Though the writing team here at Opinionated Gamers site is known for going where angels fear to tread, it seems a bit like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic to reinvent the wheel by writing a full review of Voidfall. (Yes, I’ll admit – I tried to cram as many idioms into that sentence as possible – kind of like how the good folks at Mindclash crammed so much stuff into the Galactic Box version of this game.)

The simple reason? One of our newer writers here at the OG also does a bang-up job for Meeple Mountain… and he (Justin Bell) wrote an epic five-chapter preview & review of Voidfall back in December 2023.

• Part One: The Box
• To be fair, Justin isn’t just excited about the physical box… but by all the well-designed stuff inside it.
  • Quote: “At some point during my initial sorting, I realized that even if I never played Voidfall (Don’t worry! I’m going to play Voidfall!!), I just love taking new toys out of the box, putting stickers on meeples, punching cardboard chits, and marveling at the quality of a sturdy player board.”
• Part Two: The Tutorial
  • In which Justin explains just how cool the tutorial to this massive game is…
  • Quote: “The goal of the tutorial is simple: finish the game knowing what the heck you are supposed to be doing. Let’s give credit where credit is due: this is one of the best tutorials I have ever played.”
• Part Three: Competitive Mode
  • …which also includes a detailed explanation about setting up Voidfall, leading Justin at one point in our OG conversation to write “Mark, I wish you lived here so that I could just play it at your house”, following my comment that I found setting it up an almost Zen-like experience.
  • Quote: “Here’s how much I love Voidfall’s Competitive Mode: I generally hate games with zero interaction, and I almost never intentionally play two player games with anyone besides my wife. But I would play Voidfall at two players any time.”
• Part Four: Co-op/Solo Mode
  • Though not a solo player, Justin put in the time with Voidfall.
  • Quote: “Where things get interesting—or “interesting”, quotes intentional, depending on your point of view—is when Solo is played on Medium or Hard mode. That’s because the Crisis cards quickly move from “not bad” to “utterly ridiculous” as players are forced to use not only the Level I and Level II Crisis cards, but the Level III Crisis cards too. The Level III Crisis cards feel like Buckle and Turczi were out drinking one night and thought up some of the worst ways they could punish players and still keep the Voidfall gameplay loop intact.”
• Part Five: The Review
  • Something I appreciate about Justin’s review is his honesty about what he loves AND what he doesn’t love about Voidfall.
  • Quote: “In terms of the marriage of gameplay to production, Voidfall is the hands-down winner in this category for 2023. If this were a metric tracked by BGG, it would get a perfect score. As a value proposition, Voidfall has no peer. You could play it 100 times and still not see every combination of map setup, technology tableau, and House abilities. All of this comes with a production and storage solution that puts almost every other supposedly “deluxe” tabletop experience to shame.”

So, if we’re not going to try & top Justin’s Everest-like climb through fourteen plays of Voidfall, what are we going to do?

The Conversation

Well, what we decided to do is gather a group of Opinionated Gamer writers who were/are fans of Voidfall and let them talk. What follows is my attempt to bring some order and organization to that meeting of the minds as we discuss the game, the designers (Nigel Buckle & Dávid Turczi), and our thoughts & impressions.

To begin, I asked the group: What element (designer, artwork, reviews, publisher, theme, etc.) convinced you to back/buy/try Voidfall?

And, because I’m me, I answered first.

MARK JACKSON: For me, it was a combination of the design team (Nigel Buckle & Dávid Turczi – both of whom had a role in designing Imperium Classics/Legends which I love) and the theme. The work they did in the Kickstarter of integrating the thematic storyline into “unlocking” stretch was both smart and absolutely intoxicating for someone like me who wants to enmeshed in the world of a game. (Note: the text from that thematic storyline is available as a 37(!) page document on BGG.)

ALAN HOW: I’ve known Nigel from years ago and liked the game this was based on Omega Centauri which I first played 16 years ago. David Turczi has produced good ideas in his games, particularly in solo modes.

