Mindo™ Zen Logic Game - Board Game Review | The Tabletop Crier

The Good

Portability (+6)

The size of this box can fit in your hands, so this could easily be in your bag, backpack, what have you. Shoot, you could even have it in your work messenger bag and reach your zen place during lunchtime. The cards and tiles fit in the box without taking up too much cardboard so you won’t find that it is heavy. Overall, it isn’t a table hog and I would even dare to say that you could play this on the airplane tray table.

Cute and Colorful Art (+6)

I’m generally a fan of pop colors (e.g. lime, tangerine, and others) so this game caught my eye on the shelf at our local store immediately. Granted, there may be a little appropriation here considering the artwork — not all zen things are Asian, you know. It also very much alludes to chakras if you’re into that sort of thing.

Appropriate Difficulty Progression (+4)

There are two variations on easy, followed by medium, and expert. The number of starting symbols and orientations of colors drives the challenge difficulties. As a result, the game provides some training as the levels of difficulty increase to make this a pleasant journey.

Permutation Training (+6)

Difficulty leads us to permutations; in order to perform well at this game, you need to be able to recognize all possibilities in your attempts to meet the criteria of the grid challenge. Only looking at things horizontally or only looking at things vertically will not lead you to success in this game. Consequently, non-linear thinking is key.

The Bad

Orientation Lawyering (-1)

It’s important to correctly orient the symbols or else it is not considered a success. The only exception is tiles that show the same symbol twice. I haven’t tested this out yet — so it may not even be relevant to note — but there may be ways to solve a puzzle without paying attention to orientation. It would be a bit annoying to have spent that much time artificially restricted if I were to find out… so maybe I shouldn’t look into it?

No Real Feels of Difficulty (-2)

If you’re taking the time to create completely different cards or levels of hints, it should feel at least somewhat like an accomplishment. When you move across levels of difficulty, you think “Yes! What’s the next level like?” and are severely disappointed that it isn’t noticeably harder. Expert is a really prestigious and loaded word to use for the kind of challenge — or lack thereof — this game provides you.

“And Up” is Only Partially True (-2)

Now, I’m unsure if I’m just talented at this sort of logic puzzle or if the publisher was just lazy at identifying the full range of this game. I qualify for the “And Up” age group but that doesn’t mean I would necessarily have fun or be challenged by this. I skipped straight to “expert” and performed fine. The delay difference between easy and expert was only about 1-2 minutes, which translates to about 30-45 seconds spent more per level.

The Ugly

Online Details about Age Group (0)

I felt super embarrassed when looking up details about this game; the grade level assignment for this was 3-8. It’s not like I was blasting through these puzzles with 25+ years of mental exercise on this group, but does this make me a 13 year old?! I don’t think so.

Order of the Cards (-0.5)

When you open the box, all of the cards are not in order from easy to difficult. Even better, the numbers are not in order so — if you’re like me — you have to take a moment and organize it before you can even get started. I suppose if you’re getting this game after reading this article, and you’re confident that your puzzle prowess is similar to mine, it won’t matter since all difficulty levels are relatively close.

Solution vs Puzzle – Graphic Distinctions (-1)

Along the same lines of the previous gripe, I take a concerted effort to make sure I’m not on the solution side of the card. Consequently for a “zen game” I’m stressed out before I even start! You’d think they could have just grayed out the solution side; there’s no reason why you would need to remind yourself what difficulty your solution is for.

Double-Sided Tiles (-0.5)

This is more of a complaint than anything that I would say is a major Ugly Point but it has nowhere else to go but here. I have a difficult time remembering what is on the other side of these tiles, so I am repeatedly flipping them over when I’m trying to meet a section of the grid in front of me. Super annoying, but again — manageable.

Difficulty: 1/5 for Novice
Satisfaction Grade: B (84%) for Great
Worth Your Money? No.

If you want to decide on its worth for yourself, you can find copies of this game at Amazon or check with your friendly local game store to see if they can order local!

(Updated 02/05/2024 to provide correct purchase link)

Note: This review originally appeared on the site Girls' Game Shelf.

