Board Game Review: Godzilla Tokyo Clash

I don’t know about you, but I love a bit of Godzilla. I totally understand the metaphor of the giant radioactive lizard and what he represents, but I am mainly there to see him stomping through a city crushing buildings and throwing tanks around.

Thankfully, Godzilla Tokyo Clash is based around that very concept. Up to four Kaiju – Godzilla, Mothra, Megalon, and King Ghidorah – fighting against each other in 1950s Tokyo with buildings being levelled and it is a whole lot of Kaiju fun.

You are Earth’s most fearsome Kaiju – Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah, and Megalon – battling for dominance as the most terrifying monster in Japan! Stomp across the vintage Tokyo cityscape, unleash devastating attacks, and throw trains, tanks, and battleships at your enemies. Master each Kaiju’s unique battle style to gain dominance before the humans drive the monsters from the city! The game features an impressive 3-D table-presence with large-scale figures, buildings, and a modular gameboard so every game is unique!

• Build and destroy a different city every game using modular board tiles
• Includes 13 sculpted buildings players can knock down each game
• Each Kaiju card deck features attacks and powers unique to that monster
• Event cards simulate humans fighting to save their city, increasing the danger to players

Place down the modular tiles to form the city (the size and shape depends on how many players there are), add the buildings and pick your Kaiju. Set up the card deck and away you go. The table presence is great with chunky Kaiju miniatures.

The rule book is nice and simple, although a little too basic in places. It could have done with maybe a little more editing to get it just right. We did have to refer back to it on occasion and had to do a bit of searching for it. It is not a deal-breaker, but worth reading through it a few times to ensure you know where everything is.

Each game has a couple of events that show what the humans are up to that take effect at the end of each round. You may have tanks heading to the monsters, battleships in the harbour, trains moving down the tracks, flying saucers zipping around and more.

The main part of the game has you smashing buildings and other Kaiju to build up your energy, which then means you can play cards from your deck that let you unleash the various Kaiju abilities.

It is the card deck that brings each Kaiju to life showing the different abilities they have. For example, King Ghidorah builds up power to activate his three heads for an ultimate attack. Godzilla can take damage to build up his energy level and use his atomic breath. The synergy of the energy collection and deck building works extremely well and can lead to some great chain attacks.

The theme is also implemented well and can lead to some iconic moments from the films. In my first game, I was Godzilla. The player who was Mothra threw King Ghidorah across the board into Godzilla, I then backhanded King Ghidorah into the ground and all three of us had a big smile on our faces at the Kaiju chaos.

Each victory sees you take a card from the other player which serves as a Trophy (you add up the victory points on each at the end of the game) which means each player’s deck gradually lessens as the game moves on.

The mechanics work well and I am looking forward to playing the different Kaiju. My only minor quibble was the aforementioned layout of the rule book.

All in all, I had a lot of fun playing Godzilla Tokyo Clash and I can recommend getting it to your table.

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