I'm very glad they made this game - it has less broad appeal than Point Salad but I still think I could play it with some of my family. Another method to keep track of how to refill the tableau is to keep the cards in the same positions and to the side as you pay for things - it takes less time than messing with the tokens. One thing worth mentioning is that the card quality is not as good as Point Salad. I will definitely sleeve these cards to protect them from wear and tear.
I'm definitely surprised by all of the Point Salad love. I enjoy it, but to echo Wendy, it is such a frivolous, no nothing game, I can't see ever wanting to play it over Point City, to just completely oppose Tom's opinion here. I'm 1,000% with Wendy on this, this took the basic idea of the card play in Point Salad and just totally improved upon it, giving some actual meat to the gameplay. I'll still Keep Point Salad, but Point City is something special.
Yeah, I’m feeling pretty mixed on this. I think ultimately I agree with Tom that Point Salad did what it did *so* well. It was so fast, so pleasing, so accessible, had such a range of player counts. Point City on the other hand is…well it still feels pretty solid design-wise-but I’m not sure if it is in any way a better Splendor. It’s in that strange realm of solid game that doesn’t necessarily feel like it has anything that makes me want to pull it from the shelf more than other games. I doubt that very many people will regret backing this one-but for me, Point Salad caught lightning in a bottle. This is a more “sophisticated” version but because of that, I fear, it gets bumped up a tier into a class of games where I’m not sure it stands as confidently.
Played it once at GenCon, and I like it pretty well. I can see some of the nits on it though. I love Point Salad, and the quickness of that one, but my partner is not into it that much, so Salad doesn't get played much. She's all about Point City though, so maybe it will get played more.
It's very much like Splendor, yes, but a few things that were improved. For example the card tiers. Somehow this review doesn't mention it explicitly enough, but the three card tiers make the arc of the game better thana splendor. Somehow Splendor always had this strange combo of higher level card and nobles which i could never figure out. Somehow I am not sure if there really is that rule for taking the top two cards from the draw deck. Either I must have overlooked it or you guys added it afterwards, but it certainly is something which could tilt the game's balance. Yes, this game can take a bit longer with 4, but I wouldn't say that its more complicated than Splendor...
@daviddanin8766 it depends on what they didn't like about Splendor. If the idea of snagging gems and cards out from under your opponent is what they didn't like, Duel still has that. If they felt like there wasn't enough there or it became samey quickly, Duel solved those problems in multiple ways.
@@Sparticuse yeah! My partner was missing an element of tension that you'd get from a well curated 2 player game (but I think that's mostly due to the fact that we play with each other a lot so we tend to like 2 player games a lot!) Thanks for the tip :)
I would call it a ‘discount engine builder’. That’s how I describe it when I teach Splendor. IMHO that both covers it as well as distinguishes it enough from just ‘engine builder’. Kind regards Tony White
Wait, do people not like the term "ratcheting"? I thought that was a great word for that mechanism. As for this game, this looks WAY Better at 2 players than at a higher player count. You can do some planning, whereas at more the board will change dramatically, a la Five Tribes.
It's not better than one-way street/road/path, which is the same exact thing and doesn't need explaining. Saying it's one way means you can't go backwards. Why make it more difficult to understand?
@@kevinbhieey9188I like ratcheting because it implies you are going a certain distance and then stopping, but never backwards. A one way road feels more like you're just driving right on through. The imagery works better for me, but to each their own.
I get that same feeling with Point Salad. You can't plan as much at a higher player count because the cards will change so much. With the larger tableau and lower max player count, this one might play better at all counts with respect to planning. I've yet to play it, though. I can see it bogging down a bit more than Point Salad.
It's Simplified Splendor ('discount engine'? can I suggest that?) mixed with elements from Targi and Point Salad. Definitly not original and if you already have Splendor at home, you need to consider if the differences are worth getting. And ratchet is a great great name!
