Hollywood 1947 Game Review

Written by Emma Garrett

What is Hollywood 1947?

The year is 1947, the cold war is hotting up, and we’re in Hollywood, baby! It’s the latest volume in Facade’s quirky “Dark Cities” series. Each game pairs a city with a year to set up a riotous social deduction and light strategy game. The boxes look like beautiful old books, making them probably the most recognisable series in modern board gaming. Hollywood 1947 sees a group of filmmakers in post-war trying to make sure no communist messages are snuck into their latest blockbusters. Of course, there are communists amongst you with their own message to spread and a rising star switching sides depending on where the wind is blowing - frankly, my dears, they don’t give a damn about politics.

 

How do you play Hollywood 1947

 

Patriots and communists are trying to make four films of their alignment, the rising star is trying to keep things tied right up to the end. A film becomes patriotic if it shows more patriot symbols than communist - communists win ties. The symbols come from the film poster and the cards that players choose to play from their hands. There are nine roles, each with different actions they can choose to perform including choosing which of two random cards to add at the end, or forcing a player to discard their current hand. Instead of your action, you can choose to switch your role for one in the middle.

 

There’s a little more luck involved than in many other social deduction games. As well as a random hand of five cards - drawn from a deck weighted in favour of the communists - everyone has a dice in front of them. Dice can be rerolled instead of using your character’s action, but if your die doesn’t show a star by the end of the round, you’re not putting a card into this film. It adds an extra dynamic to the social plays: you can ask to be rolled out if you have a bad hand of cards, patriots will try to roll out suspected communists, and communists will try to roll each other back in. 

 

The group I played with were unsure about the luck element, some finding it unsatisfying that even when they figure something out and try to make a play for their team, the roll can just go against you. The dice themselves are eight-sided monstrosities, that don’t roll well nor sit comfortably. We had more than one occasion where dice had been knocked while passing cards around the table causing confusion and tongue-in-cheek accusations. Given they have four stars and four blank edges there’s no real reason but novelty for them to be so awkward. 

 

Rules for Lower Player Counts

If you want to be alone, Hollywood 1947 has adapted rules for 1-3 players. It’s not a social deduction game anymore, but the strategy elements still play out very nicely. In the solo game, the challenge is in choosing which roles to use, and how to best manipulate the randomly dealt cards to where you want them. It was satisfying, possibly a little too easy to win, but I may have been getting lucky. 

 

 

Hollywood 1947 Review

There’s a lot going on in this game, but it never feels unmanageable. Each turn only allows a player to do one thing: your role-specific action, two rerolls, or switching your character card. This limitation allows strategy to come to the fore. Ostensibly suspicious plays can often be written off as ill-advised strategy, giving the communists not only bad luck but also bad decisions to hide behind. It’s a beautiful looking game that is simple enough to pick up quickly, and strategic enough to take it beyond pure social deduction. It’s a really fantastic game, that I can’t wait to play again.

 

Should you play it? Yes

A brilliant, not-so-serious bluffing card game where there is rarely too much direct pressure on any one player.

 

You should try playing this if you liked One Night Werewolf, or One Night Ultimate Werewolf - as you've tried lying to a village of your friends, so let's step things up and cause mischief in Tinseltown.

 

Buy Hollywood 1947 on Amazon

 

On the Box

Designer: Travis Hancock

Publisher: Façade Games

Time: 20-40 minutes

Players: 1-9

Age: 14+

RRP: £24

 

In the Box

4 Tokens

9 Star dice

9 Film strips

15 Genre posters

78 Cards

Rulebook

 

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