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Techno Bowl: Arcade Football Unplugged box art
Pixel block players
Going into overtime!
sorting prototype tokens for reviewers
pixel block players ready for some away games
Don't let the name or cute [but slightly sinister?] logo fool you. The KITTENS are nothing to [yarn?] yawn at! They sport one of the most impressive running games in the league thanks to their superstar running back. Interestingly enough, he wasn't drafte
Custom Player Blocks and Cards
Prototype player tokens for Bighorns, Pit Bulls, and Falchions
Second half action of Jack-O-Lanterns (white/black) vs Kittens (blue/white). Jacks are trailing 7-14 and are in the two-minute drill. Jacks #7, A.J. Blellow, uses his Shake special ability to evade the press coverage and breaks downfield for a long TD.
Electronic football figures work great, and they come prepainted...

Techno Bowl: Arcade Football Unplugged (2017)

Players
2
Best: 2
Playing time
45–90 min
Age
14+
8.45
Average rating
321
Ratings
2.81/5
Weight
#4917
BGG rank
Top 5,000
Designer:Brent Spivey
Artist:Ben McSweeney, Derek Dow, Brent Spivey, David Forest, Lina Cossette, Tom Edwards
Publisher:Bombshell Games
Average rating, ratings count, weight and rank are sourced from BoardGameGeek (BGG).
Game DNA
  • This game: Strategy 5, Luck 6, Interaction 5, Complexity 5.6, Theme 5
Strategy5.0
Luck6.0
Interaction5.0
Complexity5.6
Theme5.0

This game's strategy, luck, interaction, complexity and theme.

SportsVideo Game ThemeSimultaneous Action SelectionHand ManagementDice RollingGrid MovementAction Queue

Overview

TECH? NO! Forget about expensive game systems, emulators, disconnected online games, and high-priced yearly roster updates. TECHNO BOWL takes everything you love about arcade and video game football classics like Tecmo Bowl, NFL Blitz, and Madden and puts it all on the tabletop.

1UP And as if that isn’t cool enough, it also gives you a feature that gamers have long asked for but never gotten… until now! What is it you ask? As a coach in TECHNO BOWL, you will design your own formations and plays. That’s right. Let me say it again. You get to design your own formations and plays.

And I’m not talking about choosing several formation cards, lining up elements on a chart, or utilizing some other abstraction. This is putting the power to effortlessly create real football formations and plays into your hands.

ZERO DOWN TIME Thanks to the BOX SPORTS ENGINE, there is almost zero down time in the game [except for half time and timeouts of course!]. Coaches are constantly involved, and the on-field players are always interacting with one another as skill checks and ever evolving plays result in: free actions, reactions, read-and-reacts, and offensive and defensive adjustments. Add to that real world timers for setting up formations and selecting plays, and you have a truly dynamic fast-paced tabletop football experience.

UNPARALLELED FOOTBALL GAMEPLAY TECHNO BOWL delivers that authentic football feel like no game before it. Establish the running game by punching it in between the tackles or tossing it to a back for an outside sweep. Launch an air offensive while sitting in the pocket or throwing on the run with laser accurate throws directly to the receiver or exciting route passes where you lead the receiver in hopes of beating the coverage. Defense can run man, zone, and mixed defensive packages and bring the blitz. Oh, can it bring the blitz!

No matter which strategy you choose, the gameplay will look, feel, and flow like a real football play.

OPTIONS TECHNO BOWL is all about options, and there’s a game mode, team, and play style for everyone. You even have the option to run an option!

MODES There are five different modes of play. Each of these brings a different experience to the table.

- TECHNO is 7-vs-7 with no skills and no field goals. - ALL TECHNO is 7-vs-7 with skills but no field goals. - INFERNO! It’s ALL TECHNO with more awesome and fire! [more later] - PRO is 8-vs-8 with no skills but includes field goal rules. - ALL PRO is 8-vs-8 with skills and field goal rules.

Each of these modes offers a completely different game experience, and I know what you’re thinking. How does adding an extra couple of players to the field [and the ability to kick field goals] equate with an entirely different mode? Trust me. Having that extra player on both sides of the ball quite literally changes everything.

MAD SKILLS When playing in modes that utilize special skills and abilities, coaches will have access to three types of players:

- IMPACT - STAR - SUPERSTAR

These players will come equipped with one or more of the 26 skills found in the game. That count of 26 skills doesn’t even include core fundamentals or INFERNO MODE specific skills.

SKILL Speaking of skills, TECHNO BOWL is a game of skill and not a random ‘dice fest’. The 2d6 rolls used for skill checks mean that coaches won’t fall prey to straight-line probabilities or random chaos. Winning is about getting the right match and modifiers to deliver a high percentage roll, having a plan when you get an unusually poor result, and knowing the right time to make a high risk roll for a shot at a very high payoff. Of course, your formations, play calling, and player positioning create these opportunities.

PLAYMAKER DIE The PLAYMAKER die powers some of the special skills in the game like stiff arms and spin moves allowing for sophisticated passive abilities to be triggered without the need for complex rules.

TEAMS There are 32 teams in the MORE FUN LEAGUE [MFL], and each of these has its own unique play style. This means that you’re not just trying to get into the head of the coach that’s sitting across the table from you, but that you have to take into consideration the strengths and weaknesses of the players on the specific rosters that you and your opponent are using.

PLAYER SKILL RATINGS The player skill rating system ensures that coaches and spectators will know how well or poorly a player performs fundamental actions by simply looking at the jersey number! No need to look at charts or extended stat lines. The league skill cap manages team composition so that you are never taxed to remember an insane number of special abilities or which players have them. Coaches get beaten by other coaches and NOT the rules.

Welcome to the More Fun League!

Expansions

Techno Bowl: Legacy League
Tech?No!Bowl: MF!C North
Not available yet

Player reviews, retailers/pricing and rules videos have no real data source for this game yet.

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