But for me the key ingredient in the game was the development aspects as well as the variety available. Those two items meant that I was very interested. I like space based games and the development elements fitted the theme.

When we saw the presentation on Kickstarter I was hooked. The artwork is fantastic and the deluxe version has great minis, metal development pieces, multi level boards, a clever way of sliding the different races into the player boards. It looked gorgeous.

Later I saw Paul Grogan’s videos and he was excited too. Paul and I share very similar tastes in board games so this confirmed my excitement.

JUSTIN BELL (yes, the same guy who wrote the five-chapter epic on Voidfall mentioned above): My first knowledge of Voidfall came from the first in the series of Viktor Peter’s BGG Designer Diary on the game. I had a middling experience with Eclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy, and I appreciated Mindclash designs like Trickerion: Legends of Illusion and Anachrony, so a 4X game that was more deterministic from the people at Mindclash had me intrigued.

MATTHEW MONIN: My attention is piqued by any new game announced by Mindclash, and hearing they were tackling a 4x space epic sealed the deal.  I love Twilight Imperium, but it’s just too big to play regularly.  I wanted to like Eclipse but I found it had sanded off too many edges off of the 4x experience for my tastes.  I was hopeful, knowing where many of Mindclash’s previous games sit on the complexity scale, that Voidfall would find a manageable middle ground between those two

LARRY LEVY: At first, Voidfall wasn’t on my radar at all.  4+ hour games aren’t usually my speed and, even if they’re good, are very hard to get to the table.  Big games set in space often feature a lot of combat (Eclipse is the outstanding example) and while I don’t mind playing Eclipse, I don’t need another version of it in my life.  And unlike Mark, Imperium wasn’t a favorite of mine, so the designers weren’t a particular draw.  So at first, this wasn’t a game I planned to pursue.

What actually got me interested in it was a comment from Alan How.  Between what he’s written for OG and the many years he was one of the principal reviewers with Counter magazine, I know his tastes very well and they match mine quite closely.  So when he enthusiastically mentioned a while back that Voidfall was one of his favorite games of all time, I picked my ears up.  In addition, I had greatly enjoyed another game that Turczi had co-designed, Nucleum, so I was now much more inclined to check out his other recent stuff.  The early reviews of Voidfall made me think that combat wouldn’t be the end-all and be-all, which was another positive.  So when a member of my game group announced that he had picked it up, I said I was interested in trying it out.  Then it just came down to when we could find the time to learn and play this beast of a game.

Then I asked: Voidfall is a sprawling design… but I’m going to force you to pick 1-3 pieces of the game that you really think set it apart. (These could be design elements, the way various game systems fit together, the production, etc.)

LARRY: Well, the first part is easy–it’s the Focus cards.  They’re not particularly innovative; after all, they’re just multi-use cards and we’ve seen that in plenty of games (although it is unusual to be able to get two, and sometimes three, different actions from the same card).  But it’s the actions themselves that make this work and make the game so enjoyable.  They’re varied and interesting and figuring out the order of playing the cards, along with which actions to use, is a lot of fun.  It’s a nice crunchy decision, without feeling overwhelming.  On the surface, it doesn’t sound like much:  you’ve got 9 cards, you get to play 4-6 of them each round, and that’s pretty much all you do.  But Buckle and Turczi make it work.  Great execution of a straightforward concept.

My only game of this was largely a learning game, so there’s many elements I haven’t truly explored yet.  But I guess I’d go with the Agenda cards as my second aspect.  They determine the way you score points and make up a big part of your score.  Choosing the ones that best fit your position was a nice puzzle, particularly since you can only play them with certain Focus cards.  At first that restriction annoyed me, but then I realized it’s a significant part of the design and one that affects the timing of your plays.  Still lots to discover here, but that was something I enjoyed.

I don’t know the game well enough to have a third aspect, but there are two things that I bet will vie for it once I do get the chance to play this some more.  I largely ignored the technology cards, but it looked as if the designers did a great job with them.  They do not just give you incremental advances (“Add 1 to your Flippy-Flop skill”); no, they’re interesting, impactful, and potentially game-breaking abilities that you clearly want to base your strategy around.  I definitely want to focus on these the next time I play and it wouldn’t surprise me if they become one of the things I like best about the game.

