Loch Ness Review

Some games are about making difficult choices and managing a dynamic landscape, but Loch Ness is really a game about card counting, luck and, potentially, prayer, much like the chances of actually spotting the monster in its namesake. The basic premise of the game is that players take the role of photographers who are seeking to photograph Nessie, and to do so, you essentially have to be in the right place at the right time. Players control the movement of Nessie by playing movement cards, but really, because so many people are secretly playing cards, and then adding a randomizer card, you have no bloody idea where the monster is going to surface, so it’s just one great big crap shoot.

To call this game anything but a family game would be a complete misnomer. This is an exceedingly random, easy to learn, accessible game where you are really just placing several camera tokens of varying value on little hills around the loch, not unlike musical chairs, and with a lot of luck, you’re hoping that everyone’s cards values align in such a way that Nessie will emerge in front of one of them. At the beginning of the round, you can place a marker on a special power, which really is the only meaningful choice in the game, and this power can allow you to place an extra camera, move Nessie an extra space, or boos the points of one of your cameras, among other things. In short, you’re literally pissing into the wind, hoping to get really lucky.

The only thing you can really do to control anything is to count the cards that have been played by yourself, other players, and the randomizer deck, attempting to deduce what cards might be played in the next round. Then, just when you think you might be able to score a solid photo or two, time runs out and the game ends. It’s an inherently frustrating game, but despite that, it’s actually fun provided you go into it knowing that it’s almost entirely a luck-based game. This is a perfect game if you have kids between ten and fifteen years of age, and I find myself taking this with me quite often on camping trips and the like. It’s the kind of game that you’ll play two or three times in a row, because the addictive nature of gambling is such that just missing Nessie by one or two spaces encourages you to play again, somehow convincing you that it was your keen intellect that got you that close, not blind, dumb luck. Really, this could’ve been named Loch Ness Roulette because it feels quite a bit like that particular game.

The most profound impact you can make on the outcome of a particular turn is to watch where other people are placing their cameras, despite not knowing the cameras’ values, in the hopes that it is an indication of what cards the other people played and where they predict Nessie will emerge. At the end of the round, if you managed to get a clean picture, you gain one or more tripartite cards which gain you points at the end of the game, depending on how many of the parts of the set you’ve collected. Collecting the sets is actually the only part of the game that you have any true control over, because you can choose from a tableau of face up cards to complete a set, or if the cards aren’t helpful, then you can draw the top card from the deck.

Loch Ness is a very light, very random, and curiously addictive game. Despite going in knowing that you don’t really have much control over anything, it has a quaintness that makes you want to play it again and again. The artwork is very cute, and this certainly aids in the game’s enjoyment, but also reinforces the idea that you’re not going to be playing this because you’re looking for a deep, intellectual game. If you have kids in the aforementioned age bracket, this really should be a no-brainer to purchase, but if you’re looking for something for your regular game group, this would suffice only as a light, fast filler game until the rest of the party arrives, if that.