by Michael Eckenfels, 16 August 2026
Nobody asked me to run for President. I want to be clear about that up front. There was no draft movement, no groundswell, no delegation of concerned citizens arriving at my door with a petition. What there was, instead, was a Steam key from GMT Games and roughly forty years of accumulated confidence that a man who has correctly resolved a combat results table under pressure can probably handle a nuclear crisis.
Part one of 🤷♂️
My qualifications are, I think, as questionable as they are considerable. I have commanded army groups across the Eastern Front. I have balanced budgets in games where the budget was measured in denarii. I have negotiated treaties with people sitting three feet away from me who I knew for a fact were lying. I once kept a coalition together for six straight hours on the strength of nothing but body language and a bag of pretzels. If that isn’t executive experience, I don’t know what is.
And so here I am, sworn in, standing in the Oval Office, being handed a briefing folder by people who do not know that my entire theory of governance is “the game will explain it in the tutorial.”
most images can click to enlarge
A word on difficulty. Mr. President (the Steam game, which is what this AAR is using to tell this story – such as it is) offers Easy and Normal. Easy, as I understand it, is for people who want to feel good about themselves. Normal is for people who want to find out. I chose Normal, because I reasoned that the actual Presidency does not have an Easy setting, and because I had already told several people I was doing this and had a reputation to consider. This decision took approximately four seconds and will be relitigated extensively over the next several hours, as well as be second-guessed at length.
The game does not, mercifully, ask me what party I belong to. There is no letter after my name. This is either a design decision about the nature of executive crisis management or a mercy extended to the AAR-writing public, and I intend to enjoy it either way. My administration will be judged on outcomes, which is a thing I am saying now, while the outcomes are still hypothetical and good.
Let’s have a look at the map.
I will switch often between my voice as a presenter/reviewer, and my voice as President. The two should be obviously different, I hope. If not, just read and enjoy. GMT Games has created a monster game here that is really worthy of both respect and time; I have played the board game extensively (and have the 1st edition as well as the 2nd edition upgrade kit), so even though as of this writing the Steam game is not 100% complete and the game is still in early access, it has much of the board game’s feel and look. If you’re on the fence about the board game given it’s size, price, or apparent complexity, understand that the size is not too big a deal if you have space for it; the apparent complexity is very easy to navigate and understand (the board game and this Steam version both do an excellent job of holding your hand while leading you through the process). Unfortunately I cannot do anything about the price, but will say I backed this via their P500 page from around day 1, which was probably eight-plus years ago at this point, and bought the board game myself as well as the 2nd edition upgrade kit. The Steam key was generously provided by GMT Games.
The Turn Sequence for this game is truly staggering when you behold it; there is a lot to navigate through here, but again, the game is really good at walking you step by step through the process. The actual process itself flows from the top left corner of this display downwards to the bottom of the first column, then goes up to the top of the next rightmost column and proceeds downwards, and so on. After the very last space at the bottom of the rightmost column, that Year ends. Yes, each navigation of this long pathway is but one Year of time in your Term as President. That means you go through this four times, naturally.
Ah, the White House. Where dreams are made and blue dresses are…well, erm, never mind, this is not that kind of AAR. This is where we will have our own Presidential Attributes, as well as our Cabinet. Granted, the Cabinet of the USA is much larger than these four (Vice President, Chief of Staff, Secretary of State, and Secretary of Defense), but these are the four I will be working closely with throughout the game.
The POTUS/CABINET FOCUS section of the board is where my, and my Cabinet’s, focus lies for getting some things done. Things like improving Public and Press Relations, improving Cabinet Effectiveness, and so on can be prioritized here. Like everything in life, especially in the President’s life, there’s a LOT to do but finite resources to get it done. Priorities are going to be what you live and breathe.
These five Tracks here reflect the current state of the country. You can read what the walkthrough says here without me having to explain it fully (nor make bad jokes about as I do with just about anything). The only ‘good’ news here is the Economy is very strong at a 6, one level below the max of 7. This, however, can easily change, even before I can do anything about it. The other tracks are all mid-range, which isn’t bad, but isn’t terrific news, either. We definitely want these all to be as high as possible.
