I got what I wanted for Christmas. I’ve always been curious about a 2011 re-issue of Battleship but my mind was blown when Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast took the classic game I used to play when I was a kid and added a lot more depth into a foray in outer space.
Battleship Galaxies: The Saturn Offensive is a tabletop miniature game that pulls you into a player vs player game of Battleship with a twist. Though it’s fit for two players, there are prepared scenarios for two teams for a total of four players.
The contents consist of a several well built miniatures (themed for two factions), stands, two hex-based boards and action cards which players draw at the start of every turn. As a bonus, the game comes with a graphic novel detailing the backstory. And it’s quite a read as it is made by IDW.
Just like in the original Battleship, the ship miniatures are divided into classes. The difference here is that just like in Warhammer, you’re allotted a set number of points at the start of the game and you can consume these points to launch ships. Better ships cost more points. And, just like in the classic implementation, the game comes with two well made dividers to hide your ship roster from the enemy.
[Photo above c/o BoardGameGeek]
Battleship Galaxies is fairly easy to learn. You draw cards, launch ships, consume energy points to perform actions and destroy enemy ships to win the game. Yes it’s pretty straightforward but the strategy involves a lot of energy management to accomplish objectives (your entire fleet shares the same energy pool, which makes it rather difficult to micromanage) and positioning your ships to flank your opponent.
As someone fond of house rules, Battleship Galaxies is easily mod-dable and theoretically can scale pretty well if you play with two or more sets. This would consist of expanding the playing field and setting starting energy levels a lot higher per turn (you only gain 10 points per turn which isn’t a lot considering it takes about 15 points to launch your capital ship — and that’s just to launch it!)
All in all, Battleship Galaxies isn’t anything like your old school classic. In fact you don’t need to have previous knowledge of any of its iterations to learn this game. It’s quite a standalone and pretty new (released middle of this year). If you’re up for small one on one board games, Battleship Galaxies is something you need to pick up.
Battleship Galaxies: The Saturn Offensive
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