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Awards

Rating

  • Artwork
  • Complexity
  • Replayability
  • Player Interaction
  • Component Quality

You Might Like

  • The smooth gameplay
  • The pleasant but interesting decisions
  • The tactile nature of the glass pieces
  • The charming art

Might Not Like

  • It’s a very light game
  • Without the expansion, there is not a lot of variability
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River Valley Glassworks Review

I never got the appeal of Azul. Bear with me; I’ll get to River Valley Glassworks eventually. I’d seen Azul’s components and thought they looked gorgeous, and the positive reviews made me want to play it. Yet, it did nothing for me. I was sure I’d got the rules wrong because I thought it was distinctly average. I even played it a few times to make sure, and my opinion never changed.

Then I played River Valley Glassworks, which has a similar feel to Azul but it’s engaging and fun.

(Many people do love Azul, though, so you can probably ignore my ramblings.)

How does it play

There are six river tiles that link up to make a single river leading into a lake. Each tile will have a number of glass pieces on it. The lake will have 5 glass pieces on it.

On your turn, you can do one of two things. You can take one glass piece from your satchel and place it onto the river tile matching the shape of the piece. For example, you have a white pentagonal glass piece; you can put this on the river tile with printed pentagons in each corner. Then, you choose one adjacent river tile and take all glass pieces from it. Alternatively, you can place two pieces with the same shape onto any river tile. So, when placing the shape is important.

Next, you take your gathered glass tiles and place them on your player board in one of the columns. Your first piece goes in the first column, second in the second column, etc. If you’ve already got a glass piece of that colour on your board, your next piece goes in the space above it in the column. If you haven’t got any space to place your glass pieces, they go in the overflow, which count as negative points at the end of the game. So, colour is important in this stage.

Your other option, on your turn, is to take four glass pieces from the lake into your satchel and then refill up to five pieces.

When scoring, you’re going to get points for rows by counting how many spaces you filled from left to right without any gaps. You also score your two tallest columns, with the columns on the right being worth a lot more points. The catch is that if you have any ties for which are the tallest, you score the leftmost column.

What’s Good About This Game

The game flows beautifully, much like the river, and despite being simple, there are interesting decisions to be made. Do you go for making lots of rows? Or try to score a couple of high-scoring right-hand columns? One thing that helps you do this is that there is a handy chart on your player board that shows how likely each colour is to show up. So, if you manage to place some rare colours in the first few columns and some common ones in the last two, then you’ve got a good chance of getting those last two columns scored. But be careful one of your leftmost columns doesn’t tie with them, or you’re scoring that instead.

The other twist that makes it fun is that there are eight colours but only seven columns. When you see which colours your opponents can’t take you can start placing that colour of glass tile onto river tiles that you want to take later, knowing full well that if your opponent takes them, they’ll be taking negative points.

The production is gorgeous, too, even the non-deluxified version. The acrylic glass pieces are lovely to hold, not as nice as the Azul tiles, but still very pleasant. The art by Andrew Bosley, while being a completely pasted-on theme, still adds to the pleasant feeling. You may have guessed this is a pleasant game.

The solo game is good, with a variety of AI opponents to play against.

Any Problems?

River Valley Glassworks is crying out for some kind of player powers to help with variability. Fortunately, there is a mini-expansion that contains these, along with some other modules that, while not making it anywhere near as heavy as a Vital Lacerda game, will appeal more to gamers.

Conclusion

River Valley Glassworks is a lovely game. It is light enough that it can be played with almost anyone. There are a couple of sticky rules in that shapes matter for placing on the river, whereas colours matter for placement on your board. The scoring of the rows and columns also needs some examples when teaching. But after one play, people will have got it. Plus, it’s a short game. It’s over very quickly, making another game a tempting proposition.

If you like Azul, you’ll probably enjoy this one too. But if, like me, Azul didn’t wow you, this may be more of your cup of tea. I’d be surprised if it doesn’t get nominated for the Spiel Des Jahres.

Zatu Score

Rating

  • Artwork
  • Complexity
  • Replayability
  • Player Interaction
  • Component Quality

You might like

  • The smooth gameplay
  • The pleasant but interesting decisions
  • The tactile nature of the glass pieces
  • The charming art

Might not like

  • Its a very light game
  • Without the expansion, there is not a lot of variability

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