Is this the best game of 2026? - Ashes: Blackout Protocol Board Game Review
Transcript
Hello everyone, this is Johannes.
And this is Senna here.
And you are watching Board Gaming Ramblings.
And today we are taking a look at Ashes Blackout Protocol.
We are. This is an upcoming a Spiel game, which means it's releasing at Spiel in Essen. We will be there. If you are there, it would be nice to see you. If you see us walking around, you can
Show us the secret sign.
Do it. So if you want to know exactly where we are, we will have a GPS tracker on. No, but we will be at the Alliance booth on Saturday evening and afternoon, afternoon and then evening, not evening first and then afternoon, and Sunday in the morning. So if you want to make sure to see us, then you can come and say hi there. And enough about that, let's talk about this game. Ashes Blackout Protocol is a worker placement ish car movement That's a new thing.
Car movement game.
Yes, it's an action selection game basically. It is set in the same universe, which I think is like the world, as Phoenix New Horizon. Yes, three words. It's hard to remember them. Phoenix New Horizon, which was a very, very good game that we enjoyed so much when it came out. This is kind of a prequel to that. The theme is it's it's terrible, but it's a Euro game. It's a Euro Euro game, and what you're doing is this very, very brief overview because there is a stuff going on. You will on your turn do one of three things. You can pass. We're going to go into detail about that. When you pass and then I then I do it. When you pass, you are basically getting some points, scoring some victory points, getting paying some medicine for your people, and you're scoring different categories of points depending on what you have upgraded on your little board here. But that's not important. The most important part is it's very important actually. But the action selection, you will be able to use some of these workers, these are active survivors, to place out here on these different actions. And what they will give you is some income depending on where you place them, and then you can always choose one of the four base or main actions in the game, which will let you place shelters, it will let you get new survivors, it will let you Oh, no more space. It will let you plan things into this Phoenix Project.
Ooh, Phoenix: New Horizon, linking the games.
No.
And then you can also get some gasoline. What's it called? It's a fuel. That was the thing I was because the word I only had it in originally in my brain. And some happiness because the more more happy you are, the better bonuses you will get when you pass, which is the last thing that you can do. And you can also move on the map with your little car. You'll be using fuel to moving the map around the car depending on
Sorry, you're moving the map around the car?
You're moving the car around the map. Depending on how far you can move depends on how much you have upgraded your car movement. Where you land, you'll be able to do the action that is there. On the way there, you can pick up and move survivors to place them in better spots for yourself and stop other people from being able to rescue them. That is basically what you are doing in the game. You will be placing out these upgrading tokens out there in the Phoenix Project to unlock scoring opportunities, also unlock some scoring throughout the game, and these resource with these resource and scoring markers that whenever you place here, you will be able to then do these things as well as an action, and you can also do some goals in the game, which is a race to get their first scoring points. Then, the thing is when people place things here, this will move far farther and farther over to this right, which will score more points for that project at the end of the game. But the earlier you do this, you want them to be placed as long to the left as possible to score the most points. And the player with the most points is the winner of Ashes Blackout Protocol.
The main way you do things in this game is placing those survivors on those action spaces.
Mhm.
And it's interesting because you want a lot of survivors.
It's a good thing to save the survivors. Don't let them out there for many reasons.
Well, yeah. Of course. And they will they will perish due to radiation if you don't rescue them off the map.
And is that bad?
That is bad. Everyone loses happiness if if that happens. But but also for your own personal gain in this game.
Yes.
You want to have survivors because you want them for several things. You want them to place here to get the income and do the actions. But you also want to place them into these shelters, which gives you income and also like one-time bonuses. And those This is a tight game. So that is kind of make or break sometimes.
And also you want to to fill them up so you can close the shelter. So you can place it down here so you can later score points for it because points are good as we already spoke about. You also need fuel.
Yes.
To move not the map around the car but the car around the map.
Yes. You want to be doing that as much as possible, I feel like, because in addition to getting the well, some are your like scoring actions, but also you can have these main actions here. And then you also will get some some resource or when you do that. Uh and you can move around the survivors so they will be easier for you to collect res- rescue.
Yes.
Rescue.
Not collect them. Save them. I felt that most of the time I would choose to when I got to move my car because depending on the strategy you have, you might not have like not going to have like a bunch of fuel. Not going to do like four times of a round probably if you're not super good at the game. I did I had like last time we played I managed to do the last two rounds as three in the game. I managed to move the car three times, which felt like Yeah. And so I usually never chose to to just get the points. Because most of the time it was better to do other things and I want to try to set myself up. Of course, if I if I had managed to upgrade so I could have three of these and I could get like nine points for getting something, that would be good. But most of the time I felt like I wanted to get the main actions when I move the car and not just the uh the bonus, basically.
