It honestly took me a day or two to process my feelings about this game. Not because it is borderline in terms of quality, but because it is spectacular in terms of making the player feel the emotional weight of the ill-fated card game between the three friends.

This game is fantastic once you let go of what you want to happen and embrace what does happen. In a very short period of time and a very tightly scripted format, the author takes us on a journey into the minds of three very dark young men. Or maybe the deck itself makes them that way, but I doubt it, personally.

Campus Magnum is dark. Really dark. I was surprised and a little disturbed the first time I played it. The second time, I felt sympathy for the protagonists more than anything else. But on subsequent play-throughs, I've come to see their transformative journeys as a kind of modern morality play, in the best way possible.

The pros:

This game is very pretty and polished.  The three characters have very distinct voices and there is a kind of Rashomon quality to their imposed memories that I really liked. this game is pretty. It's gorgeous, in fact. From the slick minimalist and modern char avatars of the characters to the sleek, mystical looking cards, Campus Magnum looks damned good. And it plays smoothly and well.

The cons:

This game might snatch your beating heart out of your chest , do a hat dance on it and shove it back into your chest without washing it first. Seriously, most of the outcomes are bad and getting there is brutal  in some ways. Brutal but not boring!

Some content repeats randomly and breaks the immersion a bit.

There is a lot to like about this one, if you can handle some pretty grim content. But hey, getting there is fun!