Board Game: Oceans

Been on a real "deep ocean" kick lately, watching a lot of nature doc shows about sea life and so on. I don't know, it just seems peaceful.

The Game: Oceans
The Publisher: North Star Games
Time: About an hour
Players: Me, Michelle, Amanda

Game Play: Oceans is a spinoff of Evolution, and the gameplay is similar, though much more elaborate. You've got four "zones" that have lots of little cardboard fishies, the Reef and then four Ocean zones. You play "Surface" cards to create and evolve new species, and then they feed, either by foraging in the Reef or attack other species, to gain population. 

I have never seen a board game with assembly instructions before

Michelle teaches engineers, so she's much more qualified than me to build shit

Anyway, when the Zones empty, other things happen. Each of the first two has a Scenario, which is just a little rules twist, ranging from "new species get 2 population" to "solar radiation means some of your fish swim back to the Reef every turn". Also, when the first Zone empties, the Cambrian Explosion happens, so everything evolves fast and dies faster. Much like Evolution, you count up your population at the end to see who wins. 

The Reef, complete

Ah, but, there's more! While the Surface cards give you things like "Tentacles" (feed more often) or "Apex Predator" (CHOMP), there's also a deck of Deep cards. These are unique, they cost points from your score to use, and they're much more potent. 

I didn't take a picture of Deep stuff, but trust me, it's cool

Opinions: Well, first of all, the production values and the artwork are just amazing. The Deep cards, in particular, run the gamut from haunting to outright terrifying to just kinda cool. The Surface cards are awesome, too, they just don't tend to have the same visceral response (Parasitic aside). 

As for the game mechanics, they're a flavorful refinement of the Evolution game. It takes some getting used to; the rules don't feel as forgiving of new species as the original game, and there are definitely some Surface cards you want to get in your first hand. But we played two games (well, really two and a half; first time through we did some stuff wrong and it was screwing with the flow of the game), and it became clear that there are a variety of card combinations and strategies that work well. 

Mah fisheez

I'm not sure if, all else equal, I'd rather play this than Evolution, because it has more moving parts and the little cardboard fish are kinda hard to pick up, but I love the oceanic setting and artwork, and I'm definitely looking forward to playing it again because I want to see more of the Deep cards. 

Keep? Yep