The rules of this game aren't that heavy, but it's still a heavy game. The because as I said the the rules are the the main thing that makes the rules a bit harder like none of the main actions are hard are basically explained to you how they work except for this one. And that is the one that's going to trip people over because it has so many steps. Like you're doing this and then you can do that and then you do this thing and the reason you do it is because you want the scorings. The first time you played you kind of just thrown that out and we're just like I don't understand how that works. You did it and in the end it's like oh I got a lot of points. So this is kind of the hardest thing to wrap your head around and what makes it a heavy game is you have seven free actions in including the other things you can do and because everything is so tight, some games you might be like oh I have a lot of fuel this game, but suddenly I have no strength. Like we played one game and strength to use mainly for placing out shelters. We played a a two-player game where I basically didn't upgrade this early on and I ended up in a position where I almost couldn't get any strength because I can only go here once and get strength and come and there are like some other ways like the missions and stuff to get some extra strength, but it's not easy. So next time we played after that I went heavy into that so I always had a lot of strength, but the plethora of actions and choices and timing so what you do, absolutely puts this into a the heavy category.
Yeah, the resource management, it also a little I wouldn't say complicated, but it's it's not very straightforward necessarily because you have these like kind of tech tree of of resources. In the beginning of the game you can only have one of each resource. And you can like upgrade the two that's are adjacent to the next level and you have to upgrade these to get to to have more than one of each resource basically. And also you talked about the the power or the what do you call it? The power?
The strength.
The strength. And here is the when you get this resource, you can choose different resources when you advance, which is pretty cool. And then also when you use it just just like decrease on the track.
Yeah, and that's another timing thing because I might be in a position where I need medicine and it's easier to get medicine if I move on the strength track but I'm but right now in the position as I am here for orange for example, if I need two medicine, I first need to spend strength and then gain strength so that timing is also extremely crucial. Also you kind of you upgrade this. And we can't go into detail about what all of them do, but basically there are a lot of strategies to go for and you kind of build up those strategies by doing those upgrades.
Yeah, so so placing out on the Phoenix Project board is pretty important because that's how you upgrade like both your scoring opportunities, how you get more resources, how like do more stuff, but as we've experienced many a time, upgrading these doesn't mean that you get like the benefit of having
No.
Like yeah, I get the opportunities to score more. Do I actually have more to score? Nope. I don't yet.
Last time we played Last time we have you played with an actor like a character because of their player powers.
Yeah, I like that.
That every time you place up here, you could have scored another one.
Yeah.
So, uh when we started playing that, I was thinking, "Oh, that's super good." But as you just said, like if you if you have everything down there, it's like, "Oh, no, I can get a bunch of points by having these." But if you spent all of them over here, it's zero points.
have Yes.
The game has because of those player powers, it has a lot of variability.
Mhm.
It has a lot of replay value because like there's so many things to do. But I would say that the variability is pretty high with the player powers, I think. I don't remember the number of them, so I don't know why I started that thought because then it sounds like I don't remember, which is the truth. But there is a bunch of these scoring rings, and each of them can be used for final scoring, and also for the goal scoring, which is like it's the same but different. And also, you have a lot of different of these the scoring that comes out, and the order you choose things, and the upgrades you choose, and the strategies you go for. And then when you pause, you score different scoring. So, let's say now, I can choose to score green, I get six points. I choose to score yellow, which gives me a point now, one point in the beginning, zero points great for having these yellow survivors. So, it's like one more point.
Or if I had a lot of materials, I could score it for that. So, there is so many parts to go. I feel like it's very strategical, strategic, that's the word. But also kind of tactical because you're like you look at what kind of opportunities come your way. But since it's so tight, you have to have a strategy to get there.
Yeah, the timing is very important as well because you want to do For example, I have this the evil master plan that I will go get the scoring, then I need to place three shelters to be able to get that scoring. Also, to actually score anything, I need to have those resources. And then I see maybe someone else is going for that as well. Then I need multiple steps to actually get there. So, you want to be as efficient as possible as well. The game can be a little long, I would say, because you get to do like more and more. First round goes yeah, pretty fast.
It's one of those that tricks you. When I play it, I'm like, "Oh, we only took 40 minutes to play the first round. This is going to be a shorter game." And then no.
And it you can have some combos on your turn. You can be like, "Okay, I'm doing this main action that gives me some resources. I also get to do this cool thing, and then I play a card that
I love that I do a cool thing. That's my favorite.
And then I play a card that lets me move my car, and boom, I go up here and do another cool thing." Yes, I'm doing a bunch of cool stuff. And then you can have some long turns and because there is more like paths to where you want to go, then my brain, especially, is like, "Okay, but which order should I do this in?" I'm just like, I'm trying something and I can see, "Oh, this doesn't work." And then I kind of do a lot of takebacks and do something else. You But I think that will be easier as you play this game more, but but my optimalization brain is trying to really complicated for me sometimes, like towards the end of the game where it's super tight and I really need some specific things to be done.
