Rising Sun Review

There is a game from CMON
They call the Rising Sun
And it’s been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God I know, I’m one

My mother was a painter
She prepped my new minis
My father was a gamin’ man
A fan of CMON

Now the only thing a gamer needs
Is some players and a game
And the only time he’s satisfied
Is when he’s won again

[Organ Solo]

Players: 3-6
Time: 90-120 mins (HaHaHaHa! Make that 120-240 mins)
Ages: 14+
Designer: Eric M. Lang
Artist: Adrian Smith
Publisher: CMON Limited

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Ever feel lost in a big and scary world? Staring at a score track that seems wildly unjust and not quite being able to figure out why? Facing a set of decisions that just keep on asking… but what if this? That’s what Rising Sun offers. A sometimes cruel and punishing mistress, at others generous to the point of wonder. It is a game of incredible opportunity and boundless frustration.

And really cool minis.

If there’s ever anything to get the Kickstarter crowds frothing it’s a miniatures laden project from CMON and Rising Sun was no exception. Coming from the same team as Blood Rage and sharing a healthy mechanical ancestry with it, this was always going to be hot property. But with Kickstarters come exclusives and that is going to be one of the big hurdles for late arrivals because the exclusives for Rising Sun were exceptional.

Just look at those turtles! The massive mahjong-like tiles! Not to mention the pile of extra monsters and other bits that make fitting everything into even this cavernous box a challenging operation (but I did it! Ha!) Missing out on these bits would be… disatisfying to say the least. I didn’t get the extra two factions and now I sort of regret it because if I did pick them up, I wouldn’t have their plastic strongholds! This has always been the way with CMON Kickstarters but in Rising Sun it does feel particularly egregious.

Eastern Wonders

Let’s say then that you are willing to suffer the indignity of cardboard turtle strongholds. After all, you’re still getting some 60 stunningly sculpted miniatures and a board that belongs as much on your table as framed and hanging in a gallery. Then lets us dive into this world that (designer) Eric Lang and (artist) Adrian Smith have created.

We have what looks like the Sengoku Jidai period of middle ages Japan, where warring clans ran riot across the country, battling for ultimate control. But, of course, there’s something amiss here, as giant mythological creatures march across the board and, well, we’ve already admired the turtles the size of mountains. Even some of the clans themselves have borderline mystical powers, like the flying Dragonfly Clan. This is clearly not historical Japan, and this is used as a convenience to sweep a lot of cultural insensitivity under the rug.

You’ve probably heard the story of the Kotahi, a stretch goal exclusive character that made it into the game because the limit of their research into the subject matter was looking up the Wikipedia article on Japanese mythology. An article two jokers had added their mate to. It is a somewhat damning indictment of CMON’s development process, at least where the theme comes in. Then you read the combat rules and run into the ritual suicide clause that encourages players to march whole armies into battle and top themselves before a blade is swung in anger. Seppuku was a real thing, but to equate it with what happens in Rising Sun is ridiculous.

That can be justified within this hazy, mythological theme. It’s easy to be internally consistent within such a forgiving setting. It is also a mechanically interesting system (more on that later) and I can understand why it was included from that perspective. But it also behoves a big American (or European) publishers to treat subject matter from distant and, especially, living cultures with some respect, lest they perpetuate ignorance and misunderstanding.

I don’t want to dwell on this further as Rising Sun is more than some poorly named mechanics. But it is important to think about these issues. Let’s get under the hood of the behemoth.

The Art of War

While Rising Sun desperately tries to look like a theme heavy experience, sweep aside those plastic statues and paint over that art with beige and what you have is a Euro game through and through. It’s a pretty damn interactive Euro game, and it hides it well, but be under no allusions. This is no war game. This is a game focused on its economy.

Battles are not battles in a traditional sense, they are auctions, and they’re probably the most interesting part of the game. Players secretly bid on each of the 4 sections of their battle board, pictured above. The winner of each of the 4 sections gets the option of doing that action. So the first is Seppuku, a desperate measure, but also a great way of getting points and boosting your honour (a track which breaks ties in the game). The second is taking a hostage, removing an enemy miniature from the lowly foot soldier all the way up to some of the biggest, most impressive monsters. Then you’ll hire Ronin, extra soldiers you may have collected over the round, to boost your force size just before the battle is fought. Biggest army wins, naturally. The final spot is for the imperial poets, earning you points according to how many models die.

It’s a clever system just for how agonisingly difficult it is to figure out, and the rewards for playing it well are potentially huge. Forget winning the battle, the real points are in suicide and poetry (see what I mean about the weirdness of this theme?) But at the cost of your units, potentially creating issues in future rounds.

Indeed, Rising Sun can be a punishing game. Like its predecessor Blood Rage, having little to no figures on the map leaves you very weak. While you can capitalise on losing battles with clever play, a slight miscalculation in your bids can have devastating consequences for the rest of your game! When things go right, Rising Sun let’s you feel like a master tactician, but to enjoy this game you need to be able to take the rough with the smooth.

