It’s time for a Mexican party! In Fiesta Mexicana, the players have offered their help to organize a huge party. The visitors have come in large numbers and it’s your job to make sure everyone can enjoy the tasty meals.
2-4 players, ages 8+
Playing time: 30 minutes
Designers: Christian Fiore & Knut Happel
Artwork: Fiore GmbH
Publisher: 999 Games
https://www.999games.nl/
Each player has the task of presenting the dishes on his table as nicely as possible, and to fulfill the wishes of the guests as best as they can.
They each receive a player board with numbers in front of them, with which they’ll place bids during the game and determine where exactly the plates will be placed. If you don’t win a bid and are therefore not allowed to place a dish, you can rotate your board so that the new numbers with which you can now bid are visible.
Each time a player places a new plate, they receive points for it, depending on the number of skulls depicted and whether or not they complete a dip. As soon as one of the players has filled their player board entirely, the game ends, and extra points are scored for completed task cards. The player with the most points wins the game!
Fiesta Mexicana is a quick playing family game, with very accessible rules that anyone can learn to play in a few minutes. The gameplay’s very straightforward, there’s a bit of set collection with players trying to complete their task cards while scoring as many points as they can on the way.
The bidding mechanism isn’t very complex but still feels very original; the further the game progresses, the fewer possibilities you will have, and there’s definitely more tactics in the game than at first appears.
The component quality is good, the only downside for me is the box size; it’s made to fit the size of the player boards, which makes there’s pretty much more air than components in the box.
If you often play games with your non gamer friends or with your family, then you might want to give this one a shot!
Tabletopping 