Space Empires: Close Encounters (English)

Space Empires: Close Encounters is the first expansion for Space Empires: 4X. The alien races encounter each other up close as they first encounter each other during shipboarding engagements and planetary invasions with different types of ground troops. The strengths and weaknesses of each alien empire are highlighted with approximately 20 unique racial abilities. The expansion takes advantage of the streamlined nature of the game system to add more technology and cool sci-fi stuff in a very simple way. Although it is designed to be used as a whole, the expansion is modular and players can choose to use only the piece that they love.

An experience system is also included in the expansion so that your ship groups become more proficient over time. There is a big advantage if you can keep the ships alive! The game gives more counters of each ship type to accommodate groups at different experience levels. Military academies in your empire can give your new groups a head start in accumulating experience.

Titans, super large ships beyond the dreadnaught, appear and can both transport fighters and destroy planets, but also have responsibilities. As requested, fleet meters and a fleet display are in the box. In addition to racial advantages, there are also unique alien technologies that can be acquired by conquering non-player planets. There are more technologies and a little more money is added into the game because of the larger tech tree.

New scenarios are added for 3 and 4 players. A new alien empire solitaire scenario is included as well as another solitaire scenario where a player can attempt to fight off an invading mass of space amoebas.

Space Empires: Close Encounters includes thicker counters for itself as well as a full set of thicker counters (4.5 counter sheets) from the base game.