As the tooltip window here explains, these are all important considerations. Public Approval starts at 40 (i.e., 40%) and can go up or down in increments of 2%. Prestige is the President’s long-term score, and improving this will help them establish themselves as a leader. Lowering it means less than stellar things. Ultimately, I think the Steam key does like what the board game does, and you can compare your Legacy score versus historical Presidents to see where you lie. I mean ‘lie’ as in on the track, not as a politician. Ahem.
Ah, the zoo. I mean, Congress. This is very important later for when we’re trying to get Bills passed, which is a fascinating component of this game, I think. Definitely a fun one compared to quagmires globally rife with Rogue States and Terror Groups. You can see here our Bipartisan Cooperation marker is on the first ‘2’ of the BIPARTISAN COOPERATION Track, just one stop short of the best possible cooperation. Who says this is fantasy?
This is easily the source of your biggest worries and headaches in the game. There is SO much going on here that juggling it all is like managing a hundred spinning plates. Ultimately it comes down to what I said before – priorities. Establish what yours are early on, and you will do well (as long as the game doesn’t send you some curveballs, which it absolutely will, oh my yes).
Let’s take a look at our world, shall we?
This is, of course, the home of myself as President. There are a few things to note, here. For one, at left is the LINGERING DOMESTIC CRISES TRACK, which is set to a 1 right now. That’s not ideal, but not nearly close to disastrous. Yet. Below the CONUS map is a DOMESTIC CRISES LEVELS Track, which can be Bad NewsTM if it gets to the Domestic Failure space. Let’s not do that, shall we? That can be awful.
You’ll also note a few military counters here – USAF, USMC, and so on. These represent deployable troops that we can send out. There’s also a Very Close counter with the Canadian flag; this represents our relations with Canada right now. Very Close is the best we can hope for.
Finally, the Intel Track at the top – that is used to track, identify, and hopefully eliminate any Terror Groups that may appear here.
This is the latest episode in a running playthrough of Mr President from GMT Games & Exia Labs; you can find the links to all published episodes at the end of article, with new installments each Sunday
As the tooltip explains, there are eight other Regions on the map, and the Eurozone is definitely one of them. Each of these Regions has a Regional Alignment track at far left, which measures its relations with the USA; next to it is a Stability Track, which shows how well off this Region is (the higher their Regional Stability marker is on this Track, the better. Chaos will not suit any of them, trust me.)
Note we have a few military forces deployed here (one USAF and one ARMY HVY unit). Russia also has an Influence Marker here, which is not good (the game can end if either Russia or China have too many Influence Markers on the map). We are fortunately starting Very Close with both the UK and the EU, too.
Finally, below the Eurozone are two tracks – Regional Crisis Levels and State of the Economy. The former is a measure that is done for every Region, while the Economy is unique. You can see that latter one is planted squarely in the middle, which is okay for now. And, there are no Regional Crises at all here, for now. I’ll use that term a lot, “for now.” Because you’ll see why.
Consider that this game is a sandbox game and starts around 2020. History notwithstanding (remember, this game has been under development for years, long before 2020), forget the politics or events of the moment. We will be creating our own in this story as we move forward. However, there are a few key things that boil over into my Presidency, and when looking at this Central/South Asia Region, you can see what that is.
For one, we have quite a few troops deployed here. While this does include the India subcontinent, it also includes Afghanistan, which is why we are here. We have troops present and are at war currently – I will explain more about this, later (see that War 1 marker? Yep.) There’s also a lot of mess going on here as both Russia and China have Influence Markers here, there is a Rogue State present (while only a Level 1 version, it’s the seeds of something much worse should it go unaddressed), and an Unstable State (which is not good either). Note we are Close with India (not Very Close).
What does that mean, anyway? Close? Very Close? You’ll see why, but ultimately the closer we are to any of them, the better it will be for us when it comes time to take Joint Actions. You’ll see.
