Be Strategic (Rio Grande Games Carcassonne)

Member Name: katygriff

Product:	Rio Grande Games Carcassonne
Date:	02/11/09 (19 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Everything

Disadvantages: Nothing

Carcassonne is one of my favourite games to play and I only discovered it a year ago. We were on holiday with my in laws and my father in law is always in the know about strategy games so he got out Carcassonne to play. Well that was it, we got it for the Christmas and have been playing it ever since and here is why.

Carcassonne is a strategy game and is by Rio Grande Games. I believe it has won awards for being the best strategy game which shows you that it is a good one to get. It comes in a blue box with a picture of a knight and a castle on it. I have to admit that the picture does make the game look a little dated but do not be fooled as this is a game that you will be playing for years to come and with everybody.

When you open the box you will see a scoreboard which has numbers snaking around it. You will see lots of game tiles which are about 5cm square (I might be a little off with that measurement as I haven't got a ruler on me). Then you will also see some great little playing pieces which are wooden people in red, black, green, yellow and blue. You have not got a huge game board however which was the first thing my friend asked when we were playing - where's the board.

Ok so now this is what you have to do, you place all of the game tiles face down and in little piles across a table. You will need to play this game on a table or a hard and stable surface. You each choose a colour team and have all the wooden pieces in that colour. You put one on the scoring board ready to take score and the rest you keep by you.

Now the idea of the game is to get points. Each player in turn takes a game tile and places it in the centre of the table. Now every time you have a new game tile you should be able to place it next to a tile on the table. Therefore as you can imagine you are creating a huge game board out of the tiles.

As you are going along you can choose to play your pieces. The game board has roads, castles, grass, rivers and cloisters. The players can all mean different things and everything has to be completed so this is what they are;

Thieves - You place a piece on a road and then when the road is complete you can earn points.

Cloisters - When you put a playing piece on a cloister you have to surround it with game tiles.

Knights - You put these in castles and then when your castle is completed you earn points.

Farms - You put your pieces on the grass and then when a castle is completed you get points.

Now these are just the basic rules and you will have to follow the rule booklets as there are quite a few ways in which points cannot be scored or you have to share points with an opponent. It is however a strategy game as you really have to think about the game tiles and how you will complete things to get points as it's not that easy.

What I have found with this game is that it can go on for a couple of hours if you have some players who really like to debate things but we usually play a game within an hour or just over. It really gets your thinking caps on which is better than the games you literally throw the dice and move. It is also highly competitive as you will find people trying to steal your points and stop you from getting any at all by making things harder to complete.

Carcassonne is a great game and has been enjoyed by all of my family and friends we have introduced it to. We love it and you can even buy expansion packs for it now. We have only got the river one which extends the board but we will be looking to get the cathedrals one when we can to make the game even harder and more competitive.

I would recommend this game for any age although it can be tricky and I think you can pick it up now for about £15 which is a bargain for how many times you will play it. Definitely worth it!

Thanks for reading.

xxx

Summary: Fun Game