Lost Cities: The Board Game - July 18th, 2009

Lost Cities: The Board Game
Reiner Knizia's adaptation of his popular 2-player card game into a 4-player board game. In Europe, this game was released as Keltis with a different board but nearly identical rules. He has also designed Keltis: The Cardgame, which means it is Lost Cities: The Board Game: The Card game. Sort of.

Our friends Jim and Karen showed up with their twin 5-year old boys, Jeremy and Ethan. Hilary and I began to play a 4-person game of this with Jim and Karen, but as more people arrived, Hilary attended to hosting and was replaced by Aaron and we only ended up playing 2/3s of a game. In those 2 rounds Jim was dominant. We ended up loaning this to Jim and Karen as it seemed like it would be something they could teach to their kids.

I'm still not sure there is too much of a game here. Most of the decisions feel like they are pretty obvious and the winner is just who happens to draw the best cards at the right time. This is in stark contrast to the original Lost Cities - there is still no small amount of luck but most decisions feel interesting and meaningful.

Jim: 350ish
Hilary/Aaron: 200ish
Karen: 200ish
Chris: 150ish

Game Time: 1 hour (amidst many distractions and interruptions).