Galaxy Trucker

I've mentioned my love of board games, yes? Good, because I have been introduced to another one I've completely fallen in love with: Galaxy Trucker. If you've not played it, you basically assemble a space ship with lots of components, then try to fly that ship around the galaxy without losing all your components and crashing. There's more to it than that, but that's the simplest explanation I can give that remotely resembles how much fun it is.

First, I love assembling a ship. It's like having a massive jigsaw puzzle where you only have to use the pieces you like, and the ones you don't can get left on the table. You also get to use some strategy in figuring out what components are going to be most useful to you on this particular space journey. (You can apparently sneak a peak at some of the cards that determine how the journey goes, though in our play throughs we never actually did so!) I have always had a fondness for jigsaw puzzles, so this part of the game instantly had my full attention.

Then you have to fly the ship. Okay, you don't actually fly anything, but you have a series of cards which simulates a journey through space. These cards can either help you - for example, cards with planets allow you to grab precious resources - or hinder you, such as the dreaded meteor shower, which can quite easily knock off a huge portion of your ship if you're unlucky, or have built your ship poorly. Come the end of the journey, several factors are thrown together to determine how many credits you receive for the journey. The person with the most credits wins.

I have to admit, I have yet to win a game. It's challenging, especially when playing with people who have played the game enough that they have all the component pieces practically memorised! On the upside, we also took the time to teach the munchkin how to play, so I always had a companion in the losing stands. And truth be told, he did really well, especially when one considers he's below the recommended age range! I imagine it won't be long before he's gleefully pointing out the mistakes in my own ship composition, and speeding off into the distance with all the credits in the galaxy...