There is a category in the board gaming world that I like to call "event games". These are games where a typical board game night may not be enough to fit a play through in so you are forced to plan these in advance on a spare weekend day. Examples include Twilight Imperium 3 (TI3), the giant epic space 4X monstrosity of a game that takes 6+ hours on a regular basis and Through the Ages, the in-depth civilisation game that when played with multiple players, really can feel like it's literally going through the ages. Despite their length, these can be highly enjoyable games giving a sense of epicness and scale to the experience.
Of course, we all have busy lives here. We got jobs, commitments, kids (well not me, so I guess I have the advantage there) and so trying to fit these games in can cause issue with some players. These games aren't typically cheap and when you splash out your hard-earned income on a mammoth title, you want to get your monies worth for sure. But I for one always feel the need to indulge in a giant game every once in a while providing it's good of course. It scratches the itch of in-depth long term strategic planning and by the end of such an event you feel a great sense of achievement in what you've done. Here lies your mighty space empire, here lies your civilisation, prosperous and happy, you just can't get that same level of scale in a game that's over and done with in less than a hour. Of course if you've done poorly then you're probably left with some smouldering spaceship wreckage or a angry citizen's revolt, but hey, nobody's perfect!
So Fantasy Flight Games have brought us Forbidden Stars, an epic space conquest game under the banner of the Warhammer 40K license. Now personally I don't feel like Warhammer has realised its full potential in board games with titles that tend to be mediocre or just plain bad. However FFG really hit home with Chaos In The Old World (my personal favourite from the license) so they've proved that it can be done. And we all know how successful they are when it comes to space games so the odds are in their favour to nail this one. Not to mention Corey Konezka is one of the designers and if you check out his resume you'll find a lot of epic style sci-fi, fantasy and horror games to his name including the aforementioned TI3.
So will this do justice to the 40K license and could it even be a potential replacement for TI3? I'd best have a look at my calendar and see when I've got some free weekends. . .
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