Review: Demon Slayer Sweep the Board Is Solid Fun

The Demon Slayer (Kimetsu no Yaiba) series inspired many offshoots like games, coloring books, and other activities for fans to check out, but Sweep the Board is by far the most unique one. This particular video game adaptation involves a board game-like experience, with a twists on the Mario Party formula.

Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board is a game any fan of the Kimetsu no Yaiba series and video games should check out, especially if you have friends or family to play with. It is essentially a board game with various minigames, similar to Mario Party, but with a ton of different demon-themed twists. For one, there are multiple boards to pick from, including iconic locations from the series like Mugen Train and the Entertainment District in Tokyo. What I love about this is that the different boards have so much more to them than a simple swap of scenery. Like Mario Party, some boards have unique mechanics, such as a boat you can pay to fast travel to spots around the map with ease. Other boards have different demons to battle, including ones themed around those specific spots.

Regardless, the basics of this board game boil down to four players competing against one another. You pick which slayer to play as, then roll dice to move around the map of your choosing. Each space, as you might expect, does different things, such as causing a short minigame, granting a player some money, or even causing a negative effect that will make it more difficult for you to succeed.

While players roll the dice and move across the board, there are goals for the each one to complete. What I like about Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board is it doesn’t follow the usual linear pattern of similar board games like Mario Party. There is no usual “end” or “goal” to reach. Instead, the map picks random spots for players to reach on the board as their current mission. The first person to reach that spot gets rank points, which helps the player to rank up through the Slayer Corps.

Once a mission is complete, Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board usually shifts from daytime to night. This is when the demons come out to play. The board becomes filled with much more negative effects. A new mission will appear, which involves scouting out and defeating a specific demon located somewhere randomly on the board.

This is when the bulk of the minigames happen in Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board. Battles with the demons are often lengthy affairs with multiple stages to them. Players might hold down the button to dodge for one turn. Then in the next minigame, they might mash the button over and over to slice away at the foe. The better the players do in the minigames, the more points they earn in the results. While I preferred the button inputs, there are motion controls for the minigames as well. These involve swinging the joy-cons in certain manners. They are mostly novel, but fun enough to make the minigames enjoyable for those who like this style of control scheme.

In the end, the goal to win in Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board is to earn the highest rank and have money by the end of the allotted turns. If two players have the same rank, the winner is based on how much money they have. This is intriguing, since you can spend money on items like more dice or fast travel to influence things

Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board thrives on this fascinating cycle of daily missions per turn. So, it creates two main goals. One is trying to reach each mission point first, and the other is to do the best in the minigames. The only issue is each mission point is random and can appear anywhere on the map. For instance, there was one game where I was in dead last because of the poor dice rolls. But then a mission appeared near me, and I was able to reach it first. Within the span of two turns, I went from last to first place right near the end of the game.

What I also appreciated about Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board is it works extremely well both alone and with others. Most of the time, board games like these are only solid with friends or family. However, I found it works surprisingly well with just the AI. I played quite a few rounds with three CPU players and never had a bad time. The AI characters work well and keep the challenge high enough.

If there is anything that holds Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board back, it is mainly the presentation. I played this on Nintendo Switch OLED, and the character models look awful. The general environments are fine, but there is a severe lack of detail for the characters. They look worse than some mediocre mobile games I’ve seen. There is no excusing how bad these fan-favorite slayers and demons look. Especiall when compared to how Demon Slayer: The Hinokami Chronicles looks on the Switch.

Overall, Demon Slayer Sweep the Board is the prime board game iteration of the series for fans. While it won’t be as welcome an experience for newcomers, it is an excellent departure from the core series. The boards are varied in stellar ways, while the minigames have great controls. The non-linear nature of the missions mean it works well no matter how you play. Whether you have a party of friends to play with or just want to compete against the CPU, it all works better than I expected. It’s just a shame the characters lack so much detail visually.

Demon Slayer Kimetsu no Yaiba Sweep the Board is available right now for Nintendo Switch. PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and PC versions are on the way.