River of Gold

This lavish area majority and resource collection game set in the Feudal fantasy Japan of Rokugan / Legend of the Five Rings catches the sweet spot of medium weight with a short timescale. With River of Gold being playable in under an hour, it really caught our attention & it doesn’t disappoint.

I AM MY 20 BEST MEN

The game revolves around merchants trading for goods down a mighty river, sailing your elegant wooden boats down beautifully embossed in gold foil on the board itself. But this is not, as you might think, a pick up & deliver – whilst it has some elements of that, as you deliver goods (Silk, Rice, and Porcelain) to your customers. However, it is the bonuses that they unlock that are key: artisans reduce the cost of building, monks increase your Divine Intervention, nobles improve your boats, etc. And building along the banks of the river, & reaping those rewards, is the key to victory.

THE ARROW KNOWS THE WAY

You have two ships that you sail down the river, but all turns on the roll of the die. The number on the die corresponds to the region you may interact with, or the number of spaces you may move. A ship gathers the resources of the 4 adjacent locations, but each player can build and potentially gain better benefits as taxation, gaining influence in that area. So the game becomes a Push/ pull of influence & construction, stopping at harbours along the way to gain Koku (funds) to build. As befits the setting, you can modify the dice with divine intervention, but this itself is a limited resource – better deliver to the monks after all!

A FROG AND A SCORPION CROSSED A RIVER

I love the setting, my son has no interest – & we both thought the game was superb. It even comes with a mini expansion that adds sponsor benefits, though again, you don’t need to be invested in the theme to enjoy the machinations of the Great Clans. That being said, the Clans themselves certainly do feel thematic. With the sponsors, you have a choice of two angles for your clan: Crane is about honor, be it supplying the Daidoji military of the Iron Crane or the nobles of the Kakita (which all feels VERY much in the vein of Josh Reynolds’s excellent Daidoji Shin novels); Scorpion is all about scheming and taking advantage of your opponents (shocking, I know); Crab like to build (well, they DID build the wall against the Shadowlands) and Mantis feel like the collection of minor Clans that they are. Would I have liked to see other clans? Maybe. Mantis could have simply been Minor and given us Dragonfly (or choice between the two) and I associate Unicorn with trade much more than Crab, but I understand the choices made – and again, the fluff provided makes it clear and accessible to non-fans.

ALL THAT GLISTERS…

As mentioned, the component quality is top notch. The boats are unique to each clan, with distinct sculpts for the basic and upgraded versions – no mere recolours. We’re always looking for thoughtful accessibility, and it’s rarely executed so well. Card layout and iconography is clear and nothing feels busy or overwhelming: again, both shapes and colours are unique, so it’s quickly apparent what everything is and does. The custom dice are a delight – yes, they’re just d6, but each face having a different colour and icon to match the region is just BETTER – a 1 is clearly the mountains, a 3 clearly the forest region, and so on. The attention to detail is astonishing: you can really feely the passion that’s gone into this as a project.

THE END IS THE BEGINNING

This game is FANTASTIC. It’s incredibly fast, as you are constantly back & forth – a turn lasts a minute or two at most. You quickly move from first building era to the second, and that zips along. The pace is brisk but never frantic, taxing and satisfying at the same time. I can see where there is room for the design space to expand – most obviously the other great clans – but it’s superb in and of itself.

This is a really special game, and I don’t hesitate to recommend it unconditionally. In an era when we are saturated with good games, and there’s so many GREAT games, this one is… Gold.