Ctrl - Board Game Review | The Tabletop Crier

The Good

Pastel Color Scheme (+5)

I really like the pastel color scheme on this because it makes it look like a game that has been around for a while. The thing about pastels, at least aesthetically, is that they can be colorful yet not loud at the same time. This is a good way to brand an abstract game like this because you often find yourself in quiet thought. Energy levels for me can be influenced by the aesthetic so this is the right color energy for a game like this.

Easy to Learn and Clarify (+6)

The game is easy to learn but hard to master, which is a recurring attribute I look out for in games lately. Especially because you are having to think in three dimensions to outwit your opponents, that’s always going to be an area of mastery. Part of the reason that this game is definitely easy to learn is simply in the layout of the rulebook. I’m a fan of rulebooks that do not need to be wordy to explain gameplay. I’m often in the situation where we want to get through a bunch of games within a time limit and no one really wants to have to spend too much time sitting around not playing a game. If I can’t read everything beforehand this is great just fresh out of the box to learn and dive into.

In situations you have questions about, the examples are complete and will be detailed clearly in the rulebook. I’ve played my fair share of games where a specific situation isn’t even close to clarified in the rules so the amount of situations actually covered in this rulebook is a relief. This is especially true because of the highly competitive core to the gameplay where people are already heated up about losing control over Ctrl.

Opportunities for more Strategy (+6)

The scoring is the part I look forward to most. If you are familiar with area control, this game is so much more than that and can catch you off guard during scoring. Looking at area coverage from the top and from all visible sides there is a good chance you may completely overlook something. I have not played this enough times yet to decide whether there are clear opening strategies (similar to games like Chess, for example) or if there is a limitation on the amount of control you have in… Ctrl. I intend to find out eventually!

Gameplay is Quick (+6)

The 20 minute play time on the box is true to real life so if you think you can do better and you have folks at the table that are cool with an immediate rematch, you can totally do so two to three times and still have time for more games. As my collection starts to grow I’m much more interested in playing more games with varied experiences than one big game. Ctrl fits in with that goal very well.

The Bad

nothing bad comes to mind!

The Ugly

Unpredictably Flimsy Components (-3)

My one complaint has to do with the relative flimsiness of the flag and placing it. The flag kept popping out of place or straight up knocking out existing cubes when placed. Depending on how badly some opponents want to win a side or have interpreted the state of the game cube, the branches of cubes will start to jut out in horrendous patterns such that they also lose some stability during handling. It’s relatively easy to figure out where pieces need to go back into, so it’s not a deal breaker — but it is inconvenient.

Difficulty: 2/5 for Advanced
Satisfaction Grade: A (93.3%) for Amazing
Worth Your Money? Yes.

You can find copies of this game at Amazon or Game Nerdz, or check with your friendly local game store to see if they can order local!

Note: This review originally appeared on the site Girls' Game Shelf.

Azul: Queen's Garden - Board Game Review | The Tabletop Crier

AZUL: QUEEN'S GARDEN

a review of the board game Designed by Michael Kiesling 

Players: 2-4    Time Investment: 60 min

Rating:

Weeping

Game Aesthetic

Components

Strangely the component quality was all over the place in this game. The player boards and score board were made of a flimsy cardboard that was nothing like the original Azul game. On the other hand, the tiles were made of the familiar resin material that made you want to eat the pieces. The gray Joker pieces were of a cheaper material that made a high pitched noise when they clacked together in the insert. The thickest piece in the game was the rotating scoring indicator which I found an odd choice since you only interact with it at the beginning of the round.

It may look nice from this angle
but there is a lot of low quality cardboard in here

Artwork by Chris Quilliams

The most attractive parts of the game were the tower art and the board game box. Everything else was as one would expect and nothing of note. They did really nail down the garden aesthetic with the pastel green palette, and that contrasted against the more vibrant colors of the tiles created a pleasing experience during gameplay. I do wonder whether you would actually be buying bugs or birds in a garden but I'll just leave that one alone.

Relatively simple design for the player boards and
clean, easy to identify markings on the tiles

The First Turn

Options

It's relatively straightforward to figure out what you need to do on your turn as you have four actions to choose from: acquire tiles and garden expansions, place a tile, place a garden expansion, or pass. While this may seem easy, in practice there is a lot more going on in each of these actions (except for passing, of course). You can only acquire tiles that have one thing in common but the rest of their features need to be different. Placing a tile requires that you have other tiles and/or expansions that follow this same logic, with the exception of using Jokers to do this. 

