Mr. President is a solitaire game about governing as the President of the United States in the early 21st century. It's not an election game. It begins after you've been elected. It's about sitting in The Chair and trying to advance your agenda while navigating ongoing crises, political enemies, public opinion, your relations with Congress and the press, and keeping your country secure in a world of rival nations and agendas that just seems to keep blowing up around you. Mr. President is a resource management game where you never have enough resources to achieve your entire agenda and the path you take through an always unpredictable storyline rests on the choices you make. Depending on the results of those choices, and on the unfolding of a "different every game" story, you'll either be thinking "POTUS? Piece of Cake!" or "Why was it that I WANTED this job?" many times in each game.

Like the actual Presidents during this period, you'll have an array of allies and resources to help you as you navigate both the corridors of power in the nation's capital and the uncertainties of international relations. These allies and resources will vary from game to game, but you'll always be able to rely on your Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense to help you with foreign policy and the use of the combat power of the U.S. military, where you deem necessary. You'll also have your Vice President, Chief of Staff, and a bevy of domestic advisors and friends in Congress to help you navigate the many challenges in Congress, politics, and domestic life. And you'll always have access to at least one truly exceptional talent (this, too, will vary from game to game), someone who excels in their particular job and is a "force multiplier" for you in their own unique way. How you lead and utilize this mix of talents and experience at your disposal will go a long way toward determining your success or failure during your shot at being Mr. President.

You are in control of the actions you can choose, and to some degree when you can choose them, during each round. Actions allow you to make progress on your legislative agenda, attempt to address any new crises presented by the round's actions cards, deal with any lingering world or domestic issues, fight terrorism, perform diplomacy, and attempt to better your situation in the world or in the eyes of the American people.

Once you finish each Activation Phase, that quarter is finished, and you move on to the next Activation Phase, repeating this process until all four Activation Phases for the year are finished. Then you perform the Final Activations Phase, wherein you update and evaluate the board state, calculate potential auto-Victory or Loss, and perform mid-term elections (after Turn 2). At that point, the turn is complete.

Seeded within the "enemy" activations during the Activation Phases, there are chit selections for Russian and Chinese Actions, Terror Actions, War Progress, Chaos!, and a variety of Crisis cards. You know that each of these chits (enemy actions) will likely show up sometime during each turn, but you don't know when. The variable timing of these chit draws each turn adds uncertainty and spice to the game, while ensuring that major players in the game present challenges for you every single turn. Russia and China offer deeper challenges, with two possible postures (aggression levels) each, Relationship with the US tracks, and a country-specific Action Booklet. Postures may shift in-game in response to your actions or to storyline events, making dealing effectively with each Peer nation an evolving challenge.

Please note that Mr. President is NOT a "beer and pretzels," surface-level game. This game is intended to be deep and immersive, one that will both frustrate and delight the solitaire player. Play time is 8-12 hours (depending on your experience level) to play an entire 4-year term. I've tried to pack as much fun as possible into each yearly turn so that even if you only have time to play one turn on a weeknight (or even a couple of quarters worth of Activity Phases), you'll be engaged, frustrated, challenged, and immersed throughout. That said, I hope you're going to find it difficult to stop playing after each sitting. I've designed Mr. President to be an experience that will wrap you up in each new game's story and beckon you back to the game table after each round, turn, or completed game.