I know that I owe you all some write ups from what I missed and I will integrate those into the next few weeks’ worth of entries but for this week because we played our game only last night, I will just write about a beautiful game that people in the industry have been raving about which is called Meadow by Rebel Studio.
MEADOW (2021)
This is a nature based game in which you are building up your personal meadow filled with different types of grounds and various other items that you may find in a nature-scape.
BGG Description
Meadow is an engaging set collection game with over two hundred unique cards containing hand-painted watercolor illustrations. In the game, players take the role of explorers competing for the title of the most skilled nature observer. To win, they collect cards with the most valuable species, landscapes, and discoveries. Their journey is led by passion, a curiosity of the world, an inquiring mind, and a desire to discover the mysteries of nature. The competition continues at the bonfire where the players race to fulfill the goals of their adventures.
In this medium-weight board game for 1-4 players, you take turns placing path tokens on one of the two boards. Placing a token on the main board allows the player to get cards, but playing them requires meeting certain requirements. Playing a token on the bonfire board activates special actions (which helps to implement a chosen strategy) and gives the opportunity to achieve goals that provide additional points. Throughout the game, players collect cards in their meadow and surroundings area. At the end, the player with the most points on cards and on the bonfire board wins.
Meadow also includes envelopes with additional cards to open at specific moments...
Weight 2.23/5
A Little More Info
The game looks a bit much at first but after just taking a few turns the game was easy to grasp. Each round has a total of four turns (five in a two or three player game) which is based on the path tokens you have.
Placing the tokens on the main board allows you to collect a card X number of spaces away in a row or column and you can play one card from your hand (optional).
Placing a path token on the campfire board (bonfire board as in the description, rulebook says campfire) allows you to take the specific action on the token which are playing two cards, collecting two road pieces, taking any card from the main board, and drawing three cards from a specific deck and keeping one. The fifth path token for the two and three player game is a wild that allows you to copy any of the other actions. Also you can fulfill a goal (optional) if you meet the requirements.
Halfway through the game (when you pass the hourglass) the South and North decks get switched out and the main board gets completely refreshed. The number of rounds played is based on the number of players (six in a 1-3 player game, eight in a 4 player game).
Final scoring is simple. You just add up the point showing on the cards you played and the bonus points for completing the campfire goals.
What we like about the game
The artwork on each card in the game is beautiful. It immediately drew us into the game and we wanted to dive right in a look at all the cards in the game.
We also loved that though it is a medium weighted game, it is not complex to play at all. Even with the 20+ symbols in the game, the game play itself is easy to understand.
With four categories of cards in the game, understanding the purpose of each type is not hard at all. Collecting and playing the cards wisely is the tricky part. The above pictures show the observation cards (added to the ground cards [not pictured] ), landscape cards, and discovery cards (added to the landscape cards).
Next thing we like about the game is that it really does not take long to play. Even with our “normal” distractions, we completed our first game (2 player) in about 45 minutes.
Another thing that we love, really love, about the game is that it is not a table hog. You can comfortably sit around a normal dining room table and have space for everyone’s meadow to grow.
The last thing we want to mention is that the five bonus envelopes add more cards to the game and only one of them add a new symbol and new mechanic to the game. We will slowly integrate each set into our game play.
What we don’t like about the game
After just one play, they only thing we currently do not like (this might change after a few more games) is that we feel certain symbols are much harder to come by.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Is this game worth the hype that it has received? We tend to think so.
Is the game worth the retail price of $55 USD? I would wait until you find it on sale for around $40.
This game will get tabled more and we will introduce it others that we feel would be able to grasp all the symbols in the game.
***Endnote: There is an expansion coming soon for the game... Meadow: Downstream***
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