The Regional Crisis Level here is a 2, which is not great at all. It’s two Levels from a Major Crisis, which would be good to avoid. We have slight breathing room here in that regard, but not a lot because this Region is definitely a party town, so to speak.
What game of world geopolitics would be complete without adversaries such as Russia and China? These both will be huge pains in our…well, everywhere, honestly. Sometimes it won’t be so bad, but events can turn on a dime, so we’ll have to try our best to foster good relations and avoid bad shenanigans. Not to mention, keep them from spreading their dirty lies about me having too many board games in my game room. (The world knows this already, but we don’t need to have it acknowledged, thanks.)
China and Russia (China is pictured here) both have a Posture rating of 1 or 2. I think Russia’s starts at 1 also; if it bumps up to 2, they can do more dastardly things to undermine the USA. Each also has an Economy Track as well. Note our relations with China are not bad, on the 4 space on that track at the top of their map. With Russia, things are a bit different – while we’re not at each other’s throats yet, their relations towards us are trending on the anti-US side of things.
This is probably one of the most ‘fun’ things I have with this game, figuring out which of these to improve. I don’t say fun lightly; I do like this part of the game as it’s possible to push USA tech to be better than Russia and China. You can see the markers here on each of these tracks showing where we lie (snicker) at the start of the game. If you can’t see a Russia marker or a China marker, that’s because it’s under another marker.
We lead the way in most of these categories, except for a few. Cyber Warfare is one, and this is a Very Awful Thing. We do NOT need cyberattacks messing the USA up, which they will do. This will be important. Note too in Space Warfare, we are one behind China (and tied with Russia, whose counter is under ours, there). We are tied with Russia on the Strategic Missile/Missile Defense track, which could be worse, but could be better.
This is where a lot of the chicanery magic happens in this game. Crisis Chits will determine card draws and other potentially nefarious things, which really drives the narrative of this game tremendously. It’s never the same thing and is almost always a curve ball of some kind (think 1,004 MPH curve ball shot from a rail gun or something).
This is a measure of all the conflicts, tensions, and worse, wars that are happening that do not involve the USA (at least, not directly in most cases). There are ten tracks here, but a little explanation might be necessary. Each track is divided into two; the leftmost (lighter) column is a Conflict Status, which can go from 1 (relative peace) to 5 (definitely not peace). Note the colored War spaces – the red ones are especially No Bueno to the game. Let’s not start a war between Russia and NATO, shall we? Or China and Japan. In any case, you can see the Conflict Marker and where it lies for each of these tracks, and see at a glance how tensions may be ramping up here.
The second (darker) column measures relative strengths. Each of these tracks is different, depending on the location. You can see the India/China track, for example (top left of the ten) goes from +3 China at the top, down to +2 China, then +1 China (where the marker currently lives), to Equal, and then to +1 India. This means right now, should war break out between the two, China is slightly better equipped to handle it than India. Now look at the US/Iran track (lower right of all ten). See how Equal is at the bottom there, and all the rest are pluses in the US’s favor? Again, current events aside, this indicates US dominance of any such conflict, but this can of course change depending on what happens.
Ah yes, war. I did mention we are involved in one, in Afghanistan. This measures the US’s efforts against the Taliban, and it is currently in a Stalemate (note the Conflict Status marker’s location). Right now our strengths are slightly out of balance – we have 6, and the Taliban have 7. We are at a disadvantage. This is not good for winning a war; we will need to commit more troops to hopefully end this more quickly, but doing that can mean bad things diplomatically. Resolving a war quickly, though, can mean less long-term bad things from happening. (They’re going to happen, it’s just a matter of choosing which hornet’s nests we want to poke, and what we want to poke them with.)
Here we go. I am now selecting the first person for my Cabinet. The Chief of Staff is the person who runs the White House while I am busy being the President of it. This is, I gather, an important distinction. The game gives me three candidates and, in the manner of all such decisions, presents them as a set of numbers with faces attached.
Eric Massey, Allen Box, John Long. Each comes with three ratings: Domestic, Diplomatic, Military, respectively from left to right on their counters, which tell me what this person is actually good at, as opposed to what they claimed to be good at during the interview.