Rewards and Objectives

There are clear in-game point scoring options, end-game point scoring options and Joker resources to obtain depending on whether you can surround a fountain, statue, bench or pavilion. All of these rewards can help inform where you place tiles or expansions, as they will score based on color or pattern. The real challenge is in attempting to create several groups that can score multiple times throughout the game and at the end of the game.

These two tiles can be placed but not next to each other
as they do not have anything in common

Ability to Pivot

Unfortunately it will become difficult to navigate around incorrect tile or expansion placements and because of the strict nature of the game's puzzle it can force you to start over in a way. There may be times where the tiles drawn from the bag just aren't want you need and you need to change up what your original plans are. Even your opponents' choices can force you to pivot your approach and perhaps give up on scoring for specific groups. In fact, you may even get in your own way because all of the tiles and expansions in your storage are ones that you'd like to place in your garden. Yet gameplay mechanic restrictions prevent you from having them all.

At the center of the board is the in-game "end of round" scoring and
at the side and bottom of the board is the end game scoring

Game End

The game ends after all players have passed during the fourth round. Once the final in-game scoring opportunities are complete, the end game scoring starts with counting remaining Jokers, removing points for having remaining tiles or expansions, then evaluating all aspects of the garden like colors, patterns, and groups of 3 or more. For those with enough planning prowess, there are additional bonus points for each group of six, though the other side of the board has a variant for groups of four and five as well.

Welcome to New Las Vegas - Board Game Review | The Tabletop Crier

 

WELCOME TO NEW LAS VEGAS 

a review of the board game Designed by Alexis Allard and Benoit Turpin

Players: 1-50    Time Investment: 35 min

Rating:

Sobbing

Game Aesthetic

Components

Ah, the components section. Well, I'll admit that they're just standard for this game. For those of you who have never played Welcome To before, the game comes with nice player sheets and "normal" cards. No fancy finish or special stock, just "normal". While the rulebook suggests that you take two sheets per player I personally think it's manageable (and more economical) to just use one sheet. Ideally in the future I would laminate a few of these sheets for replayability but for now the game pad is quite hefty and can withstand several plays. At the time of writing this we're not quite to that "unlimited" player count level of gatherings so it should suffice.

Still very happy that they kept this game box compact like Welcome To. Games that can fit several players or games that are meant to be fillers at game nights should almost always fit in a small bag or when we travel again, a carry-on. You never want to be encumbered by a filler game!

Similar to Welcome To but with new powers relevant to the new installment.
Those shiny bright signs are exciting!

Artwork by Anne Heidsieck

This game is mostly about flipping numbers and writing numbers, so there isn't too much to comment on in the area of artwork but I will say that I'm a bit irked about the solo cards. The diversity of people represented in the architects cards is laughable and some of the more difficult AI opponents present as white men. C'mon now.

For the overall aesthetic I do appreciate the consistency to the first game as psychologically you may want to feel at ease before you dig into the rulebook. This new installment art is nothing special and frankly doesn't need to be.

My absolute favorite look exclusive to this game is the shows! Love the color and the lights, and really enjoy the glowing red carpet. It's a fun time to imagine what it's like for the limo to pass by the sights. On the player sheet itself, they did a fantastic job at creating glow that wasn't distracting and that didn't make the sheet unreadable. So many times on game artwork it becomes more of a distraction than helpful but in this case it was Goldilocks-level right.

When you get up close and personal, all the glowing signs and red carpet
make you feel like you are there. Such a shame that you'll need to scribble all over this.

The First Turn

Options

The options are the easiest part of the game to explain to anyone: pick a pair of cards to put into your part of New Las Vegas. However it is not guaranteed that you'll figure out where they lead because much of the scoring in the game -- which I'll get to -- is dependent on specializing and not necessarily diversifying effort.

The beginning of the game may feel overwhelming and you wouldn’t be wrong even if you've played Welcome To before. Everything you do in the first few placements on each street will impact the rest of the game and the pressure is unbelievable in this way. 

I would say that if you could have only one “trashy” street (trashy in this case meaning not scoring well in any area) that it would be ideal. From there it’s just building on what you have already done (to lean into a specific type of scoring) or trying to build towards something. For example, focusing hotels by getting into all of the streets to make the avenue, starting the limo on its journey, or attempting to build out the end casinos to have a full golf course. 

