Sword Art Online: Sword of Fellows

Having just bought this game (from another retailer as Amazon did not have a seller who would deliver to Ireland) I felt compelled to write a review for it to express my disappointment and to hopefully give people more information than I had when making my purchase.I want to start out by pointing out that although this game states that it is a board game on its box, that is a purely self-proclaimed title. This is a card game with dice and some damage tokens. No board. (I know that may be a trivial detail for some people but, with the exception of "living card games" such as Arkham Horror, no one in my household is a fan of card or dice based games, we prefer games that rely on a board so if I had known that this was all cards I would not have bought it.)The entire game comes in a box roughly the size of a mobile phone, and the thickness of three DVD cases. The contents are:- 6 character cards- 10 scenario cards- 4 support dice, 4 main dice and 6 character dice- 8 item cards- 1 support character card- Some cardboard counters (damage, ability, etc.)- A rules "booklet" which is just a double sided sheet of paperThis game can be played solo or with up to 3 other players. One player must be Kirito and each other player can choose whoever they want. The players then take it in turns to fight each enemy or enemies that appear on each of the four floors.At this point I wish to point out that each floor, with the exception of the final floor, has only 3 possibilities. To see your opponent(s) for that floor you need to draw a scenario card at random. So if you like a large amount of variety with your games, this will not offer much replayability as each floor only has 3 different fights to choose from. The final floor only has one card, so the boss fight will always be the same.The rules for playing are somewhat simple, however the booklet does not explain much and there is not a lot of information on this game online. To begin playing you flip over the scenario card for the floor you are entering, this will show your opponent or opponents, their attacks and effects as well as how many dice can be rolled when attacking. The player controlling Kirito always attacks first. They begin by selecting a "chaining character", someone who assists them in battle. They then roll the number of main (black) dice displayed on the scenario card while the player controlling the chaining character rolls the number of support (white) dice. Each player can choose which dice to keep and which to re-roll and this can be done up to two times per turn. Each character relies of different dice rolls. Kirito, for example, needs all dice to display the same number, Agil requires high numbers on the dice, etc. Each player's dice are taken into consideration when attacking, and if any dice are not used by the end of the turn then the enemy counterattacks. They damage the character whose turn it was, or they may have an area of effect attack which damages every player.Characters also have abilities which can change the dice. Agil, for example, can change up to two dice to display the number 5. Abilities can be used a limited number of times per floor. After defeating the foe or foes of a floor the players "level up", the player who dealt the killing blow to the final enemy draws an item card and the scenario card for the next floor is revealed.The final floor is where everything changes. The boss fight had two parts, the first part plays as normal however only Kirito may attack during the second part. This may cause problems if the game is being enjoyed by younger players.The cards are nice, visually, although the feel rather flimsy. The dice are plastic and quite cheap feeling. This could be nice as a collector's item for a fan of the anime or manga, however I do not recommend it to anyone looking for a good co-operative board game. Even the Sword Art Online fan in my house was disappointed!