Anno 1503: A Fairly Good Year

This evening we played six games, including Anno 1503 (pictured), a fairly involved German game primarily about resource management. Players collect resources such as stone, wood, tools and cloth and use them to develop their private islands and launch ships. The ships discover items on other islands (on the central board), which bring rewards that help players toward the five goals of the game. Those goals include upgrading the settlers on the islands, earning a certain amount of gold, and constructing four buildings.

All of this occurs with very little player interaction. Basically, each player builds his own system to optimize the income generation and island development. It's engrossing and very cleverly designed (by Klaus Teuber, the inventor of Settlers of Catan), but it takes a while to get going.

I played with Gabe and Sarah. Sarah, who was new to the game, built quickly, but then fell behind when one of her buildings was destroyed by fire. Gabe won, being the first of reach three of the five possible goals. Sarah made a surprise comeback and probably would have won on her next turn. My strategy, which obviously didn't work, was to launch a lot of ships and do a lot of exploring, but I kept discovering items I didn't need. I came in last place.

Sarah and I rated this game 6.5 out of 10 (10 being the best), and Gabe rated it a 4. The lack of player interaction was the main complaint. Still, I found it very tense, especially the endgame when everybody was close to winning.

Also played: Viva il Re! (an Italian game about electing kings), Blink, Qwitch, Stampede and Affenraffen (a crazy German memory game).