Join the new Space Race in a space themed game with innovative orbital movement mechanics for 1-5 players.
For more information visit www.plygames.net/exploration
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Unveiling Six Sided Summoner: A New Year, A New Adventure!
4 months ago
– Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 03:33:26 PM
Happy New Year, PlyGames Community!
After two years of crafting, tweaking, and summoning creative energies, we're beyond excited to present to you the next installment in the PlyGames adventure - Six Sided Summoner! 🧙♂️✨
Six Sided Summoner is more than a remake; it's a collaborative journey with the original author, William Rouse. Together, we've summoned the essence of the original game from 2018, infusing it with new life and exciting twists.
The Core Concept:
Embark on a journey of magic, strategy, and unforgettable moments as you step into the shoes of mighty summoners. Your mission: rescue the fairy-tale world from encroaching shadows that emerge with the nightfall. Traverse enchanting landscapes, expand the world, complete bounties, and vanquish menacing monsters. Get ready for an adventure like no other!
Design Pillars & Principles:
Discover the heart of Six Sided Summoner through design pillars that promise a gaming experience like never before:
Multiple Paths to Win: Embrace diverse strategies and find your unique path to victory.
Ability to Plan Ahead: Outsmart shadows with strategic moves.
Decisions Based on Random Inputnot Output: Navigate a world of chance for an exciting, unpredictable journey.
Variable Factors with Minimum Randomness: Strike a balance for dynamic yet fair gameplay.
Rewards and Forward Momentum: Progress and rewards propel you forward, eliminating setbacks.
Dramatic Memorable Moments: Craft your narrative through epic encounters.
Short and Straightforward Actions: Minimize downtime for a seamless gaming experience.
Just One More Turn Effect: Feel the irresistible pull for "just one more turn."
A Platform for Creativity: Dive into endless possibilities with custom maps and scenarios.
Gameplay Highlights:
Dive into the heart of Six Sided Summoner:
Character Build:
Build your character throughout the game and even over several campaign scenarios. Each build will have a different play strategy. Customize your hero with:
Attribute points used in combat and quests,
Perks that increase the possibilities of actions performed by the character,
Recipes that give new skills and introduce new game mechanics,
Items that improve the use of land.
Adventure:
While traveling through this extraordinary land, your hero will encounter many interesting quests, each unique and introducing new mechanics. Each quest has several possible solutions, each bringing a unique effect that influences the further gameplay. Quests in Six Sided Summoner keep you in suspense even after you get to know them, offering a level of engagement rarely found in other games of this type.
Night is Coming:
When night falls, the whole land freezes. Shadows appear, ominous and powerful. Experience a unique combat system with low luck influence, emphasizing decision-focused gameplay. Nighttime in Six Sided Summoner adds a layer of tension and strategy as you navigate the ever-growing power of the shadows.
Epic Boss Fights:
But wait, there's more! Brace yourself for epic Boss fights that promise intense challenges and extraordinary rewards. Conquer these formidable foes to emerge victorious in the fairy-tale world.
As we embark on this new journey, your support means the world to us. Six Sided Summoner is an adventure like no other, and we can't wait to share it with you. Let the dice roll, the spells cast, and the tale of Six Sided Summoner unfold!
Next steps
almost 2 years ago
– Sun, May 15, 2022 at 02:23:15 AM
Hi all!
I just want to inform you that this is not the end. The last two and a half years have been extremely hard for all of us. Unfortunately, these difficult times do not seem to end, but I hope that we have already learned to live in such conditions. For this reason, I am going to rebuild my passion for our hobby, and your trust Ply Games. To achieve these goals, I am planning several activities:
#1 New Rulebook
This point is simple. I will continue to work on Exploration as long as it is necessary. We have prepared a new version of the manual. We basically removed the "hieroglyphs" on pages 6-9. We have completely rewritten the chapters for navigating about movement of the spaceship fleet (It was the most confusing) and more.
Give it a try. In our opinion, it significantly improves the combat mechanics (in fact, it introduces it, changing the rather primitive way of ship collisions). Let me know what you think about it.
#3 Community
We want to restore our passion for this hobby. We invite you to start a new journey with us! We are going to build a community that will have fun playing board games. Like us, sometimes not everyone has time to enjoy our hobby, so we plan to use our SM to share this joy in various forms. We are planning several formats in which we invite you to participate. More info soon, in the meantime let us know what content is missing about board games.
