- Publisher : Super Meeple
- Designer(s) : Dennis K. Chan, Adam Hill, Ben Pinchback, Matt Riddle
- Artist(s) : Agnieszka Dabrowiecka, Klemens Franz
- Players : 2–4
- Playing time : 90 - 120 Min
- Weight BGG : 3.35
What's this?
Beyond the Horizon is a civilization-style board game where players compete to build the most influential society in history. Through exploration, expansion, technological research, and economic management, each player attempts to accumulate as many victory points as possible.
How do you play?
The game is structured around several phases during each turn:
➡️ Action Phase:
Move your Action token to perform one of the available actions (explore, recruit, invest, etc.).
Some actions:
-Research technologies on the technology tree.
-Colonize a Village
-Fortify a City
-Build a Building
➡️ Expansion Phase: (Optional)
You can build buildings, colonize villages or fortify cities. Each territory has strength requirements to be met to be colonized or fortified.
➡️ Production Phase:
Choose between producing resources (food, coins) or activating new colonists/soldiers.
➡️ Objective Phase:
If you meet the conditions of an Objective card, you must claim it. The end of the game is triggered when a certain number of objectives are achieved.
➡️ End of Game:
Players count their points according to the villages colonized, the fortified cities, the technologies developed and the objectives achieved. The one with the most points wins the game.
Is it good?
“Beyond the Horizon” presents itself as a reinterpretation or a new version of “Beyond the Sun”, retaining the framework of its complex and satisfying technology tree, while adding a dimension of exploration and territorial development reminiscent of civilization games.
The mechanics of the technology tree still shine with its depth and strategic choices. This richness and the variety of increasingly powerful actions it offers give the game great replayability. The race to discover technologies first and collect their bonuses remains a central element, and works just as well as in “Beyond the Sun”.
The mechanics of your personal board with the different tracks remain as effective as its big brother.
On the other hand, the real novelties of this opus – the exploration of tiles, the construction of buildings, the colonization of villages and the fortification of cities – seem less accomplished and lack fluidity in my opinion.
Some mechanical and thematic choices may seem strange: why can two players build the same building? Why is it possible to fortify a city without having colonized it?
In addition, the choice of material leaves something to be desired: the tokens are impractical, they can slide on the wooden pieces.
In summary, “Beyond the Horizon” retains the strategic richness and depth of the technological tree of “Beyond the Sun”, of its personal board, but the exploration and construction mechanics are less fluid and less convincing.
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Review Beyond the Horizon
Positives
- Strategic depth and variety of choices
- The technological tree is still as effective
- The mechanics of your personal board
- A great replay value
- This race for objectives
Negatives
- Tile exploration mechanics, building construction etc.
- Material could be improved
- Lack of theme
Breakdown
- Components and illustrations 6.0
- Mechanics 8.0
- Thematic 6.0
- Replayability 9.0
- Handling 8.5
- Interaction 8.0
- Originality 6.0
