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"It was an ambush. That’s the only way to describe it. The mother ship appeared out of nowhere, creating a massive shadow over the city. Within seconds, wave after wave of fighters poured out of it, filling the sky." Flip Ships is one of those games that’s so simple and obvious that it’s surprising no one has made it yet. While the initial concept was created by Kane Klenko during a designers’ weekend meeting, it took him several years of development to finalize the finished game. Simple games are often the most difficult to optimize, but certainly worth the effort. Flip Ships was no exception. Flip Ships is a cooperative dexterity game where players take on the roles of brave pilots defending their planet from an onslaught of firepower. Enemy ships encroach on your territory each turn unless they’re defeated by your squad. By flipping your ship tokens on to the ever-approaching enemies, you can deal damage that will destroy your foes and open the way for your final attack on the Mothership. Make the final blow to save your fleet. As a kid, I loved Space Invaders. There’s so much tension as you frantically shoot at the enemy ships creeping ever closer to your base. Now I spend most of my free time playing board games that challenge me strategically, but rarely add the intensity and suspense that I remember from arcade games of my childhood. Until now.
“The basic idea is that there are all these enemy ships (cards) coming at us, and we must flip our ship tokens and land on them to destroy them. After the players flip, the enemy ships move toward us, and if they move past a certain point we take damage. Sort of a dexterity tower defense game,” explains creator Kane Klenko. Klenko, designer of FUSE and FLATLINE, is known for increasing your heart rate by adding a timer to his cooperative dice games. Flip Ships explores creating suspense through a dexterity mechanic, instead. Players will be on the edge of their seats as each space craft flies through the air and lands precisely in the right (or wrong) spot. The enemies will eventually dwindle down, but the Mothership looms menacingly behind them. Nailing a few perfect flips will be required to strike at the heart of this imposing, tentacled obstacle. That should get your heart pumping! It won’t be easy, but by working together you’ll have a chance (a slim one, at that). As a team, you’ll need to carefully choose upgrades to your fleet as you battle the increasing surge of enemy ships bearing down on you. These upgrades can allow your ships to move after your flips. You’ll need this huge advantage because, honestly, most of us don’t have a lot of practice flipping cardboard tokens onto cards across the table! "We’re launching the ships we have ready, but it isn’t much. Our pilots fight bravely, defending the planet, while we ready the rest of the fleet. Explosions fill the sky, and we’ve taken some hits, but we won’t give up. Will you?"
Games like Flip Ships are important for introducing new players to the hobby. As much as I love three-hour, heavy euro games with my gamer group, they’re a tough sell to my casual gamer family. Offering a gentle balance between intriguing mechanics and appealing visuals will draw in even the most skittish, soon-to-be fan. The incredible art by Kwanchai Moriya draws you into the spectacular and saturated world, heightening the experience. Whether they see a group cheering from across the café, or are introduced to the game at a dinner party, fledgling gamers need to quickly grasp the goal of the game and feel comfortable trying out a few turns. This is why Flip Ship is the perfect introduction to tabletop gaming. It taps into simple experiences that feel very human and relatable. Everyone has fiddled with flicking some sort of token towards another object. Turning this into a team sport makes it thrilling, as you can celebrate or lament your final results, together. Games with simple rules, evocative art, and an ounce of suspense can capture this magic.
As a society, we crave human contact and tactile experiences. We also need to occasionally experience defeat, knowing that we can start over and try again. Improving our skills as a squad is satisfying and reminds us that we really do need each other. Games, and especially Flip Ships, are a wonderful outlet that can let us indulge in our imagination, problem solving, and the joy of working towards a common goal. Even if it’s just saving the world from an alien invasion.
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