This week we played Survive- Escape From Atlantis and overall, I enjoyed this game. The game itself is very simple and I like that it implements so many aspects of other games into it, such as Battleship and Sorry. Getting started with the game was difficult at first because of the different elements to the game set up. There’s some pieces that are a part of the expansion pack and we weren’t totally sure which pieces we needed and which were part of the expansion pack at first but we were able to figure it out. We had a little confusion as to where to put our pieces on the board. It seemed strategic to put all of our pieces as close to us and our dock as possible, but yet we wondered if there might be an advantage to spreading them out more. We all ended up putting our pieces close to each other and our dock, which I think was somewhat a good strategy. I liked that everyone I was playing with had never played this game before. While I think this made the game take longer, nobody had a strategic advantage because we were all just kind of playing the best we could without prior knowledge and were on equal playing levels. 

As far as game play, I had planned to load a full boat and take it quickly to my shore, which did not work out for me. I can’t remember what happened to my first boat, I think a whale hit it. However, I was able to quickly load 2 other boats and was working on taking them back to my shore when a whirlpool hit both of them at the same time. In hindsight, I wish I would have left some of the people that were far away and would have just immediately taken a not full boat to shore just so I could get at least a few points. I only escaped with 1 point, which was not very good! However, I think it was a good strategy to not put too many people on the tiles that were supposed to be eliminated first. A lot of other players ended up in the water and eaten by sharks due to putting their tiles on the first eliminated ones. There were a lot of interesting game play dynamics and I appreciated that people were simultaneously working in favor of themselves, while also somewhat in the favor of others, and somewhat against them. For one turn you might be working with someone, and then the next turn you might be working against them. This can happen by choice or just by the nature of the game. 

Next time playing the game, I think I would really like to try it the normal way again and see how my fate changes. After playing once more and getting the hang of a new strategy and game play, I would like to try to play with the expansion pack because that seems like it would add even more interesting and intense game dynamics. I think this game can relate to leadership easily because there’s a lot of multitasking happening at all times. While you’re working to save your people and get them back to shore, you’re also concerned about what is happening to your players all across the board that might experience difficulties getting back on shore. The players also need to demonstrate leadership by being dedicated to their own mission. I don’t agree with this, but some styles of leadership are very dominant and people will actively step on others in order to get what they want. This game brings out the competitive nature in people and in order to survive, one must engage in the cutthroat aspects of the game and stay dedicated to each personal mission. It’s also important in leadership to learn how to reroute when things don’t go according to plan, and that’s something we did a lot in this game. 

I think this is a game that not only I would play again, but I would also want to play with my ex boyfriends’ family from back home. This sounds odd, but we used to play a lot of games together and I think they would enjoy different aspects of this game. I think the turns take too long for my friends at school, they would probably get bored waiting on people to make decisions for their turn, but my ex’s family doesn’t mind long or complicated games.