Rating
Tharsis
Tharsis is a turn-based space strategy game. With dice and cannibalism. It puts you in control of humanity's first manned mission to Mars, just as it's struck by a micrometeoroid storm. You must guide your crew through disasters, food shortages, and the unforgiving nature of space - all while maintaining your sanity amidst cryptic signals and warni...
Details
- Released
- January 11, 2016
- Developer
- Choice Provisions
- Genres
- Survival · Puzzle · Role-playing (RPG) · Simulator · Strategy · Turn-based strategy (TBS) · Adventure · Indie · Card & Board Game · Horror
- Publisher
- Choice Provisions, QubicGames S.A.
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Tharsis Reviews
Professional reviews from gaming critics
Tharsis is a good yet difficult strategy game that takes a lot of time to master.
Tharsis is a turn-based space survival game where you are in control of humanity's first manned mission to Mars just as it's struck by a mighty meteor storm.
For those looking for something unique and original, Tharsis definitely offers that up in spades. It’s not a game that can be played for hours on end, but you’ll certainly return to it time and again should you fall for its clever blend of roguelike and strategy board games.
Tharsis is a single player turn-based survival game that involves some strategy, dice throws, and a lot of luck. As each step requires you to plan ahead a little bit, the only thing stopping you from succeeding is bad luck – everything that happens during your mission is up to chance, and your job is to be flexible and plan around it. Difficult to win even if you think you’re doing well, the intriguing and sophisticated concept of Tharsis is somewhat lost due to the frustrating outcomes and unbelievably unlucky dice rolls. Am I playing Tharsis, or is Tharsis playing me?
Tharsis is a strategic nightmare where the survival of your crew, and the completion of your very important mission, relies heavily on luck and a dash of
Tharsis would be a game I would enjoy playing on a tabletop with some buddies, while drinking some beers, and enjoying our repeated failures. However, as a single-player video game, with only a few extra missions to take you out of the basic gameplay loop that is consistently frustrating, the overall experience has all the right parts but just leaves too much up to chance to be enjoyable.
Jokes aside, Tharsis is an incredibly meaningful game that has picked a woefully inadequate format to express an innately intelligent idea. If this was a narrative game, in the vein of Telltale Games’ work or Life is Strange, then we really would have had something special on our hands. As it is, we have a board game that goes out of its way to be unfair so it can make players make decisions that should have great emotional impact, but in practice become a quite pragmatic stepping stone towards victory.
Tharsis is a mission-to-Mars game. You need to direct the actions of four crew members aboard your spacecraft so you can land at least one person alive on Mars. I would say “safely” on Mars, but this voyage isn’t exactly OSHA approved.Read More
Tharsis can never stop reminding you that you don't have control over its interstellar disaster, just the illusion of it. Every time I watched my ship fall apart, and every time I watched new events propagate across the ship that were completely impossible to stop, I felt like, win-or-lose, Tharsis was having all the fun.
Tharsis is well made, but not well designed—an attractive, interesting board game idea, but only the first draft.