First Impression: Galaxy Trucker

By W. Eric Martin
September 18, 2007

Publisher: Czech Games Edition
Designer: Vladimír Chvátil
Players: 2-4
Ages: 10+
Playing Time: 60 minutes
Languages: English, German or Czech
Release Date: October 2007

Game Played: Pre-production copy
Number of Plays: Three times, once each with 2, 3 & 4 players

More spacey than Space Dealer, more fun than Factory Fun, Galaxy Trucker is a blast of entertainment that will undoubtedly be Vladimir Chvátil’s second runaway hit at Spiel. Don’t expect the second coming of his Through the Ages, however. Galaxy Trucker plays nothing like 2006’s must-have title and might even be a turn-off for folks who prefer deep thinking and careful planning over freewheeling mayhem.

The game’s setting puts you in the role of a down-on-your-luck trucker who’s willing to take a chance on building a spaceship out of whatever spare bits you can find and hauling the hunk of junk across untold light years to deliver it for a profit—assuming that you even get there, of course. The rulebook plays up your plight throughout its 16 pages and is easily one of the most entertaining set of rules I’ve ever read, while still being clear on almost every detail of the game.

Even better, the rules help you get into the game immediately. After explaining the spaceship construction details—how parts connect (or don’t), where you can place cannons and engines, why you want cabins, batteries and shields—the rules tell you to immediately build a ship for the first round. Don’t worry about what you’re trying to do—just get that sucker built. Leave the timer aside for now, and have each player flip over spaceship parts from the center of the table at his or her own pace. You can leave aside the parts you don’t like in order to build a ship that will hold together, have lots of firepower, have numerous cargo holds, etc.

Once you have the ship ready, you’ll load your crew, fill up the batteries, and set up the round’s adventure cards, using one of each type of adventure in your first game. Again, the rules take four pages of details and break them down into palatable chunks, teaching you each adventure as you encounter it.

The adventures include a meteor storm, space pirates, planets with deliverable goods, and an abandoned spaceship. Players keep track of their relative order, and the player in front usually has first shot at the adventure card. If he has the crew on board, for example, he can search an abandoned space station for goods, an act that will cost him days and possibly move him back in line relative to everyone else. If he doesn’t have the crew or chooses not to stop, the next player in line can tackle the card. Some cards, such as open space and stardust, affect all players.

If this Class III ship loses the right cannon in its front line, then the other two will be removed as well for lack of support


The most entertaining cards are typically space pirates and meteor storms because they threaten damage to your spaceship, and more importantly, to everyone else’s ship as well. If a pirate’s lasers destroy a cabin, not only do the humans in that cabin die, any part of your ship that was connected to that cabin and nothing else floats into space. In the last of the game’s three rounds, when your spaceship can be composed of dozens of components, it’s not unusual for a player to have half his ship pinged away—or even have the spaceship split in two.

Your goal in Galaxy Trucker is to earn more money than other players, and cosmic credits are earned by the order in which you finish the round, the construction of your spaceship, the goods you manage to deliver, and special events that happen during the round. You pay a penalty for all the spaceship parts you lose during the round, which is a good incentive for adding cannons and shields during construction—but this gives you less space for engines, crew members and cargo. As with all good games, you want to do far more than you can. Thankfully, during the construction phase of the game you can peek at some of the adventure cards that you’ll encounter: If you see lots of planets, focus on getting cargo holds. Wave after wave of pirates? Focus on cannons or else you might be fried.

The adventure cards can be devastating, especially in the third round when you have 16 cards to explore and a chance meteor storm might take out one cannon, which will make you too weak to fight pirates, who will shoot up your ship and make you more vulnerable to future attacks. Before you know it, you’re sucking vacuum and hoping your spouse remembered to pay the life insurance bill.

Played in the right spirit, Galaxy Trucker is incredibly fun, and the size of the adventure decks provides a lot of variability in what you’ll encounter each game. Even if you’re blasted apart by a barrage of lasers, you’ll most likely still enjoy yourself.