One of the hardest things to figure out is whether to lean into scoring or give yourself room for more casinos using the crane. I’ve found from experience that those who don’t balance new construction with taking advantage of old construction (i.e. already-built casinos) end up losing out on accelerated scoring. Opponents that have taken the risks to open up unbuilt casinos have tended to win.

Rewards and Objectives

There are clearly two things you want to do: mitigate debt, and also guarantee scoring.

The game provides lots of different ways to score, and it seems like the contracts give a very small edge but not enough to warrant focusing on them. 

In fact, more so than in Welcome To, I’ve found that you do need to try and get through all of the scoring and perform well in them because you give the other opponent(s) too much of a lead if you don't. 

A lot of the scoring punishes those who cannot keep up with the current game leader but things accelerate so quickly that it’s near to impossible to check on the opponent’s sheet to maybe make estimates on how far ahead or far behind you are. This has definitely snuck up on me before, where I thought I was doing well and we got to end game scoring and I was beat in almost every section. 

There are two sections that don’t care what the other opponents do: golf courses and the limo. If you can mitigate your loans and also make improvements on the default scoring you can score well in those two areas. It’s always possible to notice how many loans you have (i.e. how much money you owe) so there is always the option to take that will get you more money in the vault. One way to do this is getting limo to visit "mafia spots" in which case you know that the objective is two-fold: get that limo moving and open casinos on its path that have a stack of bills. 

Things that perpetuate debt that you have to be careful with: new casino construction and using special inauguration powers. Don’t be afraid to use the inaugurations if you think it will give you more points and if you think you have the cash flow to do it. 

Yes, there are projects!
And no, none of this will make that much sense until you know how to play.

Ability to Pivot

There really isn't any room to pivot, since you need to almost decide from the beginning whether you'll be going for odd or even streaks on a street, whether you'll start filling out certain sections to get to hotels, or whether you're going to build out the space to favor limo stops. All of the aforementioned cannot be undone or begin later in the game because everything builds off of the early game.

One major example from my pain in this game was with the limo. You cannot pivot at all with the limo since there are restrictions on where the limo can go after it has been somewhere and the positioning of the lights if you didn’t get the chance to review what the possibilities were and ended up opening casinos that did not fit the limo route you began. Definitely the most heartbreaking is not being able to make it to all the casinos that had interesting points.

Unlike many games that fail at designing a good solo mode, I very much approve of the rules and mechanics in this one simply to practice and have the room for making mistakes. This way you can find your own personal styles and logic to find clever ways to pivot in a multiplayer game.

It almost looks like you're back in school doesn't it?
Despite very good iconography this is clearly more involved than its predecessor.

Game End

One of three end-game conditions I have found that more likely to happen is the ribbons on the inauguration track rather than completing the casinos simply because while it is not a requirement to have all casinos be odd or even on the street, most feel compelled to close them in tight together. It doesn’t always work out that way to get exactly all the numbers since distribution is similar to Welcome To and skipping every other number makes the ascending requirement even more difficult. I have yet to play enough times to see all three contracts completed! This was a more common occurrence in vanilla Welcome To than it is here, even more so than completing all casinos.

Aquatica - Board Game Review | The Tabletop Crier

AQUATICA

a review of the boardgame Designed by Ivan Tuzovsky
Players: 1-4    Time Investment: 30-60 min
Rating:

Weeping

Game Aesthetic

Components

The main game board and the cards are standard quality but the two things that really shine in this game in terms of components are the player board and the Mantas. I have never played a board game that has a mechanic for raising locations where the components themselves can make it easier to understand. Location cards safely slide up and into the player board due to the three-layer cardboard design without being damaged. It's amazing! Picking up, placing, and flipping over Mantas has a rewarding tactile feedback and the detail on the molds for these minis is fantastic. The stingers on the end of the Mantas are sharp, by the way, so be careful. My only complaint with the Mantas is the symbols painted onto them can be difficult to see, especially if they are colors closer on the spectrum to gray.

