This game is awesome, but you should have 4-10 hours, depending on your play style.

This sounds like that old game The Republic of Rome, but in space. Are they related?

Wow. The art for this just swipes stuff from everywhere. RotJ font, Jesus/Jedi allegory lion,...is that Gollum at the bottom? Oh wait, it's just some alien with a knife.
Oh well, everything's inspired by something else. Either that, or the artist drank deep of the archetype pool.

@Miranda Kali: I'm calling my new band either Gollum at the Bottom or Alien With a Knife.

Man, I've never finished a game of this in less than 6 hours. And I've played way too many games of this.

@braak: As far as I can tell, no relation, other than trying to encompass many aspects of an epic era in a single game.

@Hobbity: @ElijahDProphet: Yeah, the box says you can play in four hours, but that's pretty optimistic. Maybe if you only have four layers and they all know how to play the game already, but otherwise, plan on a lunch break.

*P*layers.

@moff:
Whichever doesn't make the cut has to be the name of the first album.

@moff:
Bottom With a Knife? I could see some warped, Arthur Rackham type, cover art with a jackass/human hybrid, menacing fairies with a shiv.

I picked this game up on clearance at Barnes and Noble for something like $20. I'd never heard of it, but it looked pretty cool. Now I just have to wait for my kids to be old enough to play it with me.

Aside from requiring a LARGE chunk of time to play, TI also needs a big chunk of real estate to properly set up. I recommend something like a pingpong table (or larger) if you are playing with max players, and/or use off-table storage. This game has more nurn (game bits) than just about any other I've seen. Presorting of parts and separate storage is highly recommended. A large tackle box or tool chest isn't a bad idea either.

Aside from the Shattered Empire mod, there are convention mods that let you play a DOUBLED game, enabling you to play with 16 people. I've seen pics (I think on boardgamegeek) of a 16 person game played at some convention on a huge table; astonishing. I seem to recall that game was finished in less than 12 hours, which is amazing in itself. Experienced players only!

@CaptainCynic:
Wow. That was a total steal. I think the retail price when the 3rd ed. came out (which was more than a year ago) was $80 or more.

@Miranda Kali: ha ha ha...

Great reference...

And don't worry, even if I was offended I was asleep..

Yes. I agree with you all.

@DocGratis:
Why would you be offended? Are you a carpenter keen on portraying Pyramus, labouring under a Fairy Queen curse?

..but thanks. :)

@Miranda Kali: I detect Kzinti too.

@Ed Grabianowski:

It was less psychologically scarring before you changed it to "pee - layers"...

-Kle.

@moff: What about The Archetype Pool?

@Miranda Kali: May be a little Lovecraft on the left there, eh?

I'm not willing to bet that much thought went into the lion. It was probably lion = noble, and that was about it. Spot on about the other bits, though.

Dunno why but the fellow standing next to Gollum there has a Sephiroth/Bib Fortuna look about him to me.

@Klebert L. Hall: Well, why would you want to get through an entire day without a little psychological scarring?

I have not played the third edition, but the first and second editions had to be one of the most overrated games I have ever seen. It has one great mechanic (the UN-like voting), but the components are a textbook example of how NOT to do a game, from the organization of the pieces to the tech trees to everything else. (Example: Technology has to be acquired in specific sequences, which are efefctively random, and the names and descriptions of the effects are unrelated. The names are printed on the front of the token, the effects on the back. So, unless you have memorized everything beforehand, you constantly have to flip back and forth.) Prism Games _Throneworld_ is FAR better across the board.

I'll admit that I have met a few other professional game designers that really like this game, but almost all of us agree that the developer dropped the ball in designing the components.

This game may be pretty cool, but it sounds like it has way too much kipple for me.
The best 7-player, takes-all-day-to-play strategy game ever invented is Diplomacy.
If you've got 6 smart, back-stabbing, ass-lying-off friends, a simple board, a handful of wooden rectangles, pencil and paper, you can have a super afternoon taking over the world. Well, Europe. "Oh, did I say I was going to support your army's advance into Bohemia? What I really meant to say was 'Bite my shiny Tyrolian ass!'"
I haven't played in probably 20 years (because I haven't had 6 nerdy friends at one time since then), but I fondly remember some classic Diplomacy smackdowns.

Fantasy Flight Games has got a reputation for big, tons of components, time consuming boardgames. Arkham Horror (and its' expansions) is a favorite of mine. I recently picked up Descent and am puzzling it out, it looks like fun but complicated as well. I do have to complement their production values, as a rule their games tend to be gorgeous.

For those interested in getting into the boardgame scene I would strongly suggest going and checking out www.boardgamegeek.com.

I wish you could play these board games online with other people.

That is, literally play the exact board game. Not a video game, not a translation. Just the game, with the only difference being the board and pieces are on screen and not in front of you...