Dorfromantik - The Board Game is a cooperative and solo tile-laying game. It is peaceful and
laid-back while also being strategic because of basic landscape placement rules
and the task tiles that dictate how many adjacent landscapes of a specific type
are required to collect them for end-game points. Once all landscape tiles are
used, the game ends and players add their points for completed forest, grain,
village, railway track, and stream tasks, as well as their longest railway
track and river. There are also flags
that gain points if they are surrounded by landscape tiles. The player with the highest score wins the
game!
Another nice feature of this game is the optional campaign
mode. After scoring is finished, you can fill out a campaign sheet that tracks
progress from game to game. Reaching certain achievements and results lets
players unlock one of the five component boxes included in the game. These add
new challenges and tiles to create new and varied gameplay. Because these boxes also add lists of included
components, players can pause a campaign with one group of players and adjust
game components to either start a new game or continue another paused game with
another group.
The manual for Dorfromantik is concise and clearly written to get new players up, running, and having fun quickly. I love the game’s uniqueness, and I am enjoying every minute of its play! Each game session lasts about 30-60 minutes with a player count of 1-6.
Dorfromantik won the prestigious Spiel de Jahres award as game of the year in 2023. ~Marsha