Nanga Parbat: Alone in the Wilderness is the last game in the Kickstarter for Dr. Finn’s Book of Solo Strategy and Word Games I’m looking at. I saved it for last because it’s not actually in the book but a bonus for backers. Steve Finn has said that he plans on releasing it in some format in the future.
And, truth to tell, it doesn’t feel like it would belong in the book. The eight games in the book use elements from games like Scrabble and Carcassonne and Yahtzee that make them feel intuitive and familiar. They are carefully crafted for a wide, casual gaming audience. Nanga Parbat, on the other hand, is its own thing.
Nanga Parbat sounds to me like either a cryptic or a spare identity for Bruce Wayne but it is actually the ninth highest mountain in the world and is part of the Himalayas. It’s known as the killer mountain, one of the hardest mountains to climb in the world. It is also known for its diverse wildlife and that part is the theme of the game. You are exploring the mountain, documenting the animals you see.
The game sheet has six areas, one for each die pip. Each area has six spaces, also for each die pip. Each space has one of four different animals. (Yak, Red Panda, Snow Leopard and Musk Deer, by the way) At the bottom of the sheet, each animal has six different scoring icons.
Oh, there’s are also some trails between areas but those are only for the musk deer scoring.
0kay. At the start of the game, you roll a die. Put it on the marching mountain area. Choose one animal to circle in that area. Circle one of the matching animal’s scoring icons on the bottom of the page. Then, move to the die to the mountain area that matches that animal’s number. Roll the dice and cross out the animal that matches the roll in the new area. Then you move the die to the area that matches the new number.
At that point, you start over again but you don’t need to roll the die. You start over in the new area. Do that twelve times and figure out your score.
If you roll a number to cross out an animal that’s already taken, cross out the next highest number. If an entire area is filled, the roll becomes a wild number.
That might sound all cluttered but after one game, it all clicks. Nanga Parbat may not use ‘familiar game language’ but it is still a simple game.
Yaks score specific spaces in each area. Musk deer score specific completed paths. Red pandas score three or more connected circled spaces in an area. Snow leopards score for varieties of animals circled in an area. The rules include a scale for judging your score and I have yet to do well lol
Okay. Here’s the thing. I enjoy playing Nanga Parbat: Alone in the Wilderness. But I’m not sure it’s a ‘good’ game.
The way that the random elements kick into the game, in particular the fact that the areas you get to add a circle to are random, makes me wonder how much my choices matter. Am I playing the game or is the game playing me?
Mind you, I also half expect to have something click and how to play well suddenly make perfect sense. Heck, if someone told me that I was wrong and the game was actually solved, I would give them a listen.
At the end of the day, it is an interesting experience and takes very little time to play. That is enough for it to have some real value for me.
