“Shopping?” you might wonder aloud upon reading the title of this review. “I’m sure that I know enough about this game to know that there isn’t any shopping involved.” You would be right if you thought that; there is no actual shopping involved—it’s just what my girlfriend calls the “purchasing new units” phase and is her primary reason for liking the game. I do what I have to do to play a game. It just so happens that I only have to play along with my girlfriend’s notion of shopping to get Nexus Ops on the table.

But onto the (2-player based) review…

Rules/Components/Gameplay

Enough reviews have already gone into the specifics about the rules, components, and gameplay, so I’ll only voice my opinions on them.

The instruction booklet is rather nicely laid out. It keeps things simple (appropriate for a simple game such as this), and it is organized enough to look up the specific rules of something in case you forgot them. This is rarely the case, however, since the included reference sheets do a terrific job of reminding you of almost everything. I don’t think that I’ve ever seen a better reference sheet.

The tiles are quality cardboard and have some of the most obnoxious art you will ever see. The names of things might be a tad ridiculous, but I like them that way. (Don’t get lost in the terrible Liquifungus Forest!—I think that the Slime of Bremuk lives there (c.f. Stratego Legends).

As for the gameplay, well, it’s a dice fest. The good kind. Enough decisions are involved make the luck factor seem negligible, except, maybe, when you constantly draw secret mission cards that will take you deep into enemy territory and require more fighting than the points are worth. The combat, however, feels almost untouched by chance.

I also really like the energize cards and how they balance out losses.

The Niche

Nexus Ops is, for the most part, the Ameritrash version of a gateway game that still retains a good amount of enjoyment afterwards. It features simple rules, cool components and (sigh) plays similarly enough to Risk that you can convince anyone who thinks that it’s the greatest board game ever to give this one a try.

My quote for getting new people to play this: “Do you like Risk?” “Good, ‘cause it sucks and you’ll love Nexus Ops.”

Score: 8/10
Gateway Ameritrash Score: 9/10 (some people can’t get past the names)