BABEL & SAN MARCO
reviews by Dave Bernazzani

     For several years now, the German game company Kosmos has been releasing a series of high quality 2 player games all packaged in the same small box format. This series has been well received by the gaming community - especially favorites like LOST CITIES, HERA & ZEUS and the SETTLERS OF CATAN CARD GAME. The most recent of these games is called BABEL and I think it's one of the best in their already solid lineup.
      BABEL is a card game, although it does come with a nice tri-foldboard and some nice looking stone temple markers (one for each player). There are two types of cards included - temple cards and people cards. Five different civilizations are depicted on the people cards and each civilization has a matching temple foundation on the board. The temple cards are built upon these foundations and range from a low of 1 (which can only be built on an empty foundation) to a height of 6 which is a "complete" temple. These are built in ascending sequence and are worth victory points according to the highest valued temple card placed on the foundation. One restriction is that a player cannot build a temple higher than the number of people cards which have been played to that location - so a player must always balance building temples with increasing support from their people. Adding up all five temples on one side of the board gives a player their score and there are certain thresholds which must be met to win the game. I'm amazed at how quickly the scores can change through good fortune and from clever card play - it is rare that I can predict the outcome of the game until just before the end. I rather like this feature of the game!
      Game play is relatively straightforward. Each turn a player gets additional people cards and temple cards to use during their turn (actually the temple cards available for play are turned over by your opponent at the end of their turn). Players can use their people cards to move their stone marker and visit various temple locations on their side of the board. Once they have arrived, they can play additional people cards to the location and can attempt to build up the temple at that location to score points. So far... so good... but if this were all there was to the game, it might not hold interest for long. However, there is much more! In addition, each civilization has a special power which can be invoked if three matching cards are adjacent in a row at their current location. The powers include stealing or destroying temple levels, banishing or stealing your opponent's people cards and allowing you to skip a temple level. As a last resort you can reduce the cards in your opponent's hand in half instead of using a specific civilization power. With every use of these powers, you must remove one of the civilization cards from the board and so your support grows weaker for that temple location. These actions, when used appropriately, can turn the tide of the battle quickly and make for an exciting game! Of course you need the right cards at the right time - and I'll be honest that there is a moderate amount of luck in this respect. But there are plenty of decision points and there are several actions you can perform on your turn to try and make the best of the cards dealt - and the fact that it all plays out in about 30 minutes means that you won't have to wait long if things go poorly!
      The game is currently only available in German. There is a small bit of text on each card that represents the special power of the civilization. Since there are only five civilizations, there are only five powers that must be learned. With the English translated rules (available when you buy from the better retailers you can refer to the special powers at a glance. After a few games, they are easy to remember. But here is some good news! Jay Tummelson will be doing a Rio Grande Games version that will feature the same great components but in English! Rumors are that it will be available in the spring of 2001.
      Overall BABEL is a great fit to the current Kosmos 2P lineup. I would say that it is slightly above the complexity level of their average game - but easy enough to teach and play with most non gamers (probably slightly easier than, say, HERA AND ZEUS). It has just enough tactical elements, meaningful decisions and a modicum of luck that I enjoy in a game. Moreover, it has that "must play again" factor that gives me the desire to try it one more time before putting it away. Unless you are seriously allergic to card games, I highly recommend you check this game out! Keep up the good work Kosmos!
      SAN MARCO is the new Alan Moon / Aaron Weissblum release from Ravensburger and will be released in early 2001. I had the distinct pleasure of trying the game just prior to its release one weekend back in early December with Alan and Aaron's group. I only managed two plays and so will refrain from a full review until I get more plays under my belt but will say that I enjoyed the game and it went over very well with those whom I gamed with that weekend.
      The game has an EL GRANDE feel where players are vying on the board to have the most influence in six different regions (representing the six districts of Venice) with the

winner having the highest score after three rounds. The play revolves around the acquisition and use of cards - some are action cards (good) and some are limit cards (bad). Each round is broken into a series of turns where the players obtain and use their cards. These cards let players perform critical actions such as placing their aristocrats (small wooden cubes representing influence) on the board. The cards vary in power (for example, the 'Doge' card lets the owner score a region which makes it particularly desirable). However, with the action cards often come limit cards. With each limit card that is acquired, the player edges closer to closing out the current round. Once any player goes over 10 limit points, the current round draws to an end and they miss an opportunity to participate in a final "bonus" turn of play before the next round begins.
      The central mechanism and the game's best feature lies in the distribution of cards, which are divided up by one player and are chosen by the other players. It's the classic "I get to cut the cake, but you get to choose which piece to take first" which drives the game along. The card decisions are very interesting - since some cards are bad and some good the divider must chose carefully so that his opponents (who get to choose their pile of cards first) do not get the better of the deal. If you put too many good cards in one pile - your opponents will take it quickly and leave you with the leftovers. If you know your opponent is in need of a certain card, you can often tempt them with that card plus a few high value limit cards which are undesirable (but if their need for that good card outweighs the bad cards they get with it, they might just take it!). This division is done in a rotating manner each turn - so in the course of a game everyone will get to do this several times. I found the division process is very enjoyable and can cause some very tense decisions.
      Other positive things about the game - the components are top notch. There are little bridges which get built during the game to connect regions and they are nicely molded plastic. The card stock is thick and the board graphics are very colorful (I found the board a slight bit garish but most found it very pleasing and in any event it was quite functional). The rulebook comes in multiple languages - including English. The influence cubes and other markers are wooden as is common in the better German games.
      The downside of SAN MARCO? Well, it only plays 3 or 4 players. I've only played twice with 4 players (where two players divvy cards each turn) although I've heard from at least two other people that it played well with 3 players (where one person divvies cards for the remaining players each turn). Also, the decision making for choosing cards can be very agonizing. If you are playing with slow players, the game can drag on and so there is some potential for bog-down. But if your players are making an effort to divide up the cards and choose them quickly, this should not be much of a problem.
      Overall I liked my first couple plays and I look forward to giving it another go soon! By the time you read this, SAN MARCO should be widely available.

      Dave Bernazzani lives in Massachusetts and heads up the South Shore Gamers (SSG) which is a small but dedicated band of board and card game enthusiasts. He enjoys all types of games - especially board games, traditional card games and role-playing games.

DESIGN DIARY FOR "DIA DIE LOS MUERTOS" OR CHILDREN SHOULD PLAY WITH DEAD THINGS
the inside story by Frank Branham

     Being the complete game-obsessed person, the idea to create a game based on the Mexican festival popped into my head even whilst staring at the Peabody Museum's exhibit on the subject (Salem MA, Halloween weekend, 1997). The idea of the dead roaming the earth of course appealed, along with the idea of some of them having to go back at different times over the course of the three day holiday.
      For some reason, I quickly decided on a card game. But it took three years of occasional sporadic failures to come up with something close. Most were based on an idea of a large deck, of which parts would be taken away each round. Some were set-collecting games, and two were based on traditional Spanish and Mexican card games. Finally, at about the second Mexican card game variant, I dropped the removing parts of the deck, and replaced it with the idea of just changing out the scoring cards each round to simplify development.
      The second Mexican game was an oddity called TRUCO. It is a partnership gambling game with an elaborate system of signaling your partner. When I decided to slash and burn this awful version (but keeping notes on the signaling system, which makes a nice variant for the final game), I decided for a fairly simple partnership, Bridge-like game.

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