One False Step for Mankind

About this board game

One False Step for Mankind is a 3–6-player board game about California mayors racing to the Moon in 1849, with games lasting about 240 minutes.

Set during the Gold Rush, the game places players in charge of stupidly rich Gold Rush towns whose resources can be spent on almost anything. This month’s grand project is a race to the Moon—an ambitious plan that probably will not work.

The real objective is political: earn enough votes to become governor. For pioneering constituents, however, the most impressive path to office may be launching citizens into space in a way that is both grotesquely stupid and dangerously exciting.

The game requires a substantial supply of poker chips, counters, dice, paper clips, and a marker for the leader:

• 400 poker chips in red, green, yellow, and gray, with 100 of each color
• 40 counters for each player
• Two six-sided dice
• Three paper clips for each player
• A button or token to designate the leader

With its unusual combination of Gold Rush wealth, political ambition, and an ill-advised lunar race, One False Step for Mankind offers a deliberately oversized premise for a long game among 3 to 6 players. The game was released in 2003 and was expanded by One False Step Home.