The game play also changes depending on the number of players since the relative position of the spaceships is less important when only two players are competing for goods on three planets; with four players, you risk getting shut out of the goods, so you’re inspired to build your ship faster to speed up your launch.

A couple of people I played with did complain about the harshness of the adventure cards and the randomness of the ship construction—such as the need to match the right type of connections or the tendency to draw every alien support system in the pile of components—and immediately started offering solutions to fix these “problems”. Me, I held my hands on my ears—la, la, la, la, la, I can’t hear you. Galaxy Trucker is wonderful as is.

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Comments:

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Want lots. I’ll just have to remember to find people that don’t try to suck the fun out of games. It kind of reminds me a bit of an OLD computer game called SunDog. A typical fly around the galaxy and deliver things. But you were constantly having to replace bits and maintain a stock of spares to patch your ship back together after a fight. Posted by Frank Branham on Sep 18, 2007 at 11:54 AM | #

Hey, I didn’t complain!  I loved the game.  Maybe that’s because my beautifully shielded, gun-toting mega ship held together under the barage of meteors.  I can’t wait to play this game with my kids - lots of fun. Posted by Jim Forsythe on Sep 18, 2007 at 02:05 PM | #

I just received a pre-production copy and must admit that it looks like a LOT of fun!  I hope to try it this Thursday at our East Tennessee Gamers session. Posted by Greg Schloesser on Sep 19, 2007 at 11:25 AM | #

Is it permissable to whine about the vast unfairness of you two getting early copies of this game? I’m the one who is the big fan of Chvatil’s games. I now tend to play Prophecy at least once a month. Posted by Frank Branham on Sep 19, 2007 at 12:24 PM | #

Anyone know if this will be widely available online?  I have some friends going to Essen and might have them pick it up if it’s a limited run. Posted by Eric Knauer on Sep 19, 2007 at 02:26 PM | #

How likely is this one to make its way over to this side of the ocean?  Or is it pretty much either get it at Essen or miss out? Posted by Matt Fullenwider on Sep 19, 2007 at 02:29 PM | #

If the game sells well and proves popular, then I’m sure it will eventually make its way to the States. Posted by Greg Schloesser on Sep 19, 2007 at 02:38 PM | #

Where do I sing up for preorders? Posted by Oskari Westerholm on Sep 20, 2007 at 05:41 AM | #

Frank said: >I’ll just have to remember to find people that >don’t try to suck the fun out of games. Good motto to live by. As a huge fan of TTA, and of space themed games, I’m looking forward to trying this one today. Posted by Kevin Bender on Sep 20, 2007 at 09:12 AM | #

Preorder is up and running: http://www.czechgames.com/preorder Posted by Petr Sabata on Sep 23, 2007 at 02:56 PM | #

"Where do I sing up for preorders?” --Try Carnegie Hall. Posted by Jonathan Degann on Sep 27, 2007 at 11:49 PM | #

Thanks for the review - Are the Rules going to be available for download ahead of Essen ? I cannot seem to find a contact email to ask the question directly ontheir website ? Oh, and Legion of Six rules too ? Cheers, Mark Posted by Mark Robinson on Oct 1, 2007 at 09:57 AM | #

Mark, how’s this for service: http://www.boardgamenews.com/index.php/boardgamenews/comments/convention_preview_news_galaxy_trucker_league_of_six_rules_plus_graenaland/ Rules for both Galaxy Trucker and League of Six, in English and German. Eric Posted by W. Eric Martin on Oct 1, 2007 at 10:25 AM | #

Look here for links to the rules Mark: http://www.boardgamenews.com/index.php/boardgamenews/comments/convention_preview_news_galaxy_trucker_league_of_six_rules_plus_graenaland/ Or just check the BGN front page for items from October 1, 2007. :) Posted by Kevin Bender on Oct 1, 2007 at 10:26 AM | #

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