Overview: (from BGG)
Anachrony features a unique two-tiered worker placement system. To travel to the Capital or venture out to the devastated areas for resources, players need not only various specialists (Engineers, Scientists, Administrators, and Geniuses) but also Exosuits to protect and enhance them — and both are in short supply.
The game is played in 4-7 turns, depending on the time when the looming cataclysm occurs — unless, of course, it is averted! The elapsed turns are measured on a dynamic timeline. By powering up the Time Rifts, players can reach back to earlier turns to supply their past "self" with resources. Each Path has a vastly different objective that rewards it with a massive amount of victory points when achieved. The Paths' settlements will survive the impact, but the Capital will not. Whichever Path manages to collect most points will be the new seat for the Capital, thus the most important force left on the planet...
Rules & Setup:
On first glance the rules look super complicated, but they are actually quite straightforward and they are set out in a very logical way that excellently explain the turn structure and how to do all the available actions both on your own player board and the main board(s). The set-up can be quite lengthy but there are a lot of different components in the game, and even more if you add in any / all of the expansions and these are further enhanced if you have the INFINITY box, or any of the upgraded components that are available. However, once set up the game looks super impressive on the table, and even for the base game you are going to need a BIG playing area as this game takes up a LOT of room.
Theme:
It is the late 26th century. Earth is recovering from a catastrophic explosion that exterminated the majority of the population centuries ago and made most of the surface uninhabitable due to unearthly weather conditions. The surviving humans organized along four radically different ideologies, called Paths, to rebuild the world as they see fit: Harmony, Dominance, Progress, and Salvation. Followers of the four Paths live in a fragile peace, but in almost complete isolation next to each other. Their only meeting point is the last major city on Earth, now just known as the Capital.
By powering up the mysterious Time Rifts that opened in the wake of the cataclysm, each Path is able to reach back to specific moments in their past. Doing so can greatly speed up their progress, but too much meddling may endanger the time-space continuum. But progress is more important than ever before: if the mysterious message arriving through the Time Rift is to be believed, an even more terrible cataclysm is looming on the horizon: an asteroid bearing the mysterious substance called Neutronium is heading towards Earth. Even stranger, the scientists show that the energy signature of the asteroid matches the explosion centuries ago...
Gameplay:
During each of the game rounds, players will take turns to play one main action, and as many free actions as they wish to / have available, . These actions can be on the main board(s) or on buildings you have purchased and have slots available for actions when placed on your own player board.
You can also choose at the beginning of each turn to ‘borrow, stuff from yourself in the past and you can then either choose to lose points for that at the end of the game, or you can travel back in time to return it to yourself and thereby nullify this negative points deduction which happens during final scoring.
At a specific point in each round you will potentially roll a ‘paradox’ dice if you have the most of these tokens on any of the round markers, and getting 3 Anomalies will cause you to take an anomaly to place on your own board blocking off a building slot. You can pay to remove these during your subsequent turns / rounds and they will give you -3 points if still there at the end of the game for each one on your board.
Most actions are played out on the main board and these are Mining (for materials / resources), Construct (Buildings), Recruit (new workers), Research (for Super Project tokens), and you can also go to spaces where you can gain extra water (one of the games most used resources), and another space where you can ‘trade’ resources for other items you may need. These last 2 spaces are multiple use by any and all players whereas for each of the other spaces only one mech-suit can occupy a space.
Rounds keep going like this until round 4 is complete, and then the ‘meteor’ impact is resolved which starts the beginning of the end for the main board spaces as from round 5 onwards each time one of the main board spaces of Research, Recruit and Construction are used that space is then deemed out of action for the rest of the game, and if all of these are like this before the end of round 7 then the game ends early and final scoring takes place.
From round 5 onwards there is also an extra multiple worker spot available which is the ‘evacuation’ space, where players can send one of their exosuits if they meet the required criteria on their player board, and this will cause them to gain additional victory points, although the last person to do this also gets a -3 token at the same time.
Artwork and Components:
The artwork is very good and fits well in the game, and the components in the base game version are of very good quality as you would / have come to expect from a MINDCLASH game, but these are elevated to another level if you get either the upgrade packs for the exosuit miniatures and or the INFINITY box version with fully upgraded tokens that seriously enhance the gaming experience as well as how it looks on the table.
The Good:
For me everything about this game excels, which is why it has been the number 1 game in my collection for the past few years, and this was only further cemented when I backed and received the INFINTY box, with all the new components and trays as well as the new expansions.
The Other:
It would have been nice to have the VP tokens upgraded as well as the round faction markers when all the other items were done but this is a very minor gripe.
Final Thoughts:
As I mentioned earlier for me Anachrony is the number 1 game in my collection and a game I will never get rid of, the solo mode is very good and there are different levels of difficulty to it as well which is good.
The whole production is absolutely top notch, and if you’ve not tried it I wholeheartedly recommend that you do, as I’m sure if you enjoy thought provoking strategy / worker placement games you won’t be disappointed.
