5 Minute Chase

Michael: “English, Fitz or Percy? If we're gonna pull this off, we need to take one of them out.”
Abruzzi: “And you want us to tell you which one?”
Michael: “I just want you to help me get to them. I'll take it from there.”
Sucre: “You're crazy, you know that?”
Michael: “All I need is 5 minutes.”

Prison Break, Season One, Episode 5: English, Fitz or Percy written by Paul Scheuring and Zack Estrin, FOX

Game: 5 Minute Chase

Designer: David Neale & Antony Proietti

Publisher: Board & Dice

Artist: Paweł Niziołek

Runtime: 10 seconds - 5 minutes

Player Count: 2 - 4

[caption id="attachment_2783" align="alignnone" width="2048"] A pretty arty display of the game, good entit?[/caption]

5 Minute Chase is a tile-placement party game for two or more players. I’m just going to let that sink in for a second, but you read that right, Board & Dice have taken what is possibly the second most boring boardgame mechanic (behind roll and move obviously); tile placement and not only have they made it exciting, they’ve created a great party game for two.

This is a super simple game of chase, of cat and mouse, of cops and robbers. One player is on the run, the other has to chase them down all with simple, yet challenging, asymmetry. As a runner, you’ll shuffle all your tiles, create two stacks and you are ready to play. The chaser collects all their tokens and starts staring menacingly at the would–be runner and maybe does a little smack talking.

 

The aim for each player is simple, the runner must get from the prison to the hideaway without getting caught and along their route to freedom must collect a map, a key and of course the loot they hid before they went to sing-sing. Once you’ve collected, and by this, I mean used at least one of each of these tiles in your escape, you can place your hideaway tile and finally take a sigh of relief and sit down.

[caption id="attachment_2779" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Those police roadblocks will cause you so much trouble[/caption]

There are but a couple of rules governing the placement of tiles that can be summed up here easily (in the rulebook, not so much),:

1. Roads and tiles must align.


2. When placing a tile, it can only touch one other tile.


3. When escaping along a road with a police roadblock, the roadblock must join up to a wood.

See, simple.

 

The chaser has a very different task. Each tile has a number of witnesses facing in different directions. What the chaser must do is very quickly count and work out which group of witnesses saw the runners go in the direction of the next tile, and place on that tile the corresponding token.

Should the chaser ever be able to place a token on the “current” tile, they have caught the runner. However, neither this nor the placement of the getaway ensures victory. In 5 Minute Chase, there is the necessity for a “check” before final scoring takes place, where all players review the route and tokens to make sure that all is correct. Although this isn’t strictly ‘in game’ it still has an air of anticipation, since so many choices and selections are made rapidly during the chase this evaluative step comes with a results-envelope-opening sense of trepidation…just a much more fun sense of this.

[caption id="attachment_2777" align="alignnone" width="1920"] This is where you are trying to get to. Good luck, and Gods Speed[/caption]

First the runner’s route is assessed to make sure they connected all the roads correctly and included a key, map and loot tile. For the Chaser the process is a little different, the tiles themselves are flipped - where the edge connecting to the next tile remains touching and on the reverse of the tile the correct token symbols are shown - it really is quite an efficient way of doing it.

Now, it could very easily, and in my opinion, be correctly argued that the chaser has the much easier task, the rudimentary pattern recognition is a much quicker mental process, whereas the runner has to first recognise, assess and then orientate tiles to match what is down but also plan what is coming. However, where the runner's task does get easier with multiple plays the chaser’s doesn’t. In many instances the runner ‘always’ has a choice, often they may not be ideal choices but the runner can move the chase along, the chaser doesn’t get this option; they are always behind and the mercy of what the runner is putting down for them. In this regard there is actually very little one player can do to influence their opponent, each player is acting in response to time itself rather than one another.

