Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

• Designer: Alberto Millan
• Publisher: Looping Games
• Players: 1-5
• Age: 10+
• Time: 45 minutes
• Played with review copy provided by publisher

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea is a thematic exploration game inspired by Jules Verne’s classic novel. Players take on the roles of crew members aboard Captain Nemo’s submarine, the Nautilus, navigating between surface and depth maps in search of discovery, danger, and wonder. As they explore sunken ships, hunt marine creatures, and uncover the mysteries of Atlantis, they compete to earn points through smart decisions and spatial strategy.

The game unfolds over sixteen simultaneous turns. Each round, players secretly choose one of three character rows, then move the Nautilus using the indicated movement points. On their sheets, they draw discoveries and score for islands in line of sight, sunken ships, seaweed forests, treasures, and hunted cetaceans. If multiple players choose the same character, a hazard is triggered—unless one holds the rotating Conseil card, which grants temporary immunity.

With unique character bonuses, a dedicated solo mode, and layered end-game scoring, the game rewards thoughtful planning and tactical movement. The double-sided map system invites players to dive and surface at key moments, enhancing both depth and replayability. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea offers an elegant, compact, and immersive experience for 1 to 5 adventurers.

To start, give each player two sheets, one placed on the surface side up and one with the underwater side up.  After the game, save the sheets and use the blank reverse sides for your next game.  Assign the numbers 1 thru 4 to the four crew members at the bottom of the surface sheet.  Place your nautilus on the central 19 space of your sheet.  Each player chooses a letter A thru E, drawing a ship on the matching surface space and a trident on the matching underwater space.

Make a 3×3 grid of cards.  Randomize the three character cards in the left column.  They are double-sided and each side has a different bonus.  In the middle column, draw 3 surface cards and place the surface deck at the BOTTOM of this column.  In the right column, draw 3 underwater cards and place the underwater deck at the TOP of this column.  Finally, shuffle the 8 danger cards, make a deck and then flip the two two cards up next to each other. Place the round marker on the left space of the left card; these cards will represent the 16 rounds in the game. A start player is chosen and given the Conseil card.

The game is played over 16 turns, each of which is played simultaneously over 5 phases:

1] Select a Character – Each player chooses a line in the card array and writes the letter corresponding to the character at the left of the line into the box at the top of their sheet corresponding to this turn.

2] Face Danger – players that have written an initial matching at least one other player now must suffer the danger shown by the turn marker on the current Danger card.  Note that the player with the Conseil card is immune to the Danger.  Dangers can cause damage to the bow, body or propellers of the Nautilus or could injure a crew member.  Pass the Conseil card clockwise to the nearest player to have taken damage.

3] Move the Nautilus – move your Nautilus as many spaces as you have sub icons in your row of cards.  You must use all the points, you can move from the surface to underwater for one point, and you cannot revisit a space on the same sheet (you cannot double back).  If you enter a space with a drawn discovery, your bow area takes damage unless it is a ship, in which case you cross that ship out (you have sunk the ship).  .  

4] Draw Discoveries – from the end space of your movement, now draw the discovery icons on the surface and underwater maps as directed by the cards in your chosen row.  The icons can be drawn on the hex you are in or any of the six surrounding hexes.  After drawing your discoveries, see if you interact with anything adjacent to your Nautilus.  If you end next to treasure, you can draw circles in your treasure chest area to spend later.  If you end your movement next to a whale, X out as many spaces as the value of the animal. If you end adjacent to Atlantis, you can fill in the edge of the Atlantis hex between your Nautilus and Atlantis

5] Score islands and sunken ships – If you end on the surface, you score 1 point for each island you can see in a straight line from your position.  There cannot  be anything in between you and the island.  In turns that are a multiple of 4, you also score 1 point for each sunken ship.

At the end of the round, move the round marker to the right by one space.  Flip over a new card if you move off the left most card.  Also update the market by removing the top card of the surface market and sliding in a new card from the bottom AND removing the bottom card of the underwater market and sliding in a new card from the top. 

At the end of 16 rounds, score the game:

• Sum the scores from each round (for islands and sunken ships)
• One point for each mark in the whale chart
• Points for crew members that survived
• Score all your seaweed areas on your sheet
• Subtract points for each impact on your Nautilus
• Atlantis: 15/7/3 pts for the most/2nd/3rd marks around Atlantis
• Character Bonuses – the player with the most uses of each character gets the bonus of said character

The player with the most points wins.  Ties broken in favor of the player with the most unused coins.

My thoughts on the game

So when the whole X and write movement started, I was captivated by each new entry in the genre.  There was always some new twist or unexpected rule that made the new game stand out from the rest.  Ten years later, well, not so much – not that there is anything wrong with a XAW without innovation…

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea was pitched to me at Spiel 2025, and I was interested in the way that you used two sheets in the game, one for the ocean surface and one for underwater.  Yes, not entirely novel, but different enough to escape the X and write ennui.

The game gives you plenty of different goals here, some short term and some long term – so generally you’ll be able to use more than one of the card pairs on offer to you in the display.  This is a good thing because you’d really rather not take the penalties too often for matching other people.  

Of course, when you play the game with 5p (as we do here often), you’re going to end up with penalties nearly every turn!  Interestingly, the game doesn’t scale at all for this, so you’ll just have a lot more penalties at higher player counts.  I wonder whether the game wants a second “get out of jail” free card at higher player counts; but it doesn’t, so there isn’t one.  The end game bonuses also don’t scale – there are always three bonuses regardless of player count, and they can be quite beneficial, so good luck winning without one!

The turns generally move fairly fast – most of the time is spent in the planning. Once you have written your letter down, you usually already know what you’re going to do with the things on the cards. Sure, maybe an unexpected penalty throws a spanner in your submersible, though our experience here has been to essentially always plan on the penalty and then be pleasantly surprised when you don’t get it.  Each round moves fairly quickly, and our games usually finish just past the half hour mark.  

As a group, we’re not good artists, and each of us has come up with our own shorthand for the drawings.  I tend to just use dollar signs for the money and I use a “W” for the cetacean, because it looks like a whale in the icon, and W is short for Whale.  It’s not pretty, but it gets the job done!

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea is definitely on the meatier end of the X and Write game spectrum, and it gives you a lot to consider in the 30-45 minutes that you’ll play it.  It’s not quite a point salad of a game, but there are definitely lots of ways to score points, and the key is maximizing your scoring potential from all your options.  

Thoughts from other Opinionated Gamers

Doug G.: Shelley and I enjoyed the innovation of the two-pages, with one “above” the other (surface/under sea) taking a moment to get your brain around. Since we play most of our games 2-player, the penalties Dale discusses weren’t as frequent, and therefore we felt freer with our actions than you will in a 5-player game. This one worked better for us than the previous Around the World In 80 Days from 2024, and it’s staying on the shelf. We reviewed it on Episode 1019 of the Garrett’s Games podcast – https://traffic.libsyn.com/garrettsgames/GarrettsGames1019.mp3

Ratings from the Opinionated Gamers

• I love it!
• I like it. Dale Y, Doug G.
• Neutral. John P
• Not for me…