The Ares Project

Plays: 3Px1.

The Game

The idea behind The Ares Project is based on real-time strategy (RTS) games on the computer, like Starcraft, Age of Empires and Warcraft. Players start with a base and some basic units. They harvest resources, construct buildings, use those buildings to build new and better units, upgrade units, and then fight to the death. Usually there are different factions for players to choose from, and each has its own strengths, weaknesses and unique aspects.

The Ares Project implements all these using a clean overall structure. Every player has his own deck of cards. On your turn, you just play one card. If played face-down, it's a resource that you can use to construct a building or train a unit. If played face-up you use what's on the card, which can be a building or some special improvement. All this is done behind a screen so your opponents can't see what you're doing. There are some special battle cards, and when played face-up, you attack an opponent.

Other than the players' bases which are not adjacent to one another, there is one other location called the frontier, which is adjacent to everyone's base. Normally you can only attack the frontier from your base, and only after you control the frontier, you can attack others' bases. If you conquer an opponent's base, he is eliminated. You win if you are the last man standing. The game also ends if everyone runs out of cards. In this case victory is determined by the number of battle cards held and control of the frontier. Whenever a battle card is played, it is usually claimed by the player who is holding the frontier at that moment. Thus the importance of controlling the frontier although it makes you more vulnerable to attacks.

Only during battle are player screens removed, so that you can see what your opponent has built. Units are placed in a battle line, and a number of combat rounds are conducted using dice. There are four types of units, infantry, armour, air and buildings. Every unit has different attack abilities against the four unit types, so it's important to position your units well at the battle line.

Every turn a card is played into your own playing area behind a screen. You have a hand of 3 cards, and whenever you play a card, you have to decide between using it as a resource, or using the ability on its face (usually a building type). Buildings which can train new units have two halves, each for a different unit type, and when constructing them, you have to decide which half to use, and play the card with that half pointing forward.

When it is time for battle, the screen is removed, and both combatants get to see what buildings and units each other has built. Only at this point resources (i.e. cards played face-down) are converted to actual unit tokens.

The Play

Allen, Han and I did a 3-player game. I played the Terrans and Allen the Kahoum (a wizard-like human faction). These two are "normal" factions. Han played an insect-like race called the Xenos, which works rather differently. We were mostly conservative and did much build-up before committing to battle. I was first to claim the frontier, and Han was first to attack me. I managed to fend off his attack, but this battle left both of us weaker, while Allen preserved his strength and built powerful buildings and units. Later when Allen attacked me, I conceded the frontier to him. He attacked me again, this time targeting my base, so it was a battle for survival for me.

Allen's units were expensive and he didn't have many, but he had very powerful obelisks, a unique Kahoum building that support his units during battle. One of them gave instant kills by expending power, and it destroyed a full battalion of my armour units (four of them). I lost the battle and was eliminated. I had collected the most battle cards (equivalent to victory points) up to that point, but they now went to Allen.

Han's only chance of winning was to eliminate Allen, since he didn't have that many battle cards. When he attacked the frontier, Allen conceded it to him. Before his deck ran out, Han launched a final attack at Allen's base. To maximise his odds, he brought along his queen, which is the most powerful single unit in the game. Unfortunately for him he couldn't overcome Allen's defenses. Even his queen got killed. So Allen was the final victor.

The small red square board is the frontier. Whoever controls it places his faction marker on it. The orange player screen is for the Xenos faction, blue for Colossus (but Allen was actually playing the Kahoum) and green for Terran.

The final battle between Han and Allen. Units are arranged in a battle line like this. Green squares are infantry-type units, red circles are armour units, blue triangles are air units, and grey pentagons are buildings. When you attack an opponent's base, you can get your units to attempt to destroy vacant buildings instead of shooting at enemy units. You do so by attacking the Base cards, which are placed at two ends of the battle line on the defender's side.

The Thoughts

I wonder whether this should primarily be a two player game. With three or more players, it seems the first two to get involved in a battle are making themselves vulnerable to the other players. I have only tried one game so I can't say for sure. It's just a gut feel. In our game we did a lot of build-up before the first battle so it was a big one with much losses inflicted on both sides. If players attacked earlier and more frequently, this situation I worry about may not occur much.

