Age of Mythology (AoM) is a conversion of the award winning computer game of the same name - and a very good one. Players can choose to play one of three races - the Egyptians, Norse or Greeks. Their goal is to build the greatest empire and in doing so earn the most victory point cubes to be declared victor at games end. The game revolves around each player's individual game board, which is made up of 4 key areas. Their region area offers various terrains (each civ has a different makeup of terrains in accordance with their homeland). Players must explore these regions to find key resources, which are then assigned to a terrain and can be produced in future turns. The city area has 16 spaces where purchased buildings can be placed to offer strategic advantages (like Warcraft or Civilisation). The other two areas hold a player's army and resources. The game flows through the use of cards, which offer player's a series of actions each turn such as: Recruit, Attack, Explore, Build, Trade, Gather (resources) and rare but crucial God Powers which are more powerful versions of the other actions. The twist though is that player's can only select a limited number of actions per turn. It is through this game mechanic that players are presented with multiple strategies to build their civilisation and must often make hard choices. Add to this mix the ability to attack opponent's resource producing terrains (to destroy or steal them), resource storehouse (to steal resources) or city buildings (to destroy them) and the game gets very intricate, very quickly. Each race also has its own unique military units offering a mixture of mortal and mythical combatants and each unit has strengths and weaknesses against other specific unit types. Combat is unique in that each player commits his forces to the engagement but the 2 units selected for each individual battle are done so secretly. In this way a player is rarely certain if they will gain a strategic advantage with the unit they have selected. Victory Points (VP's) are gained in 1 of 4 ways and players must place a VP cube each turn on one of the 4 options. In this way players can pursue a particular line of expansion when developing their civ in order to gain the most VP cubes by games end!

The Final Word

AoM is a brilliant game as it combines good game design with play styles from many other formats and titles. Very few games offer a tactical combat system and a detailed empire-building component (both Risk and Settlers of Catan offer one or the other). AoM also fills a niche that has been poorly serviced by the industry - a balanced 3 player game. Most games using 3 players result in 2 players squeezing the person in the middle and removing them from the action. AoM avoids this and keeps all players firmly in the game until the end. With quality components and 300 miniatures this game offers great value. If you only have 2 other gaming friends then this game is an absolute must. AoM also allows for team play for 4 or 6 players! Put this one up near the top of your wish list…..it's that good!