Earth Gambit: Light

• Designer: Liana Manukyan
• Publisher: Honest Quarks Games
• Players: 2-10
• Age: 10+
• Time: 15-20 minutes
• Played with copy provided by publisher

Earth Gambit: Light is a social adventure game with extraterrestrials, hidden identities, and tough choices. In this game, you will play as the Aliens, the Scientists, or the Extinctionists, who each have very different plans for Earth and the course of the Earthlings’ science. Advance the science by playing science cards, stall your opponents by playing action cards, and share your research by passing cards to other players, but who can you really trust? Can you make the right choice if there is no good choice at all?

Time is limited, options even more so. Draw one, play one, pass one, and keep one for the future (if there will be one). Don’t think too hard, it’s not chess, it’s just the fate of Earth, that’s in your hands.  Note: The game has elements of social deduction with hidden identities, but not a social deduction game per se. That’s why we call it a Social Adventure game.

To start the game, prepare the deck of role cards as well as the deck of Play cards – the distribution of each determined by player count.  Each player is dealt a role card: Scientist, Alien or Extinctionist. These roles are kept secret throughout the game.  Each player is also dealt a single card from the Play deck as their starting hand (well, give 2 to the starting player).  Finally, if you are using them, deal each player one special ability card (this gives a once per game special rule).  Players may never reveal the actual identity of the cards in their hand though the can make generic comments about them such as if they are “good” or “bad”.

On a turn, the active player first draws a card.  Then the player chooses one of these three cards to play, putting it face up on the table and then resolve that card.  In the rare case that you cannot play any cards, reveal your entire hand to prove that you’re not lying, then discard a card (and you get no action).  Once the action is resolved, pass one of your remaining cards to the next player, who then begins their turn.

If you play a Science card, it stays face up on the table. The color(s) on that card will help the factions attain their victory condition.  If you play an Action card, it remains face up on the table until it is no longer in effect, at which point it is discarded.

Each of the action cards has a short description of its action, though the back side of the single page of rules has a more detailed description of the action.  Some examples:

• Damage – the damaged player must discard a card from their hand
• Heal – a damaged player draws the top card of the deck
• Shuffle Hands – collect all the cards in all player hands, shuffle them, and then redistribute them back to the players
• Psych Weapon – when in play, no Blue Science cards can be played. Eliminates a Psych Defense card in play
• Psych Defense – when in play, no Red Science cards can be played.  Eliminates a  Psych Weapon card in play
• Trade cards – choose 2 target players to trade a card

The game continues until a victory condition is met:

• Aliens win when 6 Red Science cards are played
• Scientists win when 6 Blue Science cards are played
• Extinctionists win when 3 yellow Science cards are played.  They win if their victory condition happens at same time as any other faction

My thoughts on the game

Earth Gambit: Light is a light social deduction game.  Here, each player has a secret role, and the players must try to deduce who is on what faction.  For the most part, you can use the cards played by each player as a big clue as to which team they are on; but clever players may find a way to disguise their goals, and this will likely help them win the game.

The intriguing catch here is that you must always pass a card to the next player right as they are starting their turn. Thus, you really need to try to figure out which team that player is on; unless they are also on your team, you definitely don’t want to give them cards which they can use to further their victory condition!  Well… maybe if you’re an extinctionist, you can give the next guy a Yellow Science card to play and hope that they’re willing to put it on the table for you.

Once players are familiar with the game, you can add in the special action cards which give everyone one more chance to affect the outcome of the game, often with surprising timing.  Even with these cards, the game remains quick to play,.

The rules are pretty simple, included on a single page.  We got a bit stymied in our first game as the chart to make up the Play deck confused us a bit (we missed the part about including all the other cards not specifically stated).  But once you get the deck sorted out, it’s honestly a really simple game to play.  After a few rounds, you’ll get the flow, and it’ll take only a game or two to learn what all the cards do.  We passed around the rule page for the first game so that people could read the clarifications without giving up knowledge about what is in their hand.

The Action cards can definitely change the game, and you’ll have to be ready for both a bit of randomness as well as targeted play at times.  If this isn’t your jam (or hidden role games aren’t your jam) – you likely already have figured out that this won’t be the game for you.  But, if you like this sort of game, it’s a great introductory social deduction game that has the added benefit that it can accommodate up to ten players, making it ideal for large groups, holiday parties, etc.  I’d definitely recommend this for fans of the social deduction genre or for people who want to see what they are all about.

Until your next appointment,

The Gaming Doctor