La Stanza
This is a clever heavyweight game (no surprise, given who designed it) that I thoroughly enjoyed when I tried it at the UK Games Expo. The theme is the Enlightenment with players investing in the art, science and exploration that powered the Renaissance.
The key to the game is recruiting the right people for the actions you want to take. However, the people are spread around the 'rooms' on the board, so players need to plan their sequence of moves according to who they need to recruit when for which actions. And they can only have so many people at a time. Thus, compromises and decisions have to be made.
Actions give players resources, money and points. The first two help them get more of the last, of course, as do the very useful bonus tiles that can be picked up in the right places. This is a bit dry, but still makes for an entertaining challenge.
For 2-4 players, aged 10+, playing time 60-90 minutes: £50.00 (£41.67 without tax outside the UK)
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