Battle Systems is a company known for their immersive cardboard terrain, which we’ve reviewed multiple times on the site. But what happens when a company that takes such careful care to create lavish scenery tries their hand at tabletop gaming? The result is something truly immersive. We saw it with Core Space, which we reviewed way back in 2019, and now they’ve sent me their fantasy tabletop skirmish game, Maladum, to check out. Read on for my review!
What is Maladum?
Maladum is a cooperative tabletop board game experience that combines skirmish wargaming with tabletop RPG elements to create a unique, ongoing story-driven game focused on bringing heroes through dungeons, finding artifacts and treasure, and getting out while the getting’s good.
In Maladum, players take on the role of Adventurers, who each come with their own statistics, special abilities, and starting equipment. In the game, you’ll play through scenarios in order starting from the very beginning of your questing, and whether you win or fail at said scenario will determine the next scenario you play in.

What’s the Maladum Setting?
The world of Maladum is set in the same world as Core Space, their sci-fi themed game that follows a similar structure. Maladum still takes place in that far-flung future, but so much time has passed that the world resembles something akin to a dark ages setting (it’s giving Hard to be a God). Technology, once developed, honed, and understood, now feels more like magic - and your Adventurers know nothing of the greater universe beyond their squalid little planet.
How does Maladum Play?
But all this is simply trappings and background noise for a game that truly does feel wonderfully medieval and fantastical. In the game, you’ll use actions to move around the board - which is brilliantly decorated with Battle Systems one-of-a-kind cardboard 3D terrain - to defeat monsters by using weapons and rolling dice.
But the coolest part of Maladum, in my opinion, is the way treasure is looted in this game. Each treasure is represented by a little cardboard chit, which you’ll put into a drawstring bag. At the start of each adventure, you (without looking) fill 3D cardboard treasure chests with those tokens.

When your hero opens a chest, you’ll gain all the tokens you have room to carry (there’s a psychical slot on your board used to hold tokens), and you may also accidentally draw trap tokens which dish out nasty damage.
The story moves along at a nice clip, seeing your heroes going off on branching quests based on whether you succeed or fail at a mission (and based on how well you succeed). From humble beginnings to powerful end-game encounters, your heroes will need to find excellent gear, level up, and keep striving.
Maladum Requires Patience
While the gameplay is clean and easy to grasp, and the board always looks incredible, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the cost that such a decked out board requires: time. You’ll need patience to properly set up a board, snapping together the right walls, gathering the correct treasure tokens, and getting everything into place.
You don’t get a game as engrossing as this without putting in extra work, but set-up is not very speedy. And as with a long plane ride home from vacation, the break down of the game after a fun, lengthy session is more exhausting than the exciting set up.

And look, I know using a word like “exhausting” is a bit dramatic - we’re not mining coal here - but I think it’s really important to highlight that you’ll either need space to store everything built out, or you’ll need the patience required to build and break down each time you play. This is easier if everyone at the table chips in, of course, but for solo players you’ll be doing a lot of scenery snapping.
Luckily, the quality of the materials - even though they’re cardboard - are the same quality we’ve come to expect and respect from Battle Systems. Everything is sturdy, gloriously illustrated, and snaps together the way it’s intended to (though guides for building everything are not included in the box, you’ll have to watch YouTube videos from Battle Systems for the trickier bits).

Maladum Final Thoughts
All that grumbling aside, I still think Maladum shines head and shoulders above many other similar games. The gameplay loop is exciting, it’s really thrilling to open up a treasure chest and see what you’ve found, and it feels especially rewarding to sink your teeth into the story.
If you’re looking to get absolutely lost in a cooperative fantasy game, you’ll find a lot to love about Maladum, with each new quest beckoning you to heed its call!
The copy of Maladum used in the creation of this review was provided by Battle Systems UK. All images courtesy the author.
Review Summary
Pros
- Fun and engaging story
- Satisfying gameplay loop
- Gorgeous plastic miniatures and incredible scenery
Cons
- Scenery involves a lot of lift to set up and break down