The basic turn structure is very simple, which I like. Player turns are quick. The game is most rich in the unique faction abilities and characteristics. They all require different styles of play. You need to invest time to understand their strengths and weaknesses to fully appreciate the intricacies of the game.

I found the battle resolution procedure a little tedious. How the various unit abilities and faction abilities come into play is interesting, but there's no avoiding the actual execution. The game has the rock-paper-scissors concept of units being effective against some unit types but not others, but I didn't find the implementation particularly interesting.

In summary, I like the high-level design, didn't fancy the detailed implementation, and still need to explore much more of the faction intricacies to get a deeper understanding of the game.

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Buy from Noble Knight Games. Status: in stock (at time of this post).

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Fluch der Mumie

Fluch der Mumie (also sold as Pyramid) is a game about treasure hunters collecting treasures from a pyramid, while trying to avoid being caught by the unhappy blind mummy roaming the corridors. It is not a cooperative game. Each player has the chance to win the game as an individual, including the mummy player. However there is a nice tension among the treasure hunters, who have to compete with one another, and yet at the some time cooperate to prevent the mummy from winning.

The Game

The game has an upright magnetic board. The mummy sits on one side, and the treasure hunters on the other side. The mummy's piece has two parts, each on one side of the board. These two parts always move together because they are attracted to each other by magnets. The treasure hunters can see where the mummy is. A treasure hunter only has one piece, and there is no corresponding piece on the other side, so the mummy cannot see where the treasure hunter is.

Each treasure hunter is dealt a hand of 5 cards, dictating the 5 different artifacts he needs to collect to win the game. On his turn, he throws up to 5 dice, and chooses one die for his movement. He must move the exact number of steps, so he may not always choose the biggest number. He can reroll, but there is a risk. Whenever a die shows the mummy side, it is temporarily locked and becomes unavailable to all treasure hunters. Each such die adds to the mummy's movement on the mummy's turn. A treasure hunter can reset/unlock these locked dice only by giving a bonus turn to the mummy. To collect an artifact, the treasure hunter must land exactly on that spot. He then reveals the card depicting the artifact, and this is when the mummy finds out the position of the treasure hunter.

The mummy wins the game by catching treasure hunters a certain number of times depending on the number of players. A treasure hunter is out of the game if he is caught 3 times. Often in the early game the treasure hunters will try to help the mummy catch or hinder other treasure hunters, to give themselves a better chance to win. However if the mummy scores many captures, the treasure hunters will need to work together to prevent the mummy from winning.

It is a pretty simple game, suitable for families, and the idea is quite novel.

The game board from the treasure hunters' perpective. Light and dark blue are the treasure hunters, white is the mummy. At the bottom of the board are the dungeon (where the mummy starts and where captured treasure hunters go to) and the pyramid entrance (where the treasure hunters start).

Close-up of a treasure hunter piece and the mummy piece, and also some of the spots with artifacts.

Claimed artifacts are turned face-up. Those two below are life tokens. Every treasure hunter has three at game start, and loses one every time he is caught. Lose all and you're out of the game.

Card backs of the artifact cards. There are artifacts in 5 different colours and at the start of the game you draw one of each colour.

Close-up of the mummy piece, the one on the mummy side of the board.

The mummy side of the board.

The Play

Chong Sean, Michelle and I played this twice. Chong Sean has played this a few times, and often had to play the mummy, so in both games we let him be a treasure hunter. Michelle was the mummy in the first game. In the early game Chong Sean showed us how a treasure hunter could easily harm another treasure hunter. On one of my turns I calculated that even if Michelle were to roll the highest number on the mummy die, she would be one step short from catching me. So I bravely stopped at a spot just outside of Michelle's reach. Then on Chong Sean's turn, he did the locked dice reset, giving Michelle that exact one step to catch me. Eeeevil!