Much like a child’s playground game of tig, the sole objective of the chaser is much simpler, whereas the runners must invent their escape on the fly. This pattern shifts somewhat in a 3 or 4 player game. I’ll admit, I was dubious as to how this game would work at the higher player count but I was pleasantly surprised. The runner gets a huge bonus here, communication, a moment, albeit a brief one, for consideration. Although the chaser also gains help in a 4 player game, the help gained isn’t quite enough to offset the runners, when this happens everyone knuckles down that little bit more.

It's all those do-gooder witnesses that cause the bother if they would only all just look away

Also, much like a game of tig, there can be a rising degree of frustration with this game, simply because some people will be naturally better at it, or one role within it, than others. 5 Minute Chase create a very level playing field for the game state, where neither player can bring inherited experience to bear. Again, like a game of tig, some people are just faster, more nimble and in this game that converts to some people being faster at recognising patterns, of being more mentally agile and can more deftly rotate and align the tiles to their need. My software engineer friend Mario is an expert runner whom I rarely manage to catch and I’m pretty flipping good at chasing people (obviously I mean in the game, I’m not like a bounty hunter or anything). For some, this frustration twinned with how lightning fast the game is could lead some players to...I don’t want to say sulk, but; well, sulk.

 

The game comes with a bunch of silver and gold star tokens, which you’re meant to use to work out who won and add up at the end of a game. To be honest, I’m not too sure how you win them or count them because for me 5 Minute Chase isn’t about collecting points, it’s about the sheer, unbridled joy of playing, of having that nervous-fun energy. It’s called 5 Minute Chase, but actually, I’ve found I don’t want to play this game for 5 minutes straight just because I fear I’d be a nervous wreck afterwards. A round can last literally seconds - seriously, I’ve caught someone within 3 tiles before, but even a full route with loot, key, map and all still comes in around the minute and a half mark at best.

 

Finally starting to get somewhere...I think

If you hold with the definition of a game being the abstract simulation of an event, then one could argue that 5 Minute Chase is “The Perfect Game”. It splendidly captures the excitement, anxiety and rush of a chase. Playing this game you’ll find yourself trembling with anticipation, you’ll feel your pulse rushing as you frantically search for the right tile. You’ll get that feeling of being hunted, of the chaser being hot on your heels, the exultation when you spot all the right witnesses almost instantaneously and have the right token ready in your hand and for these moments 5 Minute Chase is not only a stand-up, it’s a standout game too.

This game does what a party game should, it gives you a shot of cardboard fun. You’re not going to be overladen with difficult weighty decisions, you won’t agonise over how you engineer your escape, it is a straightforward, fun, family-friendly game of cops and robbers. It’s a small box, with a small price tag (£13.55 currently on a pre-order special) and although you won’t get hours and hours of play out of it you will get a lot of laughs.

Burgle Bros. Review

Designer: Tim Fowers

Publisher: Fowers Games

Artist: Ryan Goldsberry

Players: 1 - 4

Run Time: 45 - 90 minutes

 

Admit it, you've always wanted to rob a bank. But not really rob it, not in real life, with actual people, real security and a genuine risk of imprisonment. No, you want to rob a Hollywood bank, like Danny Ocean, robbing a bank with style, panache and in a way that can only be pulled off by making your escape in a mini cooper (yes, I know neither of those films actually feature a bank being robbed, but you know what I'm getting at I'm sure) Burgle Bros. from Tim Fowers lets you do exactly that. You and your merry band of crooks must break into a bank, crack the safe on each floor. Dodge security cameras, motion detectors and avoid at all cost the patrolling security guards, to finally escape with all the loot. And most importantly do it in style and to a great soundtrack.

[caption id="attachment_2549" align="alignnone" width="3757"] Burgle Bros. in full swing[/caption]

The bank is made up of three grids of tiles, each representing a separate floor in the bank, and each has its own flight of stairs and it's own safe to be cracked. There are also eight walls on each floor that your team and the security guards will have to navigate around. There is a wide array of characters to choose from, and in a typical co-op fashion, each brings something unique to the game. Now, put on your suits, balaclavas and stick a heist playlist on Spotify and you’re ready to play (In fact I’m going to listen to one while I write this review.

