I received Cthulhu's Rising for Christmas because my wife knows I enjoy mythos-related games. Unfortunately, the lovecraftian flavor does not extend past the game description and the artwork. Don't let it fool you, and if you are buying this game because you anticipate a bit of insane, tentacled fun, you might give it a pass.

Despite this disappointment, there is a decent game in the box. The game board contains a counter running from 10 to 0 and then back up to 10. It also contains 2 5x5 grids. The number track is for keeping score and the game-play occurs on the grids. Each player has thirty colored tiles (red and blue). The tiles are numbered 1-10 and each color has three of each number. The tiles are seperated by color, turned upside down and scrambled. Each player takes his turn by choosing one of his own tiles and placing it on one of the two grids on the board. The goal is to complete rows or columns of five, predominately in your own color and containing multiples of the same number. Points are scored each time a row or column is completed. A pair on the column gains the predominate color one point, two pairs two points, three of a kind three points and so on. If a row or column is all one color there are bonus points. The points move the scoring counter up or down on the track and the first player to 10 points wins (alternately, if all the tiles have been played the player whose side contains the scoring counter wins.)

Game play is quick and relatively engaging. The box says 20 minutes for a game but 10 is probably closer to the truth.

My main complaint, as stated above, is that the game is sold as something its really not. Just a little more effort on the part of the publisher could have helped. The scoring token, for instance, is just a standard black game pawn. Just making it a tiny Cthulhu statue would have been a vast improvement. Maybe have green as one of the primary game colors would have helped as well. Granted, the number tiles have some suggestions of monstrous madness below the numbers but the art-directors wisely did not allow this to be so bold as to make the numbers hard to read. Which means that you scarcely notice this artistic embellishment. One other complaint, the sixes and the nines are too alike. Me and my wife played two or three games before we realized we were failing to properly differentiate between the two.

So to sum up. Not a bad game. If not for the misleading premise I would probably give it a four. But the fact that it really has nothing to do with Cthulhu other than artwork is a major downer with me, so I'm giving it 3 stars.