EPOS: A Gentes Game

EPOS: A Gentes Game made the table because Gentes was already well liked, and because Risthaus is the sort of designer one is prepared to trust. Before any cultural development could begin, though, the little monster in the box had to be defeated: a great many pieces, scenarios, and bits that will not forgive a casual ‘put it all back in’. Two quiet hours of arranging things for zero lifting later, it had a future on the shelf rather than the fate of a game nobody dares unpack.

At its centre, this is a slightly improved Gentes. The base game retains that familiar sense of building a civilisation and does not disappoint; the campaign adds group and personal unlocks. That is the genuinely interesting promise here: not merely more material in a large box, but a structure intended to alter the reasons for returning to it.

There are eight scenarios, compact modules with added and adjusted rules. In the first, players also spread across the map, with a small area-majority element; suddenly it is not enough to watch your own development, because where you sit beside the others begins to matter. It is a modest change with real weight, and a good indication that the campaign can bring some very good play to the surface.

EPOS does not move away from the Gentes I like; it simply gives it more reasons to be laid out again, provided you grant it the organisation it asks for at the start. With its material in order and its scenarios waiting to unfold, it is quietly excellent.