Kemet Review

The Egyptian mythology area control game that rewards aggression and punishes patience. One of The Most Aggressive Euros Game You Will Find

Kemet is an area control game for 2 to 5 players in 90 to 120 minutes. You are an Egyptian civilisation competing to reach 8 victory points by attacking temples, recruiting mythological creatures, and upgrading your civilisation through a tiered power tile system.

The design key: you only score victory points for attacking, not for defending. Turtling earns nothing. The game forces aggression from the first round and creates constant escalation.

Best at 3 to 4 players. No solo mode. The Blood and Sand expansion is the most significant addition. Buy the second edition if you are purchasing new.

Buy it if: you want direct, aggressive area control with Egyptian mythology and faster play than most games in the genre.

Skip it if: you want diplomatic maneuvering or a longer sustained strategic experience. Kemet is fast and confrontational by design.

What Is Kemet?

Kemet is the area control game we recommend to people who want direct conflict without the three-hour investment that games like Twilight Imperium require. It is fast, aggressive, Egyptian, and produces the kind of creature vs creature moments that stick in your memory for sessions afterward.

Designed by Jacques Bariot and Guillaume Montiage and published by Matagot, Kemet plays 2 to 5 players in 90 to 120 minutes. You control an Egyptian civilisation, moving armies across a board of interconnected temple cities, attacking other players to score victory points and upgrading your civilisation through a system of coloured power tiles that each provide different advantages.

The design decision that makes Kemet distinctive is that defending earns you nothing. You can only score victory points through attacking. A player who turtles in their starting city and builds defences is simply falling behind while everyone else fights for the temples. The game is built to create constant action.

Key Game Information

Players	2 to 5 (best at 3 to 4)
Play time	90 to 120 minutes
Designers	Jacques Bariot and Guillaume Montiage
Publisher	Matagot
Year	2012 (Second Edition 2021)
Categories	Area Control Games, Strategy Games, Miniature Games
Mechanics	Area Control, Tile Placement, Direct Interaction, Variable Player Powers, Action Points
Theme	Egyptian Mythology, Ancient History
Complexity	Medium
Best for	Groups who want aggressive area control with asymmetric upgrades, strong mythology theme, and faster play than most comparable games

How to Play Kemet

Each player controls a city on the board with three pyramid tokens in red, white, and blue. The board shows a map of interconnected locations including temple cities that score victory points and smaller outposts that provide strategic position. Each city starts with one sanctuary space that the owning player can defend.

On your turn, spend action points (Prayer Points, earned each round) to take actions. Available actions include recruiting troops into your city, moving armies to adjacent locations, worshipping to gain Prayer Points, and buying power tiles.

The pyramid and power tile system

Each player has three pyramids in red, white, and blue. Each pyramid can be upgraded from level one to level three by spending Prayer Points. Higher-level pyramids unlock access to more powerful power tiles in that colour.

Red tiles improve combat: higher combat values, shields that reduce damage, battle abilities that activate when you fight. White tiles improve economy and mobility: extra Prayer Points, movement bonuses, teleportation abilities. Blue tiles provide special abilities and access to mythological creatures.

You choose which tiles to buy throughout the game based on your strategy. Two players cannot hold the same power tile simultaneously. If the tile you want has already been claimed, you either wait for the holder to be eliminated or pivot to a different strategy. This creates asymmetric player development and ensures no two games play identically.

Combat

When you attack a location, both armies roll combat dice and compare results. Casualties are calculated, then each player may play combat cards from their hand to modify the outcome. The attacker needs to have more surviving troops than the defender to take the location.

Combat is fast and decisive. There is no drawn-out siege mechanic. You attack, you resolve, you move on. This keeps the game’s pace up even with complex power tile interactions.

Victory points and winning

Victory points come from controlling temple locations at the end of certain rounds, from winning combats, and from building Djed towers. The first player to reach 8 victory points wins immediately. This creates a race dynamic in the final rounds as everyone calculates who is closest and adjusts their attacks accordingly.

Playing Kemet at Different Player Counts

2 players:Works well at two with a specific variant included in the rulebook. The board is adjusted and the dynamic becomes a direct duel. Less chaotic than higher counts but the power tile competition is sharp and focused. A legitimate two-player experience.

3 players:Good. The board feels properly contested and the three-way power tile competition creates interesting decisions. Games run toward 90 minutes. A strong count for groups who want the full Kemet experience without the chaos of five.

4 players:The sweet spot. Enough players that the board becomes properly contested across all temple sites and the creature arms race is at its most interesting. Games run 90 to 120 minutes. Most experienced Kemet groups prefer four.

5 players:More chaotic and slightly longer. The board can feel crowded in the mid-game and the victory point race accelerates. Still enjoyable but requires more flexibility in strategy as opponents can disrupt plans from multiple directions simultaneously.

Playing Kemet Solo

There is no official solo mode for Kemet. The game is built around the direct confrontation between players for temple control and victory points. Without real opponents to fight, the core mechanic does not function.

If solo area control games are important to you, Spirit Island offers a cooperative solo experience with a thematic overlap in mythological powers. Kemet itself needs a group.

Components and Production Quality

The second edition revised the component quality throughout and it shows. The board is clear and the location connections are readable from across the table. The pyramid tokens are well-produced and distinct by colour. The power tile boards give each player a clear display of what they have and what is available at each pyramid level.