Players get a King, starting character cards, and 
a set of trained mantas

Artwork by Irina Kuzmina, Andrew Modestov, Oleg Proshin, Artur Varenyev, and Marat Zakirov

It's not entirely clear with this size of an artist team who contributed where but I can understand why you would need a team this big. The main game board has a gorgeous underwater scene in the background, all of the player boards have sea creatures pulling up locations, then there are the locations themselves, the Kings, starting character cards and finally the ocean character cards. That is a TON of art, with all sorts of variations in scenery and color. I've played the game a few times now and still couldn't tell you if there were any repeats. The style of art in this game could easily be printed and framed for the wall, and there is an impressive sense of depth and distance. In a time where we've been inside for too long, all of the seascapes are a welcome feeling of escape.

The Sea Horse brings forth a wave of new locations using Scout

The First Turn

Options

The two main resources in this game are Coins and Power, so it's at least obvious in the beginning of the game that you need these in order to acquire locations. They didn't make a fancy player board for locations for no reason! From there, you'll understand that playing cards are how you take actions so acquiring cards with the appropriate resource type is a viable move. The game makes resources acquisition a little tricky in that you do not hoard them so you must be able to pay at the moment of purchase. This helps make resource management more approachable since you only need to plan for those moment to moment. You luckily also have four starting "trained Mantas" that will help augment your actions one time until you flip them (note: flipping is a separate action and refreshes the ability).

Aquatica is one of those games that requires you to have a main action of playing one of the Character cards from your hand, so the gameplay is straightforward in terms of the category of action but not necessarily in the type or style of action you take. In other words, Character cards all have different abilities and it's up to you to choose what you want to do with them. They will allow you to Recruit new Ocean Character cards to augment your starting deck, Buy Locations (at the top of the location card, the value next to the coin icon), Conquer Locations (at the top of the location card, the value next to the trident icon), Raise Locations, Score a fully risen Location, or Scout for more Locations.

  

Legioner is great for conquering locations if you're low on coins

Rewards and Objectives

Very prominent and obvious at the top of the main board are four goals. The base goals are to have 8 Character cards in hand, 5 Locations on the player board, 3 or more Locations in the Scoring pile, and 2 or more Wild Mantas. Being first to each of these goals will cost a trained Manta but are worth eight points each, which is very good. Be careful doing this though, since this is one of the end game conditions!

Rewards is by far the most difficult to understand and assess in the game, mostly because you can get so many of them working independently of each other on the Location cards. This is especially true when you start raising locations and ignoring some rewards to gain others. You will find yourself possibly overcalculating Raise effects, trying to gauge whether it's time to start pushing for fully raising a Location -- and therefore Scoring it later -- or milking it for its benefits for as long as possible.

Though it's not a formal reward, learning how to use the synergy of your cards, Mantas, and locations to make powerful turns is my favorite thing about this game. I honestly have not been able to consistently be first or second on all the base goals yet, and the game box comes with additional goals to make gameplay varied. Time and repeated plays will tell if I can ever justify adding the new goals! I fully plan to get there.

Ability to Pivot

If you picked a Location that you end up not liking later, your only choice is to Raise it fully and then Score it. Since you cannot just replace Locations at will, if you have not set up your character cards or available mantas in such a way to speed up this process you'll have a spot on your player board that's just stuck. You almost always want to be keeping locations partially raised to your benefit for only so long as it makes sense and then retiring them immediately after. 

The inability to pivot is also true with whether you have missed out on recruiting the right characters. If you're still stuck with your starting hand, you'll be having useless turns just getting your cards back from the discard pile and opponents will be making more progress than you. In this game you want to have an excess of resources and you never want to be just barely paying for something or relying too heavily on mantas.

It may be daunting at first but
getting the five locations goal is doable

Game End

There are three endgame conditions: 1) one player has accomplished all 4 goals, 2) the Location deck runs out, or 3) the Ocean Character deck runs out. When this happens, every player takes one more turn and then scoring starts. You get 1 Prosperity point for each Character card in hand, including the king; Goals points, and Prosperity Points shown on the Location cards that made it into the Scoring Pile. The player with the most points wins, and ties are broken by number of Mantas in the player's reserve.

Santa Monica - Board Game Review | The Tabletop Crier

SANTA MONICA

a review of the board game Designed by Josh Wood

Players: 2-4     Time Investment: 35-40 min

Rating:

Silent Tears

Game Aesthetic

Components

The feature tiles, which indicate the starting point of the boardwalk, are a very nice sturdy cardboard. It does illicit some confidence in one's ability to build out their boardwalk, as good foundations are a must.

