by After sharing in the Inn all the contents of Brazilian and Japanese versions of classic HeroQuest, now I am so glad to also share with you the game contents of probably the most difficult language variant to be found of classic HeroQuest: The Hebrew Edition.
The existance of this version of HeroQuest has been really unknown by most of the fans worldwide, including me of course, until just a few months ago, when a couple of pictures of the box were shared through social media and also on this forum website. Even Ye Olde Inn website frontpage never shew the Israel flag as one of the HeroQuest available languages, because nobody noticed it in decades!! Now, we are really lucky to be able to see its contents thanks to the collaboration of Facebook member and HQ fan Shlomy Garaya, who kindly given to me good scans of his box's content and permission to upload them here to be enjoyed by the rest of Inn members. All credit for him on this contribution with the classic HeroQuest legacy, otherwise I would bet finding those scans had been a really difficult challenge. THANKS A LOT SHLOMY!!
I shorted and edited the scans to make them handable, you may find them iside this ZIP file. Please, notice that unfortunatelly there are a couple of missing card scans (one Gold card and Talisman of Lore card), but I schematically mentioned them in the pdf's for a better identification:
Note 1: Tiles file is not included in the PDF because the tiles are the same as any other EU version of the game.
Note 2: As far as I know, didn't exist expansions in Hebrew language, only existed the basic game box.
And now... WHAT DIFFERENCES HAS THIS HEBREW EDITION OF THE GAME COMPARED WITH OTHERS? Well... I have not still checked everything and I invite you to do it and comment, but the Hebrew edition has -generally- the same rules as the 1st Edition of EU versions of classic HeroQuest, the one released in 1989, nothing found exotic about the rules... BUT THEY ARE NOT 100% THE SAME, there are some really interesting differences which are at least the following ones:
- - Rulebook and Questbook are basically the same as 1st edition ones... but questbook does not include the Monsters descriptions at the last page nor Painting suggestions in the back cover which has no texts.
- All the cards are the same as the ones included in the 1st edition of HeroQuest, EXCEPT THE EQUIPMENT CARDS DECK which correspond to the one included in the 2ND EU Edition of the game, but in hebrew. YES, the Equipment cards deck includes Bracers and Cloak cards and the Short Sword may be used to attack diagonally. This is for sure one of the most relevant aspects of this version fo the game, suggesting it could be considered a mixture between 1st and 2nd Editions of the EU versions of the game. I would like to also confirm that Treasure cards are the ones from 1st edition of EU versions because they say that good cards must be returned to the deck, however bad cards not (the opposite than 2nd EU edition). Please, if you find pictures of the Talisman of Lore and the missing Gold card, it would be great to complete the set of files.
- Aesthetic topics are the same as the rest of EU versions of the game, however due to the language change matter, Rulebook and Questbook are read in the opposite way as the rest (including the Japanese ones, which could have also do the same but they didn't).
- All the quest maps are incorrectly orientated in the questbook because most of them are rotated 180º respect to the quest parchment and notes, so the Evil Wizard player would be all the time turning the book, or he had to place the board turned 180º than in the rest of HeroQuest versions to match its orientation with the one shown in the questbook pages. Moreover, Quest #1 map is horizontally mirrored. I would bet these mistakes were probably caused by the language change fact because the original EU questbook was intended to be read in the opposite way as the hebrew one and editors probably missed that the quest maps should have been also rotated like the texts.
- Quest #14 has also an exclusive errata of this edition, it does not show any stairway icon, leaving blank its place in the map.
- There are also more exclusive errata in the maps, because this edition does not use to show the label of the special characters in the maps like "ULAG", "SIR RAGNAR", "BALUR" or "CELL", so somethimes it is not posible to know by the Evil Wizard were those characters should be placed onto the board.
- No copyright year number is written in any component of the game nor "Games Workshop" logo (maybe in the box but as as far as I know they aren't there either), nor the usual copyright text written in other HeroQuest versions. MB GAMES logo is shown in the box but not in the rulebook or questbook, however I can confirm "Citadel Miniatures" is mentioned on page 3 of the rulebook. The rights of this version of HeroQuest seems to me a bit messy since I couldn't find the release year of this version. Shlomy told me that it could be well started the 90s, not in 1989 necesarilly, which fits with the existance of Bracers and Cloak equipment cards inside it, so minimum 1990 should be the release year or a later one. As far as I could investigate, the game books were printed by Orda Print Industries Ltd. (that's the Company mentioned in the last page of the questbook as copyrighted), and the game was distributed in Israel by KODKOD International Board Games Company, however this company didn't get officially any Hasbro license until year 2004, surprisingly, but as far as I have checked, they used to do it also with other MB board games before like Taboo, so I guess a kind of agreement with MB should have existed before 2004.
- Just a final detail, the Character Sheets show the label "4271 GB 389", so it suggests they used the 1989 UK edition as template to create the Hebrew stuff.
About the character and artifacts names, I have not identified any big differences with the EU ones (The Evil Wizard is also called "Morcar", Loretome is also called the same, same name for Mentor and the historical Heroes, etc), and the story looks to be exacly the same, but as said, I have not checked all, so I encourage you to do it and share your findings.
Well, here is all the info I have, any more details you may know or discover about this edition, please post and comment below!
Enjoy!
REMARK: I would like to remember that all these files are fan creations FOR PERSONAL USE ONLY, so selling printed or digital versions of them in any way or website like eBay or similar is not authorized in any case. Thank you for your comprehension.