The other area that I’d like to explore some more is the combat system.  Our battles in our game were as vanilla as they could be, since no one grabbed any of the techs that would have let them build the more advanced ships or defense systems.  But I bet they would have been fun to play with.  I don’t think this will excite me as much as the technologies will, but it’s something I’d like to check out in more detail.

ALAN: Thanks for a very good analysis Larry.

My own take on Mark’s questions:

1. The other side of Larry’s Focus coin. I love the cleverness of the targets that are set by the game. A galactic event poses an era wide goal; the agendas require some planning to achieve and timing of when to play, while the goals for the scenario provide a long term targets. And of course the focus cards are the tool to achieve these objectives. These all present problems to solve but interesting ones all the time.

2. The presentation. I went for the extra bits so the triple layered boards, the slide in race sheets, the minis that add great presence and the metal enamelled tokens are just beautiful. But the presentation extends in so many other ways. The artwork is excellent and even the myriad of icons don’t take long to learn. When you tell someone about the number it appears madness, but they are quickly assimilated. The rule booklets, scenario book and glossary show the Mindclash people have looked at the game and decided how to make things easier to find and learn. As an example, the solo/cooperative game elements are highlighted so you can focus or ignore those accordingly. And when you play the game a few times, you even know where to look so I think these are laid out very logically.

3. The variation. The Kickstarter campaign added so many more choices – extra races, space hexes, scenarios – all to good effect. The game has aspects that change each game, even playing the same scenario, that each game feels fresh as you tackle the puzzles the game presents. And this challenge to each game excites me as I know I have to work out a way to solve the problems armed with the tools I have. More complex races have different focus cards, while the heroic cards are added for solo play. It’s almost as if someone playtested this to an extreme and then made it smooth, even though there are so many game elements to consider. 

JUSTIN: Three things that set Voidfall apart:

The Focus cards, particularly the unique ones for a few of the factions. Across my 14 plays, I was surprised how often I found myself staring at the cards, wondering how to max a turn, knowing the goals for that particular Galactic Event and trying to figure out which Focus cards fit best. Even an expansion with just two standard cards added to the nine included in the base game might make my head explode.

The production, typically an A+ for Mindclash anyway, is their best work yet. The triple-layer player boards, the storage solution, the artwork, the rulebooks, the ship miniatures, the metal tokens, the map tiles. Even those who have not played a game of Voidfall have marveled at the Galactic Box (the deluxe version) sitting on my shelf, and for good reason.

The variability tied specifically to the technologies available in a particular session. The techs here are dope, man. They create interesting combinations when considering every aspect of the game; seeing which techs will be in a game is one of the great pleasures during that otherwise tedious 45-to-60-minute setup time.

MARK: I’m right with Justin on the production of the game… Voidfall is gorgeous. (The only thing missing is the House reference cards Nigel Buckle loaded up on BGG to put in each House box. My hope is that any expansion would add these to the game.)

And I’ll echo pretty much all of us with the admiration for the sheer amount of variety built into the game system – and yet, despite that, the system isn’t impossibly bogged down. Customization is inherent in the initial choice of Houses and technologies… but it doesn’t fundamentally change the structure of the game. (I will note that the solo & cooperative games do alter the game system – but in ways that are clearly outlined in the rules and the various components.)

MATTHEW: What sets it apart?

Others have touched on the quality of the production and the variety of factions – both of which I heartily +1.  Another thing that sets Voidfall apart for me is how cleanly the economy of the game works thanks to the production dials. The dials make it possible for players to track the production and storage of five different game currencies – currencies which are produced at a non-linear rate relative to how many production facilities they have, and which also have different scales of production growth from one another. Having these different rates all baked into the dials lets Voidfall have an interesting economy while freeing up the players’ bandwidth to focus on actually playing the game.