@@Wylie288 Originality is part of the things you can look for in a game. One can choose to regard this aspect more highly than another person. It really is splendor with some modifications in the way to acquire resources and have the victory point target cards to show up. Spiced with the civic buildings bonus points. If you are a person who looks at it and goes 'hey, it's basically the same game as I already have at home', you might choose not to buy it because of that. It's not always important to everyone, but it IS important to a lot of people who don't want to spend their money and get a game that basically does what a game they already have does. That's why it's important to compare to other games. especially best sellers like splendor.
I'm with Wendy and I'm glad I preordered this a while ago. It looks like another clever, fun weeknight couples game... of which I have many but I always welcome a new one. 😊
Thanks, everyone! The theme of point salad attracted casual gamers. I feel this one won’t have the same ability. It still looks like a good game that I would enjoy.
This sounds like that perfectly dreadful mix of light/themeless and fiddly. The thing Chris mentioned about having to remember which card side was up and where it was seems annoying to keep up with, especially in a game where every card is just a color and a shape and a number. Definitely not up my alley
I just sold off point salad. I thought it would be my great intro game to people, but instead it just bored them. I'm more interested in this game, but not for the intro purpose. Still looking for a game that ANYONE can play, but still feels exciting (Looking to buy incan gold).
Between this Fantastic Factories and Furnace I'm gonna need my "accessible engine builders" to pick a more interesting theme... At least in Splendor the gem collecting is something
I would play point city over point salad anytime. Game is simple enough to play it with anybody and have a little bit more depth to make it interesting.
I love extra complexity IF it was as long as point salad. Otherwise, it falls into the 7 Wonders trap too complex and long for casuals but too simple and boring for heavy gamers.
Point salad is a 10 for me. The quick snappy turns combined with the tactical decision space of how to build your engine, drafting that actually matters, player interacting of what you reveal or remove for the next player, should you take a point card or condition card, and the absurdly highscores in the hundreds. Point city is an 8.5 for me (based off one play). I like the extra layer of engine building, but that extra engine building unfortunately doesn't translate to extra points like I was hoping and the name of the game suggests. I enjoy the crunchy decisions of selecting 2 orthogonally adjacent cards and what you flip or leave adjacently behind matters. 17 turns is way too few imo, but the game is already longer than point salad and idk if I'd want it to go longer to get the extra cards I think it needs. More plays will help. I still really like it. But i had higher expectations.
I don't know that there was anything 'build your engine'-related about Point Salad though, was there? It was entirely building toward end game scoring.
Point salad is such trash. It's so basic and boring. There are literally 1,000 different fillers I would much rather play before that one. Point City is much better overall.
I don’t have point salad and took a look at the gameplay videos. You are right, point salad is so pointless. Point city is so much better. I have played it a few times and love it as a filler game
Now we need a Christmas game in the series called Point Settia.
I'm very glad they made this game - it has less broad appeal than Point Salad but I still think I could play it with some of my family.
Another method to keep track of how to refill the tableau is to keep the cards in the same positions and to the side as you pay for things - it takes less time than messing with the tokens.
One thing worth mentioning is that the card quality is not as good as Point Salad. I will definitely sleeve these cards to protect them from wear and tear.
I'm definitely surprised by all of the Point Salad love. I enjoy it, but to echo Wendy, it is such a frivolous, no nothing game, I can't see ever wanting to play it over Point City, to just completely oppose Tom's opinion here. I'm 1,000% with Wendy on this, this took the basic idea of the card play in Point Salad and just totally improved upon it, giving some actual meat to the gameplay. I'll still Keep Point Salad, but Point City is something special.
Thanks for reviewing. May try it out as we enjoyed Point Salad.
Yeah, I’m feeling pretty mixed on this. I think ultimately I agree with Tom that Point Salad did what it did *so* well. It was so fast, so pleasing, so accessible, had such a range of player counts. Point City on the other hand is…well it still feels pretty solid design-wise-but I’m not sure if it is in any way a better Splendor. It’s in that strange realm of solid game that doesn’t necessarily feel like it has anything that makes me want to pull it from the shelf more than other games.