For a Chief of Staff, only the first number really matters. The Chief of Staff works the domestic side: Congress, the legislative agenda, the endless grinding business of governing a country that is, at any given moment, somewhat annoyed with you. Diplomatic and Military ratings on a Chief of Staff are like a strong swimming background on an accountant. Admirable. Yet, not the point.
Eric Massey has a Domestic rating of 1. Allen Box has a 0. John Long has a 0.
Now, before I get too pleased with myself, Box and Long each come with a +1 Action, which lets them do two things where Massey does one. This is not nothing. In a game where your entire term is a running deficit of Actions against Crises, a man who does two things is worth serious consideration, even if he is provably bad at both.
But here is my thinking—and I want it on the record now while it still sounds like thinking and I’ve not yet proven I am incapable of doing that—two zeroes are still two zeroes. Twice the volume of a man contributing nothing is just a louder nothing. Massey’s 1 is the only number on this screen doing any actual work.
And there’s a second half to it. Cabinet members can be promoted from “Inexperienced” to “Veteran,” at which point their ratings tend to improve and they may pick up a +1 Action of their own. Massey, if he survives long enough to get good at his job, becomes the man who is both competent and doubled. Box and Long get to be twice as fast at zero forever.
So: Eric Massey, Chief of Staff. I have selected the candidate who is currently worse on paper on the theory that he will be better later, which is either sound long-term thinking or the exact reasoning that has doomed every roster decision I have ever made in any game with a promotion mechanic.
We’ll find out. That’s rather the point of the exercise.
Next! The Secretary of State is my voice in the world. Whatever that voice says, it will say it with a Diplomatic rating attached, and the world will respond accordingly.
Henry Hanes, Bill Hansen, Ellen Price. The relevant number here is the middle one – Diplomatic – because the Secretary of State works the international side: relations with Allies, Regional Alignment, the slow patient and usually frustrating business of getting other countries to like us slightly more than they did last quarter.
Hanes has a 1. Hansen has a 0. Price has a 0.
I want to be honest about the quality of this field. A 1 is not a distinguished number. It is the smallest possible amount of being good at something. (A 2 would be best, but we’ve not been that lucky, yet.) Somewhere out there is a Secretary of State with a 2, and that person is presumably running someone else’s foreign policy while I hold auditions for the least worst option available to me.
Price complicates it slightly. She’s the only one of the three who would gain a +1 Action on promotion; the ability to do two diplomatic things per segment instead of one. That’s a long-term asset, and having just talked myself into exactly that logic with my Chief of Staff, I feel some obligation to be consistent.
But I chose Massey because he had a 1. Price has only the upside, and the upside is conditional on her earning it, in a job where survival is not guaranteed and my attention will be elsewhere. Doubling zero remains zero, and I’d rather have the one point of competence now, while the world is still relatively calm and I naively still believe things are going to go well.
Henry Hanes, Secretary of State. The single most qualified person available, which is a sentence I am choosing not to examine any further.
Now for my Secretary of Defense selection.
The third number on the counter, Military, and the first time all afternoon I have had an actual decision instead of a process of elimination.
Bo Hamilton: Military 1. Ivan Mercer: Military 1. Krista Hallsten: Military 1.
So far, a three-way tie and a coin flip. Except Hallsten has a +1 Action printed on her counter right now, on the Inexperienced side, before she’s done a thing to earn it. Two military actions per segment from day one. And on promotion, her Military rating goes to 2.
Let me put that in the terms I’ve been using so far: Massey I picked for a 1 with promise. Hanes I picked for a 1 with nothing behind it. Hallsten is a 1 with a doubled action already in hand and a 2 waiting at the end of the tunnel. She is, in the strict arithmetic of this game, the best person I have met today by a comfortable margin.
I want to be clear that I am not in love with Krista Hallsten. I am, however, experiencing something adjacent to it; the specific warmth a gamer feels when a counter comes with a bonus already printed on it and no strings visible from this angle. The Secretary of Defense is the one who deals with terror groups, rogue states, intel gathering, and the deployment of American forces to places that were quiet just a moment ago and are now louder than a Warrior Shaman concert. Two of those per segment, from someone who will eventually be better at them than anyone else on this roster, is not a marginal advantage.
