Spyrium.

Spyrium is a highly-rated (#288 on Boardgamegeek) but as yet not that well-known strategy game from the designer of the award-winning Caylus, but employs different mechanics for a game of moderate to high complexity that works best with three to four players but does play with two. Spyrium is a fictional crystal that unleashes tremendous energy when players use it in factories, but the crystal itself is hard to come by, as is the money the players will need to buy buildings and to use the workers they’ve placed in the game’s central market. The game thrives on scarcity and rewards players who pursue a tight strategy and don’t deviate from it, but you’ll need some luck to do that, especially if other players are after the same cards that you want. The game is currently $18 on amazon, through that link above.

In Spyrium, players represent industrialists who seek to gain victory points by processing spyrium to gain victory points, generally in factories that the player buys and buildings, in which a combination of spyrium and workers (meeples) yield victory points in each turn when they’re used. Each player starts the game with three worker meeples and places them in the 3×3 “market” of cards, which includes buildings to be purchased; technologies for purchase that provide recurring benefits (such as discounts on building purchases); and one-time bonuses of spyrium, money, victory points, or progress on the residence track.

The catch, and the game’s most distinguishing characteristic, is that players place meeples in the spaces between the cards in the market, rather than on the cards directly. The price of a card is equal to its face value plus another £1 for each meeple (yours or others’) adjacent to that card. (You have to have a meeple adjacent to a card to buy it.) Players place workers into the market one at a time, rotating through all players, but at any point a player can choose to switch to his/her “activation phase” and begin taking meeples off the market, even if s/he still has meeples to place.

When removing a meeple, the player may purchase any of the adjacent cards OR receive money equal to the number of other meeples adjacent to the same cards. Therefore, placement and removal introduce a significant strategic element to the game. You may place meeples just to try to gain money, but if you wait too long to remove one, you may get nothing – no cash, and no card because the adjacent cards are gone or unaffordable. Money and spyrium are always in short supply, so you’ll rarely be able to do everything you want, especially early in the game, which runs six rounds in total.

The basic strategy involves getting at least one building that generates spyrium, and at least one that lets you convert it into victory points. The “technology” cards can provide discounts or other bonuses that make concentrating on certain cards or assets more valuable, while the residence track, where all players start at 2 and can advance to 7, can provide frequent bonuses if the player concentrates on advancing there early enough and nabs one of the associated technology cards. (In short, you get your token up to 7, and then try to invoke that track repeatedly for a 7-point bonus each time.) By the game’s final rounds, the cards become more expensive while spyrium is almost impossible to come by.

With two players, the market is much less competitive – it’s easier to grab the cards you want, unless you and your opponent are pursuing the same cards, something you can avoid by switching your strategy very slightly. The order in which you withdraw your workers from the market matters regardless of the number of players With more players, you need more focus on getting the right combinations of cards and grabbing resources when you can, and you’ll have to adjust at some point because an opponent took the card you wanted, or because opponents priced you out (deliberately or as collateral damage) of a card you intended to buy. That means the game also requires a fair amount of foresight, but knowledge of the cards isn’t required or very tricky, as the technology cards appear early and the buildings all follow a simple formula of increasing rewards.

The game promises a steampunk theme that doesn’t materialize. Game themes are tricky things to begin with – most German-style games involve a theme that sits awkwardly on a game mechanic, with only a tenuous connection between the two, and Spyrium’s connection is among the weakest I’ve seen. You’re placing workers, gathering two resources, and converting all of that into points. At the end of the game, you can earn additional points for your buildings, including some special points-only buildings similar to the prestige buildings available at the end of Caylus and the luxury ships at the end of Le Havre.

A typical two-player game takes 45 minutes in person, about a half hour online at Boardgame Arena, mostly because of decision-making time rather than time to resolve the effects of moves. That decision-making time is one of my two complaints about Spyrium, along with the fact that the tight resource constraints introduce what I think of as game-stress, best encapsulated by the difficulty in keeping your people fed in Agricola: I don’t play games to worry about whether my imaginary family has enough to eat. Granted, Spyrium has no direct penalties for running out of money or its namesake crystal, but if you don’t manage the first two rounds correctly, you are well and screwed in rounds five and six, meaning the pressure to make good moves early on is enormous. (I don’t think it’s possible to fully recover from a bad opening, but I haven’t played enough to say that with any certainty.) That, I believe, is why the game hasn’t caught on despite a good combination of simple mechanics and complex decision-making, with attractive elements and a famous designer to draw you in. It’s a smart, balanced game, but it’s more challenging than it is fun, and as such I think it’s for serious or hardcore gamers only.