Yamatai — Days of Wonder — Review

Publisher: Days of Wonder

Designer: Bruno Cathala, Marc Paquien

Artist: Jérémie Fleury

Game Type: Action Drafting, Network and Route Building

Initial Year of Release: 2017

Age Range: 13+

Expected Playtime: 40–80 Minutes

Number of Players: 2–4 Players

Sail through the beautiful archipelago inspired by ancient Japanese culture to build up trade routes, hire specialists and try to dominate the land.

This is such a beautiful game with a fantastic theme that draws you in with every component. Lets talk about how it plays and what the game quality is like further.

There are 10 numbered cards that have varying abilities, each round players will choose one of these cards as their action for this round (two cards in a two player game). The number on the card also dictates the turn order for the subsequent round.

Players then follow the actions on the player board that consist of –

- Take the action on the action card

- Trade boats for money or money for boats

- Place boats on the board

- Take tokens from the board or build

- Store boats

Each turn a player must place boats on the map following specific rules for boat placement and then make hard decisions based on their current resources as to whether to build or collect. Collecting tokens allows players to buy specialists but building gives players higher end game points and potential money for subsequent rounds.

There are various ways for the game to end which forces players to play in a very balanced manor or the game could end before you have a chance to complete your master plan.

Yamatai jumps out of the box at you. The components are super colorful and the board is simple but very effective. Everything is laid out in clear view and everything has its place. I hope the images I am sharing convey the beauty of this game and how eye catching it really is.

For the most part the components are top quality. The player pieces are all heavy wood and feel substantial to handle. The designs of the buildings are simple but effective and the card tokens are all of a good standard stock.

My only minor gripe would be the quality of the player boards. These are made of a thin card stock which can give them a flimsy feel. It a shame the designers took this route as a thicker board would have gone well with this game… a dual layered board would have been even better but I might be pushing it now.

The art in Yamatia is outstanding. There actually isn’t anywhere near as much art as most card driven games these days, but each character sheet and specialist all look amazing and the art for archipelago is defined and easy to follow. I personally love a Japanese themed game especially when it’s done as cleanly as this.

I have yet to have a “bad game” of Yamatai. Every game has been a unique experience and in almost every game its been impossible to predict who will win. You might have created a fantastic chain of buildings and be gloating over the marvel you’ve created but then realize your opponent has been accumulating wealth and specialists that boost end game scoring and find you have come up short. I love a game where there is no clear winner until the final scores have been tallied.

I personally think that 13+ might be a little bit much for this game. The main reason for this is that this is not a massively text driven game. It may be slightly complicated but once the general rules have been explained and you’ve worked through a few rounds I think even a slightly younger audience could appreciate Yamatai.

Yamatai is an outstanding game with beautiful components, lovely artwork and fantastic game mechanics. What more can you ask for from a board game these days?

This is a game that you can easily teach to any level of gamer. You can happily play Yamatai over and over again and have a fun experience every time and more than likely not see the same win conditions twice.

I honestly can’t recommend this game enough to casual or hard core gamers. Please check it out and let me know what you think.