Farms Race: Deluxe Edition

When I see the phrase “Catan with Nukes,” my first instinct is to assume it is utter nonsense. Still, having spent countless late nights with Nuclear Escalation at Gamer’s Circle and Nuclear War on the Amiga, I hit buy and simply hoped I was not being taken for a ride. Thankfully, it is not quite what I feared.

Its foundation really is Catan-like: you spread out to secure resources, and an area randomly produces a particular type. That familiar logic provides an easy starting point before the game begins to drift away from its calm, settlement-building relative.

Because there is much more business going on here. There is fighting, dice, karate and, above all, plenty of nukes falling left and right and leaving everyone else with satisfyingly heavy losses. The interaction is not subtle: players do not merely build their little economies, but face the consequences when someone decides to make things explode.

I would not take it seriously for a second—especially once you remember that we are playing mutant zombie rabbits going after super-sheep. But that is part of its charm. For my group it had, and still has, potential: it is the right pick when we want something chaotic, aggressive, and ridiculous enough that we can laugh while destroying one another.