Everyone we played it with have had turns where you end up being like, "I need to think this through, and I need to be like, okay, when I do this, then I get to do that." So that do tend to end up to the length of the game. With four players, I like it with four. We haven't played three. We played two and four, and I think as very often with these kind of games, three will be the sweet spot because But I would say there is not anything I I I I think there's not a lot of things lacking in the two-player game.
No, I would say so myself.
It's a smaller
map, which makes it tighter, obviously. And this is also has less spaces on it, and this has less spaces on it. So, I feel like the scaling is very well done. So, I do feel that it works very well in both player counts. And if you have non-AP groups, or if you play with the same group multiple times, then you can get it down, but I I think like the box says 35 minutes per player. I think you need to play it very many times to be able to get it down to that. The first time we played two players took 2 and 1/2 hours.
Yeah.
That was a long game, because then after that, the same day we played a three-player game
and four players
four-player game in 3 hours.
Yes.
So, the two-player game was like an an an non and not the the norm, but like no, that's going to be a long game, especially the first couple times you play, because there's a lot to get your hand at your head around.
And your hands. Not that much.
Uh but in interaction-wise, I think it's like a typical Euro
Yeah.
blocking you you're not chasing for any special specific like action spaces or anything, but these action tokens, if you go there with your card and do that action, that will be just like a resource bonus now. So,
that's the timing in there, and also people can rescue the survivors that you really want to rescue and take the scoring that you really wanted. So, I feel like because this game is so tight, that's where the interaction hurts the most, really, because it's it's not very like head-to-head interaction, but your plan is a little fragile. If somebody else comes and do does the thing that you really wanted to do, that has that's a huge impact.
It's mostly indirect interaction. I feel like the race, of course, to get these and to try to score them fast is like the most direct kind of type of interaction, and the rest of it you might be stealing people from people, but other than that it's mostly indirect interaction. With that said, do you want to find thoughts?
Yeah, absolutely. I am very pleased with this game because we really, really loved uh Phoenix
Phoenix New Horizon.
And uh and this feels like they're totally different games. I haven't played Phoenix New Horizon in uh such a long time because I so I can't really compare them be like I want to keep this over this I don't know.
different games.
Very different, but um these these like upgrading tech tree things and this map thing and upgrading kind of your player board. I feel like I've seen some of the DNA in Phoenix New Horizon as well and I really like this new game. I really like the the um board game references on the board, but overall this is a game that is really fun to play because you you feel like you want to utilize your actions and you've you're trying to see like the best way possible to do that and instead of having like I have this final scoring that is secret to like everything you can score for it's it's wide open. It's really the same for everybody. You have the same scoring opportunities on your board except for some maybe special power here that you can choose to play with and you all all have the same scoring play spaces are over there to to fight over basically. So, I'm enjoying myself immensely when I'm playing this game. The only downside is that it's a long game. I agree with you. I think it is a really great game at two and three and if you don't mind the time I think it's great at four also. That's like my only negative with this game basically.
Other than that I think it's a stellar game. One of the best I've played so far this year, I'm going to land this on a nine.
I chose Blackout Protocol and with the caveat of me not remembering every single thing I rated or played is the favorite game I played this year. I I love almost every single thing about it. The only thing I I I agree with you basically. Only thing is those very lengthy third turns in a four-player game where I kind of sign off because I'm like, "Oh, come on. Do your turn now." Because and it's kind of a positive thing because I know what I want to do.
Mhm.
And I want to get to my turn because my turn is going to be cool. And I I care about what you're doing, but it's not as cool as my thing because I want to get the points. And I'm just having plain fun. This is one of those games like it is a lot. The first time you play it, the first time we played we played four players and I would not recommend that for the first play. If you But it's because it's it's that long and it's like a lot of things going on. For me, I wouldn't say the length is really a negative. Like it's not too long. It's those long turns I'm waiting and people being like, "Oh, maybe then I would do that." That is like a negative thing. And I think you can get that down if you were to play the same game with the same people 20 times. I love the optimization. I love the variability in choosing what to upgrade. I love the different player powers that we have played with and seen. I really love this system. There's so many reasons for me to do that. I want to get this specific scoring tile. I want to get this specific or the points I get when I go up there is a lot of points as well. I want to get that to be able to score it.
I want to be able to fast as possible get these out. So maybe I go here and get few points because I really want to to get this be able to to move forward or be able to have two of each material before going long in the game. When you start off, it's only three rounds. You feel like, "Oh, it's going to be so short. I can't get anything done." I feel like I get a good amount of things done. I feel like I don't get everything I want to get done done, but it's not one of those where I feel like I haven't gotten anything done done when I'm done. And that is a good thing. For me, I'm going to land on a 9.5. A fantastic game that we highly recommend if what you saw here seemed interesting to you. And that's going to be the end. You can
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Do it. And hope to see you at Spiel shows the secret sign. We'll see you there. Thank you so much for watching. I'm Johannes.
And I'm Anna-Lena.
And you've been watching Board Gaming Ramblings. And bye-bye.