ALAN: I’d agree with all your points and especially the dials, which I had overlooked. It’s easy to see how to increase production and its benefits and the amount of control you have over these elements.

MARK: I’ll note that Justin used part of his Meeple Mountain opus to complain about assembling those production dials… it’s painful. (He’s not wrong.)

Next question: What elements of the game/game system would you want to warn folks about? In other words, are there certain things that might be off-putting to particular types of gamers… or that a gamer might want to know before diving into Voidfall?

LARRY: What would I warn others about?  The first issue is obvious:  the ginormous setup time.  I don’t expect the 2 hours we needed for our first game to be the norm (basic familiarity with the components should help a lot), but I still suspect each game will require a minimum of 45 minutes, and possibly as long as an hour to set up.  That’s a real issue.  Most likely, it will mean that all our future games will take place at the game owner’s home, so he can set up ahead of time (as opposed to our normal venue at a local game store).  That will definitely limit how often this gets to the table.  Right now, everyone is sufficiently enthused about Voidfall that I predict such future games will happen, but it’s certainly something prospective buyers need to know–not everyone has the patience to deal with such an elaborate set up.

The second issue is one that seems to have bothered me more than my more experienced fellow reviewers, but I had a lot of heartburn with the massive amount of iconography.  It’s used throughout the game, there are well over 100 different icons, and much of it seemed unintuitive to me.  It really slowed our game down as we were constantly looking things up.  Hopefully, this will improve with future games, but I will definitely be relying on printed out cheat sheets to provide words rather than the less than helpful symbology.

I’m not sure if my third concern is a valid one, since I don’t own the game and wasn’t able to really dive into the rules as much as I would have liked prior to our first play.  But I’m not sure I’m thrilled with the way the rules are presented.  Dividing things into 3 books is often problematic and thumbing through multiple volumes while searching for answers during our game was kind of annoying.  But more to the point, while going through the online rules, I wasn’t really grasping what the game was about.  I even did something I hardly ever do, which is watch a video.  That helped some, but when it came time to play, I really didn’t have any idea of what the hell I needed to do (other folks in my game felt the same).  It just seems to be a very tough game to put your arms around, even though mechanically, it isn’t that complex.  Fortunately, in our scenario, at least, doing the logical things of building up your position and managing basic expansion seemed to work well enough (at least it didn’t put anyone in an untenable position), so perhaps I’m overthinking this.  Even after a full game, I’m still not sure what good long-term strategies are, but I’m reasonably confident that will come with later games.  So I guess this is more of a warning that you shouldn’t be afraid to just plunge into a game; Voidfall doesn’t seem all that punishing, so even a learning game should be very enjoyable (ours certainly was).

It should be obvious, but I’d still mention to anyone interested in it that this is a long game.  I don’t expect our 6-7 hour initial play time to be repeated, but I gotta feel that even with experienced players, this is at least an hour per player.  So be aware of that ahead of time, particularly if you’re planning on 4 player games.

Finally, I do have one complaint about the otherwise excellent components.  (Even though I’m not really a gaming parakeet, I couldn’t help but be impressed by the work that went into the physical copy.)  Putting the ships on stands is cool looking, but they were constantly falling off and it took a bit of doing to get them onto their stems.  Plus, it hid the cubes sitting under the stands a bit.  It’s far from a big issue, but I would have actually preferred the low-tech cube holders from the basic version.  I don’t expect anyone to agree with that point, but I figured I’d get it off my chest.  :-)

ALAN: Several areas come to mind.

Set up time. This is not a quick set up so it’s best if someone sets it up in advance, but it’s not so bad when everything is known about. I’d say about 20 minutes now I have a good idea of what to do, which isn’t too bad.Tear down but this is not a problem for one person and the guide provided help and the inserts make things far easier.

But the main aspect I found daunting and perhaps others would, is the initial range of options. While this is one of the best features, I think it’s also a scary one. But when you play the game you realise this dazzling array of options isn’t as big as you thought. Many of the focus cards need to be played later, not first, so that reduces the choice to a more approachable number. But the choices might be more than most people want to deal with when you explain the game.

