The Rise and Fall of Galactic Empires

GAME DESIGN MATTERS

1. Level of abstraction is high - a downside for me, but only a matter of taste, not a structural problem.

2. Theme integration is weak, IMHO.  May be ameliorated by final art.

3. Multi-functional cards a good choice; as a consequence, interesting strategy decisions arise. 

4. Having a player's active card subject to auction is genius; it adds interesting strategy decisions and mitigates luck of the draw and potentially imbalanced card powers.

GAME PLAY MATTERS

1. In our two-player game, the level of player interaction was high, and down time was low; these are good things.

2. The game appears to have alternative paths to victory and has a design-intrinsic resistance to being "solved."  As a result of the same factors that produce alternate victory paths, game play is very tactical and long-term strategic planning is difficult.  

3. We found a slight tendency toward "analysis paralysis" due to the multiplicity of factors to be considered in some decision making.  That problem might increase with a larger number of players.  It should be noted that this problem is also dependent upon the character of individual players as well.

OTHER MATTERS

1. In a 4X game, I'm always disappointed if there is no hierarchical technological development; I find it helps distinguish one civilization from another.  In Rise, a player doesn't really represent one civilization.  The stock-holding mechanism of scoring based on color cards in hand and controlled sector values is interesting and works well, but detracts from theme integration (it bears repeating that this is a matter of personal taste).

2. It seemed to me that the game is suitable for player's aged 12+ and that its target audience is moderately serious gamers who enjoy abstract games and who want a medium weight game that can be played in about an hour.

3.  The game is easily portable and has high replayability; these are good things.

4. The game is easy to learn, but our play test raised many questions; rules and card text clarity needs improvement.

OVERALL FIRST IMPRESSION

1. An interesting game that I would like to play again, but I'm not sure I'd call it a 4X game except in the most general sense.  It was a bit to abstract and lacking in theme integration for my taste.  I want my "explore" to reveal more detail than a mere sector value; I want my "expand" to represent the expansion of my unique species; I want my "exploit" to yield some kind of production (e.g. warships, technology) and I want my "exterminate" to evoke images of space craft battling with advanced weaponry against a background of star-flecked space.

Can't wait for this game to go public, it's going to be big!