We've previously featured on Board's Eye View other titles in Funko Games' Funkoverse range. Check out our review of Funkoverse: DC Comics for an outline of how the game design by Prospero Hall works across all the range. The games all use the same core mechanics, making it perfectly possible to mix and match them in any combination you choose. Funko Games have tie-ins with several very different IPs, so you can, for example, mix characters from Harry Potter with Rick & Morty or even the Golden Girls! Along with the marvellous Funko Pop figures themselves, that's part of the joy of this popular series of very accessible games.
The Universal Monsters box is more of the same in that it shares the same core rules. Tho' it's a standalone game (as are all in the series), it too can be combined with any of the other Funkoverse games. What's strikingly different about Universal Monsters is that the board and the Funko Pops models are all in black & white. Quite right too: the monsters are all characters from various Universal Pictures horror films from the 1930s, all of which were made in black & white. So in this set you'll find Dracula, The Invisible Man, The Creature from the Black Lagoon, and the Monster's Bride from The Bride of Frankenstein.
Having said that the core mechanics are identical between Funkoverse games, with special actions triggered in the same way by spending tokens that go to a cooldown track before they can be used again, that doesn't mean that the characters are all the same. Far from it, each has their own specific special actions, and those in Universal Monsters are particularly well tied to the individual characters. The Invisible Man, for example, can take stealth actions, and the Monster's Bride has her own thematic deck of cards that can be activated.
Funko Pops collectors will snap up Funkoverse: Universal Monsters just for the figures; they are among the best in the series. Tho' the game itself is essentially only a minor variant on the others in the series, in our Board's Eye View plays we've especially enjoyed pitting these classic movie monsters against teams of DC and Marvel superheroes. And that's the point, collect the serious and you can have infinite diversity in infinite combination. Hang on a minute - isn't that the Vulcan IDIC from Star Trek? Come on Funko Games, now we need Funkoverse Star Trek sets to add to the collection.