#The colonists game rules full

For nearly every game I review here, I play the full game through at least once before writing anything, but in this case, for reasons that should be apparent, that didnвЂ™t happen: I played one two-player game over two eras, which took two solid hours of gameplay plus the half hour of setup. The Colonists takes place over one to four eras, each comprising five years, with players taking two turns per year and taking three actions per turn, so thatвЂ™s 30 actions per era and possibly 120 for a full game.

And it presents you with an enormous array of possible decisions that could easily lead to paralysis by analysis if youвЂ™re so inclined. YouвЂ™re building a colony (or city), youвЂ™re placing workers, youвЂ™re collecting resources, youвЂ™re playing cards to improve your little nation-state. The game really has almost every mechanic you might find in a low-luck game. This is the game for people who think Le Havre doesnвЂ™t take enough setup time, for people who really wish someone had merged Civilization with Agricola, for people who saw Cones of Dunshire on Parks & Recreation and really did want to be the Ledgerman, because if thereвЂ™s one constant theme of gameplay in The Colonists, it is that good accounting is absolutely essential. ItвЂ™s a very clever, well-designed game that almost invites us to mock it for its ambition, and perhaps a little pretention too. The Colonists bills itself as вЂњan epic game,вЂќ and certainly delivers on that promise in size, scope and even sheer weight (the box is around 7 pounds).

The colonists game rules