There is perhaps nothing better than getting an unexpected box in the mail, and this week I received the most amazing surprise ever from Marrow Production... a copy of Journey: Wrath of Demons! As backers of the Kickstarter are anxiously awaiting their copies of the game, they thought it would be great to give Beasts of War an early exclusive peek of their long awaited game.

We'll explore this fantastic game in two parts, starting with the contents of this beautiful box!

What's In The Box?

Let start with the outside and work our way in, shall we? The box itself is really beautiful with graphics wrapped around it, including pictures of the minis and a list of contents on the back of the box - which I LOVE.

The packaging of a game can really make or break the impulse buy of a game for me, since that contributes to the "hook" initially. Plus it looks even more amazing on your shelf!

When we lift the lid of this really heavy box of goodies, you see right away that they really paid attention to detail and ensuring that the contents of your game would survive shipping and handling nicely and keep your beautiful miniatures nice and safe until they arrive in your hands. With the box top removed, you see 2 more boxes, branded nicely by Marrow, that store the majority of the miniatures.

When you lift out the two internal boxes, you see one more box, as well as the rest of the contents required for the game - but let's focus on the what's in the boxes first.

Within these three boxes, the miniatures rest perfectly in clear plastic trays that have prevented them from moving around, warping or (heaven forbid) breaking while in transit. And when I said they are "resting" in the trays, they are literally sitting in spots that have been molded for their shape, and they lift out perfectly.

There is no fighting to free them from the sometimes too careful packing, where you end up breaking fragile pieces from your miniatures when you try to take them out.

It's safe to say that the resin miniatures with killer paint jobs shown off by companies will always show off their products in the best way possible. We have all seen examples of this, where you get very excited about how minis look on project, and then they just fall a little short when you receive the final product. Well let me tell you, once you get into these boxes, you will be absolutely blown away by how gorgeous these miniatures are!

The Miniatures

The miniatures for Journey completely live up to your expectation as they have translated beautifully into the plastic miniatures Marrow promised. The larger of the three boxes house the heroes: Monkey King, Cho Hakkai, Monk Sha and Tripitaka, as well as the smaller demons. The Third, smallest box, holds the two largest miniatures: the fearsome Koorogg, and the stunning Kei Lun.

The miniatures are not only beautiful, but are extremely well made. They are solid (no assembly required) and have next to no mold lines! They have to be the most detailed, mass production plastics that I have seen! Now if only my painting skills were more impressive...

Now where were we?

Cards, Tiles, Dice & More

The rest of the contents, right. When you move beyond the boxes of miniatures for the game, you see the rest of the contents for the game which includes character cards, dice, a spinner, tokens, various card decks required for game play and perhaps most importantly, a full color rulebook.

The rule book is really well done, with pictures of all the pieces so they are easy to identify and step by step instructions for game play, which should make it relatively easy to get straight into game play. From the reading I've done so far, they do brilliant job of explaining the mechanics and turns in a conversational way, which is really cool because it feels like you are sitting with friends teaching you how to play.

As for the rest of the goodies? The large square game tiles are printed in vibrant color and there are also thin bridge tiles which allow for numerous different configurations for game play. These will make for a lovely, diverse playing area. There is also one square tile's worth of tokens for the game, and I have to say, they do a splendid job in the rule book of clearly identifying which tokens are which so there's no confusion when the time comes during game play (this has been a real annoyance for me in a couple recent games).

The character cards for the heroes and Kei Lun are both beautifully done and useful. They have built a slide mechanism into them with small plastic arrows for you to adjust life totals, as well as dials for you to control "good Karma, bad Karma, and Chi"- so there's no need for laminating or dry erase markers!

The custom dice are lovely and themed both with symbols and numbers (which is great, so there's no having to refer to charts for what the rolls mean). There are four different colors represented: white, blue, red and black- each being indicative for specific use in play.

There are eight types of cards required for game play, and they have done a wonderful job of making the cards different sizes and clearly labelling the top of the cards so you can clearly distinguish which decks are which (there's no having to debate over similarly colored borders, or questionable symbols to separate them). And finally, there's the fate spinner. This Yin & Yang spinner dictates whether your heroes gain fortune or suffer misfortune while meditating at the mystical box in game play.

So just in case you can't tell, I am completely enamoured with this game! It's visually stunning, the miniatures are amazing, the components are straight forward and the rules appear clean and easy to interpret. It's safe to say that I am looking forward to trying it out. If you don't already have a copy of the game on the way from the Kickstarter...What are you waiting for?

The game is available for pre-order from the store on their Facebook page. So if you'll excuse me, I have a game to play. Be sure to keep an eye out for part two of this journey where I explore game play for Journey: Wrath of Demons.

What do you think of the incredible miniatures for Journey?