Space Cowboys | Bureau of Investigation: Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective | Board Game | Ages 14+ | 1-8 Players | 90 Minutes Playing Time

One of the best games I have ever bought. Many of the cases are moderate to hard difficulty, they require a lot of thought and discussion, can take up to 3-4 hours or even longer to solve a case! You can tell they are written out thoughtfully, the detail is meticulous. Me and my wife love playing it together! I’d recommend at least 3-4 people though to get the best out of it.

I finished this game recently with a friend and I honestly can't praise it enough. Every case is really interesting and makes complete sense when you read the solution/s at the end. There are a number of cases that work slightly different from the rest which keeps the game fresh and exciting throughout. If you are playing for the first time, there are a few points I would like to add: 1-Don't try to beat Sherlock. I think it must be possible to beat Sherlock, but I'm not sure how you would without fluking it or cheating. If you've ever read any of the Sherlock Holmes books, watched the films or TV series, you will know that he is the master detective. It works so much better for it when he explains how he solved the case in less moves than you did at the end of each case. It wouldn't be as good if he turned out to be pretty dim. I would recommend trying your best to score above 0, its ok if not, the most satisfying part is understanding the case. 2- It can be quite difficult to know when to call it. The first time we played, we wanted to see all the criminals in handcuffs but it is usually just about understanding what has happened. There is a possibility that you may get side tracked to some extent, but often you will be presented with some additional questions to boost up your score at the end. Ultimately, the more leads you follow, the more content you get, so just enjoy figuring it all out. When we played, we did pretty well (I think). The lowest score we got was +35, which from what I understand is OK, however each case took us around 4 hours or more to finish which considering the box contains 10 cases, is amazing value for the money. Just know that this isn't a party game. If you want to do well and get the most out of the game, you are in for the long haul (scrutinising newspapers, directories, the map, the case book and using all the ink in your pen collection to make a mountain of notes). Hope you enjoy it as much as I did. I will certainly buy another edition at some point, though I feel like I need a long holiday before I embark upon what was the best "board game" I have played, accompanied by essentially a ton of work.

While there is quite a bit of reading to do, it's an interesting read and at least you don't have to read over the same stuff a bunch of times so it's more a question of prioritising leads and keeping focus on what is important to investigate. I don't think the single play-through is an issue per se. At 10 cases, it's cheaper than a pint per game so well worth the relative time it takes to finish it and once you're done, I think it makes an excellent gift/share for someone else to try their hand and compare how far off you all are from holmes' deductions.

Not too many rules so it is easy to teach if you have lots of players. Great value for money for the time spent on it, probably spent about 30-40 hours on this game total.

This is a really enjoyable game (I have only played two-player). It's full of atmosphere and you really feel like you're following a proper Sherlock Holmes story (and there are 10 stories in the base game, each lasting a good hour or two depending on how much you want to investigate). he best advice I can give is just forget about beating Sherlock and enjoy the game. Don't worry about following too many leads (you will be penalised for following more than Holmes) because after playing through two cases already I can say that the Sherlock in this game has retrocognition abilities very much on par with the one in the novels. We got way more satisfaction from being able to answer some of the questions at the end of each game, half of which are like side-plot, but really flesh out the story. Worth a buy, especially if you are a total newcomer to this style of game, as I am.

Played with a group of friends. About an hour per week for 10 weeks. We played remotely via video call- both of us having a set. I even took it on a trip when I had a 5 hour break between flights (you can take just the case fine and the map and things- you don’t need the whole box just to do one case. The cases are quite varied and all of them are solvable but not obvious. This is better than the original game, which we felt ‘cheated’ and made the answers too obscure after about the third case.

The best cooperative game

The instructions for this game explicitly tell you not to make any assumptions to base everything on evidence and deduction which any sherlock holmes afficionado would expect - a couple of this game's cases require leaps of imagination not based on evidence or even logic. One on case i went through every piece of evidence in the book and still could not have got the correct answer. Not a game for the perfectionist! However very easy to learn fun and engrossing, but for the money i would go with one of the later games where these kinks have been ironed out. Just for info Space Cowboys: one small unathletic/strong person CANNOT lift a dead body of a large person up and into a sarcophagus on a plinth. Not possible without equipment!!

I love this game. It's perfect.

El producto es un juego de mesa pero está etiquetado como alimento para perros. Me siento afortunado de tener una copia.

A fascinating dive into Sherlock's Victorian London with compelling mysteries to solve. You're given a map, address book and a newspaper page (plus ones from previous cases). Armed with these, you are presented with a crime to solve and have the freedom to choose how you go about it. When you are ready, you can go to the back page of the casebook to answer a range of questions. The mechanics of the gameplay are therefore very simple and effortless to learn, but the challenge is often high. You can play solo or in any sized group. There is a scoring system, based on your ability to answer the questions correctly while visiting as few locations as possible. However, I think the game is best enjoyed without worrying about it. Exploring London, going down rabbit holes, and being tricked by inevitable red herrings is more enjoyable for me than trying to "beat" Sherlock's score (which, let's face it, is rather a fool's errand). It seems a shame to have all this narrative material and then try to ignore as much of it as possible for a high score. But players are free to play however they like, so I don't really consider it a problem. There's ten cases in the box. A couple didn't quite grab me, but on the whole they're great and well-written. While replayability isn't really possible (maybe many years later?), there are dozens more free fan-written cases available online to get more mileage out of your purchase. Highly recommended.

Fun!

This game is the best. So different than any other board game, exciting and fun! All the cases are in-depth and very detailed (or at least the 3 we played so far), the newspapers are cleverly put together and the whole game experience is just awesome. I'd highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys crime & detective stories. Bear in mind though that it's NOT a party game, when you sit down to play, you're in for a 2-3 hour sitting, reading and speculating, so don't bother bringing it to a party that was supposed to be about music, alcohol and chit-chat. Also, don't worry that the cases are not replayable. 10 is a lot, you probably won't finish it in 10 days. The cases are - as I mentioned - in-depth and can be tiring too, so once you finish them you'll feel like you just finished a very-very long book. Besides, there are two more games with 10-10 brand new cases each so if your only concern is that the cases are not replayable then drop it and just buy the game! 😃 You won't regret it.