{"id":264199,"date":"2022-12-18T07:59:06","date_gmt":"2022-12-18T13:59:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/?post_type=reviews&p=264199"},"modified":"2022-12-18T09:01:06","modified_gmt":"2022-12-18T15:01:06","slug":"anachrony","status":"publish","type":"reviews","link":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/reviews\/anachrony\/","title":{"rendered":"Anachrony Game Review"},"content":{"rendered":" \n\n

My friend Alec was walking into our game night, carrying a box that appeared large enough to be a pet carrier, a microwave, or one of those Bankers Box carriers used to move legal files.<\/p>\n

It was none of those things. It was, in fact, the Anachrony <\/i>Infinity Box, with so much Anachrony<\/i> (2017, Mindclash Games) in the box that just seeing the box took my breath away.<\/p>\n

About three hours later, I sat in my chair, exhausted. I am still amused that some people think Anachrony<\/i> is \u201clight.\u201d Light is going to the beach, sitting there, looking out at the waves, listening to some good music, and reading a book that is so predictable that the liner notes give away the ending.<\/p>\n

Anachrony is not that<\/i>. As my colleague Ashley Gariepy<\/a> mentioned all the way back in 2018 in one of our First Take Friday<\/a> articles, \u201c[Anachrony<\/i>] is big.\u201d Now that I\u2019ve seen the box, everything in it, and all of the ways a game can play out, I can share this much:<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll ever be good at it, but Anachrony<\/i> is a good time. It\u2019s a hell of a production, particularly the Infinity Box, but it also has the kind of world building fans have come to expect from the heavier titles in the Mindclash Games line.<\/p>\n

It also has David Turczi.<\/p>\n

\"\"

The Backstory<\/h2>\n

Usually, this is the point in a review where I trash a game because the world-building is weak, the theme feels pasted on, and\/or the \u201ccharacters\u201d are a mix of White Guy with Blue Cap, White Guy with Red Cap, etc. and not factions with real issues.<\/p>\n

Anachrony<\/i> is not guilty of any of these. In fact, Anachrony<\/i> is right there with some of the best games ever in terms of backstory, as evidenced by the 27-page art and storybook file referenced on the Mindclash website called Anachrony<\/i> Art and Story Book<\/a>. <\/p>\n

But the Anachrony<\/i> Art and Story book is rich. Most games don\u2019t even take the time to tell you what\u2019s really going on when playing the game, let alone why you might want to play. (Another Turczi design, Vengeance: Roll & Fight<\/i><\/a>, doesn\u2019t even tell players why their Hero is in trouble in the first place.) Anachrony<\/i> is a world before you even rip off the shrink, then the gameplay leans into the desperation felt by each faction as they try to find a way to gather the resources needed to escape before a giant asteroid takes out their home planet.<\/p>\n

Why does each faction know so much already? Because time travel has been invented, and people are using their new knowledge to get moving. In gameplay terms, you\u2019ve got somewhere between 5-7 rounds to figure out how to get what you need to evacuate, and to gather enough points to become the ruler of whatever new planet you end up settling.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Then, Worker Placement!<\/h2>\n

Armed with a great, rich, well-illustrated backstory, you then need to place workers, gather resources, and score victory points.<\/p>\n

But the mix of those workers is where the gameplay shines brightest for me. You\u2019ve got two sets of places to go. First, your player board, where you will send workers like Engineers, Geniuses and Scientists to activate buildings. Standard fare.<\/p>\n

But you\u2019ll also need to send workers out to the main board in Exosuits to perform better tasks\u2014like building those buildings, or hiring more workers. But to even power up the suits, it\u2019s going to cost you (maybe resources, maybe power cores). And to use workers, it\u2019s also going to cost you, usually in the form of water to wake up anyone who worked hard enough the day before.<\/p>\n

What makes Anachrony<\/i> such a heavy piece of chicken for me is that it feels like you\u2019ll have a lot of time to do the things you want\u2014not even to build a strategy necessarily, but just to feel like you are doing useful things from turn to turn.<\/p>\n

But then the game really lays it out for you because of the time travel element: you already don\u2019t have much time to execute that strategy, AND you\u2019ll sometimes need workers to go back in time to repay loans you\u2019ve given yourself in previous rounds.<\/p>\n

Uhh, what?<\/i><\/p>\n

So, to recap: you need workers for the main board, your player board, and to really make the most of things, you need workers to go back in time using some of the buildings on your player board. Plus, you\u2019ll need to constantly math out how many workers you\u2019ll need in a round to maximize the efficiency puzzle.<\/p>\n

A first turn in Anachrony<\/i> really hurts the brain. For some, that will be why you buy a game like Anachrony<\/i> in the first place. For others, it\u2019s the reason why you just stopped reading this review.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Symbiotic<\/h2>\n

If you\u2019re still here, I think it\u2019s because you want to make sure that I see what many Anachrony<\/i> veterans see: it\u2019s quite a rich puzzle, a puzzle that is worth playing even with the peasant version of the game.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s pause to talk about the production.<\/p>\n

The game\u2019s standard version, Anachrony<\/i> Essential Edition, is a perfectly fine production. But I had the chance to see the Infinity Box version of the game, with Exosuits in the form of incredible plastic minis that hold each worker in place with a look that makes it feel like they are operating an actual suit.<\/p>\n

The resources were metal, the storage solution has the look of Game Trayz, and for some reason the crazy height of the box makes everyone ask about it when it\u2019s on a friend\u2019s shelf. It is deluxe in every way games can be deluxe.<\/p>\n

Back to that puzzle: it\u2019s rich. It\u2019s rich because spaces are so tight, particularly in the areas that create the most conflict: Construct (for building buildings, which fill up your player board and offer more worker placement spaces) and Recruit (for bringing in workers from the market). In a three-player game, those spaces feel really tight, especially if you are behind the proverbial eight-ball in turn order.<\/p>\n

