I'm back with another review! This one is for another game by renowned designer Reiner Knizia. Like Karuba (which you can read about here), it is a game in which players are racing through a South or Mesoamerican jungle to reach an enormous temple. Unfortunately, it shares that colonialist theme with Karuba and Lost Cities, but like both of those games, it is wonderfully designed.
This is the game's cover, boasting the fact that it was nominated for Germany's Game of the Year award in 2017. Image from Board Game Geek and posted by Helga Lucey (https://boardgamegeek.com/image/5103515/quest-el-dorado).
This game is truly unique because it combines deck-building and racing elements. On their turn, players use their hand of five adventurer cards to either hire new adventurer cards or get further into the jungle. Spaces in the jungle are printed with various numbers of machete, paddle, and coin symbols, and players must play cards with the number of symbols indicated printed on them to pass the corresponding spaces. If, for example, a player had five machete cards and there were five spaces ahead of them, each with only one machete printed on it, they could move to the end of that row of spaces. Each card is worth half a coin, unless there are coins printed on it, in which case it is worth the number of coins printed on the card. If a player discards a card with one coin printed on it and four which don't have any coins on them, they have three coins to spend on a new adventurer card.
Here is a game of Karuba in progress. The board is modular, which is to say that the box comes with a large assortment of tiles that can be arranged differently every game to create a new path. The market, containing the cards which are available to buy, is at the top of the table in this photo.
Because a player only has five cards, buying an adventurer will cost a number of those cards and limit their movement, although they can do both as long as they have cards which enable to them to move or buy. This trade-off is a fascinating one. One player might decide not to buy any cards and to use all of their early moves to rocket deeper and deeper into the jungle. However, each tile-board has spaces printed on it which are increasingly more difficult to traverse, so they may find themselves delayed while they buy cards, where other players can keep moving through this area. In that case, players which had been behind may suddenly gain a significant lead.
Here are the meeples from the first photo. In this case, the game is currently tied, with everyone at the same point in the jungle. The market is just above the meeples, with cards' prices printed at the bottom.
The rules for The Quest for El Dorado are very easy to learn, but the game is very intriguing. Turns are short, since players have small hands, and games typically take thirty minutes to play. Setting up the modular tile-boards according to the examples provided as well as the market can take a moment, but even including setup, every game I've played has taken less than an hour. There are expansions available which add new adventurers to the market and expand the board, but the base game itself is also highly replayable, since the box indicates that there are more than 100,000 possible setups for the board! This has become one of my favorite games recently and I would certainly recommend it for any family or board gaming friend. I would recommend, however, that kids wait until they are ten or older to play, since the decisions surrounding buying cards from the market or moving are tricky.
That wraps up another review! Let me know what other games you'd like to see reviewed – maybe another Reiner Knizia game, or a deck-building game! Until then, happy board gaming, everyone!
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