VIPs leaving their mark on the boardwalk

Santa Monica's real shining stars are the wooden components, though. The meeples represent VIPs, tourists, and locals that meander about your boardwalk. Tourists sport a cute camera about their necks, while locals are of course the coolest kids on the block sporting sunglasses. VIPs... are kind of just there. Like they prefer. Please don't ask for a photo. Then, there are the cute sand dollars with lovely golden detailing and the cute pink food truck. Every one of the wooden components adds to the fun.

The rest of the components are standard cards, though the finish on them is very nice. There isn't much card handling in the game considering everything is focused on an unconventional tableau build -- since thematically you are constructing a boardwalk area -- so don't think about that part too much. On that note, this may also mean you don't need to spend precious time sleeving.

Locals are always the coolest on the boardwalk with their sunglasses
and carefree attitude. We live here, who needs a camera?

Artwork by Brigette Indelicato , Jeremy Nguyen and Josh Wood

Can we talk about this box art for a moment? And the palette, too. Takes you back to the summertime, maybe during the times where surfing had a lifestyle surrounding it. Everything is bright, pastel and beachy keen. 

The details on the individual cards whether they are on the sidewalk or on the beach itself are charming. You'll see weddings in there, relaxing beach activities, 

and cute stores. The style in which all things are drawn also is reminiscent of old cartoon shows, which furthers the inviting feeling (at least for me).

The First Turn

Options

It's fairly clear that the beginning of the game that you're going to draft a card. The rules state that your two options are to select a feature card or use a sand dollar action to acquire cards in a different way. From past playthroughs more often than not you don't have enough sand dollars to start with so your likely only other option is to draft. This makes it easy and frankly I like that the game forces you to start making decisions right away. It also makes it easy to learn and/or teach the game because the turn overview is so straightforward.

From there, some of the deeper strategy is revealed through deciding what side of your feature tile your feature cards will go. There can be opportunities to swap these cards around in the future depending on what kind of sand dollar actions you have available, but for the most part you are deciding the permanent location on the beach or the sidewalk. Games that have variable starting powers, resources and/or objectives are helpful in narrowing down what an applicable strategy would be, and Santa Monica does just that. So, when in doubt, check out what your feature tile is all about, what location tags are associated to it, and then pair up feature cards accordingly.

When deciding between cards sometimes the incentive from the
food truck and the foodie can tip the scale

Rewards and Objectives

Aspects of the feature cards can impact where the meeples go, what scoring chains can be developed, or how you progress on the public objective card. Considering this section is literally labeled "Rewards and Objectives", perhaps starting with the objective card is a great option.

I've found that the objective card, while it may be tempting to try and dedicate your game play to your feature tile, is full of points to be had. It also usually comes with something detailed that is a penalty at the end of the game so an objective to avoid said penalty is also a viable goal. However, unlike other games I've played, I have had success just taking things moment to moment while leaving room for changing a plan in the future.

Individual feature cards can provide sand dollars, and almost always the sand dollar actions are the better way to acquire cards for your boardwalk. The reason being, it will provide more actions to take during the game.

Encouraging your VIP to walk to specific parts of the boardwalk can also be a fun theme to drive your objectives, because you can either design the boardwalk with the locals and/or tourists in mind, just the VIP, or a combination of both. I can imagine that there are cool vacation spots that are not for the "little people" but in my opinion -- both in principle and in terms of this game -- the boardwalks that really thrive are for the people.

Sand dollar tiles and objective tile can provide some guidance
on making lucrative choices

Ability to Pivot

You'll know whether you can pivot in this game right away, based on the sand dollar actions. If there isn't anything that will let you swap cards in your boardwalk, and since this is a game where scoring is very heavily dependent on positioning of the cards, you can assume that pivoting is unwise. Planning from the get go is a must, but luckily the types of decisions you are making are limited to just looking for tags and patterns.

I would say the one thing that the game does not have a lot of room for is population control. Several feature cards bring in the crowds, and sometimes you don't want too many people hanging around doing nothing. 