As the game progressed, I collected four artifacts (one more to go) and Chong Sean three. Michelle had caught us a total of three times, and only needed one more catch to win. There was one very tense moment, when Michelle was near both of us, and it was her turn to move. She rolled well, and would have enough moves to make a catch. As she started moving her piece, Chong Sean and I fell very silent, staring at the white mummy piece taking one step after another towards us, trying to keep our faces expressionless, while we were screaming inside. The worst part was when Michelle suddenly paused. I think Chong Sean and I both held our breath and probably skipped a heartbeat as well. Was she going to charge ahead? Or change direction? Then Michelle continued on, and SNAP!, caught one of us (I don't remember who). Game over! And Chong Sean and I immediately burst into laughter. That was one climatic horror-movie moment!

In the second game I played the mummy. It was rather lonely playing the mummy, because I couldn't see anyone else on my side of the board. I only managed to make 2 captures, but Chong Sean and Michelle later told me that there were some very close calls, in one of which I was only one step away from catching Michelle, and I turned back at the last moment. Eventually Chong Sean won by collecting his 5th artifact.

I think the game will be more fun to play with more players, because there will be more captures (which are exciting for both mummy and treasure hunters), and with more artifact cards in play and being revealed after the artifacts are collected, it is easier for the mummy to narrow down the remaining artifacts to protect. With more players, the treasure hunters also have more buffer in trying to get another treasure hunter eliminated, without risking a mummy victory too much.

The Thoughts

Chong Sean commented that Fluch der Mumie is a reversed Scotland Yard (or New York Chase), and I find it very true. It is one hunting many as opposed to many hunting one. The game is easy to teach and easy to learn - quite straight-forward. Very suitable for non- or casual-gamers and families. It is an exciting and funny game. I think the game is more fun if you are a treasure hunter. The mummy player is mostly there to provide entertainment and excitement to the rest of the players, but I think even playing the mummy can be quite fun if there are more players. It is very satisfying to hear that snap when you capture a treasure hunter, and his player piece snaps onto yours on the other side of the board.

New York Chase / Scotland Yard

I played a 5-player game of New York Chase at Carcasean boardgame cafe on 26 Jun 2009. Chong Sean was Mr. X (game owner / cafe owner is normally asked to do the honours of being on the lonely one-man team), Han, Kevin, Choo (2 new friends) and I played the detectives.

I actually intended to try Scotland Yard (played on a map of London), which is the older game and is very similar. Chong Sean has both Scotland Yard and New York Chase. Somehow we ended up playing the latter. Maybe it was because it has more elements - the helicopter and roadblocks.

New York Chase is a game about a team of detectives trying to catch Mr. X, the fugitive. Mr. X moves secretly and records his trail secretly on a piece of paper. The only clues he leaves are the modes of tranportation used to get from one location to the next (taxi, bus or subway). In specific rounds, Mr. X must reveal his location, making himself vulnerable. The detectives need to make good use of such opportunities to quickly surround and corner Mr. X.

Each detective has a limited number of tickets for the 3 types of transportation. Once he uses up his tickets, he cannot move anymore. If Mr. X can last until all detectives are unable to move anymore, he wins. If he is captured (by simply being on the same spot as another detective), he loses.

There are some twists. Mr. X has two double-move cards which can help him to get out if tight spots. He also has some black tickets (wild cards) which can hide his mode of transportation, and can also be used to take a ferry, which the detectives can't take (NYPD forgot to buy them some ferry tickets I guess). The detectives have a helicopter which can be used 3 times in the whole game to transport one detective quickly to any place in the city. There are also road blocks (if you play with less than the maximum number of detectives allowed) that can be set up when a detective leaves a location.

The game is a lot of deduction (for the detectives) and bluffing (for Mr. X to try to escape) and double-guessing. The detectives need to work together, just like in any cooperative game. The game mechanics is quite simple. Scotland Yard would be even simpler, without helicopters or roadblocks. The game is also a lot about planning. Mr. X needs to plan ahead for the rounds when he has to reveal his location. He needs to make sure he is at a place with many escape routes. The detectives need to plan for these rounds too, to make sure they are at strategic locations to be able to react quickly the moment Mr. X's location is revealed.

Chong Sean. The game comes with this hat-like thing, to allow Mr. X to hide his eyes, so that the other players cannot see which part of the board he is looking at. Something like this is useful for Ticket to Ride too.

