A few years back, when my daughter was old enough that board games became a thing in the household, we started picking up a number of different things. One of them was the old version of Rallyman, an excellent racing game out of France. We played it quite a bit, but it’s sat unused for a year or so. then I saw there was a new version by Holy Grail Games for Kickstarter last year and backed it. This was for Ralleyman Dirt…I hadn’t realized they’d also done a road/track racing version, GT.

I stumbled across this new game at the excellent Ettin Games and Hobbies here in Albuquerque, and on a whim decided to buy it. The daughter and I kicked the tires on it this weekend and early this evening, and here’s the basics:

The essential design and mechanic remains: You have a rally car mini and a “dashboard” that give you information on what kind of awfulness happens if you biff it while taking your turn, depending on conditions and tire types. You still roll dice that represent the gear you are in — 1st through 6th, with two “coast dice” to hold your speed, but added are red “brake” dice to change your speed. One of the issues with the original design was that you could only drop or go up with dice you still had available. This allows you to accelerate hard and still be able to brake without having the dice to downshift. It’s a good fix.

There’s also the boards for the the track. In the original — you have a couple of board you could piece together to make different tracks, but there wasn’t a ton of modularity. The new game uses interlocking hex tiles that allow a lot more tracks to be set up. The sections of track are rated for difficulty from yellow, orange, through to red. If while rolling your dice you get a warning or ! face, this shows an increasing lack of control. If you get three, you lose control and spin out or crash and do damage. Damage takes away gear dice (starting with 6 and working down), or get you in the coast or brake dice.

When racing, the car in the higher gear goes first, and ties go to the car in front, or on the inside of the track. the turns have special restrictions for speed, and some cause automatic ! results, even if you get through. there are rules for weather, for pit stops, and there is a mechanic for saving from the dreaded ! — if you take a chnce and go “all out” you roll all the dice together. You gain a “focus point” that can be used when you roll the dice on your subsequent turns one after the other to negate a ! result.

The rules are simple, easy, and we found that the addition of the brake dice really made the game work well. The art on the tiles and in the rule book is quite good, and the car minis are simple but serviceable. The price was $50 at the FLGS.

So was it worth the price? Absolutely. If you enjoy racing board games, it’s a great buy.