This is a preliminary review of Galactic Emperor after playing a 5-player game last night. Apologies in advance for references to other games I've played or seen.


RULES:

I'll provide a brief, incomplete summary though I strongly recommend taking a look at the official rules (available from the publisher's website if not BGG). If you'd rather not read my synopsis of the rules, please skip to the next section(s) for the actual review.

The player with the most VPs wins. The game ends when one player has placed their last empire token or when the VP pool runs out.

Initially, there are seven roles to choose from: Explorer, Merchant, Steward, Engineer, Scientist, Warlord and Regent. Roles are chosen starting with the Emperor. The Emperor chooses a role and it is acted on. Then the next player chooses a different role from those remaining, and so on. The player who chose the role ("the chooser") gets an extra benefit. (Like Puerto Rico role selection.) After everyone has chosen a role, another round begins, though there may or may not be a new Emperor.

Explorer: There are a number of sector tiles turned face up. The chooser gets to go first and also gets to place the 1 or more extra tiles. The tiles can be placed on any space that does not already have a sector tile. There are exactly enough tiles to fill the board. If the Black Hole is placed, it replaces the Omega star at the center of the board and can now be used as a warp point for moving a fleet of ships. Once all sectors have been placed, the Explorer role becomes a second Warlord role.

Merchant: The chooser gets $3 (called "marks" because apparently this is a German galaxy) and gets to affect the market prices. Food is produced on all controlled worlds that produce food. Food can be sold or stored on planets (any controlled planets, max 2 food per planet). Food is needed to produce metal and energy on planets. Players can purchase or sell resources (food, metal, energy). (Think of Race for the Galaxy's phase V: Produce.)

Steward: The chooser gets a free metal or energy (their choice). Any controlled planets that can generate metal and/or energy do so by consuming 1 food that is on that planer. No food = no resource generation. (Think of Race for the Galaxy's Consume phase - consuming food to obtain other resources, namely metal and/or energy).

Engineer: Chooser gets a free fighter. Everyone can purchase one or more ships by paying the cost(s). Ships are deployed to any starbase.

Scientist: Purchase technologies, starting with the chooser. Chooser gets -1 energy cost. All technologies only cost energy to purchase. There is a limited supply - 1 each of 12 different technologies. Once the Black Hole is placed, no more Scientist role.

Warlord: Move ships and attack other fleets/empires/starbases on a same sector. Chooser gets one extra die for each battle. Battles are resolved by dice roles and any damage is assigned by the player receiving the damage. Uncontrolled (unclaimed) planets can be claimed by moving a spaceship over it and placing an empire token on the now-controlled planet.

Regent: First, starting with the chooser players can purchase an extra (a third) empire token to place. Then, starting with the person after the chooser, players place their 2 or 3 empire tokens (or fewer if the player does not have at least 2 empire tokens remaining) on any planet, including those already controlled by that or other players.



REVIEW:

POSITIVES: Galactic Emperor is fun! Everyone of us 5 enjoyed the game immensely. It was involving and constantly evolving. There was a definite progression that kept our attention and had us planning out our galactic conquest.

The role selection, chooser benefits and actions combine to make for a very interesting game. The order of roles is important. The order of players is important. There are just a ton of interesting decisions that players have to make throughout the game. Galactic Emperor includes aspects of production/consumption, markets, role-selection, resource management, spaceship construction, unique abilities (technologies) and warfare. There's a lot to the game.

There's the potential for a sweet metagame aspect. Players can form alliances, gang up on one another and there are plenty of opportunities for revenge. No one is absolutely safe.

The plastic, oh the plastic! The spaceships are friggin' sweet! Just excellent pieces that we all enjoyed zooming around.

There are elements of a Eurogame and Ameritrash. Initially, we all kept our distance from one another and concentrated on expanding our dominions. Once we each controlled a few planets, we turned to spaceship construction and everyone built some pretty sizable fleets. There was a distinct euro feel early on - lots of strategy and resource management. Then the battles began. Since battles are resolved by dice roles, this became a dicefest (and I say that in a good, fun way). The Ameritrash showed through as we rolled tons of dice, fleets attacking one another, ships bursting into flames in the coldness of space (science-types be quiet) and victors rejoiced.

