We’re going to need bigger guns
PROJECT: ELITE
Designer: Konstantinos Kokkinis, Marco Portugal, Sotirios Tsantilas| Publisher: CMON
Originally released in 2016 to general acclaim, Project: ELITE has returned to the board gaming tables, boasting a new coat of paint, plus some updated components and mechanics.
If you are unfamiliar with the game, at first glance it’s possible to confuse it with another instalment of the Zombicide series. It’s a tough cooperative game, in which players are an elite group of soldiers battling hordes of monster-like creatures – in this case, aliens – on a gridded board. Two-thirds of the game box is occupied by the alien miniatures, and from the first round, they spew onto the board in endless waves that players will struggle to clear. However, as an elite squad, players are armed to the teeth and what equipment they don’t have, they will be able to find by searching the map. During the game, they will need to clear the enemies through dice-based combat, fight bosses, complete objectives, and try to stay alive to win. Although the game comes with three modes of difficulties, none of them will be a walk in the park.
However, this is where the similarities with Zombicide end, because what sets Project: ELITE firmly apart is the real-time action phase. Between the start of the round, where events trigger bad things to happen, and the end of the round, where aliens cause more bad things to happen, players get two minutes to perform as many actions as they possibly can by rolling dice. The reroll mechanic is pleasantly generous, which helps to keep the fast-pace of rolling that is needed to do well. There is only one ‘bad’ dice outcome, which triggers the zombies to move, and the rest can be distributed between weapons, items, actions or objectives as players see fit.
Yet, while luck is a dominant part of the gameplay, the game manages to utilise dice rolling in a way that introduces strategic thinking. Objectives, as well as some items or weapons, ‘lock’ assigned dice until the end of the round. This this limits the number of dice players can keep rolling, making it harder to complete specific outcomes. So, do players commit to an objective straight away and risk action inefficiency towards the end of the two minutes, or risk waiting until the last minute and thirty seconds to try to complete the objective?
Those last two minutes are also complete chaos, as everyone around the table is rolling dice as fast as they can, moving miniatures on the board and shouting out their progress or how much time is left (counted on the included electronic timer or through a free app). It is possible to make a mistake, for example, move an alien in a position that is worse off for the team overall, but that is also part of the fun, a ‘price’ to pay for the swift decision-making.
To win a game of Project: ELITE players must complete missions. These are quite simplistic in nature, primarily differing in the type of symbols required to roll to win and a bit of initial setup, and overall are lacking in variety. Also adding a bit of narrative to the bones of the overall story would really help improve the theming of the game beyond ‘generic burly sci-fi soldiers kill scary aliens’ premise.
It may be a game of several years old, but among newer, miniatures, dice-combat, grid movement games, Project: ELITE still feels like a breath of fresh air. The only let downs are the semi-feeling missions and somewhat a generic theme, and that despite the setting of space and inclusion of really fascinating alien designs, still feels like it has too much grey paint.
ALEXANDRA SONECHKINA
WE SAY
With improved components and tighter mechanics, this re-release of Project: ELITE still carries the rat-a-tat of fun from its first edition.
WHATS IN THE BOX
► 6 Hero miniatures
► 53 Alien miniatures
► 1 Electronic timer
► 1 Double-sided map boards
► 6 Hero dashboards
► 6 Counter bases
► 64 Equipment cards
► 3 Swarm stats cards
► 25 Event cards
► 30 Swarm spawn cards
► 20 Boss spawn cards
► 6 Player aids
► 42 Dice
► 6 Damage markers
► 88 Tokens
► 28 Double-sided objective tokens
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED ZOMBICIDE: INVADER
In addition to the cornucopia of detailed miniatures and dice-based combat akin to the Zombicide series, Project: ELITE also adds a challenge of the time constraint with its real-time action phase for a tense gameplay.