Red Rise Board Game Review
Blog Andrew Joseph 09 Aug , 2025 0
This year, I want to Pierce Brown's Red Rise of Science Fiction Worldwhich quickly became one of my favorite books. Until I finished most of the books on board games based on these stories that actually existed, but once I did, I immediately snatched it away faster than Sophocles. While the board game version’s red rise doesn’t make you feel like you’re running with Sevro and Howlers or taking part in the Iron Rain, it manages to do a great job of making you feel as if you’re standing out for added sneaky game to increase impact and handle issues from the shadows.
Stonemaier Game: Red Rises
5
What's in the box:
- 1 Rule Manual (Multiplay)
- 1 rule book (only)
- 112 character cards
- 30 automatic cards
- 6 asymmetrical house tiles
- 1 match
- 1 wolf head tray and lid
- 60 Helium-3 Red Gem Token
- 60 Affect Cubes
- 1 Sovereign Token
- 1 new moon landing first player token
- 1 custom red rise death
- 6 Fleet Tokens
- 1 scoring board (50 double-sided paper)
- 6 reference cards
Red rising TBG by Stonemaier Games and designed by Alexander Schmidt and Jamie Stegmaier. You may recognize this name from his other famous games, including sickleviticulture and his latest Vantagethis is the most Gen Con's Popular Games This year. Their red rise adaptability created from 1-6 players plays the role of the novel's various houses as they compete for strength and influence in three different fields (Institute, Fleet Armada and Helium-3 production). Houses, Apollo, Valley, Diana, Jupiter, Mars and Minerva all have their special abilities that can be triggered whenever they manage to ask for sovereign tokens (more on that later), which adds asymmetrical small sprinkler to the packaging.
The gameplay of the Red Rising is very simple. On your turn you play a card from your hand to one of the four rows on the game board, triggering that card's deploy effect, then you pick up a card that from one of the three other rows adding it to your hand and triggering that rows effect, or if none of the cards look particularly appealing, you can draw blindly from the top of the deck and roll a dice, taking the action of whichever row is shown on the dice. These actions will allow you to advance the fleet track market, earn 3 helium symbols, increase influence at the institute, win sovereign tokens, and trigger the house’s bonus. The turn is then passed to the next player, which continues until between the two players: between all players, there are more than 7 helium tokens/influence on the Institute/Fleet track, or a single person encounters two of these criteria, and the score happens.
Although there are many strategies and plans for the Rise of Red, it is frustrating that there is too much interaction between players. In addition to another card you might want, in my drama, I always care more about my own hands, where in the tracker, than on the opponent. In books, conflict is a key point, and board games are almost totally lacking, minus the hand of another player or adjusting the influence. Of course, it can also play backroom trades and backstabs in the novel, but when I play, I just wish I could do more for other players. Slam Sevro or Elegant language Should be excited. Instead, in the case of Howlers card, it protects you from another player in order to try to steal or expel one of your cards, an act that can only do this throughout the entire 112 card deck. This basically turns Darrow and Sevro’s elite band into something you just want to master and do nothing because it can score some good points at the end of the game.
Regarding the topic of ratings, I find this a little confusing. Each card in your hand has a point value, which will score at the end of the AS and have a bonus effect, which can get more points based on the other cards in your hand, and you will get different opinions depending on your impact on the three factions, and if you have a sovereign token and then delete the bonus points for seven cards in the seven factions, you will get a bonus point. This would be annoying for all counts if the point value is only in unit numbers, but the point value is double digits, some are odd values like 28 or 43, just more troublesome than I want.
Honestly, most of my enjoyment from the Rise of Red comes from seeing artwork from my favorite books, depicting clear pictures of the world Brown made in my mind. I love seeing these cards show up for a larger life Telemanuses ((Sophocles Similarly), able to provide better faces for EO, SEFI, Uncle Narol and Ragnar, etc. However, there are still strange choices that contain characters such as only display Daro As a red labor card, and the fact that there is a universal “Mess Hall Cook” and “DataPort Expert” instead of Darow's Reaper version or any other noteworthy ll rat (like Sewsface)? Strange.
The red rises in its manual management and how players interact and think about board status. Willing to manipulate around individual rows, strategies are developed that will put their hands at their best to purify those coveted bonus points while ensuring they also spread their influence to maximize their potential. The overall process of gameplay is relatively simple, and the fact that you can also focus on developing these strategies and which results are solid card style games. This is a game I don't necessarily want to play with my friends who are easy to analyze – co-analyzing, or have to take the best turns so they always take the best, but if someone knocks it out on game night, my mechanics are solid enough that I'll play this game well.
However, as a fan of the Rise of Red, I never really got this “red rise feeling” when playing, more like Pierce Brown's work on some tricks on it. When I imagine board games based on these books, I think of calling Iron Rain To destroy my enemies, make difficult decisions with significant influence, skillfully put my ll behind the enemy lines, put my allies in the way of harm, and even sacrifice for my cause. Instead, the game offers a hand-built experience that inspires synergy. It's a fun enough game, but unfortunately it doesn't do everything it can to use Pierce Brown's property, but instead makes it a dressing for both dressings.