“But afterwards there occured violent earthquakes and floods; and in a single day and night of misfortune…the island of Atlantis..disappeared into the depths of the sea.”-Plato
Atlantis is doomed, or so history tells us. But today we are going to look at a game where maybe you can save the people of Atlantis from its impending destruction by helping the survivors get to safety before all is lost.
Atlantis Rising is published by Elf Creek Games and designed by Galen Ciscell with illustration by Vincent Dutrait. It plays 1-7 players in 1-2 hours time.
Overview
In Atlantis Rising, players are working together to gather resources and energy needed to build ancient artifacts and unlock the technology to build a gate that will be transport those of you left to safety. We win if the gate is constructed and we all lose if Atlantis completely sinks below the waves.
Gameplay
The large island of Atlantis is set up as a 6 legged star in the middle of the board with the Library and Misfortune deck shuffled and placed near it. The Wrath of the gods track is started at zero and placed near also. The Power core and Component tiles are placed near the Cosmic Gate board. Each player takes a councilor board and their tokens and places their extras on the Wrath of the gods track with the Volunteer meeples.
The game plays out in rounds, each round in four phases that repeat until one of the end-game conditions is satisfied. These phases are:
1-Place Atlanteans
2-Suffer Misfortunes
3-Take Actions
4-Endure Wrath of the gods
1-In Place Atlanteans players must place all of their Atlanteans from their pool to empty crystal discs on island tiles or built component tiles. There is player order here, players can chose to place in whatever order makes the most sense. You can chose to place them where you want but in the case of two players wanting the same location the starting player decides. Each tile can only support a meeple for each disc on the tile. The Center tile of Atlantis can hold any number of Atlanteans.
2-Next comes Suffer Misfortunes where players beginning with the first player and going clockwise draw one Misfortune card and resolve it. These cards can lead the loss of resources, flooding of certain sections of the map and many other bad things. There are some calm seas as well where nothing happens for that round. Flooding caused the most distal tile from the tip to flip over. Any Atlanteans out on the flooded spots are sent back to their owners’ pool and do not get an action for the round.
3-In Take Actions any Atlanteans who survived out on the board from the misfortunes are able to take the actions of the placement spot they are in. These can be resolved in any order. The order can be bounced around from players or all in a row. All Atlanteans should perform their actions and then lay on their side. At the end of that phase all players’ Atlanteans are returned to their owner’s pool.
4-Endure the Wrath of the gods has players decide to flip over and flood an area or areas of Atlantis equal to the current level on the track. The wave token moves up by one and the round then ends.
The game continues round after round until either everyone escapes or Atlantis is destroyed completely through the flood.
Impressions
Atlantis Rising provided for me one of the best co-op experiences I have had in a while. Each player had specific decisions they had to make, and making them at the same time as other players seemed to help keep the individual decision-making intact. That took away from some of the “alpha gamer” aspects that other co-ops can bring. There were times that a specific person had take charge of a decision but it wasn’t every single play of the game. Each time I game played this all the players at the table brought unique and helpful traits to help solve the puzzles we ran into throughout the game.
I really like the push-your-luck aspect of worker placement that this game brings. Are you willing to sacrifice your workers for a better or easier way to gain resources or effects knowing that they could wash away? I love the “game in a game”, especially in a co-op title where people have different levels of risk/reward they are willing to do. I enjoyed the interaction of all of us at the table as we had players with different risk/reward feelings on this one. That really levels the challenge of a co-op up for me.
Also this game is just gorgeous. The board and all the components really shine on the table. The design of Atlantis itself is great-it is unique to almost any other type of board I have ever played on. The art on the pieces and cards really pops off the surface and demands an audience.
For anyone looking for a different co-op experience than you may be used to, may I offer up Atlantis Rising as the answer to your search. This beautiful game will keep you and your fellow players coming back for more add your seek to create and save all of your fellow Atlantians.
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