Description

You are the representative of one of 6 Corporations, currently on a Satellite in orbit around Mars, tasked with the job of exploration and conquest of Mars for the profit of your employer over a maximum of 6 years. Uncontaminated water on Earth is scarce and so it is the chosen commodity and the benchmark used to evaluate your success in competition with the 5 other Corporations.

Your Earth Corp is sending you, on a yearly basis, a diminishing amount of water from Earth for your use on your satellite. You utilize this water to activate "Squishy" (men) and "Crunchy" (robots) stored on your satellite. You use Squishy and Crunchy to drop down from your satellite to a constantly rotating planet Mars to explore the hidden terrain and discover water resources. Each Squishy that holds a terrain hex at the end of the fiscal year will provide water to send back to Earth in a running tally with the highest total at the end of the game being awarded the Monopoly of Mars for their Corporation.

Each Fiscal Year is divided into 4 Quarters and a Fiscal Year End. During the turn order players: receive water from Earth and roll for safe transit; active Squishy and Crunchy units; bid on the Chair; resolve storm movement and damage; determine and wait for Mars rotation; move units down to and around on Mars; resolve hex control through conflict; resupply their units on the surface with water from the satellite; accumulate profit points for terrain held; attempt to discover Alien Tech; and generally mess with the competition whenever they can using MarsNeedsYou Cards.

MarsNeedsYou Cards are held by players and used to benefit themselves or mess with the competition. Players also bid with water for a "Chairmanship" which allows them to roll to determine the amount of rotation of Mars before players are allowed to move their Squishy and Crunchy to the surface. "Chairman" also get to decide which of all the players will go first, with play proceeding in a clockwise order. This allows them to decide where they would like to be in the order of play. Where conflict occurs between multiple players for a terrain hex the "Chairman" also decides who fights first, even if they are involved in the conflict. And speaking of conflict, players who move their units onto other player occupied terrain hex are now in "Strenuous Negotiations" and must roll dice to determine who will hold the terrain and reap the profit from it and who will die and be rendered back into water for collection. If a player is not involved in any conflict they may pay water and roll for the chance to collect an Alien Tech Card which will provide them with an advantage courtesy of found Mars Alien Technology.

At the end of the last Fiscal Year, players count up their profit and any game bonuses for things like holding specific terrain or having the most Squishy on Mars and see how much total profit they have sent back to Earth. The player who squeezes the most profit from Mars is granted the development monopoly and wins the conflict!

-description from designer