I’ve had In Too Deep in my collection for the last 4 or 5 years, but I only managed to play a full game of it this month! It’s quite a heavy game, so when trying to field it for the first time with friends, we ended up only playing the first part of the game (this happened twice). But I had a motivated buddy who likes big games, so we finally played one game from start to finish, and we had a blast!
In In Too Deep, all players work for a secret agency that fights against the criminal organization The Syndicate. Players hook into criminals to control them on the board. They can move them, make them pick up items, use their powers, or activate the effect of the zone they’re in. Each time the players make the criminals accomplish missions, they gain Intel and clues about the bigger plot of The Syndicate, but they can also slowly get corrupted by drawing some Dilemma cards.
The goal of the game is to be the player with the most Intel at the end of the game and to foil The Syndicate plan. However, there is a twist: the player with the most corruption points (indicated on the Dilemma cards) is in too deep, they went too far in the criminal mind. They get penalized in the final score count if The Syndicate plan is foiled. All Dilemma cards can generate Intel for the players at the end of the game, so being the most corrupted player means you’ll get a lot of points. If the plan is foiled, however, you’ll get a huge malus for falling to the bad side.
There are tons of different keywords during setup, 4 boards (yes, really! Evidence, Syndicate, Player, and Zone boards), and quite a lot of components (3 card stacks, 2 token pools…), so it can be intimidating for new players. It also felt quite hard to estimate how many points you’d get at the end of the game during the scoring phase. So I’d recommend playing the first game a bit blind on that side, and everything gets clearer once the first game is completed.
Controlling the criminals to complete missions is super fun, as you unlock the powers of the criminals and store some Boost tokens (allowing you to do extra actions) from side crimes, you can end up doing crazy things in a single turn. It’s like trying to find the solution to a puzzle each round. Sometimes you can’t complete any missions in a single turn, but you can set up two of them for the next one or create a contingency plan in case another player touches or moves a criminal or an item you need. Completing a difficult mission in one turn is satisfying and a big part of the fun factor of this game for me.
We played a 2-player game, but I did the first acts with 3 or 4 players already, and more players means more chaos when trying to complete missions, which is fun. It’s also a bit more interesting because it’s harder to guess who’s the in too deep player. In a 2-player game, it’s kinda obvious who’s in too deep.
The theme is fantastic, the little lore on each mission is fun and matches the required objectives, which is cool. Each criminal seems powerful in different ways, even tho in the game we did focus on 3 of the 5 available to us. We just didn’t want to let another player gain too much grip (the level of connections with a criminal, allowing the player to do extra-actions) with a single one of them, so we competed a bit for the ones we found the most interesting. The ~10-ish miniatures are pretty as well, so if the game starts to become a regular at my table, they’ll definitely be painted up!
Final thoughts
It was a bit of a running gag that we never finished a game of In too deep in my friend group, and now, it’s over, we did it. The curse is broken, and I’m more familiar with the rules and system, it’s time to play it more!
I think I might try the solo mode next, and of course, another run with 3 or 4 players to try a different strategy.