Wouter & Ymke 
Bring fire to your regions and gather resources to expand your tribe!
2-4 players, ages 8+
Playing time: 15 minutes
Designer: Bruno Cathala
Artist: Cyril Bouquet
Publisher: Blue Orange Games
https://blueorangegames.eu/en/
In Kingdomino players are expanding their kingdom, which consists out of five by five squares, starting from their castle – which for this ‘Origins’-version has been replaced by their cave. By drafting tiles and placing them adjacent to territories of the same type, they form groups of the different terrains in order to score points at the end of the game: each region is worth as many points as its number of squares multiplied by the number of fire symbols in it.
The new Kingdomino Origins includes 3 modes:
The ‘Discovery Mode’ is played in the same way as the regular Kingdomino, adding a new terrain type: Volcanoes. These come with fire tokens, allowing you to place extra fires in your regions.
The ‘Totem Mode’ introduces resources that are placed on the tiles and give extra points at the end of the game: the players with the majority of each resource receive the corresponding ‘Totem tiles’; but they also may end up losing that tile again when another player gains majority.
The ‘Tribe Mode’, which is my favourite one, allows you to recruit cavemen by spending resources. These cavemen earn you points for specific types of resources, fires or even other cavemen surrounding them at the end of the game.
The extra points of each of the modes are added to the regular scoring we’re already familiar with from the classic Kingdomino.
As you can see, each of these new modes comes with a few minor additions, which makes it very easy to explain to people who played Kingdomino in the past. The ‘Discovery Mode’ is perfect to introduce new players to the game, with the Volcanoes offering somewhat more flexibility than the regular Kingdomino, whereas the ‘Tribe Mode’ can feel quite challenging when placing your acquired cavemen.
This makes the game suitable for playing with children and family or even as filler with expert players and has certainly earned a nice spot in my collection!
