I would also say that if you’ve played Ghost Fightin’ Treasure Hunters and thought it was merely okay, something you would play but probably wouldn’t suggest, this may just be the thing to turn your play experience from okay to good if not great.

On the other hand, the expansion version is still significantly easier than Nightmare mode from the original. Another thing to note is that all of the cards and tokens are language independent and use artwork and iconography to get across what they mean.With such a low track record, we haven’t yet tried the cool-looking advanced version which locks certain doors and requires gems be picked up in a certain (hidden! Overall I like Ghost Fightin’ Treasure Hunters, I wouldn’t play it with other adults, but for twenty minutes of family fun this one does a good job and with the advanced mode it is tough enough to actually offer some challenge. There is also an Advanced Game that has you use the original tokens again but now they have to be delivered so that they are placed on the matching number in the cellar. I have also been able to teach this to a group of 3 rd graders who were able to play the basic game on their own by midway through the first game – and that’s a wonderful trait to have in a game that can also be played by adults. In this form, it is more of a time management issue – when do you choose to go for the jewels and when do you choose to fight off some ghosts.

There can only be two ghosts in a room at a time, flip a card that tells you you need to add a third ghost to a room and that room becomes a haunt. Now available in English, this delightful game is the winner of the coveted 2014 Kinderspiel des Jahres (Game of the Year) award, recognizing it as an exceptional game for families. There is one Cursed Treasure Tile that reduces your movement by one, one that makes you draw two ghost cards each turn instead of one, one that requires you to have an ally with you when fighting, one that stops you from using the secret passages we just talked about, one terrible one that adds a ghost to the room you are in before moving and one that pins you if you are in a room with a ghost. It is a very challenging game for us, and has become one of our go-to cooperative games (along with Samurai Spirit). It’s not only a game my kids enjoy playing on their own as well as with us, but a game that I will happily break out without the kids.GFTH is a deceivingly simple cooperative game that has a fine balance between being easy to learn and play (as you would expect of a Kinderspiel winner) and being a challenging enough game to keep the interest of gamers of all ages.