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Board game review & gameplay of: Everdell

Game design: J. Wilson

Illustrations: A. Bosley

  • 9/10
  • 13+
  • 1-4 (6 in expansion) players
  • 40-80 minutes

Gameplay

In Everdell you and your fellow players are going through the four seasons while collecting resources, building structures and inviting critters in your little village. 

You do this by placing your critters on the board gaining resources or playing cards from your hand.

After each season you have a transitioning turn in whichyou get all your critters back and gain one or more extra workers, so you get more work done towards the end of the year.

Thoughts

Everdell always reminds me of the bookseries Redwall I used to read when I was a kid. There were mice, squirrels and bevers fighting against the evil cats and nasty rats. I loved reading it and now I love playing Everdell with this in mind.

Besides the incredibly lovely theme and beautiful art by Bosley which really works well for me, Everdell has a great workerplacement mechanic. It's rather simple to explain to people that like to play games and oh so great when you like making smooth combinations and building towards a great ending.

Solomode

To play Everdell solo all you need is an 8 sided die! I think it's very strong to be able to design a good solo that works with very few components added to the game. 

You basically get to play regular turns of everdell and every time you play a card, Rugwort plays a card as well, which one is decided by rolling the die.

Besides this, Rugwort also blocks some spots on the board, rotating when seasons change.

At game end, Rugwort scores 2 points for every card, 3 for purple prosperity cards. Rugwort also scores for completed events as well as for every event you didn’t complete.

I really enjoy playing Everdell solo and as mentioned above, I think it's very elegant in its simplicity. It also feels quite balanced!

On the other hand, the special events are important to not miss and can steer you a bit more to getting these than in a regular game. Not per se a bad thing, just something to know. 

9/10

Boardgamegeek BGG

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