LAST EDITED ON 06-06-13 AT 05:41 PM (EST)

The episode #1 clip is quite short at only 7:51, as we are introduced to the players one at a time. Then it gets into the players' initial placements of armies on the map. Games usually can't be won at this stage, but games can already be lost with a bad set-up. The real fighting hasn't yet begun, but the clip ends with the shake of the dice...

A review can be found here and click on Summary (and also Scouting Reports). Comments are favorable, some folks would like to see more of the board action.

The battle order:

Eric Stein (BB8 5th place): Black, starting 1st
Stephen Fishback (Survivor: Tocantins runner-up): Silver, starting 2nd
Ian Terry (BB14 winner): Yellow, starting 3rd
Sophie Clark (Survivor: South Pacific winner): Blue, starting 4th
Matt Hoffman (BB12 7th place): Green, starting 5th
John Cochran (Survivor: Caramoan winner): Red, starting 6th

The game begins with a "round robin" draft, meaning that all players will choose where place their armies on the board, one at a time, similar to a fantasy football draft. After all territories are taken with a single army on each, the players build up armies on the territories they already occupy.

And here's the set-up after draft and placement:

Eric (black) could be in trouble with his two main armies split far apart, although it appears he wants to converge in North America, coming from the south and northwest, but it could get bloody with Sophie's main army camped in the Northwest Territories.
Stephen (silver) has all but secured Australia and has space to roam into Asia.
Ian (yellow) is well-poised to take Europe and could make a deal with Cochran for a non-aggression pact so that they get early continents with Asian territories open for the taking.
Sophie (blue) main army is camped out in Northwest Territories (far right on map image), in a bid to contest for North America.
Matt (green) can make a bid for South America with some building up there, but his armies elsewhere are scattered around the board.
Cochran (red) is in a great position to take Africa, and could deal in a non-aggression pact or two to hold it and roam, or play spoiler in South America or Europe.

If all six episodes are short as this one was, it will go quickly, less than an hour of total viewing time. I have a feeling later episodes will run a bit longer as the players interact more and there is more action on the board.

My only complaint is the lack of a very clear view of the board and army placements for at least a few seconds. It took some work for me to extract the screen shot (posted above) from the video.