Tharsis Reviews
Though the mechanics of Tharsis are often exciting and suspenseful, the game ultimately falls short of expectations due to irredeemably punishing dice rolls.
Tharsis is well made, but not well designed—an attractive, interesting board game idea, but only the first draft.
Tharsis can never stop reminding you that you don't have control over its interstellar disaster, just the illusion of it. Every time I watched my ship fall apart, and every time I watched new events propagate across the ship that were completely impossible to stop, I felt like, win-or-lose, Tharsis was having all the fun.
I really want this game to work. I want it to be another breakout hit from a studio known for engaging and relatively-simple titles. I want it to be something I'll return to time and time again, to land the world's least reliable spacecraft, piloted by the world's most fickle space crew, upon the surface of Mars, and revel in the rush of victory felt when tremendous odds have been surmounted. It's a bummer, then, that it just isn't. Tharsis is a brilliant title that is ironically marred by its reliance upon dice rolls, and as such, I'm doubtful that many players will be able to reach through the game's thick veil of frustration to the genius that awaits just beyond.
There would be a good story to be had if Tharsis was developed to involve more than just trying to survive a few rounds. The theme of surviving on a spaceship and figuring out how to keep everything—and everyone—together should make for a good game. Unfortunately, Tharsis fails on too many points to be really worth playing.
Tharsis is one of those games with a different approach, interesting and with the necessary complexity to invite the player to throw in all the hours of the world.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Tharsis would be a game I would enjoy playing on a tabletop with some buddies, while drinking some beers, and enjoying our repeated failures. However, as a single-player video game, with only a few extra missions to take you out of the basic gameplay loop that is consistently frustrating, the overall experience has all the right parts but just leaves too much up to chance to be enjoyable.
Jokes aside, Tharsis is an incredibly meaningful game that has picked a woefully inadequate format to express an innately intelligent idea. If this was a narrative game, in the vein of Telltale Games' work or Life is Strange, then we really would have had something special on our hands. As it is, we have a board game that goes out of its way to be unfair so it can make players make decisions that should have great emotional impact, but in practice become a quite pragmatic stepping stone towards victory.
Tharsis is an enjoyable game to start, but the frustrations and random nature of the game quickly eliminate the fun.
We so very much wanted to enjoy Tharsis. A project with a lot of potential, we've had our eyes on it for a while. Unfortunately, the little satisfaction we could garner was buried beneath a path of frustration.
Its simple rules coupled with the brief length of its rounds make Tharsis very easy to pick up and get addicted to...for a few hours. Unfortunately, so much of its gameplay is reliant on luck, which can make for an incredibly frustrating and unforgiving experience.
For the board game people, they will find this to be more up their alley. People looking for a more action type experience will have to look elsewhere. If you do decide to pick it up, just keep in mind, it is brutal, unforgiving, and takes a lot of patience to get into. When you do, you may very well find some enjoyment out of it maybe two times out of ten.
Tharsis is a captivating but sadistic game of chance that puts your fate at the mercy of dice.
When it comes to strategy games there are crowds with pretty different tastes out there...
Overall I liked Tharsis. It’s a fun, but short experience, that has you managing resources and trying to keep your crew alive. Yes there is some replay value as there are a few different endings it’s still not enough. I do think with some tweaking this would make a really good single-player board game that I would gladly play.
Tharsis is a turn-based survival and strategy game based on dice roll. It is a complex and difficult game, where in addition to doing everything correctly, we must be very lucky not to lose the game. It is addictive as we learn to play and progress in decision making and problem solving, but our margin of error is almost non-existent, and really, because of the weight of the random variable, we will never end up having control over what it happens in the game.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Tharsis is a good way to spend 10-30 minutes to see what happens on the next journey. It's a very harsh battle against the unknown, and can be utterly soul-crushing. Perhaps too soul-crushing, actually. Players will, at times, feel so defeated and useless that playing again seems pointless. And maybe that's the point, considering the circumstances. I wouldn't recommend to marathon Tharsis in an attempt to complete its journey, but instead to boot it up every once in a while and hope for the best.
With a few tweaks and maybe a more casual-friendly difficulty level, Tharsis could be a fun strategy alternative for those who don't enjoy building large kingdoms or waging wars that take hours to complete. In its current state however, Tharsis is little more than a sadistically cruel game of digital roulette.
If you're a fan of constant raising stakes with no reprieve, then this is certainly the sort of thing that will appeal to you. Even if not, it will still appeal, but in smaller doses. Either way, Tharsis is a compelling, but polarizing, game.
It’s a great concept for a turn-based strategy game but be prepared for its unforgiving nature because you’re definitely going to die more than you survive.