Wow, turn order is so huge in Anachrony<\/i>!!<\/p>\n

Going last in a game, any game with limited spaces, actions or resources, is always a challenge, but in some games (Origins: First Builders<\/i><\/a> comes to mind here), you can get around it. In Anachrony<\/i>, it will cost you the game, particularly late in a game where players are pushing to achieve their personal goals to escape the dying planet before an asteroid wipes out everything.<\/p>\n

I like the tension that comes from deciding whether to spend the resources needed to take the first player banner in a round; eventually, you\u2019ll have to do it if you are last in turn order, because placement spots are so tight.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Is Anachrony Too Tight?<\/h2>\n

That\u2019s the question I asked after my first play of the game. I feel better about it now, but there\u2019s no question that the experience is tense because you usually don\u2019t have a ton of every resource you\u2019ll need over the course of a game.<\/p>\n

Sometimes, you\u2019ll have enough resources to build a building, followed by maybe another in quick succession. Since every player\u2019s resources are public, you\u2019ll be able to track when your neighbor is about to jump on a Superproject (one of these opens up in each round, known as Eras, and Superprojects always cost a bunch of resources and Research tokens to build) or when they can potentially take away a building you want to build first.<\/p>\n

Adding to the tension around resources are the sheer number of things you\u2019ll need to think about each turn. Forget the remaining worker spaces for a moment; do you even have enough water to wake up the workers you need that round to do what you want? Do you have the resources to power up all six of your Exosuits in a round, instead of just three or four? You\u2019ve got an Exosuit to gather resources, but if you send an Engineer, that Engineer will remain active for the next round of the game.<\/p>\n

Did you just realize that you are out of Engineers??<\/p>\n

Scoring in Anachrony<\/i> is always going to be low, so everything can be a grind for a new player. Plus, you\u2019ve got some public scoring milestones, five of them, to worry about each game as well. All of them seem like they will be worthless\u2014scoring only a couple of points each\u2014but if one player scores them all, they will run away with the game.<\/p>\n

So, to reiterate: Anachrony<\/i> is tight.<\/p>\n

\"\"

But, It\u2019s My Kind of Tight<\/h2>\n

Anachrony<\/i> is a thinky affair, a game rich with theme and backstory, and rewarding gameplay if a player can execute on their strategy.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a game I have never won, and I\u2019ll almost certainly struggle to win because of the investment required to get better at it. But that\u2019s OK; that just means the challenge is there for those willing to get the plays in.<\/p>\n

The Essential Edition is fine, but at a minimum, players should buy the Exosuit Miniatures Set to replace the Essential Edition\u2019s plain cardboard tokens. (I did just that at SPIEL \u201822<\/a>.) Slipping a worker inside the miniatures is something else, an incredibly slick mechanic that makes it really feel like you are sending a Genius out into a dangerous world to hire another worker or trade with nomads to get more resources.<\/p>\n

Depending on your gaming circles, I do think Anachrony<\/i> struggles most with accessibility; getting this to a table with a mixed crowd of gamers\u2014particularly those not willing to sit through a teach that could take as much as an hour\u2014is really challenging, and like many other heavy strategic gaming experiences, Anachrony<\/i> strongly favors those most familiar with the game.<\/p>\n

If you can clear these hurdles, Anachrony<\/i> is an easy recommendation for any gamer looking for a brain burner in a sci-fi setting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Justin goes back in time to visit the 2017 release Anachrony from David Turczi and Mindclash Games!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":69,"featured_media":266163,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"MSN_Categories":"Uncategorized","MSN_Publish_Option":false,"MSN_Is_Local_News":false,"MSN_Is_AIAC_Included":"Empty","MSN_Location":"[]","MSN_Add_Feature_Img_On_Top_Of_Post":false,"MSN_Has_Custom_Author":false,"MSN_Custom_Author":"","MSN_Has_Custom_Canonical_Url":false,"MSN_Custom_Canonical_Url":"","footnotes":""},"tags":[],"coauthors":[6089],"class_list":["post-264199","reviews","type-reviews","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economic-board-games","category-science-fiction-board-games","designers-david-turczi","designers-richard-amann","designers-viktor-peter","mechanisms-dice-rolling","mechanisms-solo-solitaire-game","mechanisms-tug-of-war","mechanisms-turn-order-claim-action","mechanisms-variable-player-powers","mechanisms-worker-placement","mechanisms-worker-placement-different-worker-types","publishers-albi","publishers-albi-polska","publishers-angry-lion-games","publishers-crowd-games","publishers-engames","publishers-games-warehouse","publishers-maldito-games","publishers-mindclash-games","publishers-mybg-co-ltd","artists-laslo-forgach","artists-laszlo-fejes","artists-marton-gyula-kiss","artists-peter-meszlenyi","artists-villo-farkas","release_year-best-board-games-of-2017"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAnachrony Game Review — Meeple Mountain<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Justin goes back in time to visit the 2017 release Anachrony from David Turczi and Mindclash Games!\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/reviews\/anachrony\/\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/reviews\/anachrony\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Board Game Reviews\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/reviews\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"Anachrony Game Review\"}]}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Anachrony Game Review — Meeple Mountain","description":"Justin goes back in time to visit the 2017 release Anachrony from David Turczi and Mindclash Games!","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/reviews\/anachrony\/","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/reviews\/anachrony\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Board Game Reviews","item":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/reviews\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Anachrony Game Review"}]}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/reviews\/264199"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/reviews"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/reviews"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/69"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264199"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/reviews\/264199\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264199"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264199"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meeplemountain.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=264199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}