I had preordered this game about a week ago and my copy arrived yesterday. To say the least, I was a little bit surprised with the great turn around time.

Components
The components are very similar to LNOE:

--We get 16 little D6s, unfortunately, the gigantic one spot did not make the cut from LNOE.

--Also, there is an array of glossy cardboard markers (e.g., wound markers, investigation markers, shadow track marker, militia, skill upgrades, villian wounds, minions, villians, town elders, etc.) that seem to be the Flying Frog standard.

--Like LNOE, the cards are high gloss. They don't seem to stick together as much and are easy enough to shuffle. I tend to sleeve everything (an old CCG habit), so I don't find it off-putting in the least.

--The gameboard is a yellowed version of what apepars to be a hand drawn map. For me, the art fits nicely with the theme. A possible criticism is that the game board is small (about the size of the Pandemic game board); however, I imagine this will make it easy for them to facilitate expansions where they can release other towns.

--There are also eight heros, each with an accompyaning plastic miniature. The heros each have different abilities. Currently, they are: Drifter, Noble Woman, School Teacher, Outlaw, Cooke, Courier, Playwright, and Soldier.

--There are four villians as well: Vampire, Spectral Horseman, Scarecrow, and Werewolf. The most disappointing part of the entire game (which is not a deal breaker by any means) is that there are not miniatures for the villians. Also, the number of villians is somewhat limited; however, it appears that they have planned expansions with villians into the mix already as each villian as a classification already (i.e., the vampire is "ancient", the horseman is a "ghost", etc.) -- a lot can be built off such a system.

Object of the Game
The game can be played competitively or cooperatively. If competitive, the goal is to be the first hero to defeat the villian. If cooperative, the goal is to team-up and beat a stronger version of the villian. In either instance, the villian has to be defeated before the Shadow Marker gets from 20 to 0; where the shadow marker moves depdning on game events.

Gameplay
Pretty standard fare really. The heros turn consists of

1. Move
2. Fight Enemies
3. Take actions

1. Movement is just the standard rolling of a D6. Note that the board only contains 24 spaces, so you can make good time. Alternatively, the hero can choose not to move which results in a 16% chance that you will be attacked by a minion (which differ depending on the villian--very thematic).

2. Fighting is accomplished by rolling a number of D6s equal to the heros combat value and a number equal to the minions combat value. Hits are scored on rolls of 5 or 6. If a minion takes too many wounds, then it is killed; similarly, a hero becomes knocked-out if they take too many wounds. The hero is revived during the villian's next turn and must lose D6 of their possessions.


3. Actions inlcude: (a) Resolve encounters on a space (this includes each of the four corner spaces which have their own encounter deck), other spaces (most are in the town) have the encounters written on the board. The road spaces do not have encounters; (b) heal a wound by spending 3 investigation tokens; (c) collect investigation tokens; (d) spend 2 investigation to get a secrte from a town elder; (d) buy a lair card, the cost of which is determined by the Shadow Track; (e) start a showdown with the villian.

After the heroes' turn, the villian takes its actions. Which along with some upkeep, is the reading of a mystery card -- which usually has the villian unleashing some evil on the town.

Catching up to the villian is an arduous process. First, you have to reveal the lair and pay the appropriate investigative cost. As the game goes on, the cost gets cheaper. Second, you may form a hunting party with the town elders (one really cool aspect of the game is that the town elders may be evil, which can cause problems for a hero if they are put into the hunting party). Third, you reveal the town elder's secrets -- if the elder's are evil they join the villian's forces. Combat with the villian is much the same except the evil elder's must be killed before the villians (although wounds can accumulate on all of them).

Overall thoughts
On the whole, I really like this game. It gets my nod over LNOE (slightly); however, it is a much different type of game. LNOE had a true B-movie feel to it -- a fun exercise in ridiculousness. This game has a little less of that campy feel (despite the artwork on the vampire). Some of the elements seem to be derivative of Arkham Horror; however, there is definitely enough of the game that makes it different.

The winning addition of the game is the interaction with the town elders. The fact that some can be traitors is quite a nice element, and it puts a balance mechanism into the game where the heroes have to take their time and get their "ducks in a row". So far we have played twice and have found it to be very enjoyable.

In the end, I am hopeful for: a reasonable set of expansions, perhaps different towns, but at the very least different villians. Like Arkham, the encounter decks can be expanded to enhance replayability. Finally, plastic villian minis would be nice to accompany the heroe minis -- this isn't really necessary, because the monster is not moving around town so the mini would not represent a gameplay element.

I think that Flying Frog did another good job at capturing the theme that they wanted to. This is great when so many games are severly lacking in that department.