This review continues my series of detailed reviews that attempt to be part review, part resource for anyone not totally familiar with the game. For this reason I expect readers to skip to the sections that are of most interest.
Image Courtesy of ArtEmiSa64
Summary
Game Type – Dice Euro Game
Play Time: 30-60 Minutes
Number of Players: 2-4
Mechanics – Dice Rolling, Area Control/Influence
Difficulty – Moderate (Can be learned in about 30 minutes)
Components – Excellent
Release - 2006
Designer – <PERSON> - (Jaipur, Jamaica, Metropolys)
Overview
Yspahan was one of the first Dice Euros to hit the market way back in 2006 and comes to us from a designer that has had more success in recent years with games such as Jaipur, Jamaica and Metropolys.
Yspahan takes us back to the year 1598 when Yspahan becomes the center of the Persian Empire. As merchants the players are hoping to make great riches in this boon time by getting their wares into the many shops of the Souk District, supplying the great Camel Caravans that venture out into the desert and by building new structures as a sign of their new found wealth.
I should have given this game more love with a detailed review long before now being a fan of dice based Euros.
The question is, 'How does Yspahan stack up against the competition now?' given that the genre has exploded in recent years.
The Components
Yspahan is a Euro done pretty right in relation to components.
Main Board – The main board of Yspahan depicts the city which consists of many shops. The city is further divided into four neighbourhoods, which are separated by a road upon which the Supervisor will travel during the game. Each neighbourhood features shops of various colours and a set of like coloured shops is referred to as a Souk. Each set of coloured Souks in a district is worth a certain amount of points and each neighbourhood is given a symbol to help identify it (sack, barrel, vase and chest).
The top left hand corner features a day and week track to help mark the passage of time as the game unfolds and a scoretrack surrounds the city.
The board is certainly colourful...some may even think it garish but it is functional and pleasant enough to look at.
Image Courtesy of theo home
Tower Board – The second most important component is the Tower Board. This is placed alongside the main board and is used to allocate the dice that are rolled for each day of play.
The board consists of 6 rows, with the four neighbourhoods sitting in the middle, a coin row at the top and a camel row at the bottom. On the right hand side of each row are 3 symbols, which remind players of what they can do with the dice found there.
Image Courtesy of toulouse
Camel Caravan – Now we have the Camel Caravan Board which features a series of camels in three rows. 581
This board is used to allow players to send goods to the Camel Caravan in order to score points. The first camel in each row is fainter in shade to reflect that it is not used if only 3 people are playing.
Image Courtesy of <PERSON>
Player Boards – Each player must take a Player Board which shows a total of 6 buildings, their benefit at the top, their cost at the bottom and a VP tracker on the right hand side. These are a nice bit of design and the boards are suitably thick to stand up to many, many plays.
Image Courtesy of <PERSON>
Camels - Games are always more cool when they have Camel Meeple and <PERSON> delivers with some cool stylised wooden camels that make for some great images, which I've used throughout this review.
Oh yeah what was my girlfriend's comment upon her first play this week, "Yay Camels...they're so cute!"
Image Courtesy of Legomancer
Special Cards - Yspahan comes with a total of 18 Special Cards of which there are 9 types in all and 2 of each. These offer up many a special power to help out the players. The cards are of the small format featured in many games and suit their use here (not needing to be held in hand).
Image Courtesy of dougadamsau
Bits and Pieces - The game then offers up a bunch of odds and sods. Each player takes a set of coloured cubes and these are used to represent their goods. Yellow discs are used to represent gold and a bunch of dice are provided that come in white and three in yellow. A black pawn is used to mark the start player and a white pawn acts as the Supervisor. Two white cubes are used to track the current day and week.
There is nothing magical here but it is all does the job. 872