Science Fiction

Eminent Domain

Survey the galaxy to expand your civilization – will you colonize nearby planets, or take them over by force? Harvest resources for trade, and do research to improve your technology. Build the best civilization and win the game!

Eminent Domain is a civilization-building game in which your civilization's abilities are based on a deck of Role cards. At the beginning of the game each player has the same deck of cards, with just two cards for each Role in it. Every turn you must choose a Role to execute (and like Glory to Rome or Puerto Rico, your opponents will get a chance to follow suit), and in doing so you will add one of those Role cards to your deck. When executing a Role, you can boost its effect by playing cards out of your hand matching the Role you have chosen. For example, the more you Research, the better you get at Researching (because you'll have more Research cards in your deck).

Gunship: First Strike!

Game description from the publisher:

Gunship: First Strike! is Escape Pod Games' core release in a planned series of tactical space combat games. Players fight to win battles in a futuristic civil war with a variety of ship types. From the agile and speedy Fighters, to lethal Gunships and intimidating Capital Ships, every battle is a well-balanced slugfest that comes right down to the wire. Our new Trinity Mechanic uses boards, cards and dice together in an extremely innovative and easy-to-learn system that lets new players jump right in.

What makes the Gunship series unique are the numerous combinations of ships that the players "build" at the start of each battle. By choosing from an ever-growing selection (through expansions) of available Weapons and Upgrades, players are able to create a custom Gunship that is suited to their particular style of play or battle situation. Some guys are "defensive" minded; they'll choose Heavy Armor, +1 Shield Generators and 4 Blaster Cannons to fend off the enemy Gunship. But another player might prefer to build a "Carrier Killer" complete with wings full of Bombs and an Autoblaster Cannon to shred his way through the enemy Fighter Squadron. While most of the Upgrade cards are geared toward the Gunships (the true star of the show) you can also do some great things to your Fighters and Capital Ships. New kinds of ships will come with every expansion to further add to the possibilities. No two battles are ever the same!

In Gunship: First Strike!, the civil war has just started. Your orders are simple: Command a task force of one Assault Carrier and its Gunship and Fighters on a mission to destroy the enemy's Carrier. Guess what? He has the very same orders! Dogfights will ensue, Torpedoes will strike home and Thruster Bombs are going to pound the Capital Ships mercilessly. If your Gunship takes too much damage for comfort, or if the battle situation changes and you want a different weapon load, land inside your Carrier for a quick "pit stop". Make sure that you defend it with all your might because once your Carrier is gone, the only option left to you is to flee the battlespace and hope to take revenge another day.

As the Gunship universe grows, players will be able to fight bigger and bigger battles. Soon the objectives will include breaking through the enemy picket line to drop troops on the planet below. The Gunships will be called upon to not only assault other ships, but also to go dirtside and give air support to the land battle raging below A free Campaign System is planned where players can keep track of a fleet of ships and territories. Lose your Carrier in today's battle and you might lose a critical Outpost next week. Don't let the enemy find the Shipyard where your damaged Destroyers limped home last time – if he does, they're toast!

Space Mission

In Space Mission, players explore eight planets (randomly selected from twelve in the game) by flying from planet to neighboring planet or passing through a "jump gate" that allows them to travel anywhere. Each planet has a different combination of values for jumping to it, scanning it and landing on it.

Each player has a hand of five cards, with each card having three color-coded values on it: blue for jumping, green for scanning, and orange for landing. On a turn, you take two actions from six possibilities, with the same action being possible:

—Top up: Discard any number of cards (including zero), then refill your hand to five cards.

—Jump: Move your spaceship from the jump gate (where players start the game) or a planet to any other planet by discarding a card that shows the landing value of the target planet. Place one of your tokens on the jump gate.

—Fly: Move your spaceship to either neighboring planet; this move is free.

—Scan: Discard a card with the scanning value of the planet where your spaceship is currently located; look through the face-down planet tiles, place one aside face-down with your marker on it, then return the tiles to that planet. This action is possible only on undeveloped planets.

—Develop: Develop the planet where your spaceship is located by discarding two cards that match the two landing values shown on that planet. Mark this planet with your space station token, hand out all scanned and claimed planet tiles to the appropriate players, claim one remaining planet tile for yourself, then place the remaining tiles face-down again. A planet can be developed only once.

—Discover: Take a planet tile of your choice from the developed planet where your spaceship is currently located.

If at any point, all of the planet tiles on a planet show only empty space, the player holding the tiles lays them face-up next to that planet. When 6-12 space tiles have been revealed, an amount based on the number of players, the game ends and players tally their points.

Each type of planet tile scores in a different way. With Minerals, for example, you multiply the number of mineral tiles you hold with the largest number of mineral tiles in a single color. Medals are worth three points each. A green-blue pair of Matter tiles is worth seven points, while a single Matter tile is worth only two. Each space station you've built is worth three points, and the players score 9, 6, 3 and 1 for having the most, secondmost, etc. tokens on the jump gate. The player with the most points wins.

Reimplements:

Jump Gate

Online Play

Yucata (turn-based)

Quantum

Send out the scouts! Position the Flagship in tactical orbit! And reconfigure that Battlestation into something new! Your fleet of loyal ships, powered by the might of quantum probability itself, carries your empire to the far-flung stars. How will history remember you? As a ravenous destroyer? A clever tactician? A dauntless explorer? Command your armada, construct world-shattering technologies, and rally the remnants of humanity for a final confrontation.

In Quantum, each player is a fleet commander from one of the four factions of humanity, struggling to conquer a sector of space. Every die is a starship, with the value of the die determining the movement of the ship, but also its combat power - with low numbers more powerful. So a [ 6 ] is a quick but fragile Scout and a [ 1 ] is a slow but mighty Battlestation.

Each type of ship also has a special power that can be used once per turn: Destroyers can warp space to swap places with other dice and Flagships can transport other ships. These powers can be used in combination for devastating effects. You're not stuck with your starting ships, however: using Quantum technology, you can spend actions to transform (re-roll) your ships. Randomness plays a role in the game, but only when you want: Quantum is very much a strategy game.

You win by constructing Quantum Cubes - massive planetary energy extractors. Each time you build a new one, you can expand your fleet, earn a new permanent ability, or take a one-time special move. The board itself is made out of modular tiles, and you can play on one of the 30 layouts that come with the game or design your own. The ship powers, player abilities, and board designs combine to create a limitless set of possibilities for how to play and strategies for how to win.

With elegant mechanics, an infinity of scenarios, and easy-to-learn rules that lead to deep gameplay, Quantum is a one-of-a-kind game of space combat, strategy and colonization that will satisfy both hard-core and casual players.

Quantum won the 2012 Game Design Award at the IndieCade Festival of Independent Games, as a prototype game with the title Armada d6.

Battle Beyond Space

Battle Beyond Space is a massive, multi-player free-for-all space battle with 60–80 ships slugging it out IN SPACE.

In 45-60 minutes. And 9 turns. In an asteroid field.

The combat system is diceless and extremely deadly. On a turn, you choose one of your three squadrons, move and fire with it, then get to move one of your two capital ships.

The big difference between the players is the super-secret alien power of technology which they can spring on another player at any time. Some are one-use, amazingly powerful items (aka Death Blossom), some are more subtle, long-term effects.