
The cases get gradually harder, from one star to five stars and I will admit, the cases do feel considerably harder as you progress. The entire game hinges on the map and they absolutely nailed it.
It is incredibly well designed and I just cannot give enough credit to the designers and artists that worked on it. It can be daunting on first look, staring at the portrait of figures in front of you but players will get a distinct feel for each district in the city and will recognize characters as they pop-up over the map.
The map itself is black and white and absolutely dripping with life while not being cluttered at the same time. While this is a game, it did take these subject matters seriously and nothing ever felt trivial. I would not be comfortable exposing the game to children or even adults that may have triggers due to traumatic events. Even in a cartoonish manner, the game deals with heavy subjects such as death, murder and more. I used the word ‘adult’ in the past point because while this game may have cute cartoonish artwork, this is an adult game at heart (it is called ‘Crime City’ after all). I played without it and it wasn’t an issue. The magnifying glass also wouldn’t be helpful to player counts higher than one and while it was a nice inclusion (my partner exclusively used it), I would recommend a real magnifying glass if you needed assistance viewing the map. Playing with two, we routinely had one player looking at the map from the correct orientation and the other looking at it upside down and I struggled to think how we would fit another adult around the table. While the map is big, you won’t necessarily be utilizing the entire map for every case and leaning over each other will get old fast. The box says this game is for up to four players but I honestly wouldn’t go higher than two. Simply put, MicroMacro is basically a crime-filled Where’s Waldo?. There is a demo case available online if you are curious about how the game works. It’s an incredibly interesting dynamic and while it will make people say “how?”, the tutorial/first case will walk players through it perfectly. The unique pitch that MicroMacro has is that the map is showing the past, the present and the future simultaneously. The game includes one magnifying glass to help players better view the scenes that unfold in front of them.
There are sixteen standalone cases that will help guide you around the map and direct the players to what crimes they are supposed to be solving. MicroMacro: Crime City is a deduction game based almost entirely on one large map (29.5 inches x 43 inches).
MicroMacro: Crime City 3 - All In is a stand-alone game, no previous knowledge from the other two MicroMacro games is required. A magnifying glass is included in the game as a little help to find all the details and the individual cases are again marked with symbols so that parents can decide which cases the youngest investigators are allowed to research and uncover. An attentive eye is just as important as creative deduction skills in order to unravel everything on the 75 x 110 cm game board. These are brand new stories, more ingenious and devious than ever before! Players need to determine motives, find evidence and convict the perpetrators. On a new, huge city map, which seamlessly connects to the previous maps, 16 tricky criminal cases are again waiting to be solved by one to four amateur detectives. With MicroMacro: Crime City 3 - All In, players can venture into the next district of the crime-ridden black and white metropolis Crime City. The Spiel des Jahres 2021 (Game of the Year 2021) inspires experienced gamers and newcomers alike as it provides thrilling and innovative detective work in your own four walls.
#Micro macro crime city full
Since the release of MicroMacro: Crime City in October 2020, around 2 million copies of the first and second part, MicroMacro: Crime City 2 - Full House, have been produced worldwide - in no fewer than 31 languages.