"The sea is only the embodiment of a supernatural and wonderful existence. It is nothing but love and emotion; it is the Living Infinite."

Cardboard Critique: Nemo’s War (Second Edition)

Tabletop •

I’ve never played a solo game quite like Nemo’s War from Victory Point Games. I went into it prepared for the usual solo/cooperative game tropes–turns divided by a “bad” phase, more fires to put out than you have hoses, a general sense of being completely screwed–but found none of those. Instead, Nemo’s War felt more like one of those open-world video games like the Elder Scrolls series. Do whatever the hell you want, when you want, and have fun doing it. There’s never that moment, as in other cooperatives, where you “beat the game”. It’s strange, yet mesmerizing.

You won’t be shocked to learn that the game places you in the polished boots of the titular Captain Nemo, captain of the Nautilus submarine, bane of English imperialism, and all around good guy. You might remember our hero from the tales of Jules Verne unless, like me, all you remember is an old ride at Disney World that’s been replaced with something from Snow White. In other words, knowledge of the Nautilus or its crew isn’t a prerequisite to enjoying the many tales you’re about to weave when opening the box cover.

While most games have little things like, I don’t know, win conditions, Nemo’s War lets you pick and choose how you’ll play. There are four game “motives” to choose from–War, Exploration, Anti-Imperialism, and Science–each changing the point values of certain activities. For example, if you’re playing with the War motive, destroyed warships earn more points than if playing playing with the Science motive active. That’s as close to forcing gameplay decisions down a certain path as Nemo’s War ever gets.

“I am not what you call a civilised man! I have done with society entirely, for reasons which I alone have the right of appreciating. I do not, therefore, obey its laws, and I desire you never to allude to them before me again!”

Each turn begins by revealing an event, following its instructions, and proceeding with your turn which consists of spending an allotment of action points before returning to the Event deck for the next go around. Unlike other cooperatives where Events exist solely to make life miserable, Events in Nemo’s War can go either way with bad events only happening if chosen or a skill check goes awry. Each event comes with a bit of fluff text on it explaining the reasoning behind the card’s outcome creating an small addendum to the game’s overall story. Nothing happens in this game that wouldn’t be written down in the Captain’s Log and make a pretty good vignette in your memoirs once the adventure is done.

Actions allow you to explore seas, battle military and civilian ships, repair your hull, hire new crew, search islands for treasure, free those subjugated by the British colonial machine, and more. It’s up to you. Are you an explorer? Search away and see what’s found buried below the ocean’s depths. Are you a warmonger? Then it’s torpedoes away at every ship you lay your periscope on. Of course, warmongers can also free colonies or search for treasure, just as explorers can hunt down and sink British freighters if the fever grips them.

“Sir,” replied the commander, “I am nothing to you but Captain Nemo; and you and your companions are nothing to me but the passengers of the Nautilus.”

The point of all this is just that, points. Score enough of them and you get to read a triumphant epilogue from the Epilogue Book (a real thing!), but score lower and you’ll have to read a sad tale of your shortcomings. If the hunt for points turns you off, you could simply play for the hell of it and leave the Epilogue Book in the box.

The game does a good job of ramping up the difficulty as it progresses. Ships are added automatically each turn and more deadly ships come looking for you as your notoriety increases. Thus, even the most pacifist of all captains has to take out a ship here and there. Repairs to the nautilus or attracting new sailors will cost you treasure, however, so warmongers have to spend some time digging for gold. Or, you could just wing it and hope the dice are on your side.

“It was marvellous, a feast for the eyes, this complication of coloured tints, a perfect kaleidoscope of green, yellow, orange, violet, indigo, and blue; in one word, the whole palette of an enthusiastic colourist!”

That’s really the only issue I can see “hardcore” gamers having with Nemo’s War: randomness. Much of the game relies on randomness, starting with drawing from a deck of cards and climaxing with the roll of dice. You’ll be rolling dice a lot in Nemo’s War, beginning with seeding the board and determining your number of action points all the way to those damnnamble skill checks. Luckily, skill checks can be mitigated by gambling your health, upgrading the nautilus, or having a crew mate sacrifice themselves at just the right time., but there’s always a chance for failure and, as usual, it will strike when you can least afford it to.

That said, Nemo’s War is a story-telling game, not a game for armchair strategists looking for a perfect-information-brain-burner. Sometimes failure makes for a better story, and in Nemo’s War that’s more often the case than not. Dice feel natural in a game like this and if VPG had replaced the skill checks with a different resolution method (the way Fantasy Flight often does) I think much of the game’s tension would be lost.

From a presentation standpoint, Nemo’s War is a piece of art. The board is painted in a beautiful 19th century style, every card is illustrated with a pencil drawing that evokes the age of Pax Brittanica. The boats are all painted on heavy chits, and there’s even a plastic Nautilus to track your location on the board. Glittering gems rest on the board to remind you which seas are currently hiding treasure beneath their waves.

“The sea is everything. It covers seven tenths of the terrestrial globe.”