[caption id="attachment_2543" align="alignnone" width="2808"] This is your gang, all suited and booted[/caption]

With four actions a piece, each player will ideally want to creep around the bank, peeking at tiles before moving into the room revealed. You’re looking for the safe on each floor, but more than that you’re looking for the code to crack it, each tile is numbered 1 - 6, and these represent the pieces of the code needed, so once finding the safe you’ll need the other 5 tiles that make up its row and column. Spend some action points preparing the safe to be cracked allows you to put some dice on the safe tile, these you’ll roll when you attempt to crack it, trying to roll the numbers of the code. Thankfully, successes are cumulative, and once it pops open you’ll grab the Loot and a Tool (that is obviously stored in a safe y’know, because where else would you keep an EMP grenade or a pair of roller skates?) and head off to the next part of the mission.

 

 

[gallery ids="2551,2556" type="rectangular"]

Sounds pretty easy, huh? But then there are the motion detectors, heat sensors, fingerprint scanners, laser fields, open walkways, deadbolt rooms, and of course the guards. In short, navigating around this bank will not be easy, just on account of the rooms, but the guards! Well, they add something really special.

[caption id="attachment_2547" align="alignnone" width="2416"] Guards! Guards! Guards![/caption]

Each floor has its own guard, and it will take its turn moving after each player on that floor, and it will move towards its target room, - assigned by the route deck - for which you simply use one of the red/orange dice, and it will move in the most direct clockwise path a number of spaces equal to the pips on that die. Make it through that deck, and you turn the die up one pip. Crack the safe and turn it up again. Set an alarm off, and it’ll temporarily go up again, once for each alarm sounding - and here it gets super interesting. Setting an alarm off will obviously set the guard on duty into panic mode, he/she will start running for one thing, but they’ll now head towards where the alarm is going off - abandoning their original route. Why is this so interesting? Well, for one thing, it makes the game incredibly tense, watching a guard slowly make its way towards you, step by step is a great example of atmosphere and theme entwining brilliantly with mechanics, but, it also lets you the player interact with the AI.

[caption id="attachment_2536" align="alignnone" width="4032"] The rooms that will no doubt cause you a lot of trouble[/caption]

In many games, where the “game” is playing too, it often relies on a deck of cards to dictate what the AI does, however, unlike Burgle Bros. the interaction is one way. This card is drawn, you as a player are limited somehow (like the solo mode of Viticulture) as the AI fills that space on the board or this thing happens to force your attention and action elsewhere (like Pandemic). This is still true of Burgle Bros. but in this game, you can act back, not simply react to it. And this, this makes this game brilliant.

 

 

[gallery ids="2542,2540" type="rectangular"]

Burgle Bros. is a game you can tell was design with theme at the forefront, each of the different types of rooms makes sense - ending your turn in a Thermal detector room would set the alarm off as your body temp changes the environment (just think of the trouble Redford went through to get around that one). A laser field would slow you down (unless you’re the Night Fox). Each of the rooms makes sense - which is good because the description on some of the tiles is sadly lacking in clarity. True Story: when my brother-in-law played it for the first time, he said: “It probably has something to do with a poor translation from a foreign language or something like that.” Once you’ve played the game through, even only once, he tiles click, but on first impressions, these descriptions are quite jarring. The same is sadly true of some of the tools, and the special rules on some of the Loot. It’s a minor thing, but irksome, and in some cases painfully noticeable.

[caption id="attachment_2538" align="alignnone" width="3024"] The language can be a little jarring on some tiles and cards[/caption]

The retro cartoon movie poster style artwork had me, it is whimsical and silly and takes a game which is based on a highly illegal activity, and makes it okay, and fun, and helps lift this game off the table. With each game you’ll tell a heist story, some of the success and some of utter failures, but in each one I can pretty much guarantee there will be a memorable moment, accentuated by this artwork, you’ll be able to very easily imagine the Rigger barreling down a corridor with a dog under one arm and a painting under the other as he is chased by a rapidly approaching guard. Burgle Bros. does what every great game does, it draws you into its little cardboard world, exposing you to this adventure.