#4 Trade fairs
We want to have an opportunity to speak with you, that's why we will join some events this year and hopefuly exted the list of events in the next year. You will also be able to see reports from every event that we will take part in, so I think it is worth seeing what this type of event looks like in Poland. Fianlly, we may even organize our own event to make a big blind test session for our new game, which soon will be anounced! This year we will be exhibitors at the following events:
03.06 - 05.06 - RetroSfera vol.4 - is a festival created by our colleagues who, returning with it after a pandemic break, intend to expand the board games zone. It will definitely be a good fun! I realize that you will not be able to join. However, the more I encourage you to watch the report that we will prepare. I am curious if there are such events in your local area as well. Let us know.
17.06 - 19.06 - Pyrkon - here we have a greater probability of meeting, because it is the largest fantasy convention in Poland, which attracts up to + 60k people from all over the world every year.
20.09 - 25.09 - One More Game - this is a total novelty. For the first time in our city, there will be a festival of board games, which is gaining momentum day by day! They will host great publishers such as Portal Games, Lucky Duck Games, and they will also host us. I warmly invite you!
06.10 - 09.10 - Spiel '22 - at the end there is a cherry on the cake. The largest fair in the world, at which we have participated many times. This year, for the first time as an exhibitor. In my opinion, every gamer should visit this fair in Essen at least once in their life. The climate prevailing there is an amazing experience!
Finally, I am asking for a favor. Please sit in front of the Exploration box. Treat it as a game you are playing for the first time and start your adventure again with the latest version of the rulebook and a new expansion. I hope that this game will allow you to spend many happy moments with your friends during the conquest of space!
In the meantime, take care!
Kind Regards
Damian Korus
Is Warzone an expansion for Exploration?
over 2 years ago
– Sun, Nov 21, 2021 at 11:21:51 PM
Hello all!
The answer is: not supposed to be, but it could be! While playing Warzone, I encountered a slogan repeatedly spoken by testers: You can make a game in the game by using Warzone while playing Exploration. During the initial tests, the idea struck me as strange, but ... You have written many times that the "Strike" system is lame, unintuitive and not precisely described in the manual. That is why I have been playing various games for months (which you can follow on our instagram) and I am watching closely the combat / encounter systems they contain, with the thought that maybe it will be possible to improve it somehow in Exploration. The time has come to show you the results of your work in the extended version of Exploration.
You can find a detailed description of the rules at the link below on our dropbox. They were written on one A4 page which is ready for printing.
Replacing the "Strike" mechanic with the "Combat" mechanic, which consists in comparing the attack power attribute of the confronting ships. The attack strength attribute consists of: base attack strength, the number of laser cannon modules and the number of hexes of war used.
In the game, it was relatively easy to get up to 10 experience points, which at a later stage of the game could only be used to exchange for victory points, or to avoid the effect of an event card, which, however, did not happen very often. In the extended version, we will be able to buy war cards for experience points, which makes sense in the context of the game's theme. The more experienced you are, the better technology you have and the stronger the spaceship fleet you have.
War cards determine the "overall" strength of your fleet. You can use them as a boost during combat for any ship. This introduces an interesting element to the gameplay. Players have greater flexibility and the ability to react to enemy actions, eg. When your AM Odysseus ship has 4 habitats on board, you will want to defend it at all costs and this mechanic will allow you to do so.
Mechanics changes made it necessary to adjust the abilities of some ships as well as laser and energy turret modules. We also needed to rebalance the gameplay, so we made some minor changes to ranged attack and constant speed flight.
You will be able to use the Exploration: Warzone War Hexes to play the extended version of Exploration.
Finally, I would like to add a brief information about the rulebooks. After the last update, you ordered a lot of them, which resulted in a bit longer preparation time. The instructions were posted last Friday and, depending on where you live, the first one should be arriving by the end of next week.
Kind Regards
Damian Korus
Warzone is coming.
over 2 years ago
– Wed, Oct 27, 2021 at 01:48:34 AM
Hello all!
#1 APPENDIX
After the release of Edition 3, there were a few new questions about the rules. For this reason, I have prepared a short appendix that answers the questions asked. If there is something new, please ask and I will answer your questions.
Almost 3.500 people played the Exploration: Warzone on Board Game Arena. We received a lot of constructive feedback and ideas that took the game to the next level.
- New win conditions, with various strategies to win. Thanks to them, even if you seem to play badly at the start, you still have a chance to win by changing your strategy.
