TowerRex is a Ukrainian based company that make organisers and accessories for many popular board games and, as I have a popular board game called Mansions of Madness that is a bit of a table swine, I thought I might give them a whirl and buy the TowerRex Box Organiser for said game.
I bought the box organiser as I thought it might help organise the game for play more than I was worried about storage of the game as I am yet to paint the minis I do not mind them being in a bag. I will paint them at some point so this is just forward planning in my mind and should make the game a little easier to bring to the table.
The shipping took about 3 weeks from order on Etsy to arrival and I had just put together the Smonex Gloomhaven insert so it had some stiff competition in terms of my expectations of quality.
It is advertised as handmade and MDF so whilst the materials were not going to compete with Smonex the fact it was handmade should mean it made up for it in other ways.
Now, in the UK handmade means made by hands, a person crafting the item directly. In Ukraine, it would seem handmade means something else, like a hand pressed the button that started the laser or a person picked up the wood and moved it because these pieces are clearly laser cut.
That’s not a bad thing because lasers are more accurate at cutting than a man however, it’s a little oddity that you may want to be aware of before ordering.
So I sat to start the process of putting everything together, opening the pack I was immediately hit with a smell that reminded me of smoked kippers. The edges of the cuts had a brownish stain on them from the laser passes and these cuts had a sticky brown residue on the edges that made me think it was some sort of resin, perhaps from whatever was used to bond the fibreboard. After I had finished building I looked it up and found out that predominantly urea-formaldehyde adhesives are used in the manufacture of MDF. My hands had a brown stain from this residue after building and so knowing Formaldehyde is carcinogenic I scrubbed my hands with my wife’s face soap until the stains had gone completely. Perhaps if you purchase this insert it might be wise to wear gloves to construct it.
A mild dose of cancer on my hands, I began construction and have to say that whilst I did use some glue, it isn’t essential as the pieces fit so incredibly well. The instructions are clear and easy to follow and it only took about 35 minutes to have everything built.
Looking at the set before I decanted the Mansions of Madness components to the organiser I was quite taken by its design. There are gothic arches on the cardholders and brickwork etched into the sides of some of the boxes and the token trays have symbols showing you what goes where. It’s a charming design, and I would happily have paid more for it to be made from a better quality medium.
The birch plywood in the Gloomhaven insert smells and looks incredible and even if it doubled the £42 this insert costs I think it would be a wise choice to at least have it as an option.
Once I had everything in place the pieces fit into the box perfectly and the box shuts flush. I only have the base game but there is definitely room for some of the expansions, the one thing I will note here is that I have not tried to store the box vertically because I am not sure how the cards would fair and the tokens don’t have a lid. I am pretty sure the minis would be fine however as they are held very well.
Storage and build dealt with how does this insert work for the reason I bought it, getting the game to the table? Well, from grabbing the box to starting a game took about 4 minutes!
The TowerRex Mansions of Madness box organiser is an essential purchase if you want to play your game. THE END. Everything you want or need while playing is on hand and available to everyone, the cardholders, three thrones that you can sit either side of the play area at one end, the dice-box with its flourish of swirls in between the thrones, it looks incredible and is really in keeping with the theme of the game.
The tokens and monster cards, (the ones you put in the bases) have their own little boxes and make finding things really simple.
The overwhelming benefit these types of inserts, the ones that come to the table, is to get out of the way, to remove the need to spend half of your playtime searching through cardstock to find the token or thing you need and to allow you to do the thing you really want to do, play your game without as little interruption as possible.
In Summary
TowerRex Box organiser for Mansions of Madness is not perfect. Predominantly because of the materials it is made from but the build quality, design and utility make this an absolutely essential purchase for anyone who plays Mansions of Madness. Not only will it speed up the amount of time it takes to set up and break down but it looks incredible and will save an incredible amount of time when playing.