Short answer: Yes. Read on for my first impression after two plays.
What is the game?
Underwater Cities takes us below the surface of the oceans as we attempt to build research labs, kelp farms and desalination plants to support our cities. Along the way we might be doing science projects, interacting with governments, and yes, even dealing on the black market or with smugglers for much needed supplies…all for the purpose of building and expanding our — you guessed it — underwater cities. Other than the typical action-blocking (intentional or otherwise) there isn’t any direct player interaction in this game. You can’t go raid your neighbor and steal their kelp or sabotage their cities. This is fairly typical of a Euro-style game and therefore probably won’t be a surprise to players.
Getting the game to the table
As with many games with a worker-placement mechanism, the main game board is dual sided. There is a 1-2 player side with fewer action slots, making for a tighter game with a lower player count. Some of the action slots which are separate on the 3-4 player side are compressed into a single action slot on the 2 player side; this requires the player to select one or the other while blocking both. With the base game, each player has an assistant and three tokens to place on the board (one for the score track, one for player turn order, and one for the Federation Track). The expansion adds a set of 8 assistant cards with the intent of dealing out two to each player as options. Each player selects one and returns the other to the box. While I have not played with the full expansion yet, I definitely used this in my second game and would do that going forward. There are three different decks to be shuffled (Era I, Era II and Era III). (I really like this feature and will talk more about it below.) Place each deck near the game board. We discovered if we put the decks on the era track then we didn’t forget to switch decks.
The rest of the game is sorting and piling up a bunch of tokens (money comes in 1, 5 and 10 denominations, resources are kelp, steelplast, science, or biomass, buildings are white, green or yellow plastic discs, cities are clear or purple domes) within reach of players on the table. Each player starts with six cards and will discard down to three before taking their turn.
Explaining the game
alkjfA turn boils down to this: Select action slot, place your action token and a card, and then do what it says. Action slots are green, red, or yellow. Cards are also green, red or yellow. Placing your token claims the action slot. Placing the card activates the slot. If the card color and action slot color match, you get to use both the action and the card. If the card color does not match, it is used to activate the slot and then discarded. Since there are only 10 rounds with 3 actions each, being able to double your actions by carefully matching the card to the slot seems important. When your turn is completed, you draw one card and add to your hand. The hand limit is three cards, but it’s not enforced until the start of your next turn, which I like. More on that below.
Actions include:
- Building a building, tunnel or city
- Upgrading a building or tunnel
- Acquiring resources
- Using an Action “A” card
- Acquiring a Special “S” card
During the game there are three production phases (which is one of the similarities between Underwater Cities and Terraforming Mars). During production your farms grow kelp, desalination plants make money, and science labs provide tokens that can be used later to upgrade your infrastructure. (Science!) Tunnels generate money (tolls) and upgraded tunnels also generate victory points (VP). Regular cities do not produce anything, while the special (and limited) purple dome cities will earn you VP. After each production phase the deck of cards is removed and a new deck is brought into play. I really like this feature as it ensures that the cards you see are appropriate for the stage of the game that you are in. The Era I deck has cards that help you get your engine built. Era II cards expand and enhance your network, and Era III cards often include end-game bonus cards that you might not even know that you want until you get to that point. Contrast this (again) with Terraforming Mars where you might get a project in your very first card draw that you have no capability to build until several generations have passed.
At the end of 10 rounds a third production phase is completed followed by end-game scoring.
Final Thoughts
I really enjoy science (or science fiction) themed games. Underwater Cities does an excellent job of capturing the science and challenges of building on the ocean floor. There is quite a bit of flexibility. For example, you can build tunnels that go through empty city slots, and the tunnels are still connected. You can build a city dome at the far edges of your player board right away, and work to hopefully connect it later to your network.
Choices matter! For example, each city has three building spots. There is a fourth spot that might be open depending on the cards you draw and play, but by default you should assume you’re only getting to build three buildings. If you build one of each type of building around a city (farm, water plant, lab) then it is worth more points at the end of the game. But if you double something up (two farms and one lab for example) then you get a bigger bonus during production. There are lots of different trade-offs like this within the game, which emphasizes that decisions are important throughout all 10 rounds.
I mentioned earlier that both action slots and cards have colors. To be able to use both, your card and action color have to match. Green cards are mentioned as being stronger, but green action slots are the weakest. Yellow action slots are the most powerful, but yellow cards are the weakest. Red action slots and cards are somewhere in the middle. Every decision matters! Do I have an awesome green card that I really want to use? I will have to select one of the weaker green action slots on the board. Want to use the powerful yellow action slot? The associated card is probably going to be less interesting. For example, there is a green action slot that allows me to upgrade something for the cost of one science token. There is a yellow action slot that allows me to upgrade up to three items by spending up to three science tokens. Same basic function, but the yellow action slot is three times as powerful.
I like the hand management process in this game. During your turn, you may take actions or play cards that bring extra cards into your hand. You can keep them and examine them until it’s your next turn. Only at that point are you required to discard down to your hand limit of three cards. I like this because I can monitor which action slots are taken by other players, and only discard cards based on what color actions might still remain. You are also required to have only three cards in hand when the decks are changed out (between Era I and Era II as well as between II and III) as well.
There is a “mini expansion” that comes with the base game called Government Contracts. Three cards from this smaller deck are placed faced up on the game board at the start of the game. Each presents a specific goal or achievement. Once a player has completed the goal, they may take the card and gain the benefits. Only three contracts are available throughout the entirety of the game; completed cards are not replaced. If you needed something to focus on other than building out your network of underwater cities, this can provide that. However it’s also potentially a distraction from the main goals. Choices matter in this game. 🙂
I like that player turn order for the upcoming round is based on actions I take in this one. I can ignore the Federation Track and go last, or I can try to push my token up to the top in order to ensure I get first pick of the action slots in the next round.
I like that in a four-player game there is a way to use an action slot that someone else has already taken. It costs money (1 credit) but if I absolutely need to do a specific action that has already been blocked, I can do that.
There is also a solo mode which I have not tried yet.
But no game is perfect, so what are some of the observations about this one? To start with, the base game came with basic player boards. The expansion provided dual-layer boards which are a must in a game like this, where bumping your player card would result in major catastrophe. I have not played with the expansion (aside from the custom Assistant cards I mentioned earlier) but the dual-layer boards are indispensable. If you have only the base game and no interest in the expansion, you can buy the boards from the Board Game Geek Store.
Anything missing? I would like to see some sort of event deck (underwater earthquake, land slide, collapsing tunnel…giant cephalopod
attack…). I don’t know if this is included in the expansion or not. Terraforming Mars offers the ability to “accidentally” rain down asteroids (or even an entire moon!) on one of your opponents tree farms (Oops, my bad). Something like that might be an interesting add to this game.
Overall, though, I have thoroughly enjoyed my first two plays of Underwater Cities. As I have included it on my 20×5 for 2023, I will be playing it at least three more times during the balance of the year. Honestly, now that I have learned and played it, I feel like it will get played a good bit more than that. 😎