Thursday, February 19, 2015

Review of Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries

Overview
I have played the original Ticket to Ride several times. But with the new rules, this edition feels more complicated and worth playing. I played with two other people. We enjoyed the game. Below are what I noticed and what I thought:

Breakdown (each was rated from 0 to 10)
1    Set Up (8):
I like the Set Up a lot, because there is an instruction picture printed on the rule book, which shows the layout and how to use the space around the board very clearly. This saves lots of effort on setting up the game.

Since it is a turn-based game, I was concerned about the first-hand advantage, while this game starts with “the most experienced traveler”. However, it fixed this problem by ending the whole game with a nice rule “when one player’s stock of colored trains gets down to ≤2 at the end of his turn, each player including that player, gets one final turn.” When we played the game, we didn't feel there was obvious advantage for the first player as well.

The only thing that I dislike is how it was explained with texts (see picture). I didn't notice that the numbers at the end of each sentence is corresponding to the components on the image. I think if they could rearrange the space and add arrows to link the texts with the icons, it wouldn't confuse me.

2    Obstacles/Decisions (6):
There are some interesting decisions in this game.
For example, after you finish the Destination Cards that you initially drew when the game starts, you have 3 options:
1.         You can choose to draw new Destination Cards;
2.        You can try to guess other’s paths and try to block them;
3.         You can make use of your hands and get more points.
I find this very interesting, first because of the uncertainty of other’s destinations; second, it brings lots of other interesting decisions. For instance, if I want to block other players, who should I focus on. And these are also influenced by the stage of play. If someone is running out of his car, then I won’t consider drawing a new Destination Card. But if I already have lots of paths and I noticed that my destinations are very short and there are a thick deck of Destination Cards left. I probably should draw 3 new Destination Cards and pick from them, which could have changed the winner of our play.

On the other hand, I didn't like the additional rules on the longest path, the ferries and the tunnels. From the market perspective, I can understand why this game (theming in Christmas, shooting for families) ranks higher than the original version. But design wise, I especially feel the complicated rule specifically for only one path seems to be a little too farfetched, although when a player really built that path, we all laughed out because we saw him spending 20 cards on a single route. For the ferries and tunnels, the usage of the wild card is explained clearly but too inefficient.

3    Rules (8):
Overall the rules are very simple. As a family game, even little kids can pick it up, find out some strategies, and eventually master it. When first read some of the rules, it can still be confusing. But since this game is so popular, many people know the basic rules and the rule book really explains everything clearly.
When it comes to the depth of the game, I think there is much replayability. It takes some times for the player to know the map and Destination Cards well. Also, because of the interesting choices in the game, you can have different strategies. Your opponents and starting hand also add to the replayability. If you have a troller friend, you might want to play safe and win the game easily, or just have fun taking extra Destination Cards. If you have skilled players, you might want to deceive them by building some paths irrelevant to your goals. If your friends are building long routes and you are scared by that, you might try blocking their paths instead of drawing extra Destination Cards. If you start with some short paths, you might want to build as many as possible and give up the longer ones. If you get some long paths as your starting goal, you might want to build them carefully. So, I think this game can be played many times and still feel satisfying.

4    Goal (9):
The ultimate goal for every player is very simple: get as many points as possible by building routes or completing Destination Cards. You can also get 10 more bonus points by completing most number of destinations. However, the Destination Cards are actually “quests” serving as subtasks. It is very interesting that players don’t know each other’s destinations. During our play, I (P1) was trying to block another player (P2) who seems to be building a very long route. I even persuaded the third player to block him as well, which made the P2 laugh out loud. He might be acting, or I was so wrong. However, all these actions add a nice social element to the game.

Fun Elements (each was rated from 0 to 10)
Sensation (7): The art of this game is really simple and kind of generic. I wanted to rate sensation “5”. But I realize that the art style actually support the theme and story pretty well. It is just that I am not a fan of this art style. And the usage of colors, design of map and plastic car tokens are also fairly good for setting up the entire relaxing and fantasy atmosphere.

Fantasy (8): The theme of Christmas works. Personally I didn't feel so attached to the theme might because that I didn't have much western cultural background as local western people. But I do feel that if the places are replaces with city names in China, I will enjoy a lot playing this game, maybe reminding me of some trips in a specific place and stories happened there, or if I always wanted to visit somewhere but didn't get chance, however I virtually “reached” there through the play. Then the theme would actually be super interesting and add a lot of fantasy elements. Also, the theme of traveling by train (or building train rails) works too. I am a big fan of traveling by train, because the pace is just right: You can watch the beautiful and changing scenery as you talk with other travelers. You can physically experience the travel through time and space at the same time and feel the change in your mind (like, reaching a new place might remind you of something delightful, which changes your mood). For some other players, the theme might be more like a story of a train tycoon.

Narrative (7): The story is very simple. And as a Euro board game, some rules don’t make much sense to the story. However, from the perspective that narrative is also the events occur during play. The simple framework of the game actually provides lots of different scenarios.

Challenge (8): The challenges are not very difficult. But the game provides a relaxing atmosphere while the players are facing some interesting choices.

Fellowship (8): As a board game that can make a group people laugh, it gets the basic credit on this. Not like some other hard core board games, players sometimes don’t pay attention to what others are doing on their turn. What I noticed from our play was, we always knew what others did on their turn and response to their action, such as picking up the wild revealed after the last player just took a card from the shared resources, or taking the left lane on a two-lane route when one was just taken.

Discovery (6): Although this game doesn't have much juicy content, it has space for discovery. Because players can always find new strategies depending on different situation, play style, goals or other players.

Expression (8): As a family/party game, it successfully makes the player express his enjoyment, regret, surprise, excitement, etc. Since the game is well-balanced, two of us were almost tie at its conclusion, so it ended with a dramatic tension.


Submitting (7): Pulling out this game on Christmas day (or whenever a family wants to have fun together) seems a good idea?