IKI: A Game of Edo Artisans Board Game For Ages 14+

Product Information

Iki is a wonderful light to mid weight euro game that gives your brain a good workout. The game length to decision space is spot on. The game length is around 60 to 90 minutes and for that time you have varied and interesting choices as well some tense gameplay moments and enough time to execute a strategy. If you build a building, you pay the resource cost and place it in an empty stall. You don’t do business with buildings and they can be burnt down in fires. Nagaya Harmony Bonus

If you couldn’t tell, I think Iki is an excellent game. It definitely takes a while to get your head around it cause there are so many meeples and they all do different things. There are so many different ways to earn points and it has the potential to overwhelm people so it isn’t a game I’d put in front of a beginner. But on the other hand, it means the game has depth and allows players to develop better strategies as they play more, so it gets better with time. With the exception of the fear and risk of near-uncontrollable fires sweeping through your shops and leaving you in utter carnage, playing Iki is a relatively calm stroll around the streets of ancient Tokyo. However, during that calm stroll you will watch the cogs whir in other player’s as they try to maximise every move, it’s how you will look on your turn too! Let me start by saying there is nothing new within the box of Iki: A Game of Edo Artisans. No amazing mechanic that you won’t have seen before. However, what it does do is mesh and meld a host of really fun mechanics and decisions into a board game in a smooth and seamless way. Offering a point salad of scoring opportunities.Throughout the year there are some special events including payday, fires and the changing of seasons. Before each turn you place a mon for workers that weren’t taken previously. Then you reveal four new workers. Once you get your head around Iki it makes sense but there are a few unconventional mechanics and ideas in the game that might be confusing. I’ll be doing my best to clear the fog and teach you how to play Iki. Aim

Every loop around the board will train workers in your shops. Employees are also trained when activated by other players. When they reach the top of their career path they retire and move to that player’s personal board for further set collection and ongoing benefits. Placing workers in shops also offers scoring opportunities if they are in districts with vendors of the same type. You will get even more points if those same-trade vendors are all yours! There is a lot to think about when playing Iki, it is this streamlining of options that makes the game so interesting, and so, so good. The point salad approach to end game scoring with various set collection and bonuses to consider, provides the strategy to make Iki a board game worth returning to, time and time again. It features on my 2022 10 x 10 challenge for exactly that reason.I really like the two player variant and alternative side of the board. It is a different game offering different strategies but I’m equally pleased to play it at two as I am at four. Iki really does work at two, three and four players quite brilliantly. Building a building (which can give you ongoing bonuses or end game bonuses, for example, the Merchant House gives you three iki for each leftover scandal you have, with a maximum of 30 points you can get this way)

Iki is a wonderful game. The artwork and presentation throughout is beautiful, and the graphic design is clear and understandable. For each season, when the cards and collectables refresh, there are more cards than you need, so you’ll always get a fresh combination of artisans to hire. There are so many neat little touches which add to the experience. Take, for example, the Harmony bonuses at the end of each season. Players who group like-coloured buildings together in a quadrant all benefit, so there’s this really juicy communal co-operation to exploit. Before I’d even learned to play, I could already feel myself being won over. Such is Iki’s table presence. Its visual appeal is a siren’s song and I am a mere sailor, powerless to resist its allure.

Final thoughts on Iki: A Game of Edo Artisans

The riveting strategy can cause a little down time between turns. Most people will be grateful for this additional thinking time. It allows moments to optimise every single movement, as analysis paralysis can set in quite hard. However, more often than not the game saunters along at an enjoyable pace. Nihonbashi is the focus of IKI: A Game of EDO Artisans, which brings you on a journey through the famed street of old Tokyo. Hear the voices of Nihonbashi Bridge's great fish market. Meet the professionals, who carry out 700­-800 different jobs. Enter the interactivity of the shoppers and vendors. Become one with the townspeople. Here’s the part where the review gets skewed by my bias. I freaking love a rondel in a game. It comes from my first introduction to them with Hamburgum, a game I still love. For the uninitiated among you, a rondel is usually a wheel of actions, where each player chooses how many steps around they move each turn. It creates loads of interesting decisions. The main mechanism in Iki is a giant rondel, which is tied into the design of the town. Each step around visits a different set of shops, and presents different actions.

At first glance, Iki seemed like a very unassuming game, or at least it did to me. Recruit some characters, move around a board and gain some resources/money etc. There didn't seem like much to the game. But I will admit when I am wrong and I was so wrong on this one. Iki is a wonderfully deep game with a lot of interconnecting parts and tough choices. Yet there is a feeling of elegance to the gameplay. I really liked the artwork of the original board game, imitating the Ukiyo-e prints of the period. Equally though, I understand the necessity for updating it. I think David Sitbon has done an extraordinary job illustrating all the cards and with the designer, create clear and concise iconography that works.

Gameplay

There are a lot of components and tokens but first thing’s first, make sure the board is on the correct player count. The 2 player board has fewer stalls and doesn’t have an extra Nagaya. At the end of the game, you combine the scores from the criteria I mentioned in the Aim section at the beginning alongside the iki you got during the game.