There is one problem I’ve experienced with this game, and it’s one that is quite unique to this game as it is essentially a 3D game played in two dimensions. The three grids represent three floors of the bank, which on the whole makes sense but there are a few rooms such as the walkways and the arboretum where you can move/see into different floors - this has caused some players to miss obvious errors as they’ve had trouble converting the three separate grids into one tower. The simple solution, don’t play with people that have poor spatial awareness. Another option (one I’m very seriously considering) is getting yourself a Burgle Bros. Tower, by either building your own or buying one.

After hearing of this game I was immediately interested, and the more I looked around about it the more interested I became. The glorious artwork, the massively underused theme, and fantastic fun gameplay has made this one of my best purchases of 2017. With standard, advanced, and a “Fort Knox” variants all in the box, plus the ability to easily make your own blueprints this is a game that can and will hit the table over and over again, you could, in fact, call it a steal!

[caption id="attachment_2560" align="alignnone" width="1944"] Me, on the train home with Burgle Bros. after a great day at Dragonmeet 2017[/caption]

This review was based on a full priced retail edition of the game that I paid for with my hard earned money

Dead & Breakfast Review

Publishers:          Braincrack Games

Designer:            Rodrigo Rego

Artist:                   Louis Durrant

"Relax," said the night man. "We are programmed to receive, you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave." The Eagles, Hotel California

 

[caption id="attachment_2506" align="alignnone" width="4032"] It's behind you!!![/caption]

 

Your eyelids are heavy, you've been driving all night, and because you went left when you really shouldn't have, and then because the battery died on your phone you lost your way.  Behind schedule, in the middle of nowhere, you stop to rest for the night at a delightful, ivy-covered bed and breakfast.  The warm yellow glow of lights in the window, the cheerful and friendly blue door invite you in.  And yet, your skin crawls, something screams inside you to run, hide, tear away from this place and never look back. But...but you’re just so tired.

Welcome, to Dead & Breakfast.  If that introduction sounds all too heavy and morbid just take one quick glance at this delightful artwork from Louis Durrant and you'll realise I'm simply been melodramatic.  In this game of tile placement you'll be building up the most horrible and frightening of hotels, by ensuring you have the most elaborate and cohesive array of ghouls, ghosts, witches, and cursed dolls to scare even the hardiest of lone travellers, but at the same time trying to ensure the outside of your hotel looks as inviting as possible, with long, continuous vines of flowering ivy.

 

[caption id="attachment_2504" align="alignnone" width="4032"] BCareful placement to get these flowers and creatures into just the right spot.  I hope[/caption]

 

Dead & Breakfast is wonderfully simple to teach, and equally quick to get started, turning devilishly taxing.  You’ll build a hotel in a grid of five by five, selecting double window tiles from a central pool, placing them next to an existing tile to create your hotel tableau.  Once a row is completed you’ll select one of the four available guests waiting for a room, and you’ll cover one of your windows with this guest, each of which is terrified by one of your creatures in either the row or column in which they’re placed.

You'll score points in two (three, if using the bonus cards) ways, the ‘biggest’ and most obvious method is your ill-fated guests.  By aligning your guests in a row and/or column that has those beasties you'll score points, potentially lots of points.  However, equally, as important though is your second source of points: flowers (obviously these are scary flowers as is fitting of a haunted hotel).  Each hotel lobby (the brightly coloured front door) needs to be offset in the most delightfully twee way with flowers of the right colour, so by placing tiles with that colour flower that connect back to your lobby/door, you'll score points. Bonus points, ah well, they’re bonuses for doing stuff aren’t they, like aligning your guest orthogonally, or having your vines spread off the edges of your hotel.  These bonuses add an extra layer of strategy and complexity to the game that some may want to help elevate to a more serious game, but there is enough going on without to enjoy the game for most.   

