The Sinking of the Titanic

About this board game

The Sinking of the Titanic is a 1975 board game for 2–4 players, with an approximately 60-minute race from a sinking ship to final rescue.

The Titanic is going down, and every player must hurry through the ship to rescue passengers from their state rooms. Get them to the lifeboats before the ship sinks, because the opening stage of the game is a contest against time as well as against the other players.

Once the ship has sunk, the struggle continues. Players must stay alive until the rescue boat appears by obtaining enough food and water. These supplies can be found in two ways: by visiting islands or by drawing cards.

• Rescue passengers from their state rooms.
• Rush rescued passengers to the lifeboats before the ship sinks.
• Visit islands and/or draw cards to obtain enough food and water.
• Reach the rescue boat when it appears to win.

The final objective is clear: be the first player to make it to the rescue boat. However, the ending is especially unforgiving, because the other lifeboats and all the passengers in them are lost.

That leaves a single victor, together with the passengers in that player’s lifeboat, as the only survivors. With its two-stage structure—an urgent rescue aboard the Titanic followed by a fight to endure after the sinking—the game creates a focused race for survival from beginning to end.

In The Sinking of the Titanic, saving passengers is only the first challenge. Players must also secure the food and water needed to survive and then reach the rescue boat before anyone else.