New York. Four detectives at their randomly drawn start positions. Mr. X is off the board for now. His location is secret.

Close-up of the streets of New York. The pawns are half transparent, so that you can see the numbered locations.

Mr. X is the white capped pawn. The yellow pawn is riding the helicopter and is about to disembark to the spot on the left of Mr. X. The yellow disks are the roadblocks. When a detective leaves a spot, he can leave behind a roadblock. Depending on the number of detectives in play, the number of roadblocks differ. Once they are all on the board, you can still set up a new roadblock, but you'll have to take down one of the existing roadblocks.

Chong Sean was nervous in the game, because all of us were plotting aloud how to trap him and catch him. There was nothing subtle about it. He probably felt like a goat listening to the butchers discussing how it was going to be slaughtered. We had him trapped by about Round 18, just past the mid point of the game. So the detectives won. Chong Sean checked that the last time he played, Mr. X was also captured at about that time. The helicopter was a tremendous help. We had used up all three of our helicopter flights, and if we hadn't caught Chong Sean at that point, we might not have been able to do so anymore for the rest of the game. Roadblocks did not seem very helpful. Maybe we haven't learnt to use them well yet.

Quote of the game: "I hate helicopters" by Chong Sean.

I enjoyed the game. This is suitable for families, and I'll probably try to get a copy. I'll likely get the Scotland Yard version though, because my wife used to live in London, so the nostalgia factor may make her enjoy it more.

Space Hulk

On 18 Apr 2009 Han and I played Space Hulk, a copy he bought from eBay I think. This is a classic (old and well-liked) game, and I was surprised to find that it is still in the top 100 at BoardGameGeek.

The background story is that humankind (which has settled many planets and star systems) is being invaded by an alien race called the genestealers. These aliens send their invasion force in large spaceships called space hulks to human-inhabited planets. One of these space hulks has been intercepted, and the space marines (humans) are now boarding it to try to wipe out the genestealers. The genestealers and strong and fast (just like the aliens in the Alien movie series). The space marines are armoured and armed and can shoot from a distance, but are not as fast or nimble. There are very many aliens on board the space hulk, and they attack the space marines wave after wave. The space marines need to survive the onslaught and complete their mission before they are overwhelmed. 6 scenarios come with the game. The human player wins if the space marines succeed their mission, the genestealer player wins otherwise.

This is the setup of the first mission - small rooms, narrow corridors and doors (the green stand-up cards). There is a team of 5 marines at the top right. They need to make their way to the room in the lower right and blast it with a flamethrower in order to complete their mission. In this scenario there are 6 points where genestealers can appear - the open-ended corridors on the left half of the board.

Genestealers first appear as blips, i.e. moving and blinking spots on the marines' radars. Each blip token has either 1, 2 or 3 on its hidden side, which only the genestealer player knows. The blips get "converted" into real life aliens when they move into a location where they can be seen by the marines.

Each space marine team has 5 members. 3 regular guys who can shoot regular guns, 1 captain who can shoot regular guns and is slightly stronger (but still not as strong as the genestealers) in hand-to-hand combat, and 1 flamethrower guy who cannot shoot regular guns but has a flamethrower with 6 shots. The flamethrower is a very powerful weapon. It often kills everything in its path, and the flames block entry to a whole room or a whole corridor until the next round.

I played the space marines and Han controlled the aliens. Normally the human player has a limited time in taking his turn, but since this was my first game, we played without this rule. This rule is to simulate the chaos and to create the tension of a mission, when the humans really do not have much time to think.

The markers that come with the game:

• Top left: blips, which show 1, 2, or 3 aliens on their hidden side.
• Top centre: command points chips. There are 6 such chips numbered 1 to 6. In each round, the human player randomly draws one and looks at it, but hides it from the genestealer player. For that round, the human player gets that many extra action points which can be used on any marine, and can also be used during the genestealer player's turn. This is an action point game, where you need to use action points to move, turn, shoot, fight, unjam your gun, open a door etc. Marines get 4 APs, genestealers get 6AP. This means the aliens are faster and nimbler.
• Top right: Overwatch marker, showing the jam icon on the other side. When you order a marine to set up an overwatch, he takes a defensive position and points his gun in a direction. On the genestealer player's turn, this marine on overwatch gets to shoot every single time a genestealer moves. Obviously this is important for the marine player considering how few APs he gets. However during an overwatch the gun may jam, and the marine won't have any more free shots, and will need to unjam his gun next round before it can be used again.
• Bottom: Flamethrower markers. There are 6 each for marine teams A and B. Some scenarios have the marine player controlling 2 teams.