- Removal of "crude" ACCURACY stat from combat mechanics. It caused a lot of confusion and the feeling of uselessness.
- Changing the combat system of rolling dice (too much randomness) in favor of the hexes of war, which give you full control of the combat, at the same time maintaining a sense of uncertainty due to the lack of knowledge about the opponent's strategy.
- Increased number of actions to be played from 5 to 10. Usually more actions means more fun.
- From now on, actions are more complex. Base actions are divided into 3 groups: Spend resources, Take bonuses and Warzone. Something new are Global effect cards which immediately affect all players.
- To improve the balance of the game, a simple element of the economy based on 3 types of "resources" has been introduced.
To be honest it is a new game, with a potential to become something more than a filler game based on a rock-paper-scissors scheme. It is a big-small game for the spaceship battles and “take that” enthusiasts.
#4 WHY IT IS RECOMMENDED FOR YOU TO SUPPORT WARZONE?
The answer is simple. We are here with you from February 2019. Thanks to your support and patience, we can keep making games in 2021 and beyond. To show our gratitude, we have prepared a special offer only for Exploration backers.
1st - In 2021/22 it will be very difficult to find a board game Kickstarter project with a good price for shipping, that’s why we will offer you FREE SHIPPING.
2nd - We are going to add for free a Day-1 gift to all pledged rewards. Now I can only tell you that it will be another game, which you can have for FREE.
3rd - Of course all of you will receive a 3rd edition of Exploration rulebook.
4th - Today we have started our Giveaway contest. Don't mind that the reward is content from the previous campaign. If you win, you will be able to exchange the prize for another game or a coupon with the value of the winnings. The option to choose a prize will only be available to Exploration backers.
Rulebook edition 3 - the last one
almost 3 years ago
– Fri, May 21, 2021 at 01:14:12 AM
Hello all! Sorry for huge delay with this update. During last three weeks I got infected by Covid-19, but obviously this was not the only reason of missing information.
#1 RULEBOOKEDITION 3
In edition no. 3 you have additional 4 pages, with the quickstart game overview. I believe this will make it easier for new players (or for those of you who haven't played yet) to understand the rules. You can download latest version from our dropbox. On the title page you can find information about the edition number.
It is the last version, which means that at this moment we finish the rulebook updates.
#2 Rulebook delivery
Here situation is little bit more complicated and mainly this was the reason of delayed update. In short, new problems arose.
1 - New rulebook size. We send several rulebooks in 210x210 format but the feedback wasn't good. Font size and pictures were too small for majority of users. Unfortunately for low print runs, local printhouses are not able to print the rulebook in 280x280 size. Generaly they are using A3 format (297×420) for this kind of printing. The maximum size for one page is A4 (297x210), when we fold the A3 sheet. To achive our square ratio printhouse must cut the bigger side from 297 to 210. The only solution for this problem is to order high print run from large-format printing house (preferably from the game manufacturer) and here next problem occurs.
*Update: It seems that I have found the smaller local printhouse which can make a "normal" size rulebook. I will keep you informed about details.
2 -Budget. Unfortunately, we exceeded the budget for this project by over 20%. There were many reasons like: campaign re-launch, Covid situation which significantly increased the cost of transportation for both freight and delivery (we didn't increase the cost of shipping and took all additional costs to keep what we have promissed during campaign), wrong decisions during game development and quality check, especially for the rulebook. Unfortunately at this moment we can't afford for just order the high volume of print run and deliver it for free. Anyway, I don't want to give up and at this moment I came out with following solutions.
A - We will add an option for you to order rulebook edition 3 in 210x210 format. It will be free of charge, but if you consider to support us, I would be glad if you could use tip option. This option will be open till the end of month. 31th of May.
B - We have still some copies of Exploration in our inventory. We will try to sell them and if possible I would like to spend the profit on rulebook printing and delivery. Please wait for the outcome, we should know more till the end of June.
C - Soon we will run the second campaign with the new game Exploration:Warzone. It is a spin-off, much smaller and simplier game. Some of you already played this game on BGA, but after collecting feedback, we made a lot of improvements to the gameplay. You can read more about upcoming game on WIP post on BGG. When you can see that you like the new game and it is perfect for you, you will get the rulebook v3 with your copy of Exploration: Warzone
#3 Game content
If you want to see some new gameplay movies, please visit BGG page. Soon more content will be uploaded.
