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Game Info
Year
2013
Collection
Ratings
Creator Score
Mechanic profile
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Description
In 1845, Sir John Franklin led an expedition on behalf of the British Royal Navy to find and explore the last portion of the Northwest Passage, regardless of the cost. The Royal Navy gave Franklin two heavy Ships (HMS Terror and HMS Erebus) filled with scientific equipment, 1000 books, a crew of 128 men, and enough food to last for three years. They left England in May and encountered whalers along the west coast of Greenland in August. There, they waited for more favorable weather conditions for the crossing of the Lancaster Sound. Once the weather improved, they sailed into unknown waters, and no one ever heard from them again...
Their disappearance provoked a great deal of turmoil in public opinion, and numerous British and American expeditions attempted to find their trail. As leaders of these expeditions in Expedition: Northwest Passage, players must venture into these hazardous Arctic waters in order to discover Franklin's fate and succeed where he failed – by finding the Northwest Passage. Players allocate their crewmen in their ship or in their sled to perform various actions such as exploring, moving, or gathering clues on the whereabouts of the Franklin expedition.
As the game progresses, the seasons will pass and parts of the sea will be frozen, blocking the way for the ships. Players acquire victory points by gathering clues, mapping the area, and – of course – discovering the Northwest Passage. However, in order to claim victory, one has to come back home to the Greenland on time!
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All mentions
Browse transcript mentions, sentiments, pros/cons, mechanics, topics, quotes, and references.
Total mentions: 3
This page: 3
Sentiment:
pos 2 ·
mix 0 ·
neu 0 ·
neg 0
Showing 1–3 of 3
Video mZwx0ul3wKU
Gaming with Edo & Jessica Review at 0:18 sentiment: positive
video_pk 89264 · mention_pk 362827
Click to watch at 0:18 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
positive
Pros
- Unique seasonal mechanic
- Evolving map creation
- Challenging decisions
- Good storytelling potential
- High replayability
- Quick playtime
- Challenging experience
Cons
- Out of print (possibly)
- Solo rules released separately for this edition
Thematic elements
- Finding what happened to Sir John Franklin
- Arctic
- The rulebook has a cool little intro that sets it up for this interesting exploration type thing.
Comparison games
none
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- action selection — All the actions at the bottom that is what you can do. There's another one in the solo mode but basically this is like a really nice reference card saying what you can do, what you can't do if you don't have enough crew members.
- exploration — When you get to the edge you can use an action to explore and continue moving and what that does is you actually create a really cool map.
- Resource Management — You can actually move your crew between those two and decide how many are on the ship, how many are on the sled.
- Seasonal Tracking — There's actually a solar disk which is tracking the seasons and what happens. So as you're placing these tiles they're going to have a combination of water and ice on them. Depending on where either the ship or the sled is, it's going to be for instance my solar disk. It will actually indicate anything below the line is frozen so that means the water is actually ice at that point and anything, you know, in the other area is open so the water is not frozen so the ship can go through.
- tile laying — It is a tile laying sort of exploration game. I really enjoy tile laying games in general, just putting them out there seeing how a map kind of evolves.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- I absolutely love this game
- It is a tile laying sort of exploration game.
- It's very very difficult decisions
- The rules are pretty quick and easy to pick up
- It is just a great solo game
- It is just very fun, very challenging but also just kind of a familiar sort of experience
References (from this video)
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Video JTYTGmWoMWk
Gaming with Edo & Jessica Top List at 23:43 sentiment: positive
video_pk 89151 · mention_pk 362814
Click to watch at 23:43 · YouTube ↗
Overall sentiment (raw)
Positive
Pros
- Engaging tile-laying and exploration
- Unique seasonal mechanic impacting movement
- High replayability due to randomized tiles
- Quick playtime (approx. 25 minutes)
- Potential for future reprint/new edition
Cons
- Out of print
- Crew may not make it back to Greenland (challenge)
- Solo variant not included in the box
Thematic elements
- Exploring to find the Northwest Passage
- Arctic Ocean
- Player-driven exploration and survival
Comparison games
none
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Resource Management — managing crew and ship's movement based on seasonal changes.
- Route Building — figuring out how to get the ship over and back.
- Simulated Seasons — a solar disk simulates seasons, affecting water and ice, which impacts movement for ship and sled.
- tile laying — laying tiles out to explore the Arctic Ocean.
- variable setup — tiles are randomized each game, leading to different assortments of islands and channels.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- it is all for fun
- these are games that have stood the test of time
- the rumor and asset system I really like but it is the narrative experience that I really really love about the kilforth series.
- some of the rules aren't 100 clear there's things you have to look up and some rule books.
- I really have never seen something like it.
- it's the only game in my collection that has a perfect score.
- everything just works so well.
References (from this video)
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Video i4sUWYOocZY
Rules Teach at 0:07
video_pk 67352 · mention_pk 163436
Click to watch at 0:07 · YouTube ↗
Pros
none
Cons
none
Thematic elements
- Exploration and travel, collecting tokens
- Arctic Northwest Passage, Greenland
Comparison games
none
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- discover — Discover: spend two crew to get Inuit person token or Karen token; place on your board and score Prestige by zone.
- draw a tile — Draw a tile from the four large or six small available and place it near your player board.
- explore — Explore: spend three crew to explore a Franklin site or a straight and score Prestige based on board section.
- Movement — Move your ship or sled to an adjacent tile; ships require water to move and water may not be frozen; sleds move over land and may cross water when frozen.
- pass — Pass when you have no or choose not to take more actions; moves turn order to the first available space on adjacent track.
- place a tile — Take a tile from your personal Supply and place it on the main board; must be one tile away from the tile you place; Land and Sea must match on all sides including diagonals; symbols on tiles may require tokens.
- refresh tiles — Replace the four large tiles with four new ones from the back; costs two crew members.
- rounds_and_end_scoring — The game runs for 10 rounds; end scoring occurs after rounds or when expeditions return to Greenland.
- Tile Placement — Take a tile from your personal Supply and place it on the main board; must be one tile away from the tile you place; Land and Sea must match on all sides including diagonals; symbols on tiles may require tokens.
- transfer crew — Transfer crew between ship and sled; first time transferring you can move crew; status does not change upon movement.
Video topics + discussion points
No key topics recorded for this video.
Quotes (from this video)
- Expedition Northwest Passage is played over 10 Rounds where each round players will utilize their crew members to take actions which will often revolve around exploring traveling and collecting various tokens
- The Arctic will freeze and thaw meaning you'll often have to adapt to travel by both sled and ship depending on the circumstances
- thank you so much for watching our how to playay video of Northwest Passage
- it's coming to crowdfunding so learn a little bit more dive into the world of the Northwest Passage and start exploring
- mhm until next time though we'll see you later
References (from this video)
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Showing 1–3 of 3