 

[caption id="attachment_2510" align="alignnone" width="4032"] A gallery of creatures[/caption]

 

The scoring of both the guests and flowers come to a rather lovely juxtaposition.  You can't win by solely focusing on one method over the other, although ivy is lower scoring, it is a steady "revenue" of points you can't simply ignore.  This scoring balance hangs perpetually in front of you like some malicious spirit, taunting you with good choices, but rarely the perfect collaboration of orientation, creature, vines and flowers, and when it does appear another player, of course, wants it.  It is within this delicate balance that this game really shines.

 

[caption id="attachment_2503" align="alignnone" width="4032"] Your awaiting guests[/caption]

 

Don’t be lulled into thinking just because it’s cute, and uses a simple tile placement mechanic, and because it’s easy to teach that these things combined make a simple game.  With each turn you must make the best decision from those options available, it’s a game or careful, calculated loss, of forward planning, of keeping your options open, but succinct enough that you can close those literal and metaphorical holes in your plan later and maximise your scoring.  After a quick rules explanation, I’ve seen players jump straight in, with a clear-cut defined plan of action, only to come stumbling to a halt as by the time it's their turn again the landscape has changed, their plan has to adapt, and much like the ivy that creeps along the walls, it has to grow and change.

 

[caption id="attachment_2509" align="alignnone" width="4032"] The ghost, making its way around the available windows[/caption]

 

The ghost that mournfully meanders around the central pool of visible window tiles will dash your hopes of picking up that which you need.  The bonuses demand you sacrifice your optimal placement of guests or creatures with the sweet promises of extra points at the end.  The bright, pretty flowers will twist and turn, fighting every attempt to tame them and simply get them where you want.  This game wants you to be tricked (or treated) Dead & Breakfast is far more than it seems, it is possessed of a game greater than the mere sum of its components, yet remains ectoplasmically-slick in terms of its rules.  You will be beguiled by its charm and its appearance,  not noticing its hidden depths until you are a couple of turns in, and by which point it will be too late to escape.

Dead & Breakfast is live on Kickstarter from the 23rd Feb, and you'll even be able to try the game out yourself via Tabletopia.



This review and pictures are based on a review copy of the game, as such the game and components may look different from the final product.

 

Review: Farlight

 

Game Name:	Farlight	Published Year:	2017
Game Publisher:	Gamesalute	Player Scale:	2 - 5
Game Designer:	Nick Sibicky	Run Time:	45 mins

In the not too distant future, you’ll be able to pop off on your jollies to visit the Sea of Tranquility instead of Lanzarote if what Mr Branson is selling comes about, in the meantime, you can conquer that pesky atmosphere and go boldly into that void with Farlight. Much like Branson, Musk and Bezos, you’ll be running your high tech aerospace company in a tight, and faced paced race, attempting to outmanoeuvre, outwit and outclass your competitors.

 

[gallery ids="2430,2429" type="rectangular"]

 

Farlight is an auction and tile placement game in which each round players will bid on parts for their ship, to then connect those parts before attempting one of the all-important missions. This is as simple as it sounds, in turn, each player will place two of their 5 bidding tokens - ranked from zero to four - on any ship upgrade or facility at Farlight Station, with the option of adding one of their scarce and valuable crew to the bid to increase it by one. Once all bids are placed, the winner of each is revealed, losers who bid more than zero gain one additional crew for their trouble and then parts are added to the ship.

 

[caption id="attachment_2432" align="alignnone" width="3963"] My super-cool spaceship with big meaty engines![/caption]

 

 

This is a victory point game, with only one real way to gain points (there are also bonus points and as the name suggests, the bonuses are just that, they’ll make the difference between finishing second or third, they won’t win you the game). At the top of the board, there will be a selection of Mission Cards, arranged into three columns, and missions ranked from lowest value to highest and then the game ending Climatic Mission.

