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When I first saw Land vs Sea, I thought I knew what I was getting. Hex tiles, soft colours, a shared map, that whole relaxed tile-laying vibe. Something calm. Something you pull out at the end of the evening when no one wants to think too hard.
But after a few turns, it becomes clear this game isn’t really about relaxing. It’s about watching someone casually finish something you were working on, taking the bonus, and smiling while they do it. The map grows slowly, but the game stops feeling gentle quite early on.
The idea is simple enough. Everyone builds one shared map with double-sided tiles, but not everyone wants the same things to score. One side cares about land, the other about sea. Same map, different priorities. That’s about it. And somehow, that’s enough to make you hesitate more than you’d like.
👥 2-4 players, ages 10+
⌛ Playing time: 40 minutes
📝 Design & artwork: Jon-Paul Jacques
🏢 Publisher: Good Games Publishing (review copy provided)
Gameplay overview
At the start, players are assigned land or sea. Everyone has two tiles in hand. Land goes first.
On your turn, you place one tile next to the map. You choose which side to use, and all edges have to match. Land to land, sea to sea. Nothing special there. Most of the time, something fits. The real question is whether you should play it there.
As the map grows, areas start to form, and once one is fully enclosed, it scores straight away.
Some tiles come with actions. One lets you immediately place your second tile. Another lets you steal a tile from another player. You can’t steal someone’s last tile, and if you do steal one, you don’t get to play it right away. Sometimes the map creates a fully enclosed hole, surrounded by six matching edges. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does, you drop in the volcano or whirlpool tile, matching the terrain.
Scoring is where things get interesting. Land areas score points for the land player, sea areas for sea, one point per tile. That part is predictable. The twist is that whoever closes an area gets all the bonus icons inside it, even if the area itself scores for the other side. So you’ll often find yourself finishing an area that helps your opponent, just to grab the bonuses. You’ll often hate yourself a little for doing it. And then you’ll probably do it again.
At the end of your turn, you draw from one of the two face-down stacks until you’re back to two tiles, placing them face up in front of you without showing the hidden side. Then it’s the next player’s turn.
The game ends when the last tile is placed. Highest score wins.
Additional scoring options
After a few games, you can add extra scoring systems. You don’t have to, but the game clearly expects you to eventually.
Mountains and coral add special sections that score immediately when they connect. Mountains score for land, coral for sea. Every time you extend a chain, points are scored right away, one point per section in the whole chain. It doesn’t matter who placed the earlier tiles. If you connect it, you trigger it.
Caravans and ships work a bit differently. When you place one next to another matching icon, you score two points. At the end of the game, these icons form trade routes that score by majority. More caravans means land scores, more ships means sea scores.
You can use these modules separately or together. Together, things get busy. Not bad, just busy. You’ll often need a moment to double-check what’s scoring and why.
Three-player mode
The three-player mode adds a third role, the cartographer. This player doesn’t score land or sea areas at all. Instead, they live entirely off bonuses.
Land and sea score areas as usual, but every bonus icon from a completed area goes to whoever closes it. For the cartographer, this is everything. Suddenly, finishing areas becomes even more competitive.
Mountains and coral also change here. All chain scoring goes to the cartographer, no matter who placed the tiles. Land and sea get nothing from them. Caravans and ships still give immediate points when placed, but at the end of the game, tied trade routes score for the cartographer instead.
It’s clever, I think, but also more demanding. There’s a lot going on, and the balance feels tighter. I wouldn’t play this mode with new players, and I wouldn’t expect it to be everyone’s favourite.
Four-player mode
With four players, the game is played in teams. Two land, two sea. Teams share a score, but you’re not allowed to share information about your tiles. Not even with your teammate.
Waypoints are strongly recommended here. They’re small markers you can place on the board to hint at what you’d like to see completed. It’s a limited way to communicate, but it works better than open discussion would. There’s also a free play option if your group prefers talking things through, as long as hidden information stays hidden.
Artwork, components, and visual design
The production is clean and understated. Nothing special. It just works, and that’s enough for this game.
The tiles are easy to read. Land is warm and sandy, sea is bright blue, and the coastlines are always clear. That matters more than it sounds once the board fills up.
The illustrations are small but full of character. Animals, ships, coral, mountains. Everything is part of the landscape, not floating on top as abstract icons. Most of the time, this works really well. Occasionally, especially with caravans and ships, icons can blend into the artwork a bit too much and require a second look.
The scoreboard is printed inside the box insert, which sits on the table during play. It’s practical and a little unusual, but it works. Wooden discs track scores. The player aids use illustrations instead of explanations, which helps a lot, especially if English isn’t everyone’s first language.
Our experience
Land vs Sea plays fast. Turns are short, and things resolve quickly. But because everything happens on one shared map, almost every move matters straight away. You’ll often find yourself reacting rather than planning far ahead.
The scoring doesn’t really let you relax. Areas score for one side, bonuses for another, and those two things rarely line up. You’ll often finish areas for your opponent because the bonuses are too tempting. It feels wrong. Then it feels clever. Then it feels wrong again when they do the same to you.
In two-player games, this works best. The map turns into a bit of back and forth. Do you close something small and safe now, or leave it open and hope to grab more bonuses later? Big areas look impressive, but they’re risky. If they’re not finished, they score nothing. And there’s no extra reward for making them big in the first place.
Action tiles can swing things quickly. Play again can lock something in before your opponent can react. Steal can completely ruin a plan. These moments are exciting, but they can also feel abrupt, especially when a volcano or whirlpool lands in just the right spot and suddenly a lot of points move at once.
With all scoring options enabled, the game becomes more layered. It can work really well, but it’s also a bit much if you prefer keeping things simple. Late in the game, turns slow down as everyone double-checks connections and scoring. It’s not difficult, but it does ask for focus.
Our thoughts
This is very much a game about interaction. If you want to build your own thing without being bothered, this isn’t it. Your moves affect others constantly, and you can’t really avoid that.
The core idea, areas scoring for one side and bonuses for whoever closes them, is what makes the game work. It forces decisions and stops players from playing too safely. The action tiles mess with timing, and the extra scoring gives you more to keep in your head.
With everything turned on, the game can feel dense. For some players, that’s the appeal. For others, it takes away from the clean tension of the base game, which I think holds up very well on its own.
Strategically, small areas tend to be better than big ones. Splitting regions is strong. Leaving things unfinished is dangerous. None of this is hidden, but it’s easy to ignore when the board looks so friendly.
We kept coming back to the two-player game. It feels focused and sharp without becoming noisy. It doesn’t reinvent tile-laying games, and if you’ve played things like Carcassonne, a lot of this will feel familiar. But the land and sea split means you’re rarely just helping yourself.
It rewards paying attention and staying flexible, and it keeps you involved right up to the last tile. The map keeps shifting, and you’re constantly adjusting small plans rather than committing to big ones. If that sounds appealing, there’s a lot here to come back to. It fits well into an evening, doesn’t overstay its welcome, and leaves you feeling like you made a lot of small decisions that actually mattered. That’s usually enough for me.
📝 We received a copy of the game from Good Games Publishing.
