Amyitis

An excellent example of the sort of game that I shoul avoid buying. Very solid but it offers nothing new in mechanics and quite happily sits on the shelf with all those other games that, if I only had one or two of them I would think were great, but unfortunately it's just one of the pack. I'm spoilt really.

Excellent underrated game. Only played two player. Lots of interaction. Difficult choices. Many ways to win and to lose. Impressive mix of strategy and tactics. Only quibble is whether you can win if your opponent gets the top bank and the best caravan card early.

Has that "Ystari feel" to it, in that it's a placement game with multiple, well-balanced decisions and scoring paths.

You play the role of a gardener of the Hanging Gardens, and each round you have to carefully manage your two forms of currencies (money to hire workers and camels to visit locales and acquire plants and special abilities), as well as your action selections, which of course are intertwined with the currencies.

You essentially have one of two choices each round (again depending on your cash and camel flow): 1) select a worker, with the earlier choices being free, and the later ones increasing in cost, or travel with your camel, with movement initially being quite limited and costly.

Worker selection consists of engineers which irrigate the garden and give immediate as well as potential later cumulative points (this is one of the avenues to score points in the game), and irrigation is an essential step before planting can occur. Priests can be used to take actions in the temples which have a nice balancing mechanism that pay out points, camels/money, and resources. Workers acquire resources, which are worth a victory point each at the end of the game, but more importantly are also essential for planting. And finally camel traders are the main means of acquiring camel currency.

The caravan can be selected rather than selecting a worker, but ONLY if you have enough camel currency to move the camel, AND you have the appropriate resources to pay wherever you stop. You can acquire a money card(s), point cards (which increase in value quite rapidly), an improved camel movement card(s), and you can plant a plant in the garden. Planting is a major way of scoring points and it dictates the end game.

Each plant gives some point value and many give additional awards. Also there is a bonus point scoring at the end of the game if you have planted enough plants. The game ends when a certain number of plants are left over- note that there are several different plants so the setup is variable each game, and that the level 3 plants cannot be planted without the help of the valuable gardener card. The gardener card is generally acquired through careful manipulation of the resource market, and is a very scarce and powerful card that you will want to acquire at some point in the game, as it allows you to "shift" up a level when planting for no additional resource cost.

What I really like about this game is that it's a light feeling "gamer's game", which is to say it's got some real subtle depth, but it's easy to jump in and play and enjoy. Excellent scalability as well. Only complaint is the terrible quality, stupid tiny cards!!!! (note to all game publishers: standard size cards only, I'll pay the extra production costs!)

Own the [boardgame=150635]Palace[/boardgame] mini-expansion from the [boardgame=47156]Ystari Box[/boardgame] expansion.

reviewed on my blog.

For a while there, Ystari games kept trying to make Caylus II. A whole lot of repackaged, recycled, and thoroughly uninspired ideas resulted. Blah.

First game was 2 players. Really a lot of options and tough choices to be made. I am interested in seeing how it shapes up with more.

This feels like a fun, gourmet meal with plenty of courses.

I enjoyed my first playing, although the 2.5 hours we spent on it was rough. It was part due to learning, part due to slower players, but the experience makes me think I will only play this with three, at least until people know the game better. That being said, I enjoyed the interlocking mechanics that comprise the game. There is no way to be good at everything, so you have to find your strength and play hard to it. If you don't carve out a niche early on, it seems like it is pretty difficult to gear up well enough to win. I am curious to see the different paths that one could take; this game is truly a Euro in terms of that. All in all, not amazing, but another fine offering from Ystari that keeps me confident in their ability to repeatedly release quality games.

High Ystari level, in my personal ranking only Caylus is little better. Like in classic Eurogame there is a lot of way to collect points. To win this game, the good and flexible strategy is required. Although the subject of the game seems to be light, Amyitis is a very complex game for gamers