Sovereign Skies

Sovereign Skies won me over precisely because it does not immediately advertise how interesting it is. At first glance, or even from a quick skim of the rules, it can seem simpler than it actually turns out to be.

At its core, it is a mini-rondel racing game: you travel around the rondel, choose how to move through it, and try to make the best use of the available options. Its central twist is that I can even reverse the direction in which I travel around it, making decisions more interesting than simply moving one way around a track.

The mechanisms felt clever and balanced to me, while player interaction is minimal but pivotal. This is not a game built around constantly bothering the other player; still, that small amount of interaction is enough to ensure I am not playing in total isolation and need to pay attention to what is happening around the rondel.

As a thinky filler of around 40 minutes, I think it is very good. If I had more frequent gatherings, I believe it would see the table; online, its several moving parts make it less convenient. Even so, it deserves a little more attention than you might be inclined to give it at first.