Wouter & Ymke 
Welcome to the world of FLOE, where you and your fellow adventurers embark on a journey across the icy expanse of the Iceberg Sea. This game is all about exploring frosty islands, finding treasures, and facing off against monsters in cold caverns. It’s a challenging expedition that tests your strategy and survival skills in the chilly wilderness. Every now and then, your adventurers will need to retreat to the village to thaw out, stock up on items, and plan their next icy adventure, aiming to become the most renowned explorers of this frigid landscape.
👥 1-4 players, ages 12+
⌛ Playing time: 60-120 minutes
📝 Designers: Henry Audubon, Jonny Pac & Yoma
🎨 Artwork: Andrew Bosley & Yoma
🏢 Publisher: PIKA Games (prototype copy provided)
The Journey Begins
Here’s how FLOE unfolds: Each player takes their turn to navigate their main character, performing various actions to advance their journey. You’re not alone, though! You can also deploy your familiar, a faithful companion that supports your quest. The game board is neatly divided into two main sections: the lively village and the expansive Iceberg Sea.
Out at sea, the adventure intensifies as you move from one iceberg to another. Whether you’re navigating shallow waters or sailing through deeper seas, there’s plenty to do. You can gather resources, search for buried treasures, discover new lands, and visit significant landmarks. Along the way, you’ll encounter bonuses and delve into caves to battle monstrous inhabitants. After your main action, you can send your familiar to an adjacent spot to unearth more resources or treasures. But beware, every action in this frozen world costs warmth, the essential currency of the game.
When it’s time to warm up, head back to the village. Here, warmth is regained through interactions with villagers or a visit to the healer. The village offers various actions like building homes, shopping for items, boosting your maximum warmth capacity, pursuing personal goals, or seeking allies. Each action requires spending your current maximum capacity of a specific resource, which is then increased by one for future actions. Initially, every action costs one resource, reflecting your starting capacity. This capacity gradually increases as you repeat actions. When your FLOE Stone, representing your capacity, reaches its maximum, you can place it on a shrine at an iceberg, earning you a crucial point.
Scoring in FLOE is unusual, with most points earned in half increments for actions like defeating monsters or visiting landmarks. These achievements are tracked on your player board. Collecting a second half-point allows you to move your FLOE Stone on the scoring track. The game heads toward its conclusion when a player scores 6 points, leading to a final round. After one last turn, players add up their personal goals. The player with the highest score is deemed the bravest explorer of the Iceberg Sea.
From Concept to Kickstarter Success
FLOE comes to us from the creative minds of Henry Audubon, Jonny Pac, and Yoma, and it’s being brought into the world by PIKA Games, an imprint of Fantasia Games. This game is designed for 1-4 players, ages 12 and up. It’s a journey that will typically take you between 1 to 2 hours to complete, though your first few games might stretch out a bit longer as you get to grips with it. On Kickstarter, FLOE has already hit its funding target and has drawn the support of nearly 5000 backers, with many stretch goals already unlocked.
We got our hands on a prototype version from PIKA Games for this sneak peek. Remember, we’re talking about a prototype here, so the final version of the game might see some changes, especially to things like the rulebook. However, from what we’ve seen, the rules are quite clear, making it easy to jump right into the game. This is a good sign for what’s to come in the final box.
Even at this stage, the prototype impresses with its quality and visuals. The artwork by Andrew Bosley transports you straight to an icy world, making every card and the board itself a treat for the eyes. The miniatures are equally impressive, promising that the finished game will not only be fun to play but also beautiful to look at. And yes, this game will take up quite a bit of space on your table – the pictures don’t lie. For those curious about what the final game will include, the Kickstarter page is the place to go.
When it comes to playing FLOE, be prepared for a bit of a learning curve at the start. Our first dive into the game was with a more complex setup, but normally, FLOE is meant to start simpler. The game introduces you to its world step by step, adding new goals, cards, and rules as you become more comfortable. There’s 30% extra content that gets unlocked as you play, allowing you to increase the complexity at your own pace.
Strategies, Battles, and Expanding Horizons
In the beginning, figuring out how to score those crucial six points in FLOE seemed a bit daunting, especially since you start the game pretty bare-bones: no resources and just a tiny bit of warmth to keep you going. However, it didn’t take long for us to realize the importance of building up a good set of tools and resources. Early on, you’ll find yourself busy collecting resources at sea, then heading back to the village to spend them on useful items, potions, and even building houses. These houses turn out to be quite handy, offering up new resources and crates that help you gather momentum as you play. Once our resource tracks were filled up to the brim, scoring points by dedicating them to shrines became our new focus. Around the same time, our heroes felt strong enough to venture into the caverns, taking on monsters for extra points. This shift meant that reaching the six-point goal suddenly seemed a lot more achievable.
When it comes to interacting with other players, it’s interesting to note that while you can’t block someone from their main actions, your familiars can occupy spaces, sometimes making it tricky for others to grab specific tokens. That said, the game is designed with enough flexibility to ensure you’ve still got plenty of moves to make the most out of your turn, no matter how many players are at the table. Plus, there’s a solo mode on the way that sounds like it’ll offer a solid challenge, similar to other Fantasia games like Endless Winter and Unconscious Mind, featuring a simulated two-player game with varying difficulty levels and compatibility with expansions.
The pace of FLOE really picks up once you get past the initial resource-gathering phase. Early actions are quick and to the point, but as the game develops and your options expand, turns become more complex. You’ll have more houses to activate, detailed battles to strategize over, and with an increased warmth reserve, your heroes can venture further and do more. This evolution in gameplay allows for some pretty epic turns later on, where you can pull off impressive combos.
Battles in the caves are a bit of a wildcard, thanks to the dice. While there’s definitely an element of luck involved, there are ways to swing things in your favor, like using potions, casting spells, or deploying your familiars wisely. These battles aren’t easy, but the rewards make them worth the effort, adding an interesting layer of risk management to the game.
Final Thoughts on Our Icy Journey
FLOE has been a blast to play. It strikes a nice balance in gameplay length, ensuring that each decision you make feels important and impactful. The theme and artwork add a lot to the experience, creating a game that’s not only fun to play but also great to look at. With plenty of variety and the potential for lots of replayability, FLOE looks set to capture the hearts of many. We’re definitely keen to see what the final version brings to the table.
📝 Disclaimer: PIKA Games kindly provided the prototype we played, and we’re thankful for the chance to explore FLOE’s icy world ahead of its release.
