Survive Escape From Atlantis is one of my favorite games we played this semester! I didn’t think I was going to be a huge fan of the game because I generally dislike lighter family style games because they rely too much on luck and not enough on skill, but I really liked this games “take that” mechanic and found the whole game enjoyable in the end. In the game you have different meeples that all are worth different values if you rescue them. The game involves you trying to frantically rescue your meeples while avoiding sharks, sea monsters, and whales. The hardest part of the game is keeping track of the meeple values on the bottom of your meeples. Once you place your meeple you can no longer check to see its value so you have to be constantly engaged in remembering what meeples have the highest values. The leadership in this game involves interacting in a social setting and group dynamics. If your group is out for blood they can be really mean and kill almost all the meeples. You could convince another player to work together with you and transport some of your meeples with them across the sea. Or you could try and fly under the radar and not upset the wrong people in order to silently win the game. The type of strategy players employ follows their general strengths and weaknesses when communicating with other people and in groups. If a player is really good at convincing other players to work with them they will try and employ this strategy (you get the idea). I think my whole family (especially my cousin Lydia) would enjoy this game because I view it mostly as a fun light family game suitable for most ages (my cousin is around 10 years old).

~ Ryan Estep