The galaxy was stretched out before you, and the vastness of space was yours to conquer. But other races sought to fill the cosmos with their colonies, and they used their strange and dangerous powers to aid them. Nevertheless, you ventured into the cold wastes to do battle. Now, turmoil has spread, and a new group of aliens hope to take advantage of it. How will these rulers attempt to seize power? Which will become your allies, and which your mortal foes? Who will survive this cosmic conflict? Only time will tell...

Fantasy Flight Games is pleased to announce the upcoming release of Cosmic Conflict, an expansion for the classic game of strange alien races, negotiation, and hostile space colonization, Cosmic Encounter!

The Empath, a new alien power. Click to enlarge.

In Cosmic Conflict, 20 new alien races explode onto the galaxy! Players will now shudder at the insidious kindness of the Empath, blink in confusion at the antics of the Lunatic, and howl in outrage as their planets are stolen away by the Claw!

Cosmic Conflict also makes the Cosmos even bigger, adding another player (and attractive black components) to the game. Cosmic Quakes will shake things up, ensuring that no player’s hand is truly safe. And as if that wasn’t enough, Cosmic Conflict introduces a new variant to the game – the hazard deck, which confronts the players with dangerous and amusing events that can crop up at any time.

Hazards are special game-altering conditions that bring exciting effects to your Cosmic Encounter experience. Special destiny cards, drawn during the destiny phase, display a “hazard warning” in the upper left corner; this indicates that a hazard card should be drawn.

Consisting of two types (temporary and permanent), these cards have a variety of wild effects. The Energy Fields hazard card, for example, lets each main player draw two free cards... but they must show them to the group first. And the optional “Extremely Hazardous Variant” will take you on a wild ride; it brings a new hazard card into play every turn!

Check back over the coming weeks as we reveal more on Cosmic Conflict, including many of its wild new alien races and their game-bending powers. Then, later this winter, prepare for the age of uncertainty!

Cosmic Encounter is a classic board game that puts players in charge of the fate of an alien race. Three to five players each strive to be the first to conquer five enemy colonies and establish themselves as the dominant life form in the galaxy. With over 50 alien characters to choose from, no two games are ever the same.