I doubt that very many people will regret backing this one-but for me, Point Salad caught lightning in a bottle. This is a more “sophisticated” version but because of that, I fear, it gets bumped up a tier into a class of games where I’m not sure it stands as confidently.
Played it once at GenCon, and I like it pretty well. I can see some of the nits on it though. I love Point Salad, and the quickness of that one, but my partner is not into it that much, so Salad doesn't get played much. She's all about Point City though, so maybe it will get played more.
Seriously, you guys are killing it with these video titles.
At the end, I think you meant to say “Go to town on your veggies”. 😊
So Point Salad meets Splendor
It's very much like Splendor, yes, but a few things that were improved. For example the card tiers. Somehow this review doesn't mention it explicitly enough, but the three card tiers make the arc of the game better thana splendor. Somehow Splendor always had this strange combo of higher level card and nobles which i could never figure out. Somehow I am not sure if there really is that rule for taking the top two cards from the draw deck. Either I must have overlooked it or you guys added it afterwards, but it certainly is something which could tilt the game's balance.
Yes, this game can take a bit longer with 4, but I wouldn't say that its more complicated than Splendor...
This looks good, but I already have Point Salad for game night filler, and I have Splendor Duel for game nights with my spouse.
Would you say that for a partner who didn't really enjoy regular splendor, would they enjoy the Duel version at all?
@daviddanin8766 it depends on what they didn't like about Splendor. If the idea of snagging gems and cards out from under your opponent is what they didn't like, Duel still has that. If they felt like there wasn't enough there or it became samey quickly, Duel solved those problems in multiple ways.
@@Sparticuse yeah! My partner was missing an element of tension that you'd get from a well curated 2 player game (but I think that's mostly due to the fact that we play with each other a lot so we tend to like 2 player games a lot!) Thanks for the tip :)
I would call it a ‘discount engine builder’. That’s how I describe it when I teach Splendor. IMHO that both covers it as well as distinguishes it enough from just ‘engine builder’. Kind regards Tony White
Wait, do people not like the term "ratcheting"? I thought that was a great word for that mechanism.
As for this game, this looks WAY Better at 2 players than at a higher player count. You can do some planning, whereas at more the board will change dramatically, a la Five Tribes.
It's not better than one-way street/road/path, which is the same exact thing and doesn't need explaining. Saying it's one way means you can't go backwards. Why make it more difficult to understand?
@@kevinbhieey9188I like ratcheting because it implies you are going a certain distance and then stopping, but never backwards. A one way road feels more like you're just driving right on through. The imagery works better for me, but to each their own.
I get that same feeling with Point Salad. You can't plan as much at a higher player count because the cards will change so much. With the larger tableau and lower max player count, this one might play better at all counts with respect to planning. I've yet to play it, though. I can see it bogging down a bit more than Point Salad.
"Splendor Killer" was not spoken in this review, even as a joke, I was surprised. ;)
Because splendor duel already killed splendor
@@joshjenson8111Unless you want to play with more than 2…
It's Simplified Splendor ('discount engine'? can I suggest that?) mixed with elements from Targi and Point Salad.
Definitly not original and if you already have Splendor at home, you need to consider if the differences are worth getting.
And ratchet is a great great name!
@@Wylie288
Originality is part of the things you can look for in a game.
One can choose to regard this aspect more highly than another person.
It really is splendor with some modifications in the way to acquire resources and have the victory point target cards to show up. Spiced with the civic buildings bonus points.
If you are a person who looks at it and goes 'hey, it's basically the same game as I already have at home', you might choose not to buy it because of that.
It's not always important to everyone, but it IS important to a lot of people who don't want to spend their money and get a game that basically does what a game they already have does. That's why it's important to compare to other games. especially best sellers like splendor.
whats the threshold for Seal of Excellence? their avg score was 7.5
At least one reviewer has to give it a score of 8.5+
If if I have neither played Point City nor splendor before, which would you guys recommend I purchase?
