by crazylegs
I've been tracking my game purchases in this geeklist, but as the posts seem to be more like 'impression reviews', it makes sense to post them as such, too.
Background: Tikal was bought in a bundle of games which I took on a weekend away to France with my girlfriend to try out. I’d been looking forward to playing this game for a while; when I joined BGG I found this list, which seemed like as good a place as any to search for games I might like, and Tikal immediately appealed to me. The theme is great, nice artwork and I love tile-laying games as they make for exciting, often surprising plays which are never quite the same.
Reading some reviews I suppose I was a little wary of its reputation for lengthy decisions, but I figured I’d just have to hurry people along if that happened
I also made sure I read the nice little rulebook thoroughly before the first play - especially after my girlfriend’s less than enthusiastic reaction to our first play of Stone Age; another game that’s a bit longer than our usual ones with quite a few decisions to make (it’s since grown on us both).First impressions: I tend to notice the box first, obviously, and this one just seemed oddly large considering the contents. As the board folds up quite nicely I’m not sure what the need is for such a long box, but hey. Tiles etc. were of high quality and the artwork was engaging and colourful. I like.
First play: Despite reading and re-reading the rules beforehand, we still had to refer back to them quite a few times in our first run-though. Nevertheless play proceeded smoothly and everything seemed logical enough (not really intuitive, but fairly straightforward in any case). It’s certainly a slower game than others I own, but that hasn’t put me off and once you get used to it decisions become quicker, if not necessarily obvious - but that’s part of the fun! A bit of good fortune with the treasure tiles gave me an early lead and I ran out the winner, although not as comfortably as it seemed I would early on.
Ongoing play: My girlfriend thought Tikal was only ‘OK’ (she’s not so keen on the ‘Action Point’ system apparently. Now she tells me!), but I managed to get her to play a few more times over the weekend and, as I suspected, it grew on her. It’s still not her favourite and I concede it is a bit slower than we normally like our games to be while the 10 points thing can get annoying at times - we end up counting out loud and I must admit I prefer systems like this to give you a number of set options rather than adding up your points, but at least it’s different.
I’ve also noticed that, at least with two, the player who goes second tends to win and this seems to be due to the slightly strange ending, where the player who puts the last tile gets, in effect, 20 points to move their men into the best scoring positions. I’m sure this is to balance the advantage of going first but it does seem a little strange as from now on we will have to flip a coin to see who goes second!
In sum: I really like Tikal, despite what I see as its shortcomings. Hey - no game (well apart from Scrabble...) is perfect! The theme works for me and I find the excitement builds as the game goes on, as well as the number of options which can slow things down even further, but again this needn’t be too much of a problem if you don’t agonise too much about it. It’s only a game, after all! However, it’s not for everyone and it seems to be a game you have to be in the mood for specifically (rather than just in the mood for a game, or even for a long game). I guess this will result in limited play time, but I can live with that; it just means the times I do play will be extra special
Most quoted: 'Five...six-seven-eight...nin..no wait...nii...er...nine-ten!'
Seldom seen: Glut of expedition members.
Postscript: I rate this 7/10. Actually, that may increase to 7.5. I've found a fan of the game in my brother so it's nice to get it out when he comes to visit. It's on the long side, but when I have the time to play I always enjoy it."
No comments:
Post a Comment