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Compact History
Do you love history? More specifically, do you love British history? Then this is the game for you, my friend! Show your knowledge by putting British milestones in chronological order. That is the basic premise of the Timeline: British History eco blister pack.
This pack is part of the larger line of Timeline eco blister packs that includes Classic, Inventions, and Events. All of them play the same as Timeline: British History, so you can pick any one of those up and begin playing immediately or even mix the packs together.
Components & Gameplay
Timeline: British History comes with 55 cards of various events throughout Britain’s past: Magna Carta signed, BBC founded, Great Fire of London, when Britain became an island. Every card has an image of the event on both sides. One side will have the name of the event and the other side will have the name and date the historic event took place. There can be up to 8 players maximum, so plenty of room for friends, family, or both!
Timeline's gameplay is quite simple:
First, shuffle the deck, then deal out four cards to each player with the date side facing down.
Second, draw the top card of the deck and place it on the center of the table with the date side facing up. This card begins the timeline.
Third, the first player selects a card from their hand and places it on the timeline when they think the event happened – was it before or after the initial drawn card? They flip over the card and check to see if they were correct or wrong.
If correct, play continues clockwise with each player guessing when their event occurred and placing it on the timeline. If wrong, the player discards their card to the box and draws another from the deck. Play then continues to the next player.
The first player to get rid of their cards wins.
Boom! Easy-peasy!
House Rules
The replayability aspect of the game is on the lower end, but don’t let that put you off. It is highly unlikely someone will remember all 55 dates (or more if you have other packs) well enough to master the game, so each play will be familiar but new at the same time. Also, you can use some ideas from Timeline Challenge as house rules to mix it up when playing.
Timeline Challenge was a board game version of Timeline that is, sadly, no longer in print but had some excellent ideas you can incorporate into your game. You can draw two cards and guess the difference in years between the two. You can just straight up guess the exact date of the event. You can draw four cards and have each player guess the correct order for them.
There are some other house rules that I like to incorporate into my game play as well. The first one is how to select the first player. When starting a game, draw the top card of the deck and place it on the centre of the table with the date side facing down. Each player then guesses when the invention was created. Flip the card over to reveal the correct date. The closest player to the correct date becomes the first player. The game play continues as normal with the drawn card starting the timeline.
The second house rule I like to use is not removing a card that was placed incorrectly in the timeline. Instead of discarding your card if you place it in the wrong spot in the timeline, you move it to the correct place on the timeline and then draw another card. This adds more of a challenge as the timeline gets longer every turn, not just when a player is correct.
I found these house rules add variety and improve replayability. Plus, you can always make up fun house rules of your own!
Final Thoughts
Timeline: British History is a great opportunity to have some fun while learning something new. You can even make it into an educational tool for your kids, or yourself, if you wanted.
One great thing about this eco pack is that it is not heavy on the monarchy. You don’t need to know which king/queen came after or before another. In fact, out of the 55 cards there are only 4 that deal with monarchs, one of which is an execution!
On its own, Timeline: British History is a fun, simple game that will be a nice addition to your collection if you want something light and quick. Paired with the other packs and adding in the various challenges mentioned in the House Rules section above, Timeline: British History becomes an even more fun and engaging family game.
