The Revive Board Game - Learning Board Games

Revive Board Game is a survival and strategy game for 1 to 4 players, where you play as one of six unique tribes and try to restore civilization 5000 years after everything is destroyed. You will explore the frozen earth, harness its resources, recruit surface survivors, build factories with powerful machines, and populate ancient sites to relearn your tribe’s forgotten technologies.

The game features asymmetric player powers, a highly variable setup, and no fighting or direct conflict. Playing through the 5-part campaign unlocks additional content; once all content has been opened, it is indefinite.

Board Game Revive Rules

Components

The Revive game includes the following components:

om6 tribe boards, each with a unique tribe ability and a set of ancient technologies
6 dual-layer player boards, each with 12 card slots and 4 machine tracks
6 sets of 12 citizen cards, each with a unique effect and a resource cost
6 sets of 6 custom machines, each with a unique ability and a resource cost
24 area tiles, each with a terrain type and a survivor icon
12 ancient site tiles, each with a victory point value and a technology icon
12 artifact tokens, each with a unique effect and a victory point value
4 action tokens, each with a different action symbol
48 resource tokens, 12 of each type: food, water, metal, and energy

Revive Setup

To set up the Revive game, follow these steps:

Choose a tribe and take the corresponding tribe board, player board, citizen cards, and machines. Place your player board in front of you and your tribe board next to it. Shuffle your citizen cards and place them face down on the leftmost card slot of your player board. Place your machines on the corresponding machine tracks of your player board, with the lowest-cost machine on the topmost track.
Randomly select 4 ancient site tiles and place them face up in a row in the center of the table. Place an artifact token on each ancient site tile, matching the technology icon. This game does not use the remaining ancient site tiles and artifact tokens.
Randomly select 12 area tiles and place them face down in a 3×4 grid below the ancient site tiles. The remaining area tiles are not used in this game.
Choose a starting player and give them the first action token. Give the second action token to the player on their left, and so on. The action tokens determine each player’s turn order and available actions.
Each player draws 3 cards from their citizen deck and chooses one to keep in their hand. The remaining cards are placed face down on the bottom of their citizen deck.

Revive Board Game Rules

The game is played over a series of rounds, each consisting of four phases:

Action Phase: Each player takes two actions in turn order. The possible actions are playing a card, exploring, populating, or building a factory.
Resource Phase: Each player gains resources according to their machines and cards.
Population Phase: Each player may move their population tokens from their board to the ancient sites they have populated.
Artifact Phase: Each player may take one artifact card from the ancient site they have populated, if available.

The game ends at the end of the round, where the last artifact card is taken. The player with the most points from their artifact cards, ancient site tiles, and technologies wins.

How to Play Revive Board Game

To play the game, follow these rules of revive board game:

Place the game board in the center of the table.
Shuffle the area tiles and place them face down on the corresponding spaces on the game board.
Shuffle the ancient site tiles and place them face down on the corresponding spaces on the game board.
Shuffle the artifact deck and place it face up on the designated space on the game board.
Each player chooses a tribe and takes the corresponding tribe board, dual-layer player board, set of citizen cards, set of custom machines, set of wooden resources, and set of population tokens. The player places their tribe board and player board in front of them, and their resources and population tokens are in the designated spaces on their player board.
The player shuffles their citizen cards and places them face down as a draw pile next to their player board. The player takes the top four cards from their draw pile and puts them face up on the four card slots on their player board. The player places their machines on the designated spaces on their player board, with the inactive side facing up.
Each player places one of their population tokens on the zero space of the score track on the game board.
The player most recently visited an ancient site in real life is the first player and takes the first player token. The game is now ready to begin.

Revive Phases

Action Phase

During the action phase, each player takes two actions in turn order. The possible actions are:

Play a card: The player plays one of the cards from their card slots and activates its effect. The effect depends on which slot the card is played from. The four slots are:
Explore: The player reveals an adjacent area tile on the game board and gains the resources shown on it. The player also recruits a new citizen card from the area tile and adds it to their hand.
Populate: The player populates an adjacent ancient site on the game board by paying for the resources shown. The player flips the old site tile to its unlocked side and places one of their population tokens on it. The player also learns a new technology from their tribe board by placing one of their machines on it, with the active side facing up.
Build factory: The player builds a factory on an adjacent area tile on the game board by paying the resources shown. The player advances one of their machine tracks on their player board by moving the corresponding machine to the next space. The player also gains the bonus shown on the space, if any.
Special: The player activates the unique effect of the card, which varies depending on the tribe and the card.
After playing a card, the player discards it and draws a new card from their draw pile to replace it.

A player may take the same action twice, but not on the same area tile or ancient site. A player may also pass their action only if no valid actions are available.

Resource Phase

Each player gains resources according to their machines and cards during the resource phase. The player gains the resources shown on the active side of their machines and the resources offered on the bottom right corner of their cards in the explore and populate slots.

Population Phase

During the population phase, each player may move their population tokens from their board to the ancient sites they have populated. The player may move any number of their population tokens as long as they have at least one token on each old site they have settled. The player scores points equal to the number of tokens they moved and moves their token on the score track accordingly.

Artifact Phase

During the artifact phase, each player may take one artifact card from the ancient site they have populated, if available. The player chooses one of the artifact cards on the game board that matches the color of the old site they have settled and adds it to their hand. The player may use the artifact card on their next turn by playing it from their particular slot or keeping it until the end of the game for its points value.

End of the Game

The revive game ends at the end of the round, where the last artifact card is taken. Players then add the points from their artifact cards, ancient site tiles, and technologies to their score on the score track. The player with the most points is the winner of the game. In case of a tie, the player with the most resources is the winner. If there is still a tie, the tied players share the victory.