How to Play -60° (Sixty Below)
Learn the six-round structure, simultaneous preparation, persistent Explorer placement, terrain discovery, Project cards, stations and the race toward the meteorite site.
-60° (Sixty Below) is a heavy exploration euro for 1–4 players. Its core puzzle combines deckbuilding, simultaneous preparation and worker placement on an expanding Antarctic map. The unusual part is that your workers—called Explorers—do not simply return at the end of a round: once placed, they remain on the map and permanently shape what you can reach and build.
The game lasts six rounds
Sixty Below compresses its deckbuilding and engine growth into only six rounds. That matters because every improvement has a short repayment window. New cards are designed to matter quickly rather than waiting through a long reshuffle cycle.
Each round has two broad parts: a simultaneous preparation stage and an action stage in which players take turns placing Explorers and carrying out actions on the shared map.
Preparation: work through your expedition deck
During preparation, each player works through their personal deck and decides how far to push the current round’s card sequence. Expedition cards contribute to your current capabilities, while storm cards interfere with production but can also generate useful energy.
The important teaching point is that this is not a normal hand-management game. Designer Peter Prinz describes Sixty Below as a 240-card game with no conventional hand of cards. Your deck, the cards you reveal for the round and your open personal Project Display are separate systems.
Because the preparation step is simultaneous, experienced groups can resolve much of this phase at the same time. For a first game, it is still worth checking each player’s production and storm effects before moving on.
Storms are disruption, but not pure punishment
Storm cards can block or weaken parts of your production setup, so drawing too many at the wrong time can hurt efficiency. They are not simply blank failures, however: storms also interact with energy and with the value of expedition effects.
This makes the preparation phase a controlled-risk decision rather than a straightforward “draw as much as possible” step. A player with enough capacity and useful storm synergies can tolerate more exposure than a player whose next action phase depends on one specific production building.
Project cards stay visible
Instead of holding a hidden hand of upgrade cards, each player uses an open personal Project Display. New cards are acquired from this visible display, making your development plan easier for opponents to read than in many deckbuilders.
New cards are placed directly where they can enter your deck cycle quickly. According to the designer diary, this is one reason deckbuilding works in a game that lasts only six rounds: improvements do not need several full reshuffles before they become relevant.
Action phase: place Explorers on the map
During the action phase, players take turns placing Explorers on available spaces and resolving the associated action. The central twist is permanence: an Explorer generally stays where it is placed for the rest of the game.
That changes ordinary worker-placement logic. You are not only choosing an action for this turn; you are also deciding where one of your future positional assets will live. A placement may later help support station construction, extend your network or restrict access to a space that can no longer be used in the same way.
Why persistent Explorers matter
Most worker-placement games reset the board every round. Sixty Below instead turns worker placement into map development. Your earlier actions remain physically visible and can influence what you are able to build later.
The designers also limit how many extra workers you can obtain over the whole game. That prevents a simple “get as many workers as possible” engine from becoming the automatic best route. Every additional Explorer has value, but where it ends up can matter as much as having it.
Explore to open new terrain and actions
The Antarctic map develops as players scout outward. Discovering terrain does more than move the expedition closer to the meteorite: it opens new board spaces and therefore new action opportunities.
Terrain also carries environmental information, including temperature, which affects how locations function. This means exploration is partly an economic decision. Opening the right tile can improve the action landscape for you—and potentially for everyone else.
Build and upgrade stations
Stations form the infrastructure of your expedition network. Building them requires positional preparation rather than simply paying resources from anywhere on the board.
As a practical rule of thumb, place Explorers with future construction in mind. A worker that takes a useful action now and also contributes to a station requirement later is doing two jobs. The designers deliberately made mass station construction difficult, so a station should usually solve a real network or efficiency problem rather than be built only because it is available.
Buy cards and scientific projects
Card acquisition is connected to development on the map. Expedition-oriented cards improve your future deck cycle, while Project cards can provide longer-term effects and specialization.
Because the game lasts only six rounds, evaluate every purchase by how soon it will matter. A card bought early may influence several rounds; a late card needs immediate impact, end-game value or a direct role in your final expedition plan.
The meteorite is a destination, not the whole score
Reaching the mysterious impact site is a central objective, but Sixty Below is not just a race game. Your station network, scientific development, Projects and milestone-style goals all contribute to the broader contest.
A player who sprints forward without an economy can arrive with a weaker overall position. Conversely, an engine that never converts into exploration can miss the game’s strongest geographic opportunities.
A first-game turn checklist
- How far should I push my preparation sequence this round?
- Which production spaces are storms affecting?
- What resources and energy do I actually need before the action phase?
- Which Explorer placement gives me both a good action and useful long-term position?
- Does exploring this terrain open something I can exploit before opponents?
- Am I building a station because it advances my network, or only because I can?
- Will a card or Project bought now pay back before the six rounds end?
Common first-game mistakes
- Treating Explorers as temporary workers. Their location is a long-term commitment.
- Overbuilding engine pieces late. Six rounds leave little time for slow returns.
- Ignoring opponents’ open Project Displays. Their likely development path is visible.
- Exploring without a follow-up. New terrain can help rivals if you cannot exploit it first.
- Assuming storms are only bad. Their energy and card interactions can still be useful.
- Racing to the meteorite without infrastructure. Position alone is not the entire game.
Sources and scope
Checked 6 October 2026 against the official Nanox Games page, the dlp games product and English-rulebook page, and designer Peter Prinz’s September 2026 development diary describing the final six-round structure, persistent Explorers, open Project Displays and rapid deckbuilding. The publisher’s English rulebook is the authority for component setup, icon definitions and edge cases. This article paraphrases the system and adds original teaching guidance rather than reproducing rulebook text. Editorial policy and corrections.