The game iconography is often cited as ridiculous. There are a lot of icons, but the icon language is very easy to pick up once you see the icons in action and now when I play, there’s very few that I don’t instantly get, and then it’s often pretty close to what I thought. The excellent glossary and icon sheets are great supporters in the learning of the game. 

Another thing is the number of elements in the game – focus cards, ships, agendas, hexes, game boards. When I saw this on display I was excited; but I’m sure others might think there’s too much to deal with. 

Finally, the game length. If all those other areas are overcome, do you want to play a multi hour game? I’m sure this will deter gamers and ensure that Voidfall does not win the awards its design deserves.

MATTHEW: Something I would warn players about, besides what others have said about the considerable set up time, long length of play, amount of iconography (all things that I also endorse), is that it might not be the kind of game it appears to be based on looks alone.  Someone might look at Voidfall and see the expansive map and all the ships and the interesting technologies and think this is a game of high adventure with epic space battles.  And Voidfall isn’t that. Voidfall is about solving layers of different interlocking logistics problems – what’s the best way to expand, what’s the best way to maximize my agendas, what’s the best combo of techs to meet those ends, and balancing all of the above with the new opportunities and speed bumps created by the events that come out. Now I also love games of high adventure and dice chucking as well so I’m not knocking either genre here.  But given what reasonable assumptions a player might have based on the theme and look alone, it’s important for them to know what kind of game they are actually getting into.

LARRY: Very good point, Matthew.  Despite its appearance, Voidfall is not a Space Opera game, nor is it a design where the main focus is on combat.  That’s one of my favorite things about it, but I can easily see where someone would expect it to be like that and be disappointed.

Final question… ably answered by Alan How: Comment on the various modes: solo, cooperative, competitive – which do you prefer? If you want, name a feature you particularly like about the mode.

ALAN: The honest answer is that like all three. 

I think the reason for this is that I enjoy the development and choices that each game provides. As a social gamer I enjoy playing games with friends so that scores another point for the competitive and cooperative modes. But that hasn’t much to do with the game – more my preferred gaming experience.

Looking more at my games of Voidfall in different modes: I learned the game as a solo experience and I was daunted. That would be the case in any mode, but the additional board to monitor added to my pressure. Now I’ve played solo multiple times I think it’s a sensational way to play. Cooperative makes this better as you share thoughts and I like 2 player best.

Competitive mode may depend on the knowledge of other players, but I like 3 player games best. 

The reason for these choices of player count is that I like the game to flow quickly and with these numbers I feel the game works best. But the underlying point for me is that the game actions remain the same, so the thought processes that you go through are similar, but adapted to the game type. In competitive mode generally the player versus player fighting is not frequent, but you can adjust your game plan if you see a military build up coming your way. And because combat is deterministic you can creat decent barriers that might deter an aggressor.

In solo and cooperative games you have an additional board of problems to solve but I like the discussion that takes place to overcome these challenges. As I said I am a social gamer first and foremost. 

So I’m afraid Mark I like all modes considerably and the main distinction for me is getting more players to appreciate the game.

Some Final Thoughts From the “Author”

First, I put quotes around “Author” because these gentlemen did the heavy lifting here… I was just privileged to be part of the conversation.

Second, we didn’t mention one of the really interesting thematic choices in the game – the time frame. Your faction/House isn’t simply competing in a fight against the Voidborn… it’s a conflict that takes huge gulps of time. Each combat action in the game is NOT a single battle but a war. Each ship represents a fleet of ships. Each guild and installation token is the result of decades of infrastructure building. It’s a “sweep of history” kind of thing… if history included a malevolent galactic contamination and its long-range plan for domination of the universe.

Third, there is talk of a Voidfall expansion… though nothing definite. In some ways that seems like overkill – in others, I think there’s room to do some really interesting things with this robust game system.

Finally, I can’t wait to play Voidfall again. Full stop.