Friday night we had a late dinner at Giordano's, a Chicago-style pizza place. Naturally, being in the midwest I of course had to order a deep-dish pizza. It was good and afterwards we walked home through the mall I've mentioned before. So it's almost midnight and the mall stores are all closed, but the doors are open and there some people walking through. Only the cleaning people have any real reason to be there. It's kind of surreal walking through a closed mall. Certainly where I come from the doors would have been locked. Actually I'm assuming that -- I've never tried it so maybe that's the way it's done everywhere.

My brother Chris bought Risk 2010 AD and that night we played it. It's a big game, with a full-sized Earth board and a board of the moon. The Earth board is a standard Risk map (territories and continents are the same) with the addition of sea colonies in the sea areas. There are five colonies, each composed of two or three territories. Control of a colony provides one or two extra armies/energy. The moon has three areas of size 4, 4 and 6. Control of each area is worth two or three extra armies/energy.

You still have the standard armies with figures worth 1 or more armies (called MODs -- machines of destruction -- in the game because they're actually Mecha). As you might have picked up earlier, you get energy with which you can buy things other than armies (you still get armies like normal Risk and you can't buy more armies with energy), namely commanders, space stations, and cards. Energy is also used to activate most of the cards. I think you can also bribe people with energy, though maybe that's just the way we played it.

The five commanders are Naval, Land, Space, Nuclear, and Diplomat. All except the Diplomat count as one d8 army (an army that rolls d8 instead of d6) when fighting from/into their specialty (i.e. the Naval commander rolls a d8 when attacking into a sea territory or from a sea territory). Nuclear commanders use a d8 always and Diplomats use a d6 always. You need to own a Naval commander to attack a sea territory and the same for a Space commander on the moon (the commanders don't have to be involved in the attack). Each commander costs 3 energy.

If you have a commander, then you can buy corresponding command cards (so there are five command cards) at a cost of 1 energy each. There are more or less standard cards (extra armies, destroy armies, sneak attack) as well as special cards for each commander (i.e. the Nuclear commander can get nuclear strike cards). In my opinion, the Diplomat cards are the most powerful. They can give you extra victory points and keep other players from attacking you (though there is a card to keep other command cards from being played). Nuclear cards tend to be somewhat random nuclear strikes and not good for pinpoint strikes at a specific territory.

The last buyable item is the space station (really a ground launch site). each player starts out with one and any units defending a space station get to roll d8s in defense. Other than that, they give you one extra energy each turn and you can only launch attacks on the moon from space stations. What they're most useful for is as a fortress to hold key terrain, but you only get four or five throughout the game, at a cost of five energy each.

What else. At the start of the game four random territories are nuclear wastelands, which makes the mapboard a bit random. The game only has five players and only lasts five turns, at the end of which the winner is the player with the most victory points (army production plus victory point command cards). Oh, and you bid for turn order each turn. It's a hidden bid using energy.

Dave, Woo, Chris, Troy and I started a game late that night. Troy kept attacking people while the rest of us were a bit too docile. I'm not too sure who won in the end, but it wasn't Troy. Van Horn came in during the middle of the game and wanted to go to sleep, complaining loudly anytime we made any noise. This was oh so different from every other time we've roomed with him at conventions, where he is loud and stays up all night and does the same types of things that he accuses us of doing. Next time I have to get two rooms.

For good or bad, the game pivots around the command cards. They're cheap to buy, you can hold as many as you want, and once they run out people can't buy any more. They're also enough very useful cards to make it worthwhile. It's a good thing you also get armies (and can't buy them) so you don't have to decide between buying armies or cards. Also, the first couple of players have an advantage because they can grab all the sea and moon territories without a fight. Sure, everyone else will come after them, but they'll have to fight for it at least a little. Still, it's a fun game considering it's a family strategy game rather than a real wargame.