Seasons

Seasons is a game that I believe every person interested in board games should play. I strongly believe that if you master this game, you will be able to pickup almost any game out there and play it with some degree of confidence. There are so many elements and mechanics to this game that all work so well together, it would be really hard to give this a negative review. And that is if it wasn't fun...which it oh so very much is. I don't want to talk about game play too much because that can all be found elsewhere, however, to talk about what was fun, you need to talk somewhat about game play. The card drafting at the beginning is really cool. I like the Mechanic a lot and I think it really makes people think about how they want to play any given round of this game. That being said, I think that you still have freedom to pursue any strategy that you may want to take, because you see enough different cards to tweak and bend in any way you want. The changing seasons is a really awesome way to make players get a sense of time in the game. You have this awesome move that you can do except, you need one...more...round to pull it off. Oh well. Maybe next year. Then on the next pass, you have yet another good play you can do...do I do the new one or the old one. Every year I wait, the old play gets a little worse... The dice are also great because there is enough variety/similarity that players don't get the feeling of being putout. My group is very complain-y about how unfair the dice were. This game does not muster those complaints. Just good times. The only problem that I have with this game is that I believe it suffers from "best strategy" symptoms. There are better and worse strategies...every time. And this doesn't really change based on how others play. Now, I won't get into it because it takes a good many goes to discover these for yourselves, but I will say that after 10-20 plays, people will start to realize that some cards and some play styles just don't work as well as others. Truthfully, all games will encounter this to some extent. This game is great though, because this is not quite as abrupt and obvious. Also, when you realize that some ways of playing are not as good and some cards are not as good, it makes using them all the more interesting. All that being said, the game is an excellent game that I believe almost every novice-hardcore gamer would love! As always, take my review with a grain of salt, and take a look at all the games I love and hate so you can decide for yourself if you think this would be a good choice. Games I Love to Play- Galaxy Trucker, Resistance Avalon, Small World, Istanbul, Star Realms, Warhammer Invasion, Caylus, Space Cadets Dice Duel, Eclipse, Caverna, Dead of Winter, Summoner Wars, Sheriff of Nottingham, and Cosmic Encounter. Games I'll Play-Settlers of Catan, Dominion, 7 Wonders, Agricola, Mice and Mystics, Race for the Galaxy, Mage Wars, Takenoko, Ticket to Ride, Game of Thrones LCG, Arkham Horror, Splendor, and Smash Up. Games I Won't Play-Power Grid, Memoir 44, Android Netrunner (I know, this one will hurt people), Robinson Crusoe, Lords of Waterdeep, Mage Knight, Pandemic, Apples to Apples, Cards Against Humanity (I'd list that one 10 times), and Battlelore.

Ok, you're here. You're looking at this game wondering if you should get it or not... You've hovered over the 'buy it now' button a few times but just couldn't quite bring yourself to do it. So now you're scraping through reviews hoping someone will validate your interest and give you a means to justify yet another unnecessary game purchase... ...well, good news! I've found Seasons to be a very enjoyable game. However I do have some insights for you to consider before you dive in: There's a lot of fiddly bits in the box - resource tokens, small wooden blocks, a few different gameboards, lots of movement tracks to keep in order, lots of dice with symbols on them to decipher as well as several different types of power cards to figure out. Some players may find so many mechanics to be fussy, but I found they create a rich and layered experience. The illustrations in the game are gorgeous and the power card abilities are mostly meaningful. There are 4 types of resources in the game: wind, fire, water and earth. Depending on what season the game is in, the corresponding seasonal dice will produce a lot of one type of resource and less of others. Finally, there's a "transmute" or trade-in table on the seasons track that changes the point value of each resource every time the season changes. This creates interesting opportunities to decide if you want to stockpile resources or spend them aggressively. If you decide not to simply trade in your resources for points, you can also use them to play power cards and activate abilities to give you advantages in the game. Overall the rules did take a little time to digest since each power card has it's own explanation text in the rules book. Also the game played a little longer than expected but there was nice escalation of intensity and I find the complexity is worth the learning curve. Probably not a great game for young kids or novice gamers but a good competitive game for intermediate to advanced players.