https://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/145884/memorial-game-reviewer-and-historian-herb-levy

So, expect to play from among: El Grande, Quandary, Fresco, Torres, Union Pacific, Atlantic Star/Show Manager, El Capitan/Tycoon, Santa Fe Rails, Ursuppe/Primordial Soup, Hare & Tortoise…and more

MLEM: Space Agency (led by Tim) Reiner Knizia’s 2023 push your luck family exploration board game featuring CATS in space. Players step into the shoes of fearless captains of cosmic expeditions. These intrepid felines have long conquered the Earth with their unmatched bravery, and now they’ve set their sights on conquering the entire cosmos. Players take the helm of a cosmic rocket, reach for the stars, and trust their cat instincts to decide when to bail out before things go up in flames. Fame and admiration from the entire meowing world await the most exceptional leader of the feline space agency. The board is a huge playmat with feline decorations.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/387378/mlem-space-agency

Cosmic Factory (led by K-ban) 2018 game of drafting, pattern building and tile placement in a 3×3 tile grid. Through five game rounds, each player tries to build and optimize their personal nine-tile galaxy before the 1 minute timer runs out. Players must rearrange their planets into different zones while trying to keep their asteroid path as long as possible. Kaos cards challenge each player to adapt to a new rule each round. At the end of the game, your weakest zone score is added to your asteroid path score to determine the winner.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/253379/cosmic-factory

Moonrakers (led by Matt) 2020 game of shipbuilding, temporary alliances, and shrewd negotiation set in a space-faring future. The players form a loose band of mercenaries, but while they are united in name, actual alliances are shaky as players are pitted against each other in the quest to become the new leader of the Moonrakers. It is a deck-building game in which players choose Contracts to attempt alone or with Allies in order to gain Prestige and Credits. After negotiating terms with Allies, players use their decks of Action cards to play Thrusters, Shields, Weapons, Reactors, and Crew to fulfill the requirements on each Contract. Each type of Action card has additional effects such as extra Actions, drawing additional cards, and protecting players from Hazards encountered while attempting Contracts. We added the Binding Ties expansion to encourage even more alliances. This game should appeal to those who enjoy Cosmic Encounter.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/270239/moonrakers

Sol: Last Days of a Star (led by Tim) 2017 semi-cooperative network and route building game with action points, where players are each a civilization desperately trying to harness the last bits of energy from their dying star in order to build enough momentum to send their people out of the solar system to find a new home. To do so, players have to build infrastructure in and around the star to collect energy, build sundivers (workers), navigate deeper into the star and transmit energy to their ark. The twist is that all the infrastructure that is built is shared, and your mothership moves 1 space around the board in orbit after each turn. So the challenge is to maximize opportunities to use the infrastructure without giving too many bonuses to the other owners. As the game accelerates towards the end game, the very calm build up of infrastructure becomes a mad dash to squeeze out the last bits of energy from the fated star, which even includes destroying sundivers by hurling them into the core.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/174837/sol-last-days-star

Steve