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Quick Look: The Silver River

Designers:  Robert Burke, Nate Bivins
Artist: Tan Ho Sim
Publisher: Robert Burke Games
Year Published: 2020

No. of Players: 1-4 

Ages: 14+

Playing Time: 90-120 minutes.

Find more info HERE.

From the Publisher:

Review:
 

Talk about something that is long overdue!

I have had my copy of The Silver River since 2019, and am only now getting the chance to provide full coverage of the game. While some of this may be attributed to the lack of proper time, another big factor involved was the deluge of 4x games that have flooded my game shelf — in some ways, the sheer excess of these types of games that are now available has made it feel impossible for me compare and contrast all of them. It is only now, against the backdrop of an overly saturated market for 4X board games that I find I am able to give a proper perspective on The Silver River, and why it is especially relevant to me now as a gamer.

For the uninitiated, a 4x game usually consists of 4 broad elements : Exploration, Extermination, Exploitation and Expansion. How a board game handles these elements can vary, and are present in degrees that can fluctuate between different titles, but it necessarily holds true that a game “must” consist of these particulars to be considered a verified 4x eXperience. So far so good, right?

The problem that has arisen since the inception of such grand titles as Twilight Imperium , Eclipse, Gaia Project, SPACE EMPIRES 4X, Ascendancy, Uprising: Curse of the Last Emperor & Expansion (my current favorite game of all time for the past few years) and a slew of others is the time factor ; these behemoths usually encompass and require vast amounts of time just to coordinate and set up properly — much less get to the table with a group of friends when a minimum requisite for playing time is upwards of 4 hours and extending even as long as 8 (or more!). So clearly, these epic feeling games require an epic time commitment.

When The Silver River came out, it proposed a simple goal ; what if such an epic campaign  to save the world (or secure your place as reigning sovereign of the universe) were to be condensed into a span of 1.5 to 2 hours. Wouldn’t that be something?

Thus, this is where we begin the process of evaluating The Silver River, and whether or not it can manage to contain the vital essence of the 4X experience. Being as this was the foundational goal for its development, all else will be measured against this criteria for the purposes of this review.

Gameplay Summary:

A condensed description of how the game functions is as follows. Yes, of course the gameplay is going to be much more elaborate than I described, but hopefully the following will be enough to give a good idea of what the experience consists of.

Players will each choose a race, with different abilities. The game board is static, with setups that are always identical (depending on player count), rather than randomized with hidden tiles as is often the norm. This is wisely done to save on the aforementioned time factor during setup.

Players then proceed to set up their home world tile, place 4 fleets for their ships (which have armada sizes / strengths that are kept secret, similar to Space Empires 4x). Players then can proceed to take turns in which they move, explore, conquer, colonize new planets, or build up technologies. Victory Points that are required to win the game are achieved in a number of fashions, which include, but are not limited to :

—Taking on missions that present themselves on Exploration cards

—Fighting giant monsters that exist in the center of the galaxy 

—Completing Public objectives that are randomly assigned at the start of the game

—Completing Personal secret objectives that are hand chosen at the start of the game to match your play style or the strengths of the particular race you are playing as. 

—Building up your society by “passing” on your turn, focusing on societal development rather than interstellar conquest. 

—Creating Wonders 

—Vying for various galactic titles such as Trade Leader, Spy Master, and the equivalent of a Galactic Leader.

Based on these and a variety of other factors, players will score the aforementioned Victory Points, and whoever has the most of these at the end of the game wins.

Now for the actual review of the game itself, going into the nitty-gritty of its strengths and weaknesses.

To answer the question as to whether or not The Silver River met its primary design goal, the answer for me (or my gaming group) is a resounding (but sometimes conditional) yes!

After a hiatus of playing The Silver River that lasted a few years, we decided to make the foray into its world again after experiencing a bit of burn out from the larger games in our collection. We wanted to experience the competitive battles and strategic posturing ; but without the time commitment that our busy schedules lacked. The Silver River was able to accomplish this for us, and successfully satiate our appetites, more or less, and thankfully.

Was it a perfect representation of all we like about 4Xs? No. But it did host enough of the qualities that are so endearing to us that we could somewhat forget about its areas of lacking and inadequacy. 

