Silent Death: The Next Millennium

A fiery explosion in dead silence...

• Silent Death: The Next Millennium
• Deluxe Edition
• Iron Crown Enterprises
• 2 or more players
• MSRP $50.00

ilent Death is a classic board game that was recently revamped in a snazzy new deluxe edition, which includes updated rules and other refinements. In the game, players fly one or more spaceships in battles involving a host of deadly and futuristic weapons, from disintegrators to missiles. The game is played on a board divided into hexagons which are used to determine distances and angles between ships. Combat involves maneuvering into the right position for an attack (which depends on each weapon's range and firing arc) with the results determined by a die roll. Ship and weapon capabilities aren't the only factors, though. Individual pilot and gunner skill levels play a big part in the outcome of a battle.

The ships available range from zippy, one-person fighters to hard-hitting gunboats with numerous cannons, missiles and torpedoes. For each ship, players prepare a Starcraft Display, which is a diagram that shows the ship's attributes, its weapons and their particulars. Damage to a ship is monitored on its damage track, a grid of boxes which are progressively marked off as the ship takes hits from enemy weapons. Codes in the damage track indicate when various systems -- engines, armor, weapons, etc. -- weaken or fail as a ship is progressively torn apart, until finally it is destroyed.

Although Silent Death is primarily a straight-up combat game, it's lots of fun. The greatest strength of this game is how easy it is to pick up and play, yet how intricately it simulates space combat. Despite a plethora of ship systems and flying techniques, games move quickly and rarely become bogged down in rulebook-diving. Thanks to the Starcraft Display, players always have all the necessary information about the ships in front of them -- sort of a paper heads-up display.

On top of that, the rulebook provides not just rules but also many chapters of background material about the history and politics of the Silent Death universe, grounding the game in an imaginatively fleshed-out world. Another excellent touch is the sidebars on every page, which have supplementary information about alien races, rules clarifications and short stories. The stories are not only entertaining, but provide strategy tips.

The game board itself is a disappointing plain black, which could easily have been jazzed-up with some stars, nebulas, etc. The scenarios are also simplistic: usually direct fights to the death, which rarely include secondary goals such as rescue or reconnaissance. With such a versatile game system, far more interesting stories than kill-or-be-killed are possible, and it's too bad I.C.E. didn't take more advantage of the game's potential.

Luckily, updates and expansions help keep this game fresh, and these few shortcomings in no way prevent Silent Death from being an excellent game that is well-designed and lots of fun.

In fact, I'm off to play again right now. -- Brooks

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