 

[caption id="attachment_2417" align="alignnone" width="3233"] Bonus Tiles - three of which are used each game[/caption]

 

These missions form the focus of each game, and there is a nice assortment of them, as missions can vary with their requirements as a mixture of, or a sole requisite of Science, BioTech and/or engines. And it is here that we encounter the most interesting, and most frustrating aspect of this game: getting the right parts at the right time. At the beginning of the game the board is filled with parts, and then at the end of each round, anything that was 'sold' is replaced.  However, since there is no seeding of the deck, nor a separate deck for each part "type", the draft is very random.  So, important, game-necessary cards, like, I don't know, engines, for example, don't appear quite as frequently as one would hope

 

[caption id="attachment_2421" align="alignnone" width="2539"] Engine dice - these dictate how powerful your engine is.[/caption]

Now kids, remember getting into space is really difficult because you have to break away from the Earth’s gravitational pull. Which is really, really hard. In order to do that you need really powerful engines. So when only one appears in Farlight Station, it becomes very highly sought after. Even Two engines mean that most players are going to be bidding on both of them, and probably bidding high, this essentially creates a bottleneck of bids, since only empty slots are replaced, you can end up with only two or three cards being drafted. So the “issue” is not only exacerbated but is self-serving.

 

 

[caption id="attachment_2427" align="alignnone" width="4032"] Not every Mision requires engines, these few are easy pickings for Science & Biotech ships[/caption]

 

 

Is it really a problem? For me, it’s not a deal breaker, it is frustrating, and I think there are some easy ways around it, or even a little House Ruling to make it flow a little better. But, for others, this could be too much. It does create an individual economy per game, in the same way that a scarcity of one resource in say, Splendor does alter how everyone plays, but unlike Splendor, there is no way to get around not having an engine on your spaceship (although you can get around Science and BioTech, which is odd). And if you ever hope to achieve one of the Climatic Missions then you need engines. At least two, but more likely three.

 



So let’s do the maths. In a five player game, each player is going to really want/need three engines, so that will be fifteen engines in all. Of a possible sixteen, and to me that seems pretty tight, and in the games I've played, it has been.

 

[caption id="attachment_2428" align="alignnone" width="4032"] Missions aplenty for your would be tech companies to attempt[/caption]

 

The Climatic Missions themselves also present their own quirk, and that is a linear narrative. These missions almost force the game to move in a specified direction - which really does feel like your choices are being stricken off as you advance through the game.  Normal missions are stacked in front of these, so the Climatic Missions can’t be attempted until the stack is clear, meaning that as soon as two of the normal missions are resolved, all players now focus on that column, making the others more or less redundant, since winning a climatic mission will pretty much bag that player the win.

 

[caption id="attachment_2433" align="alignnone" width="3026"] Winning the game comes with a little winner card - which is nice[/caption]

 

Since these missions are so high scoring that in some cases it can be the only mission a player accomplishes and they still end up winning.  Obviously, this does sour the milk a little for everyone else playing.  That being said, you can stop a player running away with the lead,  you can outbid them as rarely will an opponent just need one part.  It is within every player's power to stop and hinder that winning bid, but again, by doing so, this limits your choices.

 

[caption id="attachment_2424" align="alignnone" width="4032"] He really wants that piece...or are all of those low bids, it could be 4, or 11[/caption]

 

You could argue that the game is broken, or that it isn’t balanced, etc. and I could argue with you, but I wouldn’t argue particularly hard or for very long. However, and it’s a big HOWEVER, the game is really good fun. I’ve really enjoyed playing it, each and every time. Unlike Steampunk Rally (which has a similar feel, and tile placement mechanic), where all the players are building at the same time, in Farlight you have time to take stock and see what everyone else is doing. You can bluff and inflate the cost of a valuable piece for your opponents that you know they really, really want while you pick up that other thing. And there is a great sense of satisfaction when you win a tile on a low bid because you’ve misdirected everyone. Or when you bid here, and then there, to do that, so that next turn you can do the other thing. It’s a game that wants you to plan and more importantly to it wants you to scheme. It creates a wonderful market conflict and for a game with only indirect player interaction, there is usually a lot of trash talk too.

