Disclosure: Meeple Mountain received a free copy of this product in exchange for an honest, unbiased review. This review is not intended to be an endorsement.
The Search for Planet X is one of the most thematically outstanding deduction games I’ve played. Taking on the role of astronomers competing to locate the mysterious Planet X, you’ll survey the sky, research, submit theories, conduct peer reviews, and even attend conferences. It really feels like you’re putting in the work as a person of science.
“I am a Scientist – I seek to understand me”
In The Search for Planet X, players perform actions which will give them a piece of information about the objects that may be in particular sectors of space or about the objects in relation to one another. Your place in turn order is cleverly tied to which action you take, with more directly helpful actions (like targeting a single area or surveying a smaller portion of the visible sky) costing you more spaces on the Time Track, which dictates when you take your next turn.
There is only ever one object in each sector and the total number of each object is fixed for every game (for example, there are always exactly 4 comets and 2 gas clouds within the whole system) as are some rules that the objects adhere to (every asteroid is always adjacent to at least one other asteroid) but figuring out exactly in which section each object is located, and how it helps you to find Planet X, is easier said than done. It’s definitely a game that tests your logic skills, as well as your ability to take effective notes.
Additionally, the board and materials all fit the space exploration theme. Even the player pieces are modeled after specific real-life telescopes, with facts about each on the individual player screens. All these details go a long way to immerse you in the game.
“One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man.”
The Search for Planet X requires an app to play, but it’s a relatively minimalist design and isn’t bloated with flavor text, which is terrific. It only includes what is essential to play the game. From the start, it gives each player a list of facts on what object is not in a number of sectors and, after that, the app is used to execute your action on each turn. What it won’t do is help you put all those pieces of information together, which each player does on their personal notepad. If your short-hand is as poor as mine, deciphering it can become a mystery of its own.
I was a bit concerned when I saw that a deduction game with relatively simple rules needed an app to play, but those concerns quickly disappeared as I progressed. It not only allows for almost limitless replayability, but takes no time to set up and get into. After a while, you’ll wait impatiently in anticipation of joy or dread, based on the sound effect that emits after entering one of your correct or incorrect theories.
“I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn’t learn something from him.”
The game really shines at 4 players, as pressure mounts not only to discover Planet X before your fellow astronomers, but to be the first to submit more theories, which can swing the final point total. While I still enjoyed my 2-player games, there was more of an emphasis on getting the correct theory than simply getting one onto the board during those plays, so many peer review rounds were just a game of chicken, which ultimately felt less competitive.
The 2-player games also led to a lot more waiting. If you just discovered a key piece of information that affects multiple sectors, you will almost always still be working on applying all the data to your notes by the time it’s your turn again. Thankfully, the game won’t allow you to take the ‘Research’ action (which only costs one time/turn space on the board) twice in a row, so it cuts down on the number of times one player gets back-to-back turns. With more players involved, you actually have the time to work on your personal puzzle while everyone else is completing their own actions.
“The eternal silence of these infinite spaces terrifies me”
Even though I found The Search for Planet X to be most successful at its full player count, that doesn’t mean that player interaction is any higher with more people. This is still a heads-down game where each person works to figure out the solution to a puzzle, even if everyone is working on the same puzzle. If you’re hoping to engage with others at the table, this isn’t the game for you.
Each player has to announce the sectors and/or objects they are surveying, targeting, or researching, depending on which action they take, and that is generally the extent of the talk at the table. Since those results are hidden from everyone else, these moments usually just distract you from working on your own discoveries more often than it gives you any insight.
“Our passion for learning is our tool for survival.”
Admittedly, I can count the number of deduction games on my shelf on one hand, and most of them lean towards the co-op/party side of things, such as Deception: Murder in Hong Kong. As far as competitive games in the genre go, I would put The Search for Planet X up there with Turing Machine as one of the most enjoyable to play.
I think the game mechanics are excellent and the companion app is one of the cleanest I’ve used, but because it’s so dependent on having the right group and player count, it will be difficult to get to my table very often and I have a hard time ranking it too high overall because of that. It won’t be for everyone, but I would recommend it if you’re a fan of clever logic puzzles and not letting a little something like conversation get in the way of a good time.
The Search for Planet X details
- Designer: Ben Rosset, Matthew O'Malley
- Artists: James Masino, Michael Pedro
- Publishers: Foxtrot Games, Renegade Game Studios
- Release Date: 2020
- Mechanism(s): Action Points
- BGG Geek Rating: - converted to Meeple Mountain scale: .
- More articles about The Search for Planet X.
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