There are quite a few very solid reviews out there already that discuss the rules and components, so assuming you've got a base understanding of what's there already, I'll touch on those things later on and get to the meat of this review's purpose, which is to address some of the catch-phrases and common comparisons people like to throw around willy nilly about this game.
Comparisons:Race for the Galaxy
Yes... It's a card game also ...and we're done. These games are apples and oranges, both mechanic-wise and how playing them feels. You are vaguely building an efficiency engine in both (which you do in a large amount of games), but you're doing it in a distinctly different way. I enjoy Dominion quite a bit, and I wasn't really impressed by RFTG. A better comparison for RFTG is Glory to Rome, which, in fact, I liked more than RFTG.
Magic: The Gathering
Ok, now you're shooting closer to the net. So far missing the collectible component (but I've no doubt we'll get closer to that the more expansions come out), playing Dominion feels VERY much like playing a combo deck in M:tG. High Tide, Pros-bloom, Bargain... draw cards, generate resources, draw more cards, and repeat. People also frequently toss in the "deck building", and you can certainly say that both M:tG and Dominion have that aspect, but in different senses. I'll cover that more in the myths section.
Saint Petersburg
Surprised? This is actually the game I would (at the moment) say has the most similar feel to Dominion. You're building an efficiency engine on several levels, you have a shared pool of cards that you buy from, there's a random aspect to it (although the random is in the pool, rather than in the engine), and you win by gaining victory points, which is something you generally aim at after you've solidified your economic situation, because it will dilute your engine. St. Petersburg with a splash of M:tG.
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Myths and Other Observations:
It's an innovative deck building game!
Yes, it's innovative. I'm not sure I like how most people address that, because really, what you're doing is building an engine with a random element to it. That has been done plenty of times before... as mentioned above in the M:tG section, but is also present in a variety of games as well. 304
Moving the deck building from meta-game to game is good, and constitutes some amount of innovation, but deck-building as an art is not new either.
The real distinction though, is the combination of those elements. The deck must maintain base engine functionality throughout the building process- it's like telling you that you have 60 seconds to build a M:tG deck, and then will have to play it in whatever form it is when the three minutes are up. and then repeat several more times.
Components
+100 points for the amazing plastic organizer insert. +10 points for good color distinction between the types of cards on the faces. -80 points for not taking a bucket fill tool in MS Paint to turn the copper brown and the silver grey. -5 points for thinking the thin blue border is enough of a distinction on the back.
ZOMG no interactivity!
Myth. Yes, you do not point at someone and say "i'm doing this to YOU!", "I kill your dudes and loot their corpses", or "i punish you mightily for that action!". Those are not the only forms of interaction known to man, and this game has its fair share of the less gun-toting style of interaction. You're competing for limited resources, your opponent's decisions should affect yours if you're playing well, and you can perform actions which affect your opponent's hand, deck, points, and turns. I'm sorry there's no card which lets you stab a particular player in the face, but you're certainly not working in a vacuum... which brings me to my next point:
Make your decisions at the beginning of the game, and then auto-pilot
You should definitely do this. If you would like to lose.
Ok, my plan involves snagging provinces about 20 turns in. About 10 turns in, one of the other players starts picking up provinces. you should definitely not alter your course mid-stream, and instead just sail into loss-town oblivious to the world.
Or, how about when you realize someone just picked up a couple of VP cards, and is now trying to multi-buy some cheap cards to deplete three stacks? but your plan doesn't involve getting VP's yet. let's just stick with the plan. just because picking up a couple provinces would nip their blitz in the bud doesn't mean you should resort to... *gasp* thinking mid-game! 629