I can’t be the only one that is glad Uwe Rosenberg has taken a break from the polyominoes games and gone back to what he does best - farming! Though vegetables and tourism in Iceland is a break from traditional farming for sure. Icelands always been on our list of places to visit but now it’s got higher so we can play Reykholt in Reykholt!
In the box you get:
- 1 Double-Sided Game Board (front side for 3-4 players, reverse for 1-2 players)
- 8 Game Round Tiles
- 40 Goods Tiles
- 160 Wooden Goods
- 1 Covering Tile (for 3 player game)
- 5 Goods Boxes
- 4 Managers, one in each player colour
- 12 Worker Discs, three in each player colour
- 1 Sticker Sheet for the worker discs
- 1 Start Player Card
- 4 Player Guides
- 23 Greenhouse Cards
- 36 Service Cards (in 5 sets, A-E)
- 34 Story Mode Cards
Place the board with the appropriate side up, using the covering tile if you have three players. Remove all greenhouse cards that exceed your player count (marked at the bottom of the cards) Then arrange the remaining greenhouse cards into separate piles by the number of parcels shown on their back. Place these face up by the board. Shuffle the pile of random greenhouses together and put the card with the draw symbol on top.
Choose a set of service cards to play with (A-E) shuffle the set and place five at random at the side of the board. Stack one mushroom, one lettuce and one tomato in that order, and place the stack at one end of the service cards display. If you take one of the last three service cards, you will also get to take the top good in this stack. These will be the cards you use for this game so put the rest back in the box. Place the wooden goods into their (super cute) goods boxes and the goods tiles nearby. Stack the round tiles in ascending order and place them on the marked space on the board. Each player chooses a colour and takes the corresponding manager, workers and player guide. Determine a start player and put their manager at the start of the tourism track, continue in clockwise order and place the other tokens behind them.
You are now ready to play!
The game is played over seven rounds, each round having four phases.
Work Time
Beginning with the start player, each player places one of their workers on a free action space and immediately performs the action. You must place your worker on an empty space and you must perform the action if you are able to. Some spaces have more than one action and you may place there and perform one of these actions. In the property and town hall columns, some action spaces are marked with a flag. Players can only use one flag action space in each of these columns per round. If a player takes a service card in a 3-4 player it may be shared between players. Choose a service card that one of your neighbours has, slide that service card between the two of you. Now, you may also use it and no one else can join in the sharing of it.
Harvest Time
During harvest time, each player removes one good from each of their filled warehouses. If you have a warehouse that contains multiple goods, you may choose which good to harvest.
Tourism Time
Starting with the player furthest back on the tourism track. Each player completes their entire turn before the next takes theirs. You may advance your manager as many tables as you want to and can afford. To advance, discards goods from your stock as shown on the signpost of the table and advance forward. Once per round, while advancing your manager, you may use the bonus. Instead of using the goods to advance, advance one table and take the goods shown from the supply. You can use this bonus before or after advancing normally, and you may even use acquired goods to advance further in the same round.
Homecoming Time
Players retrieve their workers from the board, the top most round tile is flipped over and the start player card is passed to the left.
When the last round tile has been flipped over the game ends. Whoever has advanced their manager furthest on the tourism track is the winner. In the case of a tie, the player at the front of the space is the winner!
As well as the ‘standard’ game mode as above, Reykholt also has a solo mode and a story mode.
You can play story mode with any player count. Story mode follows the rules of the base game with a few small changes.
Before preparing the game round tiles, choose a scenario card. This will determine the number of rounds the game is played over. Shuffle the event cards into a face-down deck and place them next to the board. At the start of the work time phase, reveal the top card from the deck and apply its effect to all players.
Reykholt does feel very simple compared to some of his previous farming games, but part of me thinks that is a great thing. It’s easy to get people to play this and introduce them to key concepts such as worker placement, planting and harvesting, with a view to upgrading them to something heavier at a later stage. Having played both Agricola and Caverna again recently it’s easy to see the similarities. I love the fact this game can be played in a variety of ways, opening up new strategies to play with, ensuring the game feels very different each time you play. The artwork is subtle and beautiful making this even more of a joy to play!
Review Copy Provided by Renegade Game Studios
