Fantasy Board Game Overboss Will Be Adapted For PC

Overboss: A Boss Monster Adventure, a fantasy board game that pays homage to classic pixelated video games of the ’80s and ’90s, is coming full circle and getting its own video game adaptation from developer Goblinz Studios.

The game was revealed in a trailer late last month. It is set for release on Steam and GOG. Although the release date is still to be determined, the game’s Steam page is live, and the game is available to be added to wish lists there.

The board game, which had its first publishing run in 2021, is a derivation of the Brotherwise Games-published Boss Monster: The Dungeon Building Card Game (2013), and its standalone expansion, Boss Monster: The Next Level (2015). In the card game, players take on the role of one of several pixelated boss monsters bearing similar humorous similarities to classic video game villains, such as Cerebellus: Father Brain, and a one-winged swordsman named Angstigoth. As end bosses tend to do, players use their cards to fill their dungeons with a variety of treasures to lure in fighters, thieves, mages, and clerics, as well as traps and monsters to kill off anyone foolish enough to adventure inside. Competing players can also use spells and abilities to sabotage each other’s dungeons or strengthen the heroes attacking them.

Like the titular boss monsters, the trap rooms, minibosses, and the individual adventurers are all callbacks to video game heroes of days past, pop culture references, or an amalgamation of the two.

Overboss takes a similar approach to Boss Monster, except rather than placing traps and enemies in a linear path, the game simulates a grid-based adventure/RPG-style overworld. It has more than 1,300 reviews at Board Game Geek, with an overall rating of 7.5 out of 10, and ranks at number 385 out of nearly 2,500 family games listed on the site.

Boss Monster has already been adapted for PC by developer and publisher Plain Concepts Corp, but it has been removed from the Steam store at the publisher’s request. Prior to its removal, the game garnered mixed reviews, with 62% of reviewers giving it a positive score. This time around, original franchise developer Brotherwise Games is partnering with developer Tavrox Games and publisher Goblinz Publishing.