Format and language of this review borrowed / plagiarised from Has Eclipse Already Been Eclipsed?, but with pictures deleted (my personal preference is text-only reviews; if your preference differs there are zillions of Eclipse pictures nearby).
Introduction
Not since Power Grid has a game been played so repeatedly by myself and my Canberra friends. BUT, does Eclipse have staying power? Or will we be making comparisons between it and Agricola in 5 years time? I guess we will know soon enough.
The game play and rules have been well discussed and at length on numerous other review threads so there is no need to reinvent the wheel in this regard. This review will concentrate on my own experience with the game, what I like and dislike, as well as where I think the game developers got it right and where there are shortcomings.
Components
The last thing I look at with any game of this type is the components. Much more important is firstly the enjoyability and secondly the game play. Components are a tertiary issue for me. For example, I own both the plain (American) and aesthetic (European) versions of Innovation. I have a mild preference for the aesthetic version, but am happy to use the plain version when necessary (because of using the plain expansion, Innovation: Echoes of the Past).
Gameplay
Time
Eclipse has some downtime issues with five or six players, so I am looking forward to Eclipse: Rise of the Ancients, which (amongst many other goodies) permits two players to have simultaneous turns. But five- or six-player Eclipse is not for a novice at the game who suffers from Analysis Paralysis -- wean that AP novice on a two- or three-player game first.
Races
The human races are exactly the same, so should be uniformly used by all players when at least one player is an Eclipse novice. For an all-expert game the aliens are enjoyably different. Contrary to Twilight Imperium (third edition) there are not any better races than others, but rather a dynamic imbalance, due to careful extended playtesting by the design team.
Exploration
Exploration is incompletely (merely partially) random through a tile draw system. If a potentially hostile player is exploring the galaxy in your direction, good strategy is to explore first a possible link tile, then orient that tile to deny access (until the very late game, when it is possible to buy the ultimately expensive technology Wormhole Generator).
Economy
The economy function in this game is definitely synonymous with the Euro system. It works really well and is quite tight. The joy is that I do not want lots of ships and I do not want them now. Eclipse allows me to do what I most enjoy in civ games, gradually improve my empire in a direction which is most fun at the time (and giving me plenty of different directions to grow my empire in different replays of Eclipse). Only in the middle- to end-game do I have to indulge in major star fleet battles.
I play an old favourite game Titan in a similar style, primarily concentrating on evolving my stacks on the master board, and only secondarily indulging in combats on the tactical board.
Introduction
Not since Power Grid has a game been played so repeatedly by myself and my Canberra friends. BUT, does Eclipse have staying power? Or will we be making comparisons between it and Agricola in 5 years time? I guess we will know soon enough.
The game play and rules have been well discussed and at length on numerous other review threads so there is no need to reinvent the wheel in this regard. This review will concentrate on my own experience with the game, what I like and dislike, as well as where I think the game developers got it right and where there are shortcomings.
Components
The last thing I look at with any game of this type is the components. Much more important is firstly the enjoyability and secondly the game play. Components are a tertiary issue for me. For example, I own both the plain (American) and aesthetic (European) versions of Innovation. I have a mild preference for the aesthetic version, but am happy to use the plain version when necessary (because of using the plain expansion, Innovation: Echoes of the Past).
Gameplay
Time
Eclipse has some downtime issues with five or six players, so I am looking forward to Eclipse: Rise of the Ancients, which (amongst many other goodies) permits two players to have simultaneous turns. But five- or six-player Eclipse is not for a novice at the game who suffers from Analysis Paralysis -- wean that AP novice on a two- or three-player game first.
Races
The human races are exactly the same, so should be uniformly used by all players when at least one player is an Eclipse novice. For an all-expert game the aliens are enjoyably different. Contrary to Twilight Imperium (third edition) there are not any better races than others, but rather a dynamic imbalance, due to careful extended playtesting by the design team.
Exploration
Exploration is incompletely (merely partially) random through a tile draw system. If a potentially hostile player is exploring the galaxy in your direction, good strategy is to explore first a possible link tile, then orient that tile to deny access (until the very late game, when it is possible to buy the ultimately expensive technology Wormhole Generator).
Economy
The economy function in this game is definitely synonymous with the Euro system. It works really well and is quite tight. The joy is that I do not want lots of ships and I do not want them now. Eclipse allows me to do what I most enjoy in civ games, gradually improve my empire in a direction which is most fun at the time (and giving me plenty of different directions to grow my empire in different replays of Eclipse). Only in the middle- to end-game do I have to indulge in major star fleet battles.
I play an old favourite game Titan in a similar style, primarily concentrating on evolving my stacks on the master board, and only secondarily indulging in combats on the tactical board.