Treasure Island Review – Long John Silver and the Case of the Fuzzy “X”

My now favourite anecdote of Treasure Island – the book – is that its original name was The Sea Cook: A Story For Boys. This is such an 1800s book name if ever I heard of one. The name, of course, is a reference to one of the meanest cooks in all fiction: Long John Silver.

Who ranks a close second behind Seinfeld’s Soup Nazi.

For those who haven’t read the book. It starts with Jim Hawkins joining an ill-fated search party to find Captain Flint’s treasure hoard. Long John Silver, a famous and evil pirate, weasels his way into this party under the guise of a one-legged cook. From there he bounces between being the scum of the earth, an endearing older gentleman, and a man so pitiable he could be mistaken for a guilty dog who earlier ate your couch.

In Treasure Island, the board game, one player takes the role of Long John Silver. Their goal is to hide a treasure chest on the island. While the rest of the table of treasure hunters search relentlessly for it.

Throughout their hunt, Long John Silver will give them clues… but they can’t always be trusted.

Get Out Your Pens

Deduction games aren’t new. Cryptid, and Letters From White Chapel, also use a big map and ask you to hunt down a single location. Treasure Island sets itself apart by allowing you to draw on the board and encouraging you to do so.

I know that will cause a few jaws to hit the floor.

A lot of board gamers respect games as a premium commodity, and drawing all over them feels taboo. But once you’re over the shock, you begin to realise how freeing it is, and how much creativity and fun it brings.

Not to mention the novelty of using rulers, compasses, protractors, and various other tools to mark your journey on the map.

For instance, when moving your character, you pick up a ruler and draw a line. Where that line ends is your character’s new position. Likewise, if you’re searching, you use the stencil to draw a circle around your character to depict the area you searched.

All of this map marking puts the history of the game in front of everyone. Not only does this help the players to deduce where the treasure is, but it also lets the story of the treasure hunt emerge. After the end of the game, you’re able to trace back your steps and tell stories about what happened and why.

Becoming Long John Silver

The funny thing about Treasure Island is that during play everyone forgets it’s a free-for-all. Instead, in most of my plays, the player’s priority was wanting Long John Silver to lose rather than win themselves. Thankfully, as Long John Silver, you’re provided with the tools to create havoc regardless of if they’ve teamed up or not.

For instance, all the information about the location of the treasure comes from you. And while the rules force you to give them clues, you can make these clues as unhelpful as possible.

Moreover, you’re allowed to lie about two of the clues you give. The treasure hunters won’t know whether a clue is truthful unless they spend precious actions to find out. Because of this, it feels like Treasure Island plays into the mystique of the Long John Silver character. Where you never know what Long John Silver is up to until the end of the story/game.

In Shut Up and Sit Down’s review of Sheriff of Nottingham, Matt spends an inordinate amount of time talking about the Velcro sack. Like seriously. I’ve never seen someone more in love with an inanimate object, and I don’t want to!

There’s a similar component in Treasure Island: the cardboard treasure chest. Each time a pirate performs a search, Long John Silver gives that pirate the chest with a token inside. It could be a hint, the actual treasure, or more likely, nothing at all.

It’s a dumb mechanic, but what fun it brings. It adds the smallest layer of suspense and annoyance to the pirate players. When Long John Silver, sits stone-faced handing over the chest, even though this is the fifth time they’ve given them an empty treasure chest.

To Err is Human

Unfortunately, Treasure Island falls prey to the same complaints I had with Cryptid. Where I’ve had games ruined by Long John Silver getting some rules wrong, or providing the wrong information. Sending my pirate figurine to search for treasure in the Shadow Realm.

That sucks but will fix itself as you play the game more.

The more interesting problem is the X mark on your small map, and how you translate it to the larger map. It kind of creates a grey area for Long John Silver. Where they have to decide how lenient they’re going to be with their X.

I always play: if it’s close enough, it’s good enough. But anyone with a competitive streak could easily turn Treasure Island from a fun activity to the dinner scene from Donnie Darko.

It’s the only fault of this mishmash of artistry and deduction. And it’s not massive, but in a game of logic, you want the conclusion to be a definitive yes or no answer. Whereas Treasure Island sort of shrugs shoulders and says, “Maybe?”

Fantastic and Playful

Before we get to any sort of conclusion, we NEED to talk about the insert.

There’s a secret compartment housing some of the components. This is a fantastic and playful addition to Treasure Island. Although it’s not great for holding or organising components mind you. But it does allow the theme to leak out of the play area and into the box.

Which I love. Because it makes the board game a bigger experience than what’s presented on the table. From box open to box close you get sucked into this world they’ve created.

Speaking of, Treasure Island is more than just a straight deduction game, it allows for cleverness and has a novelty rarely matched by other titles in the deduction genre.

Yet, if there are two things you’ve learned about me from this blog: it’s that I’m a deduction purist, and my artistic ability peaked when I was about age 4. So while I love the deduction part of the game, I found it annoying getting interrupted to draw now and again.

However, if you’re not a robot and enjoy adding a bit of creativity and flair to your games, then there’s absolutely room for Treasure Island to sit alongside other deduction games in your collection.