Brian [in Unity Games] wrote:

> A wonderful night at B2O tonight
> with 21 attendees!

>Games Played: Puerto Rico x3, [snip]

I was at one of the early Puerto Rico tables. Let me just say
that I thought the game was really excellent! In fact, all 14
players that played this evening seemed to enjoy the game - I
can't remember anyone that said they didn't like it (but didn't
personally talk to everyone).

The components are excellent - although the citizens are a bit
small (and the individual player boards are not as thick as
Princes of Florence although they serve a similar purpose).
Think of Princes of Florence but with less downtime since all
actions are fairly small and when everyone chooses an action, ALL
players generally get to do the action (although the person that
chooses the action gets an additional special privilege). Also,
there is more interaction than in Princes - and often you can
influence who can bring what goods to market and who cannot. And
you need to keep an eye on what buildings folks are building -
they are not being built in a vacuum and they will influence
decisions you make (too bad the chits drawings are rather hard to
distinguish so you need to really look carefully or ask another
player what buildings they have occasionally to refresh your
memory). The Vinci/HotW method of putting increasing ducats
(money) on the privileges that don't get chosen in a turn works
great - makes them more and more attractive and assures a
reasonable balance in choosing the different action roles. The
building phase is more significant that Princes - it can really
shape the game depending on what combinations of buildings you
manage to buy. I was very impressed - but please give it at
least half a game before starting to decide if you like it!
Virtually everyone was in the confused state for the first 30 or
40 minutes (the rules are dense, although once you play the game
is reasonably simple). The 2nd half most folks said "Ahhh!" and
something clicked - of course for some folks it was too late to
do anything. Princes was like this at first too - it takes a
game or two under the belt and even today there are things I try
differently - I suspect this game will head down the same path.

Although one game is not enough to tell, with 3 different tables
generally liking the game I think I'm willing to say that Alea's
track record continues to be impressive and Rio Grande Games has
another English-release winner. I can't wait to play again!

I got my copy at Scholars (Which is the store that provides space
for B2O - was great to see everyone last night!). They
apparently sold out of all 8 copies in the initial rush. There
should now be plenty of local copies that this game will show up
at most UG events in the near future.

--
Dave Bernazzani
dber@...
http://www.gis.net/~dber (South Shore Gamers)