Attack! by Eagle Games

Review by Joe Brophy [Picture] - [Email]

We only played one turn of Attack! from Eagle Games but my impression is that this is Axis & Allies with a GED diploma.

The premise is that it is the 1930's and the world is divided into competing blocs. Unfortunately the historic value of the game ends there. Each player picks four starting areas which are regions of a world map and receives a bunch of figures representing ships, planes, artillery, infanty and tanks. Players are randomly assigned a government system: communist, democratic, fascist or monarchy, which dictates the players' victory conditions.

The sequence of play is mildly interesting. Each player receives political and economic cards to start and can acquire more through conquest or stealing them with the right political card. Each player also receives money and oil. Money can purchase more units. Oil is neded for each action. The first action in the turn costs one oil, the second two, etc. Since you start with 30 oil, oil supply is a big constraint on action. An action may be to play political cards to try to steal stuff or change political alignment of neutral areas, try a diplomatic blitz to acquire minor allies, attack neutral or opponents' territories or purchase units, in no set order.

Attacking is more similar to Battle Cry than Axis & Allies. You roll dice with symbols for various units, and if they correspond to what you are using to attack, you hit something. Defender rolls first, but attacker may reinforce and keep going if he has units to do it. You can continue each action phase as long as you want (exception for diplomatic blitz, if you lose one, you stop or pay to start again) and repeat actions if you wish, as long as you have oil to spend. It is a turn-based system so there is a lot of down time while others are taking their turns, unless they are attacking you.

At the end of the turn, everybody turns in economic cards for more oil and money and a new round starts. First impulse rotates, so the player who went first in the previous turn goes last in the next. The game is over when 13 political cards bearing eagles have been played. Those are the heavy duty political cards that can flip territories from one side to another and do other important things. At the end everybody totals up their points and sets up a more interesting game. I give this game a "C" at best. I am not an Axis & Allies fan or a miniatures player but either one is more fun than this snoozer.