Splendor mechanism, Machi Koro mechanism, the Concordia action...
I'm with Wendy and I'm glad I preordered this a while ago. It looks like another clever, fun weeknight couples game... of which I have many but I always welcome a new one. 😊
When I explain permanent 1/turn resources I tell my friends it’s like resources in Sid Meier’s Civilization 😂
Thanks, everyone! The theme of point salad attracted casual gamers. I feel this one won’t have the same ability. It still looks like a good game that I would enjoy.
There is and was only a 1% chance Chris Yi would NOT be in this video or have his input on the title.
Thanks for being the voice of reason Wendy!
This sounds like that perfectly dreadful mix of light/themeless and fiddly. The thing Chris mentioned about having to remember which card side was up and where it was seems annoying to keep up with, especially in a game where every card is just a color and a shape and a number. Definitely not up my alley
Seems fun for only one game or maybe one session. But I don’t see why I’d play this over wingspan or Targi for two players
Splendor. No greater compliment
I really only
like Point Salad at 2 players; even then it’s only alight. This looks more interesting.
From the Overview, I just can't see myself pulling this out over Splendor.
After playing this I can’t imagine wanting to play Splendor over it.
I just sold off point salad. I thought it would be my great intro game to people, but instead it just bored them. I'm more interested in this game, but not for the intro purpose.
Still looking for a game that ANYONE can play, but still feels exciting (Looking to buy incan gold).
Perhaps “ For Sale”?
Telestrations, especially for Christmas, when your uncle leaves the drawing page blank half way through because he didn’t know what to draw.
@@longtimeninerfan1309for sale is my everyone game
Between this Fantastic Factories and Furnace I'm gonna need my "accessible engine builders" to pick a more interesting theme... At least in Splendor the gem collecting is something
Title puns continue to be on point.
I would play point city over point salad anytime. Game is simple enough to play it with anybody and have a little bit more depth to make it interesting.
I love extra complexity IF it was as long as point salad. Otherwise, it falls into the 7 Wonders trap too complex and long for casuals but too simple and boring for heavy gamers.
I Was about to get point salad, now I will wait for this
Point Salad is a must get!!!
Point salad is a 10 for me. The quick snappy turns combined with the tactical decision space of how to build your engine, drafting that actually matters, player interacting of what you reveal or remove for the next player, should you take a point card or condition card, and the absurdly highscores in the hundreds.
Point city is an 8.5 for me (based off one play). I like the extra layer of engine building, but that extra engine building unfortunately doesn't translate to extra points like I was hoping and the name of the game suggests. I enjoy the crunchy decisions of selecting 2 orthogonally adjacent cards and what you flip or leave adjacently behind matters. 17 turns is way too few imo, but the game is already longer than point salad and idk if I'd want it to go longer to get the extra cards I think it needs.
More plays will help. I still really like it. But i had higher expectations.
I don't know that there was anything 'build your engine'-related about Point Salad though, was there? It was entirely building toward end game scoring.
@@RickKoeppen yeah I guess you're right. But getting multiple scoring cards that combo to score for the same thing feels engine builder-ish.
"Herpes resource". You're welcome.
I like “racheting”
Discounts
Splendor was boring for me. The spatial element alone makes this a better game.
test 1
it's just splendor
Seems like one of the ugliest games out there. 🤔
Point salad is such trash. It's so basic and boring. There are literally 1,000 different fillers I would much rather play before that one. Point City is much better overall.
Wow! I don't think I could name 1000 fillers. I'm very impressed!
You are so wrong and so delusional
@@thedicetower ok, maybe it was a bit hyperbolic. Lol. To each their own.
I don’t have point salad and took a look at the gameplay videos. You are right, point salad is so pointless. Point city is so much better. I have played it a few times and love it as a filler game
2 points for Team Point City! Am I winning the vote yet?