Review – Golden Goal

Just in time for the FIFA World Cup (and specifically USA vs Bosnia And Herzegovina) Golden Goal allows players to play out the excitement of a 1-goal-takes-all scenario. Strategically position your players, outmaneuver your opponent, and get a little lucky to win this pocket-sized game. So, is this a no-brainer starter, or should you leave this one on the bench? 

Review 

Each player will choose a team and take turns placing their players on the field. There are a few placement rules to keep in mind, which are largely there to ensure whoever goes first doesn’t score a goal on a high roll. To determine the first player, each player rolls the dice. Whoever rolled the higher number subtracts the lower-rolled number from their roll, and that’s the total number of pips they can use. For future turns, players will simply roll the dice and use that number of pips.

Pips are used to move players and the soccer ball. Players move orthogonally (up/down/left/right, like a rook in chess), but the ball can move in any direction (like a king in chess). When players enter the space with the ball, they get to move the ball 1 free space, and can continue moving the ball according to how many pips are left on their dice roll. The ball must move in a straight light, but can be “curved” once, which essentially means you can move the ball diagonally once and then in a straight line to get around a defender, etc. 

Because only the ball can move diagonally as well as orthogonally, it’s often behooving to move the ball along angles, just like in soccer. You’ll need to set up your players to either block the opponent from an easy goal or to set yourself up to score a goal—as in soccer, it’s often difficult to do both, so you’ll often experience multiple momentum swings before someone scores a goal. 

The components are good: the meeples look great, but I do wish they were sturdier, purely so they could stand on their own on the cloth game board. The cloth field works great, when it’s not creasing and causing players to topple over. This is also a smaller game, so some players with bigger fingers may find moving the meeples and the ball difficult. 

While luck ought to be a part of any sports tabletop game, luck can take over games in Golden Goal. It doesn’t matter how well my players are positioned, if I’m rolling 1s or 2s for a few consecutive turns, I’m going to get scored on. I wish Corné van Moorsel would have included a modified d6, eliminating the 1 and 2 and adding additional 3s and 4s. Then players would know they have a ⅔ chance of getting a 3 or a 4, and a ⅙ chance of a 5 or a 6, and can plan accordingly. There’s not much you can do with a 1. 

Golden Goal is a fun little game that delivers the excitement of a soccer match in a pocket-sized game box, even if it is luck-heavy. Recommended for a quick, fun time and for soccer fans. 

Allplay (Asmodee North America) kindly provided a review copy.