Atlantis Exodus

Atlantis Exodus is one of those heavy euros that spreads a lot of things across the table and makes no apology for it. The “90 minutes” felt like a rather optimistic description—especially for a first game, practically a joke. Still, it has presence and enough ideas to make you want to see what it is trying to do.

At its core, it is a dense euro with plenty of systems and choices running at once. A first encounter can easily feel overwhelming, as it did for me, because you have to keep track of many things before getting a clear sense of what is worth pursuing.

The game seems to reward familiarity with its flow and its choices, while the end-game scoring is one of the elements that makes it interesting. I do not yet have a complete picture of how well everything comes together from game to game, but there are fresh touches here that deserve a second exploration.

I cannot say I had a bad time in my first game; I simply felt the game threw more at me than I had time to digest. I definitely want to play it again before reaching a final conclusion. If you are a euro lover and a generous, demanding table does not scare you, put Atlantis Exodus on your list.