Under Falling Skies Review: Save Earth, One Roll at a Time

Sometimes the best gaming experiences are the ones where you’re all alone, staring down impossible odds with nothing but your wit, luck, and a handful of dice standing between Earth and total annihilation.

You know that feeling in Independence Day when the alien ships are hovering menacingly over major cities, and humanity is scrambling to find any way to fight back? That’s exactly the experience that Under Falling Skies delivers to your tabletop. As someone who spends way too many evenings pushing cubes and rolling dice by myself, I was thrilled to discover this purpose-built solo game from designer Tomáš Uhlíř and brought to us by Czech Games Edition that captures all the tension of a sci-fi invasion thriller.

Overview

#

Under Falling Skies puts you in command of Earth’s last line of defense against an alien invasion. Your mission is straightforward but daunting: advance your research efforts to find a way to defeat the aliens before they reduce your city to rubble. It’s a race against time where every decision could mean the difference between humanity’s survival or its extinction.

The game cleverly breaks each round into three distinct phases. First comes the dice phase, where you’ll roll and place dice to later activate different rooms in your underground base. Here’s where things get interesting–the value of each die not only determines how powerful your action will be, but also dictates how far the alien ships in that column will descend toward your city. It’s a brilliant mechanical implementation of risk versus reward that creates genuine tension with every roll.

After placing your dice, you’ll move into the room phase, where you’ll activate you chosen rooms and execute actions in whatever order you prefer. Whether you’re powering up your base, expanding your facilities, pushing forward with research, or mounting a desperate defense against the descending alien fighters, each action feels meaningful and impactful.

Finally, the mothership phase ratchets up the pressure as the massive alien vessel advances one space closer to your city and deploys new fighter ships. If the mothership reaches your city, it’s game over for humanity. If your city takes too much damage from enemy fighter ships, you story also ends. This continues round after round until either you complete your research and find a way to defeat the invaders, or your city falls to the relentless alien assault.

Gameplay

#

The genius of Under Falling Skies lies in how it combines familiar gaming elements into something that feels fresh and engaging. It’s like Uhlíř took the classic arcade game Space Invaders, merged it with the base-building aspects of XCOM or Fallout Shelter, and added a healthy dose of strategic dice placement mechanics.

Each round presents you with agonizing decisions about how to best utilize your dice. A high roll means more powerful actions, but it also means the alien ships in that column will descend faster toward your city. Do you take that six to maximize your research efforts, knowing it might bring a squadron of fighters dangerously close to your city? Or do you play it safe with lower numbers, potentially dragging out the game but keeping the immediate threat at bay?

The inclusion of white dice that trigger rerolls adds another fascinating layer of decision-making. These rerolls can be a lifesaver when the dice aren’t going your way, but timing their use becomes its own push-your-luck minigame. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve saved a reroll for late in the phase, only to have it spectacularly backfire when I roll exactly what I didn’t want. Typically, an enemy fighter landing on a sky space that advances the mothership.

The campaign mode is particularly impressive, introducing new mechanics that keep each play session fresh and interesting. There’s enough varied content in the box that multiple playthroughs of the campaign will feel distinct, and many of these new elements can be mixed into standalone games as variants. The difficulty is also cleverly scalable through the number of challenging sky sections you choose to include, letting you fine-tune the experience to your preferred level of challenge. I’m really blown away by just how much gameplay is packed into this box.

Solo Play

#

Let’s be clear - this isn’t a multiplayer game adapted for solo play. Tomáš Uhlíř designed Under Falling Skies from the ground up as a solitaire experience and it shows in every aspect of the design. There’s no need to manage multiple hands or simulate other players’ actions - it’s just you against the aliens, exactly as intended. As someone who often plays games solo, it’s refreshing to see a design that embraces the solitaire experience so completely.

Components and Design

#

The production value of Under Falling Skies really help sell the theme. The board art and graphic design create a cohesive sci-fi atmosphere that draws you into the action. I particularly appreciate the comic book style artwork used to present the campaign narrative - it fits perfectly with the game’s B-movie alien invasion vibe. It uses the minimal amount of panels and art to convey the story, but it’s effective at engaging the player with narrative than just a intro paragraph to set the premise.

The miniature alien ships are a nice touch, adding a tactile element to the threat looming over your city. There’s something deeply satisfying about shooting down a wave of these little invaders, even though you know they’ll be back next round. It reminds me of that feeling in Pandemic where you’ve just cleaned up a bunch of disease cubes, knowing full well another outbreak is probably right around the corner. Like Pandemic, you need to make turn-by-turn sacrifices so that humanity can prevail at the end of the day. Sometimes, you have no choice, but to let an enemy fighter breakthrough and attack your city to be able to complete the research in time.

The campaign provides just enough narrative to give context and progression to your game sessions without getting bogged down in excessive story. Without spoiling anything, you’ll face some tough decisions that really capture the desperate nature of an alien invasion scenario, similar to what you might find in XCOM or Independence Day.

Final Thoughts

#

Under Falling Skies hits that sweet spot of being both deeply strategic and thematically immersive. The dice placement mechanics create meaningful decisions while the constant pressure from the advancing alien forces keeps you engaged throughout. The scalable difficulty and campaign mode provide plenty of replay value, while the components and artwork help bring the alien invasion theme to life.

As someone who’s played countless solo games, I appreciate how this one delivers a complete, purposefully designed solitaire experience. It’s become one of my go-to games for those evenings when I want to face down an alien invasion in about an hour - and sometimes even save the world in the process.