Usually board games just swallow your time, but thanks to a successful—and not yet completed, so it could get even more successful—Kickstarter campaign, there’ll soon be one that’ll swallow your soul as well. We refer, of course, to the Evil Dead 2 board game, which premises to re-create the ultimate experience in grueling terror, only with a lot more little plastic pieces to set up. The campaign was launched last week by MerchGoat, a “geek apparel and lifestyle brand” that’s already released several series of comic books based on the movie: Evil Dead 2: Beyond Dead By Dawn, Evil Dead 2: Tales Of The Ex-Mortis, and Evil Dead 2: Cradle Of The Damned.
So how does it work, assuming your friends aren’t cool enough to be okay with chasing each other around with working chainsaws? (First one to lose a hand wins!) The campaign description says “2-6 players will work together in 60–90 minute sessions to gather pages of the Ex-Mortis while trying to survive demon attacks, supernatural events, and avoid turning into evil Deadites themselves.” So it sounds like the end goal is for each player to individually stay alive, although there is a team element in the ”gathering pages of the Necronomicon Ex-Mortis” part.
The game will also come with custom character miniatures figures representing Ash (of course) and the gang, as well Ash’s famous severed hand and a Deadite army. Apparently, the more you give to the Kickstarter, the more figures and fancy packaging you get, including a “deluxe edition” box shaped like the Necronomicon Ex-Mortis itself. Just, please—don’t read the text on the cover out loud. All it takes is one asshole who thinks it’s funny to recite the infernal words, and the next thing you know the whole world’s been turned into an army of undead monsters.
The Evil Dead 2: The Official Board Game Kickstarter has raised $242,372 as of this writing, and you can back it—$60 gets you a copy of the game, and $80 the deluxe edition—over at the campaign site.