For example :

—Combat itself is both satisfying and streamlined. And also highly strategic in the way it can manifest itself during confrontations that can be provoked with creatively designed Monsters that reside in the center of the galaxy, each of which sports its own distinct miniature.  (And who wouldn’t like the idea of fighting a giant, sentient moon named Kraetor that terrorizes the universe with a giant gun strapped to its head?)

—Moreover, the fact that your fleet numbers are hidden until the actual moment of combat begins means that there is a good element of initial surprise waiting when in-game fighting breaks out. 

—Exploration is a fun, card-based set of Choose-Your-Own-Adventure type decisions that are engaging and sometimes humorous , sometimes featuring the most politically incorrect methods to handling various galactic dilemmas, but that is part of the game’s charm. Morality can somewhat take a back seat when you are trying to take control of the galaxy, right?

—Technological upgrades mostly all feel meaningful and relevant, and force you to make tough decisions as to how you will advance in order to win, as you can’t choose them all…

—The game’s societal advancement tracker allows a fantastic way to reward defensive posturing  and gain points and resources, allowing “turtling” to be a valid way to achieve victory. 

—Voting on various Galactic Titles is both streamlined and fun, while providing some useful benefits. 

—The game itself feels (mostly) balanced between various races. 

—Double Sided boards make cube placement for maintaining track of resources & fleet sizes a breeze.

—Some of the miniatures can be extremely fun to behold and paint ; I am looking at you again, Kraetor!

—Great mid-weight game, not too simple, nor too complex, a good balance in terms of design.

—Plays in its advertised time span, 1.5 to 2 hours!

Elements needing improvement : 

—Getting into some of the negatives of the game, we found that some minis aren’t as aesthetically pleasing as others. Some also had some delicate parts such as antenna break off during shipping to us, and we weren’t the only players to experience this, so it does bear mentioning. 

—Exploration , while great, can get old if you play the game a lot, and as players become more familiar with the possible outcomes resulting from specific choices, giving an unfair advantage to experienced players who will take advantage of now predictable outcomes.  One can therefore tire of the same old choices for exploration ; however, the Industrial Outposts card expansion somewhat alleviates this, but again, can get predictable once again after players rack up the hours playing this game.

—We were all left wanting for more racial abilities and distinction ; with each race usually getting only 2-3 perks that set it apart from the other factions, this can quickly come to be seen as a limiting factor in making The Silver River feel as fully fleshed out as some its larger and more fleshed out counterparts out there.

—By 2025 standards, the game board material may seem a bit flimsy, but it still hasn’t had any incidents or shown any signs of falling apart either, so it is still good enough to pass muster from the standpoint of physical longevity. 

—Some races feel a bit useless, and depend more upon highly specific contexts for utilizing their strengths. 

Conclusion : 

All in all,the designers for The Silver River met their design goals in spectacular fashion. If gauged solely by this metric ,  I would give the game a 10 / 10, because it is indeed the perfect way to squeeze the feel out of much larger and more epic 4X games and place it into the (relatively) brief span of 1.5 to 2 hours.

And since its release , I must say that The Silver River has gained at least one competitor in the field of “brief” 4X experiences that I have beheld, as Nexum Galaxy is another exemplary exception to the often long-winded nature of most modern day 4X games. So evidence points to the signs that times may indeed be a’changing. 

With that being said,  the game isn’t perfect by any means ; when seeing it as a whole rather than through the lens of its design goals of being a short and all-encompassing 4X, I would probably rate it around an 8 / 10, maintaining that in theory, the game has the potential to ripen more given a few alterations or modifications. But still, this game is a gem for its ability to capture the essence of the 4X experience and condense it into such a short time commitment ; that is really the magic of The Silver River, and it is regrettable that I have had this game sitting on my shelf in hiatus for a few years, as we really should have been taking advantage of what it has to offer far more often than we actually did…

Want to see what someone else thought of The Silver River?

Then check out The Silver River review by Carl King!

After reading Jazz’s review, if this sounds like a game for you at the time of this posting The Silver River
is available on Robert Burke Games website on sale for only $52. Check it out and get it HERE.

Did you get it based on our review? Please comment below letting us know!