Earlier this year we got a look at The Great British Baking Show game from Ravensburger. All the prototype material showed promise and I hoped the months in between would give designers a bit more time to incorporate more of the competition show’s charm into the game. With the final product in stores, we test drove the game over the weekend and were left seeing subtle charm while feeling the experience is a bit odd.
(Note: Review copy provided by publisher)
GBBS is what I call a puzzle-match-build game. Drawing one of your random bake cards at a time (Sponge, rye, icing, filling, sprinkles, or soggy cake), you’ll race against other players to complete recipes based on dishes and categories from the show. The challenge being you can only hold one card so once you draw that card it’s either used in the bake or put in a discard pile with very limited options to be reused. The strategy comes from having to manage your cards as resources over the course of three rounds signature named from the show. With rounds being quick, this format makes for a quirky party game when you have a full four players.
As one of the show’s pandemic bandwagon fans, I have fond memories of zoom watching the charm hosts’ as the goth britt Liam projected on screen. This game didn’t invoke those memories because it didn’t fully dive into the IP its licensed. While that could have been a decision to keep costs down, only really renting the name gives this game a daunting shadow the fun parts get lost in. If anyone has played the Wheel Of Fortune or Jeopardy video game versions you’ll understand the feeling of not having the full show experience I had here. Even simply naming the contestants on the cooking player boards would have been a good touch for really getting into something resembling Great British Baking Show immersion.
The game had two paths it could have gone down in order to be a fuller experience. One, it could have avoided using the IP and come up with its own cleaver cooking name/story. The puzzle match mechanics are fun on their own as a casual all-ages party game. On the other hand, the game could have been better served by going all in on the license. A game board themed on the show’s outdoor tent stage with various stations players would need to move between to gather resources in order to be the first to finish and something that brings more of the Great British Baking Show’s unique aesthetic to the game, not just the food part.
Everything in the box is produced to the level of quality you’d expect from Ravensburger and the art style chosen is pleasing to the eyes. Great British Baking Show Game has a fun base to it, what ultimately faults it is layers of missed opportunity stacked upon it that either needed to avoid the license or utilize it to its fullest potential.
