I’ve talked about solitaire roleplaying game adventures and solo
wargaming before, but not a whole lot about solitaire board games.
Although the common perception places “games” in the realm of
activities engaged with groups of people, I feel solitaire gaming
across the broad spectrum of the adventure gaming hobby has value,
whether to satisfy the urge for an interesting interactive story
(“Curling Up with Solitaire Gamebooks”), teaching rules and
introducing a setting (“Solitaire RPG Tutorial Adventures”), or
any number of other beneficial applications. I’ve often lumped solo
board games in with my occasional broad overviews of the state of
solitaire gaming: “Celebrating Solitaire Play” and “Solitaire Play Addendum” come to mind. For whatever reason – my
introversion, a lack of a stable gaming community, my
slowly-increasing misanthropic tendencies – I’m exploring more
solo board games these days. It certainly helps that I’m seeing more solitaire
offerings in this field on my gaming radar.
Cooperative games naturally offer opportunities for solo play since
they pit players – or a single player – against the game and its
core escalating mechanic. With some adjustments for a “team” of
one player, cooperative games can provide a satisfying solo
boardgaming experience. Pandemic, Forbidden Island, and Castle
Panic are just a few cooperative games that come to mind as ideal
for adapting to solo play. A few competitive games use primarily
compartmentalized turn sequences that limit player interaction, fare
such as Dungeon Roll and Castles of Mad King Ludwig,
that can also
port to solo play with a
minimum of adjustment.
A number of solitaire board games recently showed up on my radar –
some relatively new releases, others having been around a while –
so I thought I’d highlight a few. I’ve played some, only acquired
and read others, but they all cater to my growing urge to indulge in
solitaire board games:
Deep Space D-6: This starship-themed
game by Tony Go originally appeared as a print-and-play game, then
had a version released through a Kickstarter campaign in 2015. The
most recent version – funded through a 2017 Kickstarter campaign –
polishes the earlier release and adds a mini expansion. The player
selects a starship exploring the galaxy, rolls each turn to determine
available crew and their actions, then deploys them to confront
threats drawn randomly from a card deck. Threats gradually escalate
and crew can become incapacitated by various events, presenting more
challenges as the player tries to allocate crew resources. This game
appealed to me on several levels: the dice and card mechanics,
several starship configurations to choose from, the compact box, and
the cover evocative of the classic Choose Your Own Adventure
books highlighting its solitaire nature. The archived Kickstarter page for the re-issue includes links to the original campaign with
more detailed rule demonstrations as well as a link to the
print-and-play files for the current version and a link to pre-order
the game (due out in December 2017) for those who missed the
Kickstarter campaign.
Friday:
In
Friedemann Friese’s game from Rio Grand Games
the player takes the role of Friday who aids Robinson Crusoe after
he’s shipwrecked on the island. Each turn the player must choose
between two hazard cards, then try overcoming them by drawing and
playing cards with random fighting values. Successfully overcoming
challenges often grants future benefits, but failure (or drawing more
cards for added values) can deplete Robinson’s health. The
challenge level escalates as the hazard deck runs out and is
reshuffled; aging cards represent the castaway’s diminishing
abilities due to his extended time on the island. The player must
save resources and knowledge for a final showdown with pirates who
arrive at the island. The few times I played I lost – the game
requires a good deal of judgment and strategy to manage resources
against hazards – but it also provides a scoring system to track
one’s accomplishments despite one’s loss.
The Lost Expedition:
Peer Sylvester’s
game from Osprey Games takes its inspiration from Percy Fawcett’s
ill-fated expedition into the Amazon seeking El Dorado. The player
assembles a team of three explorers with knowledge of the jungle,
navigation, and camping, gives them a stash of food, ammunition, and
health, and sets them along a path of jungle cards toward the lost
city. Each turn the expedition draws and places adventure cards to
form a path for the morning and evening hike; cards present hazards
and opportunities, some unavoidable, others as a choice, usually
taking some toll on the expedition’s resources. Can the explorers
make it to El Dorado before the jungle claims them? The game includes
a well-presented rulebook with examples, tokens for tracking
resources, and oversized cards with evocative graphics. The game
works equally well as a cooperative and solitaire game with only a
few adjustments in turn procedure.
Trek Panic: This game
ports Justin De Witt’s cooperative Castle Panic
to the Star Trek
universe with some elegant mechanics to evoke the atmosphere of the
iconic science fiction setting. Although a cooperative group game, a
single player can also enjoy it with the standard rules. Threats
emerge along the edge of the board, with a wonderful cardstock model
of the USS Enterprise
at its center. Attacks whittle down the shields and hull, but the
player can use cards to counter-attack and may maneuver the starship
to present undamaged sections to incoming threats. Playing as one of
the Enterprise crew
members offers different bonuses to various actions. The addition of
missions adds another layer of complexity as the player tries
accomplishing these goals (often using the same cards used for
attacking threats) while fending off the Federation’s enemies. A
must for classic Star Trek
fans who love a good cooperative or solitaire board game challenge.
(Your
Name Here)and the Argonauts: Mike
Arlington’s entry into BoardGameGeek.com’s annual Solitaire Print
and Play Contest was a
2013 Golden Geek Best Print & Play Board Game Nominee. The
game takes the player on a journey through the Greek myth of Jason
and the Argonauts, with the player as the protagonist. Each turn the
player turns over three cards representing monsters from Greek
mythology; some represent treasures to win and use in further
encounters. Each has a difficulty rating to overcome on a die roll,
but assigning some or all of one’s 12-person crew can modify the
die roll. Success dispatches the monster or wins the treasure, but
failure can reduce the number of crew available to overcome future
challenges. The game has a clever mechanic enabling campaign play;
should a player win, he or she checks off a box in the “level
track” for each defeated monster, potentially increasing their
power in future games. The few times I played it (with an occasional
win) I enhanced my experience by listening to the soundtrack to Ray
Harryhausen’s stop-motion extravaganza Jason and the Argonauts.
One of the game’s best features remains it’s free availability.
Download it from its BoardGameGeek.com page (scroll down to the
“Files” section), print, trim the cards, and play.
After reading these summaries one might notice many solo board games
rely on “resource management” mechanics where the player has a
finite number of resources (or actions) and must allocate them as
best he or she can to overcome obstacles presented by the game’s
built-in mechanics. The more transparent mechanics in roleplaying
games and wargames enable gamers to more easily adapt them to
solitaire play, though without some of the unpredictability of other
solo games. These gamers can always “play both sides,” with a
wargamer taking turns with opposing forces and even a roleplaying
gamer merging the duties of gamemaster with the role of players.
Those gamers, too, typically have more experience tinkering with
rules variants than those of board games, which rely on clearly
articulated rules to eliminate the need for a referee to constantly
intervene with rules interpretations. Too many board games rely on
imperfect information on the table, with hidden card hands and
resources, the uncertainty of bidding mechanics, and other elements
players hold close to their vests; although this presents a challenge
to adapting them to solo play, it provides a more satisfying and
unpredictable play experience with games specifically designed using
built-in mechanics for solo play.
