Mauna Kea

Players lead a team of researchers exploring a newly revealed volcanic island and race to collect artifacts and reach rescue boats before advancing lava overwhelms the map. On a turn, a player plays all terrain tiles from their hand to expand the board or spend the tiles’ movement points to move researchers orthogonally; researchers pick up artifacts by entering their spaces and can deposit them on boats to score. After turning in tiles the player draws replacements, immediately placing any lava tiles drawn; lava spreads outward from the central cone and covers terrain, artifacts, and researchers it reaches. The basic game ends when a player has no researchers left; everyone else gets a final turn and then scores for saved researchers, recovered artifacts, and boat usage. The advanced variant uses limited action/task cards instead of returning tiles to the bag, adds helicopter and special moves, and scores completed tasks in addition to the usual endgame points.

Players: 2–4 best 3
Playing time: 45 min
Age: 10+
Complexity: 1.6 / 5