For the man who thinks he has had enough Settlers Of Catan, we present this. Designers Fuzzy Wobble and Amy Wang redesigned the classic game to look like some cool futuristic space adventure! "Deep Space Settlers" is actually a variant on "Sea Farers Catan" which adds an exploration element on top of the classic gameplay. That seems appropriate since we are talking about Space travel. Here's some improvements they made in their game...
- This game is a evolution of Sea Farers Catan, in which there is an exploration element to the game. Instead of exploring the sea, we are now exploring deep space, which are inverted tiles that are flipped during exploration.
- Perimeter pieces have grips. No sliding board.
- Hexagon pieces are smaller. Can create large boards without needing a stadium size table (as you did with Sea Farers).
- When you reach a trading port your piece is elevated so other players are more aware who is owning which trading ports.
- Robber covers both the resource and the number.
- Finally, you can build your cities, rather than replacing settlements with cities.
- Building reference card is connected to the baggie of pieces.
- Longest Road and Largest Army now trophies instead of cards.
- Although, not very space themed, we kept sheep/wood/wheat/ore/brick because we did NOT want to force people to remember a new set of resources.
Other rule changes removed the pirate, building between turns even with 5-6 players, and the ability to take a resource when rolling a 2 and 12 as they are not present in this version. While the game is futuristic, your resources remain the same. The main reason for this is that the developers didn't want to force anyone to have to remember new resources again (thank you). While they remain the same...you'll notice their designs are vastly different from the original game...
From left: Wood, Sheep, Ore, Wheat, Brick
If you think that looks slick wait until you see the cities and roads, which look like your typical scifi spires and highways...
As you might be able to tell from the picture above, cities are created by sliding a piece into the existing settlement...
The resource cards look snazzy and a bit easier to read...
The hemisphere numbers are replaced by numbered marbles...
And probably my favorite feature, the robber is now a metal dome that fits snugly over the hemisphere it wishes to block...
The whole thing looks magnificent.
Even the box is sexy as hell!
Unfortunately, this isn't something you'll be able to buy unless Mayfair Games ponies up for the design. If they did, I think this is the first Catan game I would drop $100 on real quick. Check out the full gallery below...
Make sure to give the creation team your love on their site!
