Yomi: Round 1

Very enjoyable strategy game. After the first few plays, the game seemed heavily luck-based “oh, you played an attack card and I played a block, so I win...” But once you start getting some plays under your belt, the strategies start to come through. For example, you learn that some characters have more blocks than others – have they been playing attacks and their hand is getting small? Now a block becomes more likely than attack or throw. Did they just fish for Aces (the strongest cards and a game mechanic allows for pulling them from your deck/discard) perhaps an attack is more likely? Some characters have speed advantages (a faster attack beats a slower attack) so you might be safer going on offence. Also, there is a very nice computer implementation of this game on Steam. It helped me understand some of the trickier aspects of the combo and card drawing rules. Fantastic game!

I think this game is fantastic. Approachable and handles comboing!

Great game, love it!

I played this with my son and we had a lot of fun.

If you're looking for a tense game that truly evokes the dynamics of fighting games, this is the one for you. Each character plays very differently, with carefully balanced normals and supers. Each deck is a standard 52+2 playing card deck with all the suits and values, but obviously display the character attacking, blocking, etc. Face cards are all full front art cards. I believe the artist Genzoman did the art for these, and he's one of the absolute best in the business for this. Each card has two halves, so you've usually got a decent number of options at your disposal.This second edition is superior to the first, with extra reminders displayed on the card and a better overall layout.The overall gameplay is a bit like Rock Paper Scissors, where blocks and dodges beat strikes, strikes beat throws, and throws beat blocks/dodges. In case of strike vs strike or throw vs throw, the faster speed wins. As far as combos go, attacks are starters, linkers, or finishers, and use up a certain amount of combo slots. Super attacks can usually be boosted by playing more of the same card and often allow a cool secondary ability or boast extreme speed or damage. Finally, hyper combos really deal out the most damage, but require a full set to be at their best, so you'll often be biding time and risking a lot of cards to pull it off.The game is deep and rewarding, and really only improves with more play. Since each deck is premade (no deck building) it only enhances the fighting game analogy, as you'll learn how to use certain characters and play against others. You'll learn you need aggression in some cases, or heavy defense in others. It's really just an incredible game, and with 20 characters in the series, there's a lot to it.Yomi is also available via ipad for online play, and has a bunch of players online all the time.So, what is the competition like?Well, BattleCon uses actual spatial elements, a core move set, and a set of cards for each character that modify these core moves. Characters also have special abilities, sometimes using more cards or tokens. Like Yomi, players choose moves, in this case pairs of cards, and reveal them simultaneously. Unlike Yomi, you're not doing the attack type guessing game as much as trying to find of balance of speed and range. If your chosen set is faster and in range, your attack hits, you cause stun, and if your opponent didn't have enough soak to attack back, they can't do anything. While a fun game and cheaper per character (though expensive upfront) it's not nearly as tense in my opinion, feeling lighter overall. Level 99 is a great company, though, and they actively support a tournament style system. They're also working on an online version.Universal Fighting System is another option, though it's a CCG. This is my favorite CCG, and has a cool system that feels fast and fluid, but like most CCGs, it costs a fortune to really get a tournament-worthy selection. Yomi is still superior, as to a real fighting game player, UFS will cause you to raise a lot of eyebrows. Deck building is based around matching elemental symbols, but beyond that, it's totally possible to mix Blanka, Vega, and Mega Man cards into the same deck. UFS is the only one using licensed characters, and is actually the one that blocked Yomi from getting the license for Street Fighter. See, Yomi IS Street Fighter, but uses new characters. You can see this very strongly in certain characters. Vendetta is Vega (or Bison/Claw depending on region) with his backflips, careful pokes, and sneaky throws, Geiger is Guile with various sonic and flash type moves. You can match them all up. UFS had the licensing, Yomi had the soul.On Yomi's downside, this is a "starter" box. It's four characters, and yeah, that's plenty to play with, but if you want the whole set you're probably looking at 200 bucks, and more of you want the fancy storage box. Is it worth it? Absolutely. It's also in manageable chunks, as after the two starters at 40 each the decks are usually 10 to 12 bucks here in Amazon.Anyway, give it a try. I haven't found anything that scratches the itch quite like this.

One of the true testaments to a great game is its longevity. How many games did you buy in 2011 and still enjoy today? Yomi is one of those games. It really is the best at what it sets out to do, which is to simulate the "feel" of a 2d fighting game. The designer, David Sirlin, was once involved in game balancing street fighter 2. It is rumored that he originally pitched his idea for Yomi as a card version of Street Fighter 2. Capcom wasnt interested, they later developed a collectible card game version instead. How fortunate we are that Capcom did not see the potential in this great game. Because Capcom refused the idea, Sirlin decided to self publish. By doing so, he was able to offer a complete and non-collectible, tournament ready game out of the box. He also has had complete creative control, offering interesting and completely unique characters and play experiences.I own the deluxe version with the 10 initial players and Round 2. If you enjoy dueling card games and the fighting theme then this is worth a buy.

Yomi is a surprisingly thoughtful card game with a unique look at Fighting Game Fundamentals. It's made for people who enjoy fighting games such as Street Fighter, but lack the manual dexterity which is required for the highest level play, instead (correctly) rewarding you for the decisions you make based on your analysis of the current situation. Round 1 is the perfect place to start, with 4 character decks that represent the overall game very well. It has hours and hours of replayability on its own, without even thinking about Round 2 or additional single character decks.Once you and your opponent have learned the rules and played the game a few times, single games routinely last less than 10 minutes, making it very quick-playing and lends to a "one more game" mentality.Highly Recommended!

Great game. I've already got both steam and ios version, so I decided to get also board version!. Simply to understand, difficult to master.I reccomend it to all fighting games and card games lovers.Received 2 days before expected: Amazon services great as usual.

Got it on the recommendation if the Mrs. Was massively skeptical as it looked a little bit shallow.Glad to be proven wrong. :) great fun, quick to pick up, actually quite a lot of room for tactics. It now comes everywhere with us. :)