Stronghold Games | Survive: Escape from Atlantis! 30th Anniversary Edition | Board Game| Ages 8+ | 2-4 Players | 45 Minutes Playing Time

Survive is an older game, released in 1982. After a recent few games with friends a copy has quickly found its way into our regular line up along with our Eurogames. For us it is a bit of a filler game as it can be played quite quickly and without too much mental agility, it addresses the part of me that wants to see my fellow gamers flushed with anger at my latest diabolical actions.We are using the 30th anniversary edition and have been very pleased with the quality of both the board and the pieces; I believe that with the older version the mechanics are identical though.The game is best suited for three or four players so if you're looking for a solely two player game I would advise against this unless you've played it before. We did find when we tried the two player variant that it is best to enforce the rule that you still have to have the majority of a single colour meeple in order to control a boat rather than simply one player's pieces as otherwise it felt slightly game breaking.The basic premise surrounds moving your meeples from a central island to `safes' on the mainland while traversing ocean tiles and all manner of sea faring beasts that live there. Transport home is best attained by use of the provided boats however as the game descends into hysteria you will find many of your meeples swimming for dear life away from sharks, sea monsters and other dangers. The objective is complicated by the sinking island mechanic, only giving you a certain amount of turns to escape before tile by tile the island sinks, ultimately exposing a volcano which will cut down even the bravest swimming meeple in its prime. If you've previously played the coop board game Forbidden Island you will be familiar with the sinking island mechanic and the desperation it breeds towards endgame.All in all if you're searching for the next Eurogame to confound you with its elegant mechanics this is not it but it is a very playable game, perfect for when a lighter game is required, playing with less enthusiastic board gamers or I would imagine perfect for the family.

For 2-4 players, best with 3 or 4, takes half an hour to an hour to play, very simple and easy to get started, but still good fun.The idea is that each player has characters of different worth, and you have to try and get the best characters off Atlantis before it sinks, either by swimming or taking a boat to the separate islands at each corner of the board. Boats are generally better as they can take more characters at once, but other players characters can also board your boat, and direct where it goes.At the end of each players turn they will remove a tile from Atlantis, starting with the beach pieces, and when they have all been removed, forest pieces, and finally mountains. The game ends when the volcano tile is removed (one of the mountain tiles).While it makes sense to try and get your best characters off Atlantis first, other players may recognize you doing this, and try and stop you, either by sinking your boat, or permanently killing your character, which can either be done by sending a shark or sea monster to the tile they're on. The biggest problem is that once you have placed your characters on the board, it becomes very hard to keep track of the best ones as they all look the same, meaning you could think you've saved a 6, and then it turns out to only be a 1. Often it is strategic to sacrifice a 1, if you can kill a higher character of a competing player.

Brilliant game! I bought this based on Catan, which I already have & love, but this is even better. Didn’t think any game could top Catan but there u go. It does require reading guidelines over & over 2 understand so don’t give up. Persevere. I resorted 2 watching a game session on google & it helped. I’d only 1 issue when mine arrived. There was one extra red explorer with number 1 on bottom & one less blue explorer with number 1, so instead of sending the whole game back, I painted the red one with blue nail polish & job sorted. Only gripe with the game is the yellow explorers needed numbers etched in black instead of white cuz u can barely see them.

This game combines a great mix of strategy with luck.Strategy: You must focus on getting your minions (each with a different value) off the island into the "safe Zones" on the edge of the board whilst working on how to ruin your opponent's plans. You can move your minions onto boats (a faster means of travel), move sharks or what's towards your oponent (destroying their boats and killing their meeples) and take away tiles from the island, plunging opponent's meeples into the water.Luck: at the end of your go, you remove a tile off the board (you'll want to remove tiles that your oponent is on). This will either have an immediate effect or an effect that you can save for the beginning of your next turn. These effects can include bringing in a shark or whale (bad for your opponent's) , bringing in a boat (bad for you) or the ability to move a monster.The game ends either when all the meeples are out of play, or when the volcano tile is revealed. You count up the points that you have kept secret that are under your minions. This means that the winner isn't always the person with the most minions.Its a great game, I highly recommend it.

This is a very fun game, providing you have a group that is ok with betrayal and sabotage as these are essential parts of the games mechanics and part of the fun.