If you enjoy ancient Roman civilization and have always wanted to start you own, this is the game for you! A quick run down as usual, before I explain what makes this game so fun!
Theme: You are a developing an ancient civilization, trying to have the most successful civilization of them all!
Specs: 2*-7 Players. The box suggests 30 minutes play time, which is a fair minimum for four players, but it can take up to 45 minutes with more players. *If you want to play this two player, you should really get 7 Wonders Duel. It has a much better two player game play.
Recommended for ages 10+, this is relatively on par, but our 9 year old can play it. Not a beginner to mid-level difficulty.
Mechanics: Variable player powers, closed drafting, hand management, set collection.
Designed by Antoine Bauza
Art by Dimitri Chappuis, Miguel Coimbra, Etienne Hebinger, and Cyril Nouvel
Published by Repos Productions
Each player starts the game out with their own game board. Each board has different "wonders" at the bottom of the player may "build" for points and/or resources throughout the game. The game is played over three eras. For each era the appropriate deck is shuffled and dealt out in its entirety equally amongst all players.
Players secretly select one card from their hand and then passes the remaining cards to the player to their left or right, as indicated on the deck. Then all players reveal their kept card at the same time and play it accordingly. Players must have the money and/or resources necessary to play the card they kept or they can turn the card in for money.
There is a bit more to the game, but that is the general idea. Rounds go relatively quickly since all play is simultaneous and it is very difficult to tell who is winning as there are several parameters that get tallied up at the end.
I really enjoy a game where you can't really tell who is winning until the end. Other things that make this game a crowd favorite is the fact that there is no real "take that" each player is relatively independent of each other, though players may pay each other for resources and there is a military component that does gain players who lose negative points. There are also SEVERAL expansions to this game. We only have two of them, Leaders and Cities. I'm not going to touch on any of them though as I only know about the two we have and it would make this blog significantly longer and my goal is short and sweet, much like this game is!
Do you have a favorite closed drafting game?
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