Duncan
New Zealand
Thank you so much. Next please
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Firstly, thanks to
Matt Worden
United States
Minnetrista
Minnesota
www.mwgames.com/JumpGate ... check it out! ;-D
who designed Jump Gate and kindly ran a little competition for a free copy, which I won.
Introduction
In Jump Gate players embody the captains of starships travelling from planet to planet seeking to acquire the most valuable resources. The game is played through individual player turns in which a player may carry out two of a variety of actions. Players use hands of 'Navcomp cards' each of which has numbers which correspond to numbers on the planets to determine which actions are available to them-there are also special actions which are generally an improvement on the generic actions; changeing conditions required or the outcome.
Components
Jump Gate includes 12 different planets, although only 8 are used in the basic game. Each is its own seperate board and they all make for an attractive looking game when arranged in a circle to play with. Along with the resource cards, the planet boards add greatly to the theme and experience of playing Jum Gate.
Gameplay
As I mentioned in my overview players can only take two actions a turn. I especially like this because two is a lot better than one but equally, if the mechanisms are there to obtain more actions the game can get extreme. Look at Dominion-village, village, village, village...
Jump Gate has a nice balance in this respect.
The game is prepared by placing eight planets in a circle each with a face up resource and soem face down resources in the middle are placed the Jump Gate and Black Hole.
To travel around the planets players can make use of the Jump Gate, matching their destination's jump value with one of their navcomp cards or they can move a to a planet adjacent their current location. You can not move to a planet another player is already at-this can get annoying when you start adding players.
Once at a planet players can scan the planet (which I find extremely fitting to the theme) Using the scan values on the Navcomp cards. Scanning a planet causes one face down resource to be revealed and the player puts a scan marker on that planet.
Players can also claim planets using navcomp cards matching the two values on the planet-all the resources are revealed and the claimant and any players who have scanned the planet get to choose a resource. Planets the have been claimed can later be harvested of any resources that might be left.
The resources themselves are in several different types: energel, water, gem and famous find. each has a different way of scoring and differnet ways of being valuable in certain combinations. Famous finds are worth 5 points each straight up, gems score for the total number multiplied by the largest colour group, water increases at an increasing rate as you get more cards and energel scores better if you have pairs of 'light' and 'dark'. Fortunately scoring is only the once at the games end otherwise things might be confusing. the very different ways of scoring put huge emphasis on good deck management and when you add in the theme it appeas to me more than Stone Age; a game I would say had a similar card mechanic. Some of the cards also have a black hole icon-a sort of 'bad karma' each of these collected means the player puts a token on the black hole with possible repercussions for having the most. There are also a few cards that are nothing-and say so with individual, amusing text. Lots of these in one place, through chance, can be quite disappointing-and quite the opposite for an opponent.
Players also score for just about everything they did during the game. The game end is triggered by all resourc es having benn taken except (possibly) cards with a black hole or by nine total tokens on the black hole. In the later case the player with the most loses three cards from theri shuffled deck-this is potentially ctastrophic for them, especially in a larger game. Points are then scored for resources, planet claims, scans and 5 points for the player with the most tokens on the Jump Gate. At one point each AND the opportnity to gain cards during the game, scans are a very interesting and highly viable dimension to Jump Gate.
To Conclude...
Jump Gate is fun and has a theme I like, it points me a little in mind of the Dune universe but a good theme needn't get in the way of interesting gameplay. In this case it actually helps the game be so good to play-the different types of resources and the scan action being good examples of this. Jump Gate is an interesting game, it looks good and it has a good balance of skill requirement while still being fun; which is surely the most important thing.
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Ray Smith
United States
Newburg
Pennsylvania
Stay thirsty my friends.
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Our game group really likes JG, and were very impressed with its quality, gameplay, and art. As very aptly stated in the review, there are plenty of decisions and interaction amongst the players including a smattering of luck with the card draw to make things interesting.
For those of you who may be leery of Game Crafter products, I'm in the camp of full support of their products. Are they top quality with precision printing and cutting? No. Are there good games at a good price that otherwise would never have seen the light of day? Yes. (And, I sleeve all my card games anyway.)
Of the Game Crafter games I own and recommend (Dog Fight: Starship Edition, Hell, Evolution Earth: Cataclysm, Smithy, Organic Soup), Jump Gate is a leader. All systems go.
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Matt Worden
United States
Minnetrista
Minnesota
www.mwgames.com/JumpGate ... check it out! ;-D
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Hi Duncan ... Thanks for the nice review of Jump Gate -- glad to see you're making good use of your prize copy!
I did want to clarify one thing. You wrote:
spacewolf009 wrote: You can not move to a planet another player is already at-this can get annoying when you start adding players.
You *may* have more than 1 player's ship at the same planet ... there is nothing that stops you from jumping or flying to a planet that already has someone at it.
Hope that helps your future plays.
-Matt
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Duncan
New Zealand
Thank you so much. Next please
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Brykovian wrote: Hi Duncan ... Thanks for the nice review of Jump Gate -- glad to see you're making good use of your prize copy! I did want to clarify one thing. You wrote: spacewolf009 wrote: You can not move to a planet another player is already at-this can get annoying when you start adding players.
You *may* have more than 1 player's ship at the same planet ... there is nothing that stops you from jumping or flying to a planet that already has someone at it. Hope that helps your future plays. -Matt
Ah well, we making mistakes is all part of the fun-thanks for the clarification.
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Cameron Chien
United States
Rancho Cucamonga
California
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spacewolf009 wrote: The game end is triggered by all resourc es having benn taken except (possibly) cards with a black hole or by nine total tokens on the black hole. In the later case the player with the most loses three cards from theri shuffled deck-this is potentially ctastrophic for them, especially in a larger game.
If my understanding of the rules is correct, in larger games the player with the most tokens on the black hole loses fewer cards.
Cameron
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Matt Worden
United States
Minnetrista
Minnesota
www.mwgames.com/JumpGate ... check it out! ;-D
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Zeede wrote: spacewolf009 wrote: The game end is triggered by all resourc es having benn taken except (possibly) cards with a black hole or by nine total tokens on the black hole. In the later case the player with the most loses three cards from theri shuffled deck-this is potentially ctastrophic for them, especially in a larger game. If my understanding of the rules is correct, in larger games the player with the most tokens on the black hole loses fewer cards. Cameron
You are reading it correctly, Cameron.
Because there is always the same number of resource cards in the game, when more players in the game, each will have the potential to collect fewer card. So, the black-hole punishment is a fewer number of cards in games with more players -- but the approximate relative impact to your score seems about the same.
-Matt
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www.mwgames.com/JumpGate ... check it out! ;-D
