Terraforming Mars

I’ve picked up three different printings of this one over the years, secondhand each time, and the box art’s changed just enough between them that I keep them separate on the shelf like they’re different editions worth something, which they probably aren’t. You’re a corporation trying to raise the temperature, oxygen, and ocean coverage of Mars, drafting project cards, building an engine out of whatever combination you land, and every game the mix of cards on the table is different enough that no two plays build the same way twice.

The corporations themselves do a lot of quiet work I didn’t appreciate at first, asymmetric starting resources that push you toward a different opening every time depending which one you draw. Card luck matters more than the box wants to admit, there’s real variance in whether you draw the one card that breaks a strategy open or whether you spend a whole game short of the piece you needed, and I’ve read plenty of other players land on the same complaint, that the unique-card design that makes it replayable also means some games just hand somebody a better hand.

Here’s where the tactile stuff gets me. The player boards are thin, genuinely thin for how much handling they take over a two hour game, and the resource cubes slide around on them if the table gets bumped even slightly. I ended up doing what apparently half the internet already did and bought laminate overlays and a cube tray insert, which fixed it completely and made the whole thing feel like a different, better made object. It shouldn’t take an aftermarket purchase to keep your resources where you put them, but once it’s fixed, it’s fixed for good.

Solo mode against a timer works better than most solo modes I’ve tried, real pressure instead of just chasing your own best score. This is one of the only games in my collection I’d call a genuine keeper, printing quality quibbles and all.