Castle Nightingale

• Designers: Bruno Cathala, Eliette Fraile, Jeremy Fraile 
• Publisher: Sand Castle Games
• Players: 2
• Age: 10+
• Time: 20-30 minutes
• Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4aUdBDB
• Played with review copy provided by publisher

Castle Nightingale looms out of the night, both intimidating and full of promise. Three ninjas have slipped inside, searching for the fabled treasure hidden within…yet a vigilant samurai patrols the halls, watching and listening for intruders.

Two players face off in Castle Nightingale, with the ninja player trying to steal five relics before the samurai player can capture the three ninja thieves. The castle is comprised of an inaccessible garden surrounded by four double-sided floor boards, each showing two secret passage spaces and areas in five colors.

Each turn, the ninja and samurai each choose one of three action cards in hand (each has a deck of 10 cards), with the samurai also choosing a nightingale tile not used on the previous turn.  The cards are placed facedown on the card drop board. 

The ninja player first resolves their action, seen in the bottom left of the card (examples: draw an equipment token, remove a trap door closed token, look at the backside of some vase tokens, etc).  The ninja then moves across the floor, marking each space of their movement with a footstep token; the number of steps is dictated on the card played. If they step on a colored space matching the samurai’s hidden nightingale tile, the ninja stands revealed; otherwise, next turn the ninja can treat any of their footsteps as their starting space.  If a footprint can be placed on a secret passage space, the next footprint can be on any other open Secret passage.  Note that a Ninja can also discard an equipment token to jump over a space (this can be used to jump over a suspected Nightingale space or even to jump over the Samurai!)  If a footprint token is placed on a vase, the Ninja picks it up.

If the ninja picks up a vase, the samurai can still recover it on their turn by either closing the final secret passage or landing on the ninja figurine’s zone…as long as the ninja has been revealed that turn. While the ninja moves space to space, the samurai treats each colored area as a single space, allowing them to move quickly within the castle.  The samurai moves first and then takes the action on their card (such as closing a trap door, drawing an equipment token or moving around the vase tokens).

Each player has specialized one-shot equipment they can use at any time, starting with one item and gaining more as they play certain cards. Each player has ten cards that they’ll cycle through until either the samurai has captured all three ninja or the ninja have stolen five of the six relics hidden in the eight vases.

My thoughts on the game

Castle Nightingale is a tense two-player asymmetrical game where the two sides battle over the colored floor.   The Cat and Mouse part of the game is made a bit more complex with the Nightingale tiles.  There is a lot of thinking, double-thinking and triple-thinking as each side tries to anticipate what the other is going to choose.

Ninjas often have to move quickly around the board, using the secret passages, as they have to try to move away from the Samurai.  The Samurai has a significant movement advantage as they move by color block while the Ninja only can move by adjacent spaces – thus, in order to be really safe, the Ninja might need to move across the board to avoid being in the grasp of the Samurai.  

If a Ninja steps on a Nightingale tile, their turn ends immediately, and their exact location is revealed. This can be devastating as the Samurai can easily move to their zone and capture them.  If only footprint tokens are seen, the samurai will not be able to capture the Ninja.

The equipment tokens offer a lot of special actions which can change the game.  The Samurai might be able to capture a ninja at any distance so long as they are on the same floor board.  The Ninja can use a token to nullify the action or the movement of the Samurai’s card.  There are plenty of other actions – none are game-breaking but many are quite powerful, especially when used at the right time. 

I’m not much of a figurine person, but both of my opponents have remarked at how much they like them.  As with the other previous Sand Castle Games (Res Arcana and First Empires), the overall production is great.  If you’re in the market for a two player game, this is definitely one to check out!

Ratings from the Opinionated Gamers

• I love it!
• I like it. Dale Y
• Neutral.
• Not for me…

Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4aUdBDB