REVIEWS
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Michael Schact Michael Schact is one of Germany’s prime boardgame designers and he has hit on a neat idea for a range of products with his oretto titles. Coloretto is a cracking card game where colours are the mainstay of the mechanic. Zooloretto bears (pun intended) the etto signature but is an animal collecting game and is not mechanically aligned with colours. Winner of the Critic Prize as Game of the Year 2007 Zooloretto is a game where each player owns a small zoo with only three enclosures. Each enclosure has a number 4, 5 and 6 of spaces for animal tiles and only one animal type can be in each enclosure. Some animal tiles also show either the male or the female genetic symbol and if a player gets a male and a female of the species in an enclosure they also gain a baby, filling another animal tile space. At the end of the game full enclosures count. The means of collecting animals is the main mechanic. On their turn players may randomly draw animal tiles and place them onto delivery trucks (by choice) or they can take a truck, full or part-full of animal tiles, ready to place them into their enclosures. Vendors trucks are also on tiles and collectible to be placed around the enclosures in specific places. Animal enclosures and vendors score points when this game ends. For up to 5 players, this is as near to a perfect family board game as you are likely to find. DARJEELING A game about Tea ! A cover that is bland and distinctly uninteresting and an author who has been known to deliver some superb games, but also some dubious ones. DAREELING the board game wasn’t off to an auspicious start. However, DARJEELING is one of the best boardgames of the past year and deserves all the acclaim it can get. The tiles that make up the “board” (the playing area can be made up in one of the three ways shown or to your own customisation) are laid face down and each player places the playing piece (tea collector) on an edge piece. During play these pieces are moved onto tea tiles that are then collected. The tea tiles show halves of crates, sometimes 2 or 3 halves. Before they can be “loaded” onto the barges and thus score points (there is a super mechanic for points scoring) the crates have to be matched to make full crates. This means if a tile shows three crate halves you need to match all three before they can be loaded. The game mechanic for scoring is unique, using scoring boards, tea barges, crates and demand markers. There are also action tiles that can be obtained by taking a chance on a 3-half tile but the rewards from using these tiles and taking the chance can win you the game. 2-5 players will find DARJEELING a fine, excellent, impelling, challenging game. |