Shackleton Base is a complex strategy game focused on developing and running a moon base. It falls into the category of worker placement games, where your main tasks involve constructing domes, hiring workers, extracting resources, and earning money. In every session, three corporations are selected from a pool of seven. These companies drive the human activities happening on the moon, and completing projects for them is how you earn victory points.

Each round begins with drafting cards. These cards determine the types of workers and resources you receive, as well as your turn order for that round. There are three distinct colors of workers: red, yellow, and blue. The color of a worker is crucial when placing them on the main map to gather resources. Red workers are used to collect money, yellow workers gather natural resources, and blue workers collect resources specific to the corporations. When you place workers to build structures, purchase cards, or execute corporate actions, the color matters less, though using the preferred color usually grants you a bonus.

Only the three figures on the left are actual workers. The astronaut dressed in white appears only when the space tourism company is in play; these are tourists, not workers, and they appear quite impatient. You can almost see the frown on their faces.

This is your personal player board. The tiles shown are domes, which serve as habitats you can build on the moon. You must spend resources to construct them, and once built, you must pay maintenance costs every round. When you build a dome, you place it on the main board. The empty spaces that appear on your player board become available housing for workers. Workers placed on the main board to collect resources will be attracted to your domes, with priority going to players who have the most domes near where the workers are working. When these workers move into your domes, they generate resources for you or provide discounts. Placing the right types of workers in the right locations offers various benefits, including points at the end of the game.

This is the main game board. Every hexagon can accommodate up to six domes. The first player to build in a specific hexagon must also construct a solar panel. Building domes is essential because they allow you to collect resources from the hexes. When you place a worker on the main board, they face a row of hexagons. They collect resources from every hexagon in that row that contains a dome. If you own a dome in a hexagon, you get the re

I placed a red worker here, facing two occupied hexagons, both containing my green domes.

Besides placing workers on the main map to gain resources, you can also place them here to perform three types of actions. Although the action types are color-coded, you can use workers of a different color, but you won’t receive a bonus. Generally, you try to use workers that match the color of the action. The yellow action is for construction. The red action allows you to buy technology cards from one of the three corporations. These cards provide various benefits and actions. The blue action is the corporate action, allowing you to perform actions linked to the corporations and the reputation track.

For work on Shackleton Base to be viable, the three corporations must run profitable businesses. You build the basic infrastructure on the moon, and this infrastructure needs to serve a purpose. For new players, a specific combination of three companies is recommended: a mining company, a space tourism company, and a research company. All corporations have round blue tokens that can be placed on the main board. These represent resources related to those corporations. When you use workers to collect resources from the main board, these are the corporation-specific resources you can gather. The mining company introduces Helium-3 to the game, while the space tourism company introduces tourists.

All corporations come with a set of project cards, and at any time, three are available for purchase. These cards are worth points, but more importantly, they offer actions and abilities that directly or indirectly help you score more points.

This is a mining corporation. When this corporation is in play, Helium-3 will be mined on the moon. This corporation offers players opportunities to trade resources for points.

Shackleton Base is a development game. You need to build domes so you can collect more resources every time you deploy a worker to the main board. You also want to attract workers—whether placed by you or your opponents—to live in your domes. They provide benefits when placed in the correct domes. You must decide how many of the three companies you want to work with. It is likely difficult to work with all three because you will be unfocused. Working with only one might not give you enough opportunities to score points. I think two is a good number, and you have to decide how much to get involved with each company. There is some cooperation among players. When you are the first to build in a hexagon, the solar panel you build can be used by others. Your opponents will use your domes to collect resources, but you do get paid for this. When you place a worker on the main board, you have to consider whether that worker might later decide to live in an opponent’s dome. There are several interlocking aspects you have to think about.

One thing I learned the hard way was that I should have deliberately planned to attract yellow workers to my domes to get maintenance fee discounts. I noticed that everyone else did this. I spent a lot of money on maintenance because I did not have yellow workers on my board. I fell behind in developing basic infrastructure. You want to get many domes out there, because domes on the moon mean better efficiency in collecting resources, and also more space on your player board for workers.

I decided to focus on space tourism. It was fun. I bought several project cards that created a good combo. Space tourism helped me score many points during the game. Unfortunately, my weak infrastructure meant fewer points scored at the end of the game. I did not do well at the end.

Han (pink) was first to build the largest dome complex – 6 connected domes.

I built much capacity to bring space tourists on trips.

Two large dome complexes.

Workers living in your domes give you benefits, provided they are of the right type.

Tourists (in white) can temporarily stay in your domes.

Everyone gets a character card which gives you a unique ability.

These are the components relevant to the research corporation.

Game in play.

Very satisfying to see my happy customers.

This is an enjoyable heavy game. It feels good to see how the base grows. It feels almost organic. While competing with other players, you also want to make use of what they have done. A blue token they have placed on the board is an opportunity for you to collect valuable resources. If they have charged up the communal battery, maybe it’s time to use the stored power. Despite the competition, there is also a sense of building something together. You don’t win by damaging what others have built. You win by making good use of what they have built. Much of the competition is in the form of grabbing opportunities and resources before your opponents do so, for example buying project cards, mining natural resources, and fulfilling public contracts. Most of the game mechanisms here will be familiar to experienced eurogame players. What I enjoy in the game are the symbiotic relationships among players and how you balance working with the corporations in play.