Back in 2024, I was introduced to a small black box with a shiny purple trim. This box housed a small card game called Compile: Main 1 and it was full of futuristic possibility, it had an edgy presentation and contained a very good game to boot. Fast forward a few years and the lovely people at Synapses Games have sent me the follow-up, Compile: Main 2 and its small expansion, Compile: Aux 2. Will the same box with a shiny gold trim offer the same amount of technological joy? Read on to find out.
To Compile?
Compile is a hand management, lane-battling card game similar to Air, Land and Sea. I loved and even owned Air, Land and Sea but have sold it due to preferring Compile, much, much more. It's sexier, it's more malleable and has much more game in the box.
In Compile, players are opposing AI’s. You are trying to understand the world around you and must select 3 protocols to use against your opponent. In reality, each of these 3 protocols has a small deck of cards and you will be using these three decks, mixed together, to try and beat your opponent. You do this by compiling your 3 protocols first.
Back in 2024, I was introduced to a small black box with a shiny purple trim. This box housed a small card game called Compile: Main 1 and it was full of futuristic possibility, it had an edgy presentation and contained a very good game to boot. Fast forward a few years and the lovely people at Synapses Games have sent me the follow-up, Compile: Main 2 and its small expansion, Compile: Aux 2. Will the same box with a shiny gold trim offer the same amount of technological joy? Read on to find out.
To Compile?
Compile is a hand management, lane-battling card game similar to Air, Land and Sea. I loved and even owned Air, Land and Sea but have sold it due to preferring Compile, much, much more. It's sexier, it's more malleable and has much more game in the box.
In Compile, players are opposing AI’s. You are trying to understand the world around you and must select 3 protocols to use against your opponent. In reality, each of these 3 protocols has a small deck of cards and you will be using these three decks, mixed together, to try and beat your opponent. You do this by compiling your 3 protocols first.
These protocols, in the first game, were things like Darkness, Fire, Sprit and Life. Each one has a theme of sorts and the cards in that deck reflect that. How you use these decks in conjunction with each other will decide whether you come out as the top AI or are left to rot on an old computer in the back of a dusty lab somewhere.
The Game
After shuffling your 3 combined protocol decks, you draw a hand of 5 cards, then you must play a card to one of your 3 protocols. Your choice is either to play a card into its relevant protocol face up, gaining all of its powers, benefits and combo-inducing shenanigans or play it face down into any lane. Playing it face down gives it a reduced strength and with zero goodies.
Where to play your cards, how to combo their abilities and which protocol to try and compile is where the game is won and lost. Also, using the card abilities to shift things around, flip cards and generally disrupt your opponents' plans is paramount to success.
Whenever you have 10 strength in one of your protocols, you can ‘compile’. This means you flip that protocol and you are 1 third of the way to victory. The rules of the game are very simple, it's the order of your cards and the unique mixture of your 3 protocols that makes every game distinct. There is also a way to move your opponents, or even your own protocols, further manipulating the game state and get in each other's way.
The Cards
Each card in Compile has multiple things on it. Firstly, there's the cards strength, which appears as a number on the top of the card. Usually, the lower strengths have better powers, with the high strength cards sometimes even having detrimental effects. Then the card is split into 3, with each section possibly having a special effect or power.
The top section is always visible and always in play, the bottom 2 get covered when a further card is played to that lane. These effects can be re-triggered when uncovered or flipped though, which adds further timing considerations when playing other cards. Some trigger at the start of your turn, some trigger at the end and the whole thing is a web of opportunity and combo-tastic options.
Main 2 and Aux 2
Main 2 and Aux 2, which are a direct sequel to Main 1 and Aux 1, can be played by themselves or mixed together. The games, from a rules perspective, are identical, but both offer a wide range of protocols to mess with. Main 1 and 2 are the games, while Aux 1 and Aux 2 are small expansions offering 3 more protocols each. If you get both games and their mini-expansions, you have a hell-load of game and a lot of replayability, mixing all the protocols together to get a never-ending amount of effects. Every time I play, I discover something new, some new combo or side-effect.
I feel, after playing both these games quite a bit, that the new protocols build on what made the first game so special and amazingly, manage to broaden the gamespace without any extra rules overhead. You have protocols that do more varied and wonderful things, like Time that messes with your discard or Luck that adds a small push-your-luck drawing mechanism. Every game I play of Compile I just wonder which 3 protocols I can mush together, and therefore what uncanny combinations I can bring to the table.
Some of the new stuff here is very interesting. Corruption, for example, has a card you can play on your opponent's side and slowly corrupt their score for that lane; it's awesome. The thought here is yes, it helps you but will eventually end back up in their deck and may be used against you. I love that a lot of cards from Main 2 have both positive and negative effects and it makes the timing of such cards very interesting indeed.
There's a card in the Smoke deck that allows you to play the top card of your deck, face down to any lane you have a face-down card in it, which can be massively powerful, combined with something that can flip them back again. Unfortunately, you don't know what they are when they are played. When you turn them back up, you never quite know what may happen; it's so, so juicy. The ramifications in any game of Compile are endless and it only increases with Compile: Main 2 and Aux 2.
I adore that you can grab and protocol from either game or its expansion and you never have to learn new rules. It's the perfect system. In fact, Compile: Main 2 and its expansion are integrated so well, some of the protocols, I struggle to remember, without looking, which box they came from. It's all so fluidly implemented and effortless to get to the table. Too many follow-ups or expansions move a game away from its initial vision but Compile: Main 2 and Aux 2 build amazingly on an already excellent system.
A Futuristic Box of Beauty
The art direction and look of this line of games are top-notch. They look like they have been sent back in time by some advanced technological civilisation, a game played in the distant future by advanced computer systems and they just radiate sexiness. The sleek black boxes with a shiny pink or yellow trim just look out of place on your game shelf, in a good way and just look so bold and striking.
It's the same with the cards; they feel like they have been made in the future and have the looks to go with it. Everything is so brash and beautiful looking, the dark black with flashes of contrast just really gives the whole package a really unique and eye-catching look.
Final Thoughts
I adored Compile, there was just something so fresh and exciting about it, both from a gameplay and presentation standpoint. While I don’t think Compile: Main 2 and its expansion will change the minds of people who did not like the first game, I think it is perfect for lovers of the first. It does exactly what I wanted, it adds replayability, options and gameplay possibilities without changing the game's rules in any way. It's a magnificent achievement.
I think if you are new to Compile, I would perhaps start with Main 2, the protocols just feel a little wilder, more refined and more fun. Then, when you want more ‘game’, go and add Main 1 and perhaps the expansions. To be fair, it's all great, all quite inexpensive and the whole system is well worth the small cash investment.
As this type of game goes, I cannot think of many better and I love these kinds of games. Compile: Main 2 is quick, has so many decisions and the whole system is simple yet full of tactical depth. You are constantly learning, getting ever-better at the system and every time I drag these little boxes out, it's pure joy.
Right, I am going to use Clarity, Apathy and Smoke to confuse my fellow AI and grind his binary-based face into the dirt. See you next time gamers!