Nemo’s War feels as if it were made with solo play in mind, but there is a cooperative mode in which others can take over as crew members and climb aboard the Nautilus. Unfortunately, I haven’t tried the cooperative version yet, but the game feels like it should be a solo endeavor, at least for me. I’ve not had much luck in having story-based games retain their immersion with groups, as chatter will eventually turn to topics outside of the game’s universe and immersive games just become an exercise in rolling dice and moving chits. For those of you with groups that can handle it, the cooperative mode is there. Solo, however, works perfectly.

Being a grizzled old gamer, I had honestly assumed the ability for a board game to surprise me had come and gone. I’m still excited when I see a new mechanism or a hook that I wasn’t expecting, but to find something completely and utterly unlike anything I’ve ever played are those gaming moments you remember. Getting Nemo’s War to the table is like the first time you played a really good euro, saw the genius behind Dominion, or tasted your first 18xx game. I’ve only played six solo games of Nemo’s War thus far, and haven’t come close to earning the “winning” amount of points, but each one has stuck with me more than 90% of the games that populate my game shelves. Think you’ve seen everything? Give Nemo’s War a try. It has the power to revitalize that love of gaming you probably haven’t had since you first broke into the hobby. Yep, it’s that good.

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Notable Replies

  1. Great review! I’m loving this tabletop stuff you’re doing.

    As for the randomness that you mention possibly being a turn-off for some people, aren’t all solo games kind of random anyway? Otherwise, there’s no way to change up what happens.

    I would think if somebody’s willing to take the time to play a solo game, they’re ok with some randomness.

  2. Its out! OMG OMG! OMG!

    Why am I just hearing about this now!

  3. It’s quite odd to me that VPG have been bopping happily along doing budget versions of games and now just knock out some rather gorgeous editions (Dawn of the Zeds, Darkest Night, Nemo’s War) with nary a grind of the gears.

    This version of Nemo, and his actions, reminds me strongly of Moore’s version from League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Worthy reading, alongside.

  4. Interesting. From the pictures, I thought it looked remarkably spiffy for a VPG game, but that’s because I haven’t been paying attention and didn’t realise they’ve moved away from print on demand and are becoming a more traditional publisher. That said, I always thought Zulus on the Ramparts, my favourite game from them, could do with a deluxe edition.

    Speaking of which, I hope they have another go at mobile versions but find someone to do it right this time, I haven’t played Barbarossa twice because of the amazing amount of bookkeeping needed. Still very tempted by Nemo in cardboard though.

  5. The Jules Verne ride at Disneyland got replaced by the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage.

  6. I think that VPG finally realised what they can do with the financial backing of a Kickstarter campaign.

  7. I’ve never been to Disneyland, only Florida’s Disney World and there it’s now part Little Mermaid thing but mostly a Seven Dwarves roller coaster.

  8. I bought this a week ago, and haven’t played it yet. Now Amazon has it on sale for $10 off. Now is the time to buy.

    Wish I could have held out longer.

    So looking forward to getting this on the table.

  9. Avatar for Kolbex Kolbex says:

    Thanks for the heads up on the Amazon sale. I have heard nothing but great things about this one, and although I swore to myself I would buy no more board games for the foreseeable future…I bought it because it honestly sounds fantastic.

  10. Avatar for Kolbex Kolbex says:

    I feel so dirty.

  11. Avatar for Kolbex Kolbex says:

    Got this to the table tonight. Lost (on Sailor, the shame) in points, but really enjoyed it.

  12. For those of you who participate in boardgamegeek’s monthly US math trades, there are three copies of this in the currently running trade. If you missed joining this month’s, I’d guess there will be some in December’s as well.

  13. Avatar for rinelk rinelk says:

    I’ve held out thus far, but it’s the Miniature Market Deal of the Day for under 50 clams. Now I’m very tempted.

  14. It’s so good.

  15. Late to the party, as usual, but thanks to this great review I’ve jumped onboard with a Late Pledge on their “Nemo’s War: Bold and Caring & Dramatis Personae Expansions” Kickstarter. Along with picking up the 2nd Edition of the game and the first expansion, I also grabbed the “Cloth Bundle” because I miss the olden days when we would get a map, sometimes cloth, with our games. :sunglasses:

  16. Avatar for Kolbex Kolbex says:

    Is this Late Pledge thing human-mediated, because I went to the site and put my email address in and said I wanted the full pack of expansions, and…nothing. No email or anything.

  17. Hmmm, I used Google Chrome (my Firefox is locked down with NoScript), and it sent me to a pledgemanager.com page, where I did the $75 pledge, entered my e-mail address and did the captcha … did you get the popup captcha to match the images? I just did it on Internet Explorer with a different address, and once the popup captcha goes away, it puts me back on the pledgemanager.com page where I see “Successfully invited to project” and start to enter my address.

    ETA: I tried it another time with just the $18 “ALL Expansion Packs” & a different e-mail address, same thing, after the captcha popup get to the page to enter my country.

  18. Avatar for Kolbex Kolbex says:

    Ah, the desktop site let me know I had to be logged in to perform the action I was attempting; the mobile site did not, just acted like everything was fine.

    Mobile is such garbage.

  19. Game Salute own Victory Point Games, apparently?

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