The creature miniatures are the standout component. The Sphinx, the Manticore, the Giant Scorpion, the Phoenix, the Mummy, the Devouring Beetle — each creature has a distinct sculpted miniature that sits on the board with the army it has joined. When a high-level blue power tile brings a creature into play, the physical miniature being placed onto the board provides a satisfying sense of escalation.

The combat cards are well balanced in the second edition following significant playtesting improvements from the original. The iconography across the power tiles is clear once you have played a session and the reference cards help new players during the first game.

Setup takes around 20 minutes for the first game and closer to 10 once you know the pyramid and tile setup. The second edition includes improved insert organisation for the power tiles.

Blood and Sand: The Main Expansion

Blood and Sand is the most substantial expansion for Kemet and the one that most experienced groups consider essential once they know the base game well.

The headline addition is a second board layer representing the Underworld. This underground network of locations connects to the main board through specific entry points, creating a three-dimensional board structure where armies can move between the surface and the Underworld. The Underworld has its own temples and its own scoring opportunities, which means players must decide whether to focus on surface control, underground control, or attempt to contest both simultaneously.

Blood and Sand adds a significant number of new creatures, including the Behemoth, the Mummy, the Crocodile, and the Nest of Scarabs. The new creatures interact with the Underworld mechanics in ways the base game creatures cannot, creating new strategic combinations. Several new power tiles in all three colours expand the available upgrade paths.

The expansion also includes new combat cards, new event cards that trigger at specific moments in the game, and adjustments to the victory point thresholds for larger groups. Play time increases by 30 to 45 minutes with Blood and Sand in play.

Blood and Sand is worth buying once you have played the base game enough to find it comfortable. Introducing it too early adds significant complexity before the core game’s systems are internalised. The base game alone is excellent and fully complete. Blood and Sand is the right next step for groups who have played 10 or more base game sessions and want more.

Should you buy Blood and Sand immediately? Only if you have experienced players in the group who are confident with the base game. For a first purchase, the base game second edition is the right starting point. For a group returning to Kemet after several sessions, Blood and Sand transforms the experience significantly.

Second Edition vs Original

The 2021 second edition is the version to buy. It makes the following changes from the original: rebalanced power tiles that remove some of the dominant first-edition strategies, a revised combat card deck, improved rulebook clarity, updated board design with cleaner iconography, and revised creature ability text that removes several ambiguous rules interactions.

If you find an original edition at a second-hand sale, the core game is essentially the same experience. The second edition improvements are meaningful but not so dramatic that the original is unplayable. For a new purchase, the second edition is straightforwardly the better version.

Digital Versions

Kemet does not currently have an official Board Game Arena implementation or a dedicated digital app as of mid-2026. Matagot have not announced a digital version.

A Tabletop Simulator mod exists for remote play and is reasonably accurate to the second edition rules. For a miniature-heavy game where the physical components are part of the experience, the physical version is significantly better. The creature miniatures on the board create a visual spectacle that a digital implementation would struggle to replicate.

If You Like Kemet, Try These

Cyclades: The closest comparison in the genre. Greek mythology area control where you bid for the gods’ favour before taking actions. Less directly aggressive than Kemet but more strategic in the bidding phase. A good companion recommendation for players who want mythology-themed area control at a similar weight. Full review at letsplaygames.uk/cyclades/.

Small World: Lighter area control with a fantasy theme and a race-cycling mechanic. Plays in 60 minutes and is more accessible than Kemet. Good recommendation before Kemet for groups new to area control. Full review at letsplaygames.uk/small-world/.

Blood Rage: Viking mythology with miniatures and a drafting mechanic. Very similar in feel to Kemet with a Norse theme replacing Egyptian. Longer sessions and more complex but a natural recommendation for players who loved Kemet’s miniature-heavy confrontational play.

Inis: Celtic mythology area control with card drafting replacing Kemet’s power tile system. Three different win conditions and a more fluid approach to combat. A good companion recommendation for players who want mythology area control with a different rhythm.

Root: Asymmetric area control for 2 to 4 players with very different faction abilities. Much more complex than Kemet and plays longer but the same satisfying sense of asymmetric powers creating different games every session. A good step up for Kemet players who want more depth. Full review at letsplaygames.uk/root-review/.

Final Thoughts on Kemet

Kemet is one of the most satisfying area control games available because it solved the problem that makes most area control games slow: it made defending pointless. When everyone at the table must attack to score, the game creates constant action from the first round. There is no waiting for the right moment to engage, because staying passive is the worst strategy available.

The power tile system gives each game a different strategic character and ensures no player is doing the same thing twice. The creature miniatures provide spectacular moments that get talked about long after the session ends. The play time is fast for the genre.

Its limitations are honest ones. It is not a subtle game. The diplomacy is aggressive and direct rather than courtly. Five players can be chaotic in ways that reduce individual impact. And without Blood and Sand, the replay variety is good but finite.

For groups who want direct, exciting area control with Egyptian mythology: Kemet is excellent and the second edition is the best version it has ever been.

One sentence verdict: Kemet is the best area control game for players who want constant aggression, Egyptian mythology, and a creature arms race that produces memorable moments every session.

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