Galaxy Trucker board game review

Back in 2007, when the original Galaxy Trucker came out, real-time board games were still a novelty. As a result, the novel ship building system he used in which everyone grabbed tiles from the same pile and ran to finish first made it a huge success.

However, as time passed, the concept proved to have great staying power. While other games explored the design space in real time, the Galaxy Trucker continued to mass-sell and received several expansion sets. Now it’s back in stores with a new and modified formula to try and appeal to a whole new generation of gamers.

What is in the box

While the cartoon art style may not be to everyone’s taste, there is no denying that it is a cool look that suits the game. Most of this heavy box is taken up by pegboards from which he draws a variety of shipbuilding tokens and other tokens. Next to them there is an hourglass, some wooden dice and a deck of cards.

But it is the plastic components that are the stars of this show. Some fun little plastic astronauts and alien figures are here, along with lots of marble plastic cubes to represent the cargo. But best of all are the batteries, little neon plastic tubes that look like sour candy. Do not eat them.

Rules and how to play

Galaxy Trucker is literally a game of two halves. In the first, everyone takes tiles from a central pile and tries to build a ship as quickly as possible, following a set of connecting rules. In the second, players take those ships and blow them through an intergalactic obstacle course, trying to collect loot and cross the finish line.

Shipbuilding is a true marvel. There’s a dizzying array of ship components you can add: lasers and shields to protect your ship, thrusters to give you speed, batteries to power them. There are also more esoteric items, including life support for alien crew members, that can give your ship additional speed or strength.

Despite the variety of components at your disposal, it is easy to learn because the construction rules make literal and visual sense. Cannons that do not point outward and thrusters are not allowed anywhere other than the rear of your boat. You cannot connect a two-pipe edge to a single-pipe edge, and so on. There is a time limit, enforced by the included sand timer.

However easy the rules may be to follow in theory, following them in the heat of snatching face-down tiles from a pile as quickly as possible, discarding the ones you don’t want, is quite another. Not to mention the fact that you are competing to do so against your opponents. And much less that you want to discard the least amount possible, since you do it face up, giving them to other players. It’s hectic, frenetic, and fun, but still allows cool heads and smart builders to prevail.

Not only is the race aspect distracting you, but you can also spend valuable time building boats looking at the cards that will make up the next race. This gives you vital information on how you might want to build your ship. If there are a lot of planets or space stations, for example, you can add additional cargo holds to keep the loot you can find there.

Fast players are also in control of when to turn the arena timer, adding to the pressure on other players. Trying to divide your time between tokens, cards, and timer while making the best use of both is an information overload of the best kind, a mental plate with fiery discs. It is this combination that makes the Galaxy Trucker still stand out among real-time gaming after thirteen years. Striking the right balance between speed and information is rewarding in every way and very difficult to achieve.

Your reward for finishing your boat first is starting the race in pole position, with each of the other players queuing up when they finish. But beware! Before you can cast, the other players can verify that you’ve followed the shipbuilding rules. If you don’t, you will have to remove the components until it is legal. In extreme cases, this can almost paralyze your ship if you have the wrong connector in the middle of the frame. Worse still, discarded chips will count as a penalty after the race is over.

Racing is where the most changes are in this new edition. It’s nothing major – some encounter cards are less drastic, and you now fly a single longer run with your ship instead of three different ones with new ships. That reduces downtime, making the game shorter and tighter. If you want to play old-fashioned, it is included as a variant.

However, despite the adjustments, racing remains the poor cousin of the shipbuilding aspect. You draw the top match from the shared deck, and then all players apply the effect in race order. So if you lead the pack, you will have the first choice of stopping to loot the cargo or hire the crew, and those who do will lose their position in the race as a result. But you are also first in line for smuggler or pirate attacks, although there is a reward for whoever can fire them.

Despite a good variety of encounters, from meteor swarms to galactic plagues, the application of the effects feels static and processional compared to the crazy construction of the ship. The race leader guides everyone through the appropriate actions, such as rolling the dice to see which part of the ship a meteor hits. There is sure to be some excitement, especially when a roll could split your boat in half. But you still have the feeling that you are watching things happen rather than being directly involved.

For your first few races, it will also be tempting to believe that between the rolls of the dice and the cards your building skills will not count for much. But this is where it becomes important to get that regular card balance while grabbing parts. If you know there is a lot of open space on the deck, use the motors a lot. If there are a lot of pirates, be sure to incorporate weapons and shields. Not all cards can be consulted, so there are always surprises, even for the best prepared.

In the end, you get a credit bonus based on your position in the race, just like the best built ship. Then everyone adds up their winnings from the race in terms of cargo sales or bounties from defeated pirates to see who wins. The length of the game is influenced by your choice of ship size (there are three), but it will finish in 30-45 minutes, which is perfect for this relatively lightweight title.

Where to buy

Galaxy Trucker (Second Edition) is available from a variety of retailers for an MSRP of $ 29.99.