Summary

• Picking the right Horrified game can be tough due to different themes, but horror fans enjoy trying new things and exploring different tastes.
• Each game has unique elements, with Greek Monsters the hardest game to play.
• World of Monsters features the first two-stage monster, Cthulhu, and pushes the formula further with unique ideas.

Horrified games can be a spooky good time, but with the theme so🐈 core to how each game works, picking the right one can be tough. Though all are very good board games and will appeal to slightly different tastes, horror fans tend to have a curious palette, willing to try out new things.

So when picking your ideal Horrified game, just going off the type of monsters involved might not be enough. It's tough to go too wrong with Horrifiꦚed, but if you're looking for a ranking of each game and why they each stand out, you've come to the right place.

4 🉐 ᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ Horrified: American Monsters

None of the Horrified games are bad, but one of them had to be last and realistically, it wasn't even that tough of a choice. American urban legends is a strong theme, and there is some subjectivity in how much the Monsters the🐲mselves appeal. But American Monsters feels a little too close to the original Universal Monsters, especially with how much Greek Monsters and World of Monsters differentiate themselves from everything else. The board also feels the messiest out of all of them, though part of the appeal of Horrified is the hectic nature of it.

This messiness is a minor theme throughout, however. While some Monsters use near identical rules to Universal Monsters - Chupacabra the most obvious example as the Invisible Man - others are wildly ambitious. B🅠oth Bigfoot and Jersey Devil introduce new mechanics that just don't l🧔and, but this lays the groundwork for future games to get it right. So on the whole, it's good they exist, but games that get it right have to be put higher.

Stand Out Monster: Banshee

3 Horri꧙fied: Greek Monsters

The third edition of Horrified to release is third on o🦩ur list, too. While the introduction of colour is a breath of fresh air after Universal and American focussed on a dark and dreary town being overrun, its wider and shorter figurines end up feeling a little more flimsy than the solid stock of the rest of the pack. Though the Greek theme is used to decent effect, it tried to be a little bit too different, and that c𓄧an weigh down the experience.

Heroes (that's players) were given f⛎ewer movement options, combined with Monster cards that could move them around at random. These combined to make the game a little too reliant on luck. A key reason for this was the introduction of Lairs, giving players a core target to move towards. Despite getting in its own way with this innovation, this addition is why it stands above American Monsters. Lairs return in World of Monsters, and will surely be🍸 an ever-present moving forward in the series.

Greek Monsters is probably the hardest Horrified, which makes🗹 it difficult sometimes to appreciate how clever some of the Monsters are. The roll system to unlock Cerberus' doors, the Siren's matching puzzle, or p🦋ushing Medusa to the mirrors are all great mechanics and still well worth playing, even if movement is harder than it needs to be.

Stand Out Monster: Siren

2 🦋 Horrified: Universal♍ Monsters

The original Horrified is still one of the best ways to play the game. Though it benefits from not having points taken away for r♊epeating what other games have don🍃e, it still has some of the most unique Monsters of the lot, the most solid theme of the entire collection, and a board that has never been bettered for clarity and atmosphere.

Whatever points other games lose for 'copying' Universal Monsters, they were there to be gained by introducing new elements, but Universal Monsters w𒉰as so strong out of the gate there wasn't much that could be added without making it worse. With excellent Perk cards, a great spread of Hero abilities, and clever use of The Creature from the Black Lagoon as a water-only easy mode, Universal Monsters remains a top tier board game. The mechanic of Frankenstein's Monster and his Bride walking towards a union might still be the smartest idea for a Monster Horrified has ever had.

Stan⛄d Out Monster: Frankenstein's Monster and his Bride

1 ꦕ Horrified: World Of Monsters ♐

The latest edition of Horrified is also the best, 🌼and that's largely down to having the first ever two-stage Monster: Cthulhu. However, that's not the only thing it has going for it. This is the most interesting map since Universal Monsters, the strongest array of Heroes, and the other beasts aren't slouches either. Whether its escorting the Yeti's children to safety or escaping the transporting Jiangshi (a better version of Greek's Hero transportation), there are some unique ideas that push you to rethink old mechanics in World of Monsters.

It's not perfect - only four Monsters feature, and Sphnix isn't up to the level of the others, while Cthulဣhu's second stage forces it to be a must play every time, but these feel like minor points. While American and Greek feel like new editions of Horrified, World of Monsters pushes the formula further and feels more like a sequel. It shows that the connection between the Monsters is not the main drive in the game, but how well their powers and challenges complement each other, and in World of Monsters, it's scary how well they go together.

Stand Out Monster: Cthulhu