Mission: Review - The Lost Ruins of Arnak

There seems to be a board game for just about every theme and trademark that exists – from spies and trains to Star Wars, Game of Thrones, Lord of the Rings, Marvel, and more.  Heck, even Afghan history and art galleries have debuted in board game form recently. But there’s been one character that I’m surprised hasn’t had their exploits distilled down into a board game, and that’s Indiana Jones. For me, these movies represent a fantastic combination of adventure, thrills, and exploration, and even though his profession may be considered “legal-adjacent” it seems ripe for cardboard theming. Enter the Lost Ruins of Arnak, a 1 to 4 player game that has you exploring mysterious jungles, researching lost artifacts, and battling ancient demi-gods. Just don’t forget your trusty hat and whip!

Lost Ruins of Arnak combines deck-building and worker placement in a game of exploration, resource management, and killer combos. In addition to typical deck-builder effects like earning a resource type or performing extra actions, cards can also be used to place workers. Like typical worker-placement games, placing a worker allows you to gain new resources and perform specific actions all while blocking your opponent from taking the same action on their turn. Newer and more powerful worker actions become available as players explore the island. Sometimes actions will require you to spend resources, like coins or ancient tablets, to perform said action or advance on a track. You are limited to only one action per turn; however, you have lots of options for “anytime” actions, which can allow you to set up some really neat combos provided you have the resources and cards in your hand. Despite the many choices of actions, cards to play, and things to explore, games are relatively quick and usually over within an hour to an hour and a half, especially at lower player counts (this review was written after a 2-player game).

There’s a lot to love with Lost Ruins of Arnak which fortunately shares a lot with one of my personal favorite deck-builder/worker placement games, Dune: Imperium. If you’ve played Dune: Imperium then Lost Ruins will seem very familiar to you right out of the gate.  It’s not a copycat, though; there’s enough here in not only theme but also gameplay to make it stand out on its own. The actual deck-building part of Lost Ruins is a bit more streamlined than Dune: Imperium and the quality of components is stronger with Lost Ruins as well. One of the huge pluses to Lost Ruins for me is that the gameplay is slightly tighter with its myriad “anytime” actions and the game itself is a lot quicker because of it. A game of Dune: Imperium can easily take over two hours whereas Lost Ruins is over in an hour or less, especially at 2 players. The game felt a little too fast the first time but after subsequent plays, the strategy and the combos started to present themselves. I was finding ways to get multiple resources on single turns which then allowed me to leverage those resources into several “anytime” actions. Much to my wife’s dismay, I was soon instantly shooting my tokens up the various tracks and acquiring new cards all on a single turn.

The one downside I will mention is the setup time to game length ratio seemed a little out of whack. There’s a lot to organize and lay out on the table for a game that’s relatively short. But again, this is just a small pet peeve of mine and in no way a huge detriment to the game itself. If you’re into deck-building games, worker placement games, or just want to pretend you’re a cardboard version of Indiana Jones, then look no further. The Lost Ruins await.