Krista Hallsten, Secretary of Defense. Confirmed enthusiastically and without the faint apologetic feeling that accompanied my last two hires.
I note, only in passing, that I have now assembled a Cabinet whose strongest member is the one in charge of the military. Historians can make of that what they will. I intend to make very little of it and move on to the map.
I should note here, the Vice President is Raoul Sanchez. I do not get to choose my VP – that comes from the party, if I remember right – and Raoul is decent in Military matters with a 1 rating. I can’t recall what his promotable numbers are, but we may find out if things go well. Ha. “If.”
The Public of the United States (PUS? Oops. No no no no – the PUBLIC, period) have Legislation Priorities they’d like to see happen. This can be good things for me as President, if I pursue Legislation later that aligns with the Public’s wishes. You can see a Public Legislation Priorities track and an Administration Legislation Priorities track. The Public has a top 5 of their own desires, whereas the Administration ‘only’ gets a top 3 along with a Campaign Promise.
The Campaign Promise is what I railed for while running for office – Healthcare Reform. This was randomly selected for me by the game. At this point, I get to choose which Legislation Priorities I want to assign to our topmost 1 spot, as well as for 2 and 3. These should always align with the top 3 desires of the Public, so I do that here – at 1 is Gun Legislation, at 2 is Job Creation Package, and at 3 is Infrastructure Updates. Coincidentally, our Campaign Promise of Healthcare Reform also aligns with the Public’s number 5.
Now, before we get too excited, this can all change due to Crisis cards or other things. Right now, though, my Administration is very well-aligned with what the Public is expecting from us.
Let’s move on to other considerations.
Here, you can see the number of Action Points one gets. I decided to go with a Normal game (because I’m mental, I suppose – it’s hard enough on Easy mode, but let’s see what happens). In Easy mode, you get more Action Points, but in Normal or Hard mode, you get, naturally, less. I start with 17 Action Points based on my difficulty and the current Cabinet Effectiveness. That’s not terrible – in Easy mode you get 20. I believe these Action Points need to last you an entire year, which may sound easy, but it’s anything but. Action Points give you a chance to do re-rolls or other important things during your governance, which you absolutely will need to do. And, if I’m not careful, I can burn through them quickly.
The Steam version of Mr. President tends to go pretty quickly in set-up, which I think is a reflection of its Early Access status. The board game itself is fantastic in leading you through set-up and gameplay, and right now this Steam version passed something important – namely, ‘my’ Presidential Attributes. I start the game with two of them. Note the counters above my cabinet – Domestic Focus and Military.
Every President arrives in office with a certain nature, a couple of things they’re simply built to be good at, whether or not the country needs those particular things at this particular moment. The game hands me two Presidential Attributes, and I’m pleased to report that mine are not embarrassing. No “Disorganized” bleeding away my Action Points, no “Manages Stress Poorly” quietly sabotaging my own Cabinet. I got competent ones.
The first is Domestic Focus. This provides a -1 modifier whenever I roll to resolve a Domestic Crisis or a Lingering Domestic Issue. In plain terms, when something goes wrong inside the country – and something always does in this game – I’m a little better than average at making it go less wrong. This is the temperament of a President who prepares appropriately by reviewing briefing folders and information before going into a meeting. I’d like to think it suits me.
The second is Military, which lets me improve one US Strategic Capability by +1 at the start of every Turn. Air, Ground, Naval, Cyber, Space, Missiles, Recon, it doesn’t matter which, but each Year (or, Turn) I get to make the USA quietly, incrementally better at one of them, keeping pace with Russia and China rather than waking up one morning to discover they’ve lapped us in Cyberwarfare while I was busy with legislation or improving relations somewhere.
So this is the President the country elected: someone who is good at handling problems at home and good at building up the military over time. What’s conspicuously not on the list is anything about charm, oratory, or media savvy, all of which are actual Presidential Attributes you can draw in your own game, potentially. I have no “Likeable,” no “Orator,” no gift for making speeches less sleep-inducing. I am, attribute-wise, a competent administrator with a strong defense portfolio and no particular ability to get anyone excited about either.
