Puerto Rico 1897

Everyone benefits from your decision. You simply benefit slightly more.

1897, the year after Puerto Rico won political autonomy from the Spanish colonial government. You are an independent farmer in the new era — hiring workers, growing and trading crops, and putting the country's infrastructure back up as you go. Andreas Seyfarth's design, published by alea. Each player keeps their own small board of city buildings, plantations and resources; the ships, the trading house and the doubloons are shared.

Role selection is the engine, and it is one of the great ones. Each round players take turns choosing a role card off the table — Trader, Builder and the rest — and when a role is chosen, every player takes that action, not just the person who picked it. The whole game is therefore choosing the thing you need at the moment it helps your rivals least. A token passes clockwise to decide who opens each round. Underneath it the cycle is plain: grow crops, exchange them for points or doubloons, spend doubloons on buildings that let you produce more — except that neither buildings nor plantations do anything at all unless you have staffed them with workers.

Perfect for: People who enjoy being generous strictly on their own terms.

2–5 players | 70–120 minutes | Age 12+

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