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I absolutely love co-operative games and word games so when I heard about A Message From the Stars I picked up a copy straight away to see how it compared against the highs of Codenames, Just One and So Clover. I really love the co-operative nature of some party games, and what was clear was that although A Message From the Stars shares some similarity with those games, it also offers a step up in terms of complexity due to its interesting cipher mechanic.
Setup and gameplay
In A Message From the Stars 2-8 players will divide into scientists and an alien and will be passing words back and forth through 4 transmissions to first try and guess each group's three chosen words, but also to give the scientists the opportunity to guess the letters that make up the alien cipher. This can also be played as a team game where each team contains an alien and at least one scientist but will take place over 3 transmissions rather than 4 with the passing of words and scores done in secret with a shared cipher being used between the aliens.
During setup the alien will randomly choose from a deck of 26 letters (one for each letter of the alphabet) to make up the 6 cipher spots from behind their screen. These letters are divided into common, uncommon and tough letters shown by their respective green, grey or red backgrounds. Once the cipher is complete the scientists and the aliens will roll a dice to determine which of the three words on a randomly dealt card will be chosen for the other players to guess. This is similar to a myriad of other word games and follows the standard rules that these games implement when providing a clue. However the alien will score the word they first send across based on the cipher, with letters falling into trust, amplify or the suspicion category which all affect the score given. This gives the scientists an opportunity to guess whether the letters are present in the cipher as well as indicate which words might be on the aliens card. Now the scientists will make a transmission back to the alien who will then score that word against the cipher and send it back and this back and forth is done 4 times. Now the scientists reveal their message card to the alien who will guess their 3 words, followed by the scientists doing the same and then finally the scientists will try and guess each of the 6 cipher letters. A point is awarded for each correct guess for a maximum of 12 points, and if you really want to play a hard mode, you can do 3 transmissions rather than 4!
Components
The game comes with a nice big sturdy screen although I’ve struggled a couple of times to place the letters into plastic holding the cipher, although I’m sure this will become easier over time. There are loads of message cards as well as enough dry erase markers and wipe clean boards for a number of teams to take part, plus handily a dry erase notepad for each group to use to make any notes and a great cipher board for the scientists to try and identify the letters they think are on the cipher. Finally the box is a good size with not too much empty space! The rulebook is really clear and concise, providing good scoring examples for how the cipher works and also providing some handy hints on the back page that will help newer players.
Is it out of this world?
I really enjoyed A Message from the Stars, and under the right circumstances this would be my go to word game of choice. I think there are a couple of minor criticisms and caveats though that mean that this might not be for everyone. Firstly this is more of a gamers word game than Codenames or Just One, the addition of the cipher the associated scoring of words adds an additional layer of complexity that for me makes this game but might not be for everyone. Allplay who publish this game have thankfully published an app which helps you score the words as the alien if maths isn’t your strong suit. Secondly the letters to build up the cipher can cause a real challenge for the alien, meaning if they get a terrible deal there might be lots of 0 points words passed between the two teams but that is part of the challenge of the puzzle that linguists will try to rise to the challenge of. The game is quick to set up and play, however I think it can suffer from some analysis paralysis particularly at the end when scientists are trying to work on the cipher letters. Overall I think A Message From the Stars is a really clever and challenging word game for players who enjoy some of the other word games I’ve mentioned in the review but want a bit more to wrap their heads around and with two different roles to play as and a huge combination of possible words to try and play with this game will keep you occupied on those long space voyages to come.
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