in board games, you have to hand it to Milton Bradley's The Game of Life. In its original 1860 incarnation, The Checkered Game of Life (developed by Bradley himself) is said by some to be the first non-abstract game published. It's the more familiar 1960s incarnation however, that deserves the most credit. In its celebration of material culture, epitomized by plunking little plastic children into the backseats of little plastic cars, Life creates a theme that is universally appealing to children everywhere, more appealing even than clumsy surgeons, gumdrop mountains, or admonitions to avoid lightly sleeping daddies. It is equally appealing for grown-ups to fantasize about a life unshackled to a minivan full of sticky toddlers and a mountain of college debt.

CV, from Granna and Polish designer Filip Miłuński, is a sort of reimagining of The Game of Life, transferring that timeless theme onto a more strategic (kind of) push-your-luck game of card drafting and set collection. While the game’s tagline (“What would have happened if…”) makes it clear it’s targeted at a more adult demographic than Milton Bradley’s creation, it’s still on the lighter end of the gameplay spectrum; despite some advanced mechanics like hidden scoring goals and tableau building, it’s 99% about rolling the four dice and spending those resources on whatever cards you can afford.

CV takes you through the four phases of life, which, as everyone knows, are Egg, Larva, Metamorphosis, and being a %$%$# Butterfly. (For some reason, the game refers to these stages as “Childhood,” “Early Adulthood,” “Middle Age,” and “Old Age.”) Over the course of however many rounds it takes to go through all 4 decks, you will draft cards in order to build your alter ego’s CV, or curriculum vitae, a record of all your accomplishments. Cards can come in 5 colors matching the 5 facets of life: Work, Health, Relationships, Knowledge, and Possessions. All of these except Work will give you points (Satisfaction) at the end of the game: Possessions grant a set number of point based on their value, while the other 3 categories score exponentially based on how many cards of that color you have collected. (As an example, 4 cards gives you 10 points, 5 gives you 15, and 6 gives you 21.) “Life Goals,” both public and private, provide a few extra points for specific combinations of card types, but the most satisfying life is one obsessively dedicated to a single passion, be it friends and family, physical fitness or intellectual growth.

Each turn, you roll 4 of the game’s custom dice and use the symbols shown to pay the purchase cost of one of the 5 cards on offer. For instance, a Trip around the World requires money and good health, while Winning the Lottery just takes good luck. You will then add the purchased card(s) to your CV, placing it in one of 5 columns based on its type. When adding a new orange, purple or green card to an existing column, you can choose to put it first, covering up the current top card, or continue your current focus, tucking the new acquisition underneath. The top card of each column is considered to be “active” and grants a special, ongoing benefit until a new card replaces it. These benefits can include tokens that give you free resources each round, extra dice to roll, discounts on certain card types, or the option to swap two types of resources, with a few more unique abilities mixed in. Cards can also be grey, one-time-use Events, which are held in your hand and played at any time on your turn.

Choosing which cards to purchase—and which to keep active—is about all the decisions this game has to offer. There are pros and cons to each type of benefit: rolling extra dice lets you purchase more—and more expensive—cards each turn, but it also increases your chances of experiencing a Misfortune, which occurs when 3 of your dice land on the locked “Bad Luck” face. Misfortunes force you to discard a card off the top of your CV, in addition to limiting your purchase opportunities with un-spendable Bad Luck resources. Cards that provide tokens are a safer bet, but they’re less flexible. Some cards also have an upkeep cost, in particular children, who require a $ resource each round lest they get hauled off by CPS. The resource-swapping cards allow you to massage any roll into your desired combination, but they give you fewer overall resources to work with each turn. Thus, the purchase-and-tuck decision point pivots on volume versus control, as well as ability-granting cards versus focused set collection.

The game is easy to teach and play and it can create some interesting narrative moments, such as when a Misfortune forces you to choose between giving up your marriage or your career. In one game, I entered Early Retirement, preventing me from picking up further Work cards, but a later Misfortune drove me back into the workforce…specifically, that unsatisfying Job at Dad’s Company. That same game saw my high-achieving avatar get married and earn a Ph.D. straight out of high school. When my wife became pregnant, I decided to save money by continuing to put the marriage first—the kid just sort of existed in the periphery. Meanwhile, my real-life spouse somehow had surprise grandchildren late in life—she didn’t even know she’d had kids! Maybe her Friends from the Orchestra were more than just friends….

The game does have some flaws, both mechanically and thematically. The Misfortune rule, while creating the game’s strongest narrative moments, makes luck a huge factor in success, especially when you consider that the 3 Bad Luck dice is a harsh turn of events on its own, usually locking you out of at least one purchase that turn. It does add tension to the reroll mechanic, but rolling 2-3 Bad Luck faces on your first roll can feel overly punishing.

The biggest problem is thematic. For such a strongly narrative game, CV makes some baffling decisions in terms of art direction. Like how half of the cards depict vampires or superheroes for no discernible reason. We’re meant to be playing out an alternate life, not undeath. And why are the people on the Scooter card all cavemen? Why does the DJ in Clubbing appear to be a Catholic priest? The art itself is colorful and distinctive, but these goofy touches have the ancillary effect of totally undermining the “What if?” narrative the game tries to build, leaving it feeling like just another game about collecting sets of colored cards.