With Christmas well and truly here and the days counting down, plus the kids off school and the office closed for the holidays, it's time to start breaking out the games. And firstly we played our latest addition, 7 Wonders. I'd heard some good things about this from Andy at Battlequest and it stood out on the 'Geek website - especially after it jumped to the number 1 spot for family games, which really piqued my interest. I read the reviews and tried to avoid the hype and decided to make the purchase. And I can say I'm glad I did; it's become our favourite game. It's accessible to all because the game relies on the mechanic of matching symbols - "I want to buy this card, it says I need symbols ABC, do I have those in my production list, if not, can I buy them from anyone else to my left or right?" Maya picked up on this very easily being only 7 and was easily able to keep up with myself and Kavita.
The game lasts 18 turns, one for each Age. The cards are dealt out so each player gets 7 each - a clever mechanic ensures there is only 21 cards in an age for 3 players, 28 for 4 players etc etc. Each player then chooses a card to build - be it a building or a resource (stone, bricks, ore etc). In the first Age most resources are free to build. Some buildings are free also and if built, they will allow you to build buildings in other Ages for free rather than having to pay a resource fee. A resource fee is a list of resources you must have or can buy from others to your immediate left and right before you can build that building. The advantage of building a structure is that if can give you victory points at the end of the game, cheaper purchases of materials from your neighbours, better defences from attack etc.
A turn is conducted by everyone choosing a card face down to build and revealing it one after the other. Once the turn is over, the remaining cards in your hand are passed clockwise or counter-clockwise, depending on which on what Age it is. This way your hand is always fresh and not one person can have a Winning Set of cards.
After each Age, there is also a round of Battles between the cities - war breaks out between neighbours - here Military(red) structure cards come into play; in a battle with your neighbour whoever has the most of Crossed Sword symbols wins - if they are equal it is a draw. If you win, you get a Current Age win token (1, 3, 5) and if you loose you get -1.
You can also build parts of your wonder - they are built in 3 stages, each requiring resources and a card from your hand to build - each part also gives an advantage, be it victory points, money, science points etc. The game ends after the last card of the third age (each age lasts 6 turns - a turn is where you use a card then hand on your cards to the next person - the final card is placed in the middle of the table with everyone elses last card.).
When the game ends, the players have to calculate their victory points - this is takes a while as there is a fair number of cards to calculate by games end and differing cards have different ways of getting a victory point.
In conclusion, this can be a quick game or a short game, depending on how well the rules are known, so the more plays you do, the quicker you will find the game. It is immensely enjoyable to play, it has strategy, trading, building, battle without too much heavy thinking on any part - very very enjoyable.
