Scythe was released to critical and commercial praise for its gameplay, combination of Eurogame and combat mechanics, theme, and the game artwork, which was produced by Polish painter Jakub Różalski under the name World of 1920+.

Actions allow players to move units on the board, trade for or produce goods, bolster their military for combat, deploy mechs, enlist recruits for continuous bonuses, or build structures.

The factions are Polania, Rusviet, Saxony, Crimea, Nordic (based on Poland, Soviet Russia, Imperial Germany, Crimean Khanate, and Scandinavia, respectively).

He stated the difficulty in designing one-player games was for the Automas to resemble human players while being streamlined, which required "a purging of unnecessary mechanics" to reduce the downtime.

[14] The second expansion, Scythe: The Wind Gambit, was released in 2017, featuring airships and adding variable end-game conditions to the base game.

[15] The Wind Gambit was met with praise for its new victory conditions and components, but the airships were critiqued for providing only limited appeal as the game progressed.

It introduced 11 modules, featuring an eight-episode campaign, two factions (Fenris and Vesna), a cooperative mode, and a multiplayer Automa variant.

[19][20] Hall praised the storyline, art, and enhancements to replayability provided by the expansion,[21] while Williams described each module as "mind-blowing" and the campaign as "flavorful, exciting, memorable and, most importantly, extremely fun".

Samantha Nelson of IGN gave the game a score of eight out of ten, calling it "a worthy successor to Scythe," also praising its art and compononents.

[39] Kristoffer Hamborg of Avisen Danmark gave it five out of six stars, praising its game mechanics and rhythm, saying that "if one is a fan of worker placement, Expedition is worth checking out.

It was listed as one of the best games of 2016 by several reviewers, including William Herkewitz from Popular Mechanics, Aaron Zimmerman from Ars Technica, Tomasz Sokoluk from Rebel Times, and Peter Jenkinson from the Telegraph.

Zimmerman also praised the complementary nature of the simple turn structure and the "many complex, interlocking parts" of the engine building mechanics.

[47] Reviewers particularly highlighted Scythe's use of Eurogame-style resource management and combat mechanics found in American-style board games.

[2] PC Gamer editor Jonathan Bolding also commended the art quality, noting that "[t]he cards have fascinating scenes of agrarian life juxtaposed with smoking dieselpunk mechs and war machines".

Plunkett praised the functionality of the Automa as "a great way to learn the ropes before getting a crew together", but noted that there were major differences between the game's single- and multiplayer modes.

[48] Travis Williams from TechRaptor agreed, saying that the Automa was "slickly designed" and praising its suitability as a non-player faction in multiplayer games.

[53] Calvin Wong Tze Loon from PC Gamer commended the "slick tutorial", the mechanisms, visuals, and the soundtrack; concluding that it was "evocative, clever, and rewarding".

[14] Keith Law from Ars Technica also praised the visuals of the adaptation and engagement but criticized the price of 20 dollars and complexity of the tutorial.