Of course, winning lots of battles is good too, long term. Win in lots of different places, and you’ll also be in for a hearty pile of end game points. Which means players aren’t interested in holding territory, keeping the map fluid and interesting between rounds. The winner’s spend in a battle is also redistributed to the losers, a fascinating twist which can dynamically change a faction’s fate during the resolution of battles and, if you can keep all of this in your mind at once, can affect how you set up fights on the map in the preceding mandate phase.

The Battle phase demonstrates how Rising Sun has everything impacting everything else. What looked so stereotypically ‘dudes on a map’ you could almost smell the testosterone, will surprise you over your first few games with just how many layers there are to consider. It is all too likely to overwhelm, and it certainly leads to long, arduous games with lots to consider, despite there only being 3 rounds and, in all likelihood, only 4-7 turns per player, depending on player count.

However, in addition to auctions and area control and all the rest, Rising Sun is also a role selection game, which is where those luscious plastic (or tragic, cardboard) mandate tiles come in. On your turn you get to pick one and everyone gets to do the basic action. You, and your ally, get a more powerful version of it. Here is where timing becomes paramount. Playing a Muster early gets you maximum benefit from those strongholds it let’s you build, a Harvest played by your ally when you have no areas controlled is what’s known in the business as a dick move.

A nice cup of tea?

Wait… allies? Oh yes, Rising Sun aspires to the heights of Diplomacy with an ally system (the “tea ceremony”, which is what I’m actually talking about if I ever offer to make you a cup of tea) and an open system of bribing and negotiation. It’s an exciting pitch, I like a good negotiation game! But here, it never really works. The reason for that is simple: there is nothing you can offer me that will make me change my mind about what I need to do. The amount of currency available is incredibly tight, and made tighter by the cost of new strongholds and cards, while the necessity of getting the right actions done is so valuable that trades just don’t really happen. Which is no problem for the game, it works perfectly without that element, but needs to be mentioned for how earnestly the rulebook tries to convince you it is a major part of play.

The one essential part of negotiation, the tea ceremony, is also a slightly bizarre experience. Being in a good alliance is extremely beneficial. So much so that even if you know one player is doing well, you’re probably not willing to screw yourself to keep them out of an alliance. Meanwhile, in an odd player count game, missing out on an alliance can be brutal, especially depending on your position around the table.

This is because there is a fixed 7 actions per round, and depending on who goes first, certain players are going to lead on more of those actions than others. If you get trapped in the first round with only a single leading action, you’re almost certainly in trouble, even if you do get to Betray (a mandate that normally breaks your alliance as a cost) with impunity. With experience players will get better at forming sensible allegiances, taking into account seating position, current board states and faction abilities. But just one inexperienced player is going to undermine the rest.

That’s emblematic of a current that runs through Rising Sun’s design. That of presenting one thing at first glance which turns out to be something else entirely, of unintentionally misleading players throughout the design. Like capitalising on battle scoring. Like just how many points can be gained through card purchases. Like how the biggest, most visually striking model is really not that good. Or maybe there is some clever combo that emerges under the right set of circumstances and I’m still too new to the game to know.

I reiterate what I said at the start of this review: Rising Sun is a game of incredible opportunity and boundless frustration. It is a game I’ve had incredible fun with, and also the most infuriating games of in recent memory, and those seem to be correlated with how well, or badly, the game has gone for me. Which has also been tied to my relative experience with the game compared to the other players.

My head knows that I don’t have a group of players that I could explore Rising Sun with to sufficient depth to truly get the most out of, that I have more than enough miniatures to paint as it is. Yet my heart still yearns for me to keep it. I caught myself looking up the cost of the Dynasty expansion last week to try out the remaining factions and I never do that kind of thing! There is something magical about this game that, despite all its flaws, keeps me wanting to scratch at it a little more.

Rising Sun has definite flaws. The negotiation element is poorly supported by the game’s economy. Certain elements, particularly the monsters, just feel wrong. Their impact on the game being starkly inferior to their impact on the visuals. New players do fall through the holes in the design because it throws so much at you at once that it’s impossible to take it all in. But the things it does do well, the battle system, the obtuse combinations of elements that create powerful point scoring machines, the awe inspiring to broken player powers that every player gets to abuse, just override so many of these flaws. Theoretically, a good game will survive weaknesses like this has, a great game wouldn’t allow these to be present at all. But Rising Sun is more than good enough and, for you, might still be great.

Oh mother, tell your children
Not to do what I have done
Spend your cash on plastic and cardboard
Like the game called the Rising Sun

Well, I got one finger on the pledge button
They’re on Kickstarter again
I’m goin’ back to CMON
To wear that ball and chain

Well, there is a game from CMON
They call the Rising Sun
And it’s been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God, I know I’m one

Rating: Dawn of War

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Public service announcement: this will be my last article for a couple of weeks because I’m getting married! And immediately going on honeymoon. So I won’t be scheduling articles and worrying about sharing things on social media but, don’t worry, I will be back just before the UK Games Expo, at the end of May. It’ll be worth the wait, especially if you enjoy videos…