Kraken Attack!: A Tower Defense Game for the Family
We have built quite a large collection of family board games over the years, and we’ve also had plenty of time to reflect on the types of games that we enjoy playing together the most. For instance, we know for sure that we like games with an engaging theme, because we’re big fans of using our imagination and role playing.
It’s also well-documented by now that we are huge fans of cooperative board games. Working together with the family as opposed to against each other simply works for us. And we’re always on the lookout for the next great cooperative game from our favorite publishers like Peaceable Kingdom, HABA, and LOKI - who all have an incredible track record.
Other items on our checklist include high-quality components and pieces that are simply fun to play with - and gameplay that’s interesting and strategic enough to keep us coming back for more. Very rarely do family games check all of our boxes. And when they do, we know we’ve found a special one. And then of course I feel compelled to share it with all of you in a featured article.
The latest game that has blown us completely out of the water (pun intended) is Kraken Attack! - an amazing game about a Kraken attacking a pirate ship manned by child pirates. It checks all of our boxes and it captured the heart of our family instantly.
The game features very attractive pieces - something family games publisher LOKI is building a reputation for. The wooden pirates, the plastic Kraken, the dice, the game board itself - it’s all adorable. And it’s hard to get more engaging than a storyline of defending your pirate ship against the Kraken. This game is ripe for rambunctious role playing with the kids.
Just a glance at the box art and the bright cartoon illustrations caught my attention immediately. And that charming spirit of the art you see on the cover carries right over into the game and its components. Once I saw the pictures of the gameplay, and especially when I realized it was a tower defense game, I was instantly sold.
Tower defense has always been one of my favorite genres of games - whether we’re talking about board games or video games. The general idea is that you have a base to protect, and seemingly never-ending waves of enemies to defend it against. When done properly, tower defense games can be full of exciting, strategic choices - and playing them with kids is so much fun.
One of my personal favorite tower defense board games is called Castle Panic. But it’s significantly more complicated, so we were extremely excited when Fireside Games announced My First Castle Panic for kids. That game has made lots of our board game lists already - including the best board games for 3-year-olds.
The problem, however, is that our 7-year-old son currently sits somewhere in the middle of those two board games. Castle Panic is really a game for older kids and adults, My First Castle Panic is one of the best games for 3-year-olds ever made, and there’s a big gap of ages in between. We’ve long said we wish there was a My Second Castle Panic - a tower defense game perfect for our 7-year-old.
Well, consider our search over. Kraken Attack! is the absolute perfect tower defense game for our 7-year-old. It fits perfectly in the middle of our other two favorite tower defense board games in terms of complexity, and it just so happens to be the most attractive of the bunch by far.
In Kraken Attack!, you have to work together as a team to defend your pirate ship from the Kraken and its approaching tentacles. There are 8 tentacles on 8 different paths to worry about, and you have to take care of them before they get too close and slam into the side of your ship.
The tentacles move closer when you roll the dice. Each path is represented by a particular color and a particular fish: jellyfish, starfish, crab, or anglerfish. If you roll a red starfish, for instance, you move the tentacle on that path one spot closer to your ship. And if you roll the “Eye of the Kraken”, you have to move every single tentacle of that color.
Each player is in control of their own character throughout the game, although you can work together on your strategy. To attack, you have to use your cards - matching the attack symbols on them with the spaces that the tentacles are standing on - and send the tentacles back to the start. You have to choose which cards to use, and in which order to perform your actions. And you even have to move your character around the ship to be able to attack the tentacles in different sections.
Each character has their own special abilities too. Our son tends to get very attached to specific characters when we play games, and in Kraken Attack! he always chooses Samuel - the boy pirate who gets to ignore the “Eye of the Kraken” when he’s rolling. My favorite character is the cannon specialist, Billy - whose cannon shots can hit more than one tentacle at once.
One interesting mechanic of the game is that the difficulty steadily increases as you play. As the game progresses, you actually collect more and more dice that you have to roll each turn - which increases the chances of the tentacles moving closer.
And, eventually, the Kraken itself will appear and begin charging towards your ship. My son says definitively that the moment the Kraken makes its exciting entrance is his favorite part of the game. At that point you have to land 3 direct hits on the Kraken to win the game. But if the Kraken smashes 4 holes in your ship first, the game is lost.
Kraken Attack! fills a perfect need on our family board game shelf. I’m tremendously excited to discover this new tower defense game perfectly suited for our 7-year-old. Obviously I get a very big kick out of playing it too, and I have no doubt we’ll be fighting off that Kraken for many, many years. Soon our 3-year-old will be able to join in on the fun and we’ll finally have a full pirate crew.
