[Note: We’ve been on a boardgames kick, so other posts about trying out other boardgames will follow. Unfortunately, we haven’t yet thought ahead to take a photo of the board to accompany our post.]

Why? We’ve wanted to try this for awhile because it’s the top-rated game on boardgamegeek.com. It’s also strictly two player game, so we could try it out without enlisting anyone.

How’d it go? The game is a competitive two-player game in which one person plays the United States and the other plays the Soviets, and the game takes place over the Cold War, with cards representing real events. We like board games but are not board-game-geeks, and it took us a couple nights and glancing a bit through the very long rulebook to get up the nerve to dive in and give it a go. All the cards and the different ways that you stage coups and compete in a Space Race are extremely cool, so we can see why people adore it.

Playing was very slow going for us, and we finished the game only because I had amassed a big advantage as the Soviets and won in Round #4, as opposed it going the full 10 rounds. Various online sources note the early part of the game is tilted toward the Soviets, especially for newbies, so I didn’t take this as indicative of a particular strategic triumph (if anything, Beckie seemed to grasp the strategy better, which might say even more about how big the hammer-and-sickle advantage is).

Will you do it again? I don’t think either of us would say “no” to this, but probably one of the things we realized while playing this is how we don’t really like competing against each other that much (touching, I know, but we both get regretful in seeing the other person lose). Given the large time investment required and that it seems like one of those games that becomes really awesome after you fully understand the strategy, I don’t know if it will make it back on an evening’s roster or not.