Unless something says otherwise (usually a sand dollar tile)
this beach feature card is staying put

Game End

When one player has placed their 14th feature card, it triggers the end of the game. Everyone gets equal turns and then you start to tally everything up! The cards themselves score off of location tags, or, if you're lucky, make those sand dollars actually worth something. That's right, sand dollars are meant to be spent and if you haven't been spending them then you're SOL. Other scoring opportunities, if you were paying attention to them, are activities on the cards (they'll have a dashed ring with a population requirement), or footprints from VIPs based on your feature tile. Finally, like I mentioned before, the objective card is also evaluated. 

It's a Wonderful World - Board Game Review | The Tabletop Crier

IT'S A WONDERFUL WORLD

a review of the board game Designed by Frédéric Guérard 

Players: 1-5 Time Investment: 30-60 min

Rating:

Silent Tears

Game Aesthetic

Components

Nothing very special here, as there are cubes and there are cardboard bits and there are cards. I would say that the common board area is fun as it splits in half to fit in the box, and clearly explains what commodities will be produced next since it is arrow shaped. But if we're simply talking about stuff you get to constantly get more of and use, it's not that exciting. 

Resources represented (in order from closest to farthest): 
Materials, Energy, Science, Gold and Exploration.

Artwork by Anthony Wolff

I cannot say enough about the artwork, the futuristic settings and the plays on science fiction. As with all games, I do wish there was more representation and inclusivity but at least they did put a woman on the cover. We all have to start somewhere. It's also curious thinking about what the world will be like after periods of globalization where countries start to blur together. For example, you can play the Noram Estates, which I am assuming is short for North American and looks like a glassier urban jungle you can recognize.

The art on cards and tokens is crisp and futuristic, and
the iconography is clear.

The First Turn

Options

It's going to feel a lot like clockwork, but luckily if you play with the variable player side of the civilization name cards then it gives you quite a bit of direction on what cards to draft from the original hand size of seven. After that, you'll have a chance to plan (literally called the Planning Phase) and figure out whether you want to build towards a card you drafted (slate it for Construction), or scrap it for resources (Recycle) that can feed into a new or existing build. This, in my opinion is part of the heart of the game in balancing the different states of your engine. Do you give up an intimidating project just for a few commodities to finally complete a project you started? Do you give up on that other project and start the intimidating one? Do you start completely new, scrapping the intimidating project for parts and feeding into a project you just found out about? The options are exciting!

Of the seven, you can only keep one
and pass on the rest to draft.

Rewards and Objectives

Different types of scoring can allow for hedging your bets or just for straight up points.
The straight up points look yummy but in the end the winning edge belongs to the multiplier, so the math is in your favor if you stack up and lean into what you have. If you want -- but I haven't tried it -- you can also try and ensure that you receive the bonuses that come with whoever has produced the most of a commodity. In this way, you're banking on both scarcity and building up towards the future. One of my favorite aspects of the way that production happens in this game is that is goes in a specific order, so if there's a way you can have those pauses in between work in your favor, do it! If you find you are producing too much of one resource and nowhere for it to go, there is at least a 5:1 ratio to turn it into a red wild resource known as Krystallium.

Bonus tokens known as Financiers (blue) and Generals (red) indicated at the top
 of each resource for whoever produces the most of it!

Ability to Pivot

Very little. Since resources are dedicated, if you just didn't make it to full Constructed, you just didn't make it. There's no going back. Makes a bit of sense considering you are thematically building out a civilization. You wouldn't want your leader to change their mind willy nilly and just demolish everything you worked on would you? Well, okay. Turns out you actually can, if you want, discard a card in your Under Construction area but that Recycling bonus goes straight to working towards Krystallium. All hope is not lost though; if you're doing it early enough, you can try and accelerate a build with 2 out of 4 of the rounds available to you. You'd have one less successful round but if you build a tight tableau it can be possible to pivot at round 3. Anything further out than that and you should just choose to lean into what you have.

As you produce, resources can be assigned to get a project to completion
and prepare reap the short- and long-term benefits.

Game End

Four rounds. That's it, no more, no less. You'll add up gross victory points, which are the vanilla laurels with numbers, combo victory points that have a multiplier indicator "X", victory points specific to Generals (gross and combo), and then Financiers (gross and combo). Highest score wins the game. Tie breakers, in order: most cards in their Empire, most Character tokens, then after that... too bad, you share the victory. But hey, at least there are solo scenarios in case you want to just kick out your opponent and play again in peace. :)