Yesterday evening was our regular games night with friends, and I was thrilled to get a brand-new production copy of Odysseus from Gigamic to the table. One of the absolute best perks of working as a staff member at Hachette Boardgames UK is getting our hands on early production copies of upcoming titles. It gives us the perfect opportunity to learn the rules, test the mechanics, and gather valuable feedback with a local group before the main release. This adventure isn't officially launching until the 16th of September, so we were incredibly excited to be among the very first to set sail across the Mediterranean.
Here is a breakdown of how the game plays and what you can expect when it hits the shelves.
How to Play
The Goal
In Odysseus, you are sailing alongside Ulysses, helping him surmount 15 legendary challenges thrown at him by the gods of Olympus as he attempts to journey home to Ithaca. Throughout the voyage, you will draft Trial cards to build up four essential skills: Strength (red), Intelligence (blue), Cunning (yellow), and Luck (green). The player who overcomes the most perils and gathers the most valuable tales to score the highest victory points wins the game.
Taking a Turn
Players take turns moving clockwise around the table. On your turn, you must execute the following three steps in order:
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1. Choose a Trial Card: You must draft exactly one Trial card from the outer ends of the two lines flanking Ulysses’ Ship gameboard. You cannot pick a card that is trapped between two others. If your chosen card is next to a facedown card, you immediately flip the two facedown cards on that side of the ship and claim the Athena’s Favour token sitting between them.
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2. Depart on an Adventure OR Rest: Once you have your card, you must choose how to use it:
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Depart on an Adventure: You slot the card into the matching skill column above your personal Tales board and immediately claim the bonuses shown at the bottom of the card (such as increasing specific skills or gaining tokens). However, you can never have more than four cards in a single skill column.
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Rest: If a column is full or you prefer a different strategy, you play the card face down to the left of your board. You forfeit the card's specific bonuses, but in exchange, you can increase any skill of your choice by one and take an Athena's Favour token from the supply.
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3. End Your Turn: If only one Trial card remains on the ship, it is discarded, and the board is completely refilled with a fresh layout of four facedown and eight face-up cards, along with new tokens. Play then passes to the left.
Tales, Epics, and Divine Favour
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Athena's Favour: These tokens are highly valuable. You can spend one token to change the skill you are allowed to increase on a card, or save up three tokens to purchase a powerful Tale tile.
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Gathering Tales: You can collect up to six Tale tiles either by spending three Athena's Favour tokens or by successfully completing a horizontal row of four Trial cards containing all four distinct skills. These tiles grant massive endgame victory points based on the final makeup of your deck.
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The Epic Quest: If you successfully collect a Trial card from all five distinct categories—Navigation, Encounters, Gods, Creatures, and Ithaca—you instantly claim the top Epic tile from the board. These tiles offer large point values that decrease as the stack runs thin, rewarding the fastest navigators.
End of the Game & Scoring
The game concludes once the draw pile is depleted and only one card remains on Ulysses' Ship. Players then evaluate their success:
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Resolve Trials: For each skill column, check your final position on the skill track. If your track value matches or exceeds the difficulty level listed on a Trial card in that column, you have passed the trial and score its victory points. If your skill is too low, you fail the trial and score nothing from it.
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Tally Bonus Points: Add the points scored from your Epic tile and your Tale tiles. Crucially, Tale tiles award points for all relevant Trial cards you hold, even if you failed to pass the trial itself.
The sailor with the highest grand total is declared the ultimate hero of the epic.
Initial Feedback
Testing Odysseus with my regular gaming group last night was a fantastic experience, and the buzz at the table lasted long after the final scores were tallied. There is a brilliant tension between pushing your luck to chase high-value trials and playing it safe with lower-level ones to steadily build up your skills. It makes for genuinely engaging, tight choices every single turn.
The standout surprise for us, however, was the pacing. Even with four players learning the game for the very first time, our opening session clocked in at under 45 minutes. It flowed so beautifully that everyone immediately demanded a rematch. With the rules already locked down, our second game wrapped up even faster.
Ultimately, Odysseus shines as a clever tableau-building game. It packs a wealth of strategic decisions into a brisk timeframe, ensuring it never overstays its welcome. Gigamic has crafted a wonderfully accessible yet deeply strategic drafting game that does true justice to Homer's classic epic. Keep an eye out for its official UK arrival this autumn!