Growing up, I never really played that many board games, except maybe a session of Clue or Candyland when I was at a friend’s house. I only ever played the Game of Life two or three times, so I was pretty excited to see the new release from The Op Games and Sanrio! Life: Hello Kitty and Friends features iconic Sanrio characters Hello Kitty, My Melody, Badtz-maru and Cinnamoroll competing to throw the best party ever!
What’s in the box?
Life: Hello Kitty and Friends comes with a brightly illustrated game board, spinner (dial, base, pointer, and cardboard insert), 4 character movers, 24 bow pegs (4 each in blue, orange, pink, purple, green, and yellow), 60 cards (26 Sweet & Sour, 10 Party Vibes, 10 Friends, 10 Party Favors, 4 reference), 90 apples tokens divided up between 1 apple and 5 apple bushels, a storage tray, and rulebook.
Overall, the board and components are exactly as you would expect for a Life meets Hello Kitty game. The board is super pretty and has all these fun spots, the character movers are great, and the bows and apples are super cute. Unfortunately, the insert refused to stay in the spinner, so I had to tape it just a little, and I left the entire spinner in the board, and folded the board incorrectly to put it back in the box. This choice was a mistake. Don’t do that, it will break your board. For future games, I’ll just leave the spinner on the board instead of actually inserting it, for ease of removal during packing the game up.
How’s it Play?
Gameplay in Life: Hello Kitty is super easy, yet has an actual challenge so that it’s fun for players of all ages and levels. You spin the wheel and move the number of spaces shown in whichever direction you choose. You must continue moving that direction though until you hit a fork in the board, so pay attention!
Wherever you stop, resolve what is on the board space. Usually this is gaining or losing apples. Or, you have to take the top card of the sweet and sour deck or the party vibes deck and do whatever the card says. The sweet and sour deck is definitely sweet and sour. Sometimes you get sent backward on the board or lose apples. Sometimes you get some apples. The party vibes cards are a little bit more fun, and also hilarious. For example if you get the Karaoke card in the party vibes deck, you must hum a song and challenge another player to name that song. If they can’t name it, you get 3 apples. If they do name it, they get 3 apples.
If you stop on a pink space that has the friends or party favors icons, you can choose to pick the top card of that deck. You can have up to one party favor (which you don’t show the other players) to help you throughout the game. Once you use it, you usually have to put it back at the bottom of the deck. You can have up to three friends help you, and if you land on another friend space, you can swap it out. The last pink space is for if you hit a pink space with a hot air balloon, you can choose to move to any other hot air balloon space on the board that is unoccupied.
As you progress around the board and come across a store, you immediately stop and either get 5 apples or buy a bow of that color. You can only have one bow of each color in your character mover so you’ll have to strategize how to move around the board.
To win the game, you must get to the Ultimate Party space at the top left of the board, but to open the doors, you must spin 12 or more. The more bows that you have, the better, as they each count for a spin. So at minimum, you need two bows before you head to the party. You can have up to six bows, so depending on how other players are doing, you might try to beat them to the party or keep trying to get bows.
The Verdict?
For a game that’s ostensibly for families and meant to be chill, Life: Hello Kitty and Friends, actually provides an entertaining level of challenge, especially since the sweet and sour cards can be very sweet or very sour. I really like the friends aspect, where depending on who you have, you gain apples, anytime you or another player spins a specific number. At one point I was getting apples for any spin of 6, 7, and 8.
Will I choose to play this game over all my other games? Not necessarily, but it is something I expect to pull out on nights where my friends and I don’t want to think too hard about strategy during the game, or for end-game scoring. It’s the perfect game to just chat over, and I think it’s the perfect addition to anyone’s game hoard and Hello Kitty collection.
You can grab a copy now at The Op directly or your FLGS!
Images and review copy courtesy of The Op Games
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