Review: Shakedown – An introduction to Horizon Wars: Midnight Dark

Recently, David and I decided it was about time to get gaming again and we agreed upon playing the introductory rules to Horizon Wars Midnight Dark, the updated version of the small scale Combined Arms Science-Fiction game we enjoy playing.

It should be noted here, that since our demo games at LUXCON 2025 in April this year, I haven’t been playing a single game. Well, life can be a harsh mistress at times … We’ll try to come up with new content a bit more often, than every 3 months.

We both printed the small rules booklet called Shakedown – An introduction to Horizon Wars: Midnight Dark.

First impressions

This pamphlet costs around 2,5 bucks and offers a handful of rules to start playing. The rules are limited to some ground troops, such as Mechs, tanks, reconnaissance, artillery and infantry. Air-borne units, or elements as they are called in Horizon Wars, aren’t covered. I remember playing with my light bombers, VTOL troop transports as well as fighters in the previous iteration of the game. Which was a bit more complex, but always fun. I think the layout is well done and easy to read. Besides the new exhausted rules, tweaks to command points, this 20 page PDF even contains solo rules and scenarios. A well rounded intro package if you ask me.

Test Run

David and I both agreed on 164 cost points or 16 Presence points. We both fielded the same elements. That’s to say 1 Heavy Mech, 1 Heavy Cavalry with our respective GHQ, 2 Light Cavalry, 1 Heavy Infantry and 3 Light Infantry.

For the sake of play testing we skipped the suggested scenario and went right out for a basic Killer mission

We would limit our battle to 3 rounds on a 3 x 3 ft desert map with some rock formations, buildings and some scatter terrain in the shape of vehicles and spaceship wrecks. That would leave us some space to maneuver, but enough Line of Sight blockers.

After the D12 decided, I was going to be the attacker, and get the initiative, we deployed within 6″ of our respective table edge. Something we do out of habit…

And with that, the game was ready to start.

As usual, we maneuvered our elements into position. until, our Heavy Cavalry / Tanks had both LOS to each other.

We fought out our first skirmish with Heavy Infantry (Tanks).

The titans of the battle field, our Mechs, quickly engaged in CQB, or Close Quarter Battle. Destroying each other in the process …

Meanwhile 2 Light Cavalry or tanks were bumping into each other at full speed, leaving nothing but burning carcasses amidst the chaos! Close Quarter battle generally deals a lot of damage … to both elements.

We didn’t play very cautious. We bumped into each other, ran over our opponent’s elements made a general mess on the battle field. But that’s what you’d expect from a good ol’ Kill scenario.

At the end of round 3, we simply counted our Presence Points left. I won by just 1 point: 9 to 8 including exhausted elements.

What do we think about Midnight Dark?

So, what did we think about the Midnight Dark, the newest version of Horizon Wars? Apart from new rules, the game play and dice mechanics remain pretty much the same as before. The addition of adding 1 fatigue to an element per hit it suffers, destroys them quicker. This, in turn, noticeably speeds up game play, which is always good for busy gamers like us. It also means that you can field a bit more elements than before without slowing down game play too much.

As an introduction to Horizon Wars, Shakedown, in my opinion, is a well thought out gaming product for quick pickup games. Even though it doesn’t cover all the goodness of full scale Horizon Wars, it offers everything needed to get some casual games going. And, if you don’t have an opponent to test the game, there are even solo rules in this small and inexpensive rules pamphlet.

I’d like to point out, that this game was sponsored by Beer. But the one without alcohol.