Game Industry = Scavenger Type

good point.

Based on what I'm reading the only thing Through the Desert is lacking is a random element.

through the desert offers too many choices on the opening turn. Like Go you start with lots of choices and slowly reduce your options. Most of the popular games mentioned are the opposite. You start with a few and the choices grow over turns. Ticket to ride does give you an open board but it constrains you with the cards.

There is another feature all these games have in common. Expandability. Each of them either has new boards or cards or tiles etc. Through the Desert could in theory be expanded but its theme and mechanics are so conducive to being a serialized game as the other examples are.

DukeofChutney wrote: There is another feature all these games have in common. Expandability.

Again, not Acquire. Maybe you should drop it from your list, as it seems to be mucking up your point about more modern games.