Eclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy

Eclipse: Second Dawn for the Galaxy is one of those boxes that gets you thinking before you even play it. Its bling is simply impressive: such a lavish deluxe reprint that it almost made me want to own it even if I already had the first edition, along with the hard-to-find expansions and all the associated stuff. On the table, it is a proper spectacle and, as a physical object, it may well redraw the line for what we expect from a deluxe reissue.

In play, the Core-plus-Rise experience has improved noticeably over the first edition. The overall package flows a notch better and feels like a more polished, more complete version of Eclipse, without losing its big space-opera spectacle.

Player interaction and the way a session develops still serve that grand Eclipse spectacle, but the improvements do not radically change its character. Once the excitement of the new edition wears off and the game itself is what remains, its flow does not manage to rise above the issues that kept it just short of the next level before.

And that is the problem: beyond the novelty factor, I was not convinced that it solves the same problems that kept the first edition in the 7–8/10 range rather than somewhere higher. We had a good time, no question. I am simply not sure I want to get it back on the table again soon—however gorgeous it looks when I do.