We started lining up the bigger battles by setting aside the two warring fleets, arranged in rows according to dice-rolling order. Rolls ensued with much glee. I cannot stress how much fun this aspect was for us.

I like the 3 different types of ships. They have distinct flavors to them that work very well with the mechanics. For example, there are small, faster, more vulnerable fighters as well as the slower, more powerful, armor-plated dreadnaughts.

The Black Hole works. It signals a nice transition in gameplay and provides an excellent movement mechanism.


NEGATIVES: The game is long for what it is. Granted ours was a learning game with 5 people, but it went 3-4 hours and we chose to end it shortly before someone would have run out the VP pool. VPs are only obtained through the Regent role or by destroying empires (during the Warlord role). Thus, it felt like the VP pool didn't empty very fast at all. One thought is to reduce the VP pool for a shorter game.

With 5 people, it would have been very difficult for the game to end by one person placing all of their empire tokens. In other words, it felt like we had too many empire tokens. One thought might be to leave 2 tokens on sectors where a player has a starbase (at least for a 5 or 6-player game).

Battles are a dicefest. You win or lose by a throw of the dice. If you don't like that random element, this may not be a good game for you. There are alternatives, though, such as via the Regent role.

It looks like it will be difficult to catch up if you fall behind. If you get whittled down or others gang up on you, the game will probably not be as much fun.

The cardboard used for the pieces is very thin. I'm talking Princes of Florence-thin. While it's textured and the pieces look nice, it's really, really thin cardboard. Why do I mention this? I left the box in my trunk one hot July day, and now a lot of my cardboard pieces are warped/warping. Not much I can do about that. I really wish the pieces were made of that thick cardboard, like Carcassonne-thick.

There is some waiting involved and a fair potential for analysis paralysis (AP). The role selection and then the subsequent acting on the role in order means you will spend some of your time waiting. Is it a big problem? Not at all. There's usually not a huge delay, though I will caution that you may be waiting a lot longer if playing with the AP-prone.


OVERALL: A fun game! Probably an 8 out of 10 for me. I enjoyed it and definitely will play it more, though the length and the nature of the game mean it won't always be my first choice. I'm very glad I purchased it and look forward to more plays! KNEEL BEFORE ZOD!



STRATEGY THOUGHTS:

If you want to discover them on your own, then don't read the below. Else, here are some thoughts on various strategic aspects of Galactic Emperor.

Technologies went fast. Everyone got at least 1, some players got 2. Selection was pretty rough at times. All except for Saboteur and Ambassador were purchased. Getting good technologies can be very important. They are somewhat balanced, though there are ones that will be more useful than others or at least more useful at more points (for example, late-game vs. early-game).

Choosing which sector to place where is pretty important. If you are unable to place a metal or energy planet near your home base (so you can claim it), you're going to have a harder time. All the food production in the galaxy won't offset a lack of metal/energy planets. Besides, food is relatively cheap (Merchant).

Money is tight. Everyone gets $2 at the beginning of a new round, but it's relatively difficult to get more. The Merchant chooser gets $3, everyone else has to sell resources to get more money. This makes the market a significant part of the game. Selling high and buying low, when possible, are very important. Spend wisely and don't forget that constructing spaceships requires money.

Putting 2 food on a metal/energy-generating planet is often a good idea. Assume someone chose Steward after Merchant on a previous round. If on the next round someone chooses Steward before Merchant, metal/energy-generating planets that did not have 2 food will not generate their resources.

The above is one of many circumstances where the order in which roles are chosen makes a big difference. Another example would be choosing Regent and/or Warlord before new sectors and planets are placed with Explorer.

EDIT: Added 2 more negatives. They do not affect my overall opinion. (July 20, 2008)