Killerjoe1962

This game won the 2014 Kennerspiel des Jahres award and for good reason too. It’s a slight twist on the worker placement mechanic which is now very familiar to us and is accessible to folks new to designer game play. Pick up deliver your assistants (You’re the merchant) to gather goods around the bazaar which are 16 tiles payed out in a 4×4 pattern the tiles are a little bit larger than 5″ X 3″ tiles, or sell goods to the market or visit the Mosques for game altering tiles or buy rubies. You collect all of these things into your wheelbarrow, which is limited at first but can expanded by visiting the Wainright to increase your capacity to hold more goods. Goods and money will allow you to attain rubies which is what you’ll need to win the game, five for a 3-5 player game and six for a 2 player game.

You and your assistants are stacked discs of your color and the concept of picking up the stack and moving it one or two tiles is easy for most to understand, you either pick up an assistant or leave one behind to be able to perform the action of that tile, if you can’t you simply aren’t allowed to take that action. There are a few more interesting things that happen in this game, I highly recommend that you watch a video board game review for more details.

My wife and I really enjoy playing this game (there’s a two player variant) and let me say this, she is NOT a board gamer per se though I tell her all the time that technically she is, lol. The iconology used in this game just makes sense, less words means less confusion. Each player receives a players guide about bonus card, turn sequence and other info about game play but once you’ve played Istanbul a few times you’ll find yourself not having to look at the player guide or rule book very much.

This game is FUN to play!

Respectfully,
Killerjoe1962