 

[caption id="attachment_2423" align="alignnone" width="3320"] Enter a caption[/caption]

 

Farlight makes for a very enjoyable experience, perhaps a little too random and linear for some gamers, but I've found it to be just the right amount of fun to counterbalance those failings.

The Good

A thought-provoking economics game

Really good fun to play

With the right crowd, it will have some great player interaction

The Bad:

Doesn’t feel very balanced,

Can suffer from a runaway leader

Has a linear and predictable conclusion

This game was purchased/ backed on Kickstarter so some of the contents may vary from retail editions of the game

Review: Carcassonne

Game Name:	Carcassonne	Published Year:	2000
Game Publisher:	Z-Man Games	Player Scale:	2 – 5
Game Designer:	Klaus-Jürgen Wrede	Run Time:	30 - 45 mins

 

Named and themed after the beautiful French city, Carcassonne has players in the role of a cartographer (almost), creating and managing the rolling southern French landscape.  Players will construct cities, piece by piece, connecting them with roads, to other cities and monasteries.  As they do this they will be placing their followers, and depending on where they are placed they become a Knights, Thieves, Monks or left in a field; a Farmer.  With these followers players will amass and fight for their share of southern France, and more importantly; victory points.  
Carcassonne is a very simple tile placement game; players take turns drawing a tile from a Carcassonne-stamped cloth bag and then place it on the playing space anywhere they choose as long as any connecting tile has a matched edge.  In this way cities, roads and, fields continue to grow with players scoring more and more points if they are able to finish the city – completely enclose it, or the road – so it has two definitive ends.  Monasteries, on the other hand, are considered completed once the Monastery tile is completely surrounded.  In all of these instances, once the City, Road or Monastery is completed the player retrieves their follower/s.  It is in this way that Carcassonne really brings any depth of strategy, as players have only a finite amount of followers, and their commitment to the board can be made or broken by your opponent’s choices and style of play (more on this in a moment).  Finally, Farmers; these guys earn a lot of points.  A lot, but that inherently comes with a cost; once you turn your follower into a Farmer, it stays in the field, permanently reducing your follower pool.

Carcassonne is a light weight game, with rules that are very, very easy to grasp and it is also a pretty quick one too, making it a great “Gateway Game” or a lighter filler game for the more experienced. That being said it is not without its own strategic kick, as a player will continually have to choose when placing a tile to either scupper their opponents or advance their own agendas.  Closing off their opponent’s city or road and keeping their score low, or creating a massive, sprawling hodge-podge construction that can never truly be completed, and thus disposing of their followers for the remainder of the game.  However; Carcassonne does easily open itself up for very aggressive play – which given the type, feel and look of the game doesn’t quite fit – you could build a road through a city, making it virtually impossible for an opponent to finish; but playing in this style feels more like you are stopping your opponent from winning, rather than trying to win yourself.

There is a fair amount replay value in this little box, and there are a plethora of expansions to add to the game making it more fun and challenging by adding everything from the mini-expansions of wizards and witches to engineers and pigs.  The base game will serve you very well though, with a large assortment of tiles to randomly choose from, games will never be the exactly same, yet being essentially the same.

In short, this is a highly accessible, quick-to-table game, which will provide plenty of enjoyment over a pretty short run time.  It scales well, but I would argue it plays better with just two players, it is even a great addition to a game shelf for younger gamers.  Its compact size makes it a great game to travel with too. There is a chance that you may tire of this game though, even though it has a lot of replay ability, it has a limited amount of variety within.