Race for the Galaxy
In Race for the Galaxy, players build galactic civilizations by game cards that represent worlds or technical and social developments.
Each round consists of one or more of five possible phases. In each round, each player secretly and simultaneously chooses one of seven different action cards and then reveals it. Only the selected phases occur. For these phases, every player performs the phase’s action, while the selecting player(s) also get a bonus for that phase.
For example, if at least one player chooses the Develop action, then the Develop phase will occur; otherwise it is skipped. In it, each player may simultaneously select a development from his hand of cards to build. After revealing the cards, each player adds his development to his tableau of cards on the table and then discards cards from his hand equal to its cost. Each player who chose Develop discards one card fewer as his bonus.
Explore allows a player to draw cards and select which of them to add to his hand. Settle allows a player to place a world in his tableau. Some worlds produce goods, represented by face down cards, when Produce is selected. These goods can be discarded for victory points or sold to add cards to the player’s hand by selecting Consume. With cards, players can settle new worlds and build more developments, gaining both victory points and card powers that provide advantages in certain phases.
The player who best manages his cards, phase and bonus selections, and card powers to build the greatest space empire, wins.
The winner is the player with the most victory points.
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Show me another game that has constant strategic choices, yet finishes in under an hour. Yes, as others have commented, the learning curve getting into the game is steep. After introducing a dozens of new players, it still takes me half an hour to get the core concepts of the game across, and the new player doesn’t stand a chance for their first game while they put the ideas into practice. But what deeply strategic game with high replay value doesn’t face the same issue?
In my play group, Race is the game of choice when nobody has another game of Battlestar or Agricola left in them, but isn’t ready to call it a night quite yet. Or when we’ve got 2+ tables of games going, and one table needs to kill half an hour waiting for the second to finish up before we start the next round of big games. It’s worth playing on it’s own, but it’s ability to satisfy power gamers while squeezing into the cracks between other games is what keeps Race on the top of the shelf.
I really like Race for the Galaxy. It’s a good game. I would call it more tactical than strategic, but sometimes that’s what is called for. It really takes the system of San Juan and up the ante. It is very satisfying to build up a tableau of planets and developments and then throw down a couple six-point develpoments that makes your score skyrocket.
My biggest issue is teaching the game. It’s a steep buy-in to learn the iconography, and more casual gamers will almost always be put off by it. Then add in the fiddly rules of the expansions… and suddenly I have a great game that I absolutely never want to teach to anyone again.
I love playing this game. However, even as an avid gamer, it took me at least two playthroughs to figure out what all the cards meant and how to play the game. After that, it was at least ten more games before I could say “these are the coherent strategies.”
Given that you have gotten your mind around how the game functions, Race is one of my favorite games to play, ESPECIALLY the two-player variant, which adds a little more strategy and a little less chance to the mix.
One downside: I never remember the name of this game. If I tell my friends I want to play Race for the Future, they just have to shake their heads and be ready to take over the galaxy.
The iconography used in Race for the Galaxy probably seemed like a way to make things more elegant. Printing a paragraph of text on the card seems like cheating. Unfortunately, I kinda wish these cards did just have some text explaining their effects. The problem is that there are so many different possible effects a card may have, the resulting iconography requires the constant presence of a Rosetta Stone in the form of the reference card to decipher.
The game succeeds despite this by offering a number of strategic possibilities. You’ll try to find the cards which most quickly and efficiently spit out victory points. I haven’t scratched the surface in the three games I’ve played, but I can see the possibilities starting to show through in my next few plays.
Although the implementation lacks elegance, the mechanics make up for it.
At first Race for the Galaxy doesn’t seem like much, but I find myself playing this game over and over again. Whenever the question is “which game do we play?” Race for the Galaxy seems to be the best and most agreed upon answer.
The rhythm of the different strategies in the game is what really gets in my bones. Military explores for new cards and settles. Alien and genes strategies produce and consume trade, with brief forays to settle or develop. Development strategies explore and develop.
On top of this, the strategy can be really deep, the interaction is limited in a good way, and the special bonus yellow chips make varied strategies viable. I love this game.
That said, the attempted symbolic communication of individual card mechanics is inscrutable for new players. They really should have just stuck with words.
Race for the Galaxy is one of my favorite games. The learning curve for the iconology is very steep. Fortunately, this is a deeply rewarding game once you get over that hump. Find a few other people who enjoy it, and you can play it over and over. The card variability provides almost infinite replayability.
This is a really great game with lots of replay value. It has kind of a steep learning curve at first though. My friends and I used the online version to practice and get the hang of it. http://www.keldon.net/rftg/
Probably not the best game to play late at night when people are tired. It requires a lot of your attention.
Race for the Galaxy is tough to learn. REALLY tough. In fact, it typically takes about two or three full games before someone catches on. But once the light comes on, this game is a blast, and there are lots of options and paths to victory. It’s a great game, but you have to stick with it. The learning curve is worth it.
I played about 10 games of Race for the Galaxy and after that I don’t think I will play it soon again. I am missing player interaction and creating a plan on what to concentrate is almost futile.
My issue with this game is that you have no idea what cards you will get. Do go down the alien artifact road or something else?
To me the game felt like I am not really in control.
This is a great idea for a game. It is nice to see all your plans come together in front of you. The play is simple to follow and once you get the hang of the symbols it can be easy to decipher something new.
Although the bad is that there is almost no player interaction other then the choosing of action cards and hoping you choose properly for the best results.