Which, taken together with a Cabinet whose standout member runs the Pentagon, is starting to paint a picture. I notice the picture. I decline to comment on the picture.
Any game of Mr. President is going to throw you curve balls, some so curvy it’ll be like you’re next to a supermassive black hole. So it’s very interesting, not to mention fun, to determine strengths of your administration – of which there are a few.
Here I catch a genuine break, and from a direction I did nothing to deserve.
The Exceptional White House Resource I am dealt, which represents one of a handful of unusually talented people who attach themselves to an administration and make it better; mine is a person I did not hire, cannot fire (well, technically), and married some years before any of this was my problem. The Nation Has Fallen In Love with the First Lady and her Causes.
The card is rather blunt about the arrangement. Her talents and charisma, it explains, rub off on me. At the start of every Turn I collect +2 Public Approval on the strength of her popularity, plus +1 to either Media Relations or Party Relations, my choice, depending on which set of people I’ve most recently annoyed.
I want to sit with this for a moment, because the timing is exquisite. I have just finished noting, repeatedly in writing, that I have no “Likeable” attribute, no “Orator,” no gift whatsoever for making the public feel warmly toward me. I am, by my own honest accounting, a competent administrator with the natural charisma of a well-organized filing cabinet. And the game’s solution to this, arrived at without my input, is to hand the charm portfolio to my wife.
She is, evidently, the one the cameras actually want to capture. The causes are hers, the approval is hers, and I am the beneficiary of a popularity I contribute nothing to – which is, I’m given to understand, a fairly traditional arrangement in these matters.
So, my presidency’s public appeal will be, in the technical language of the game, outsourced. I’ll take the +2 gladly and the +1 wherever it’s needed most, and I’ll do the decent thing every President in this position has done: accept the help, thank her privately, and let the country go on believing the warmth was somehow my idea.
With that, let’s start applying some of these positive effects.
The most important one – well, there’s a lot of ‘important ones’ but these are high on my list – are the Strategic Capabilities Tracks. My biggest concern here is, being behind both China and Russia in the Cyber Warfare Track. This is a Bad Thing (yes, with capital letters) because it’s inevitable either or both of them will conduct some kind of cyberattack on the US.
This is the one I select, and there’s no need to roll a die – thanks to my Presidential Attribute of Military let’s me automatically advance one, so that’s what I’m doing.
With some of my close ties with the military, I’m able to get our capabilities up to match that of both Russia and China, fortunately (we’re all on the ‘2’ space now).
And now, we apply the First Lady effect described earlier, which increases my Public Approval by +2. The Public Approval track goes in increments of 2, so this is technically just one space. It advances to 44, and this can be read as a 44% approval rating, essentially.
Next up, we get to use her ability to advance either my Media Relations, or my Party Relations.
Media Relations is certainly important – I think it automatically drops one space once per Turn, if I’m remembering right (they’re fickle little so-and-sos), so I decide to use this first bonus instead to increase Party Relations. This tightens my ties with the Party and can prove important later, when getting allies in Congress to offset opposition in legislation.
Our Party Relations is now at a 7, one space from 8, the maximum. Not too bad.
Whew. We’ve done quite a bit so far and this is just the first report. We’ve not even started the game, yet! I feel, though, that there’s so much here to talk about from a storytelling perspective, that honestly, there are few games out there more robust than Mr. President to generate that narrative. Even the set-up itself is a incredibly fun, deep, and exciting (sometimes even fearful) part of the game that can really establish a strong expectation for a wild ride to come. And it will, even though I’ve no idea at this point how that will occur.
We will get into it more in the next article. Thank you for reading!
Mr President AAR – No One Asked Me To Be President
PART 1 ~ PART 2 ~ PART 3 ~ PART 4 ~ PART 5 ~ PART 6 ~ PART 7 ~ PART 8 ~ PART 9 ~ PART 10 ~ PART 11 ~ PART 12
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