My team of marines. I think they come unpainted, and you need to paint them in order to tell them apart. Han bought this second-hand, partly painted. He only painted the grey ones, just to set them apart as the regular marines. The unpainted marine will be the captain, and the already-painted-in-red one will be the flamethrower marine.

Genestealer and marine on two sides of the door.

Now, onto the mission itself.

My team of marines quickly moved through the first room. One marine opened the side door and set up overwatch for any genestealers, while the rest continued to file out of the room. Indeed the genestealers came. Thankfully the marine on overwatch managed to shoot them down before they reached him.

As the marines proceeded to the branch in the corridor, I realised how restricted movement and line of sight are. In the narrow corridors, only the marine in front can see and shoot at genestealers. The other marines behind him can't help much at all. If a genestealer reaches and kills that first marine in melee combat, the second marine will have little time to aim and shoot at the genestealer, before he himself is engaged in melee combat too, a very dangerous thing.

I had my captain lead the way down the branch, the flamethrower marine right behind him. One regular marine set up overwatch guarding the main corridor.

Han's genestealers started to grow in numbers, and they hid behind the corners, just out of sight so that I could not shoot and could not tell their numbers. In the photo above, one blip (i.e. unknown number of genestealers) and one genestealer are hiding just out of sight of the marine captain. The humans are always the ones under time pressure. They do not get reinforcements. One new genestealer blip appears every round, so if the marines do not act quickly to complete their mission, they will eventually be overwhelmed by the genestealers.

Knowing the time pressure on my marines, I forged ahead. I, being the cold-blooded commander, decided that someone has to "take one for the team", i.e. die, in order to complete the mission. My captain, who had been quite a good shot, and who had even defeated a genestealer in hand-to-hand combat, was the brave one to push ahead to allow the flamethrower marine to come up. He got himself killed. The flamethrower marine used quite a number of blasts to kill genestealers and also to set the corridor on fire to prevent them from approaching closer. However, ammo was running out, and he must keep one last shot for completing the mission - destroying the control room.

The flamethrower marine made took two shots to kill the two genestealers right in front of him, then quickly moved into that final short corridor leading to the control room. Another brave, ready-to-die marine moved up to the corridor junction to hold that position, and to block the advance of the other approaching genestealers. But we all knew he would probably only be able to slow down the genestealers for a few seconds, using his own body as an obstacle. And a few seconds was what I needed for the flamethrower marine to open the door to the control room, and to blast it with his last shot. Thankfully flamethrowers do not jam in this game.

The remaining marines probably wouldn't make it back out alive, although they have completed their mission (and won me the game). Now I have to think of how to explain to their families how I had sent them to die.

I liked the game more than I expected. I have played Descent: Journeys in the Dark once before, also Han's game. We didn't complete the game due to time constraint, but from that half-game I thought it was just so-so. I liked Space Hulk. Maybe because of the simplicity. The game felt fast and furious. It may be because of its simplicity, which allowed the turns to be played quickly. I imagine if I play with the full rules which sets a time restriction for the marine player, it will be even more fast and furious. No wonder it's still a BGG Top 100 game.

There were some rules that we weren't very sure about. The rules were not clear enough. So we had to play with what we agreed was logical. If the flamethrower marine stands at the mouth of one corridor at a crossroads junction (let's say the 1st space of the southern corridor), and shoots at the mouth of the next corridor (let's say 1st space of the eastern corridor), how does the fire spread? Does it spread only down the eastern corridor? Does it spread down both eastern and western corridors, including the single space at the junction itself? We agreed on the former. We had already agreed that the flamethrower can shoot at 45 degrees in the first place, making this scenario possible. Can anyone confirm?