Dorfromantik: A Peaceful Village

 


Dorfromantik in German means "village romanticization" and was first published as a video game. The board game adaption won the coveted "Spiel des Jahres" (Game of the Year) in 2023. The game is cooperative and a legacy game (after all that is why we are here).


Cathy and first attempted Dorfromantik on a lazy spring afternoon. We lit some candles and played some relaxing music. The game went well. We quickly achieved all of our goals, but something felt wrong... the game was too easy. I suspected that I had not read the rulebook carefully enough. Sure enough, we were not playing correctly.

A few days later we tried again. This time the game was much more difficult. We didn't even score enough points to unlock the first mystery box. Some reviewers of Dorfromantik will complain that it is not a game at all, but a sort of peaceful puzzle. Those reviewers are wrong. The game is full of strategy- enough strategy to keep the heart-pumping and the brain-ticking. And yet, it is not a game that you can lose. You can just... win less.

But we look forward to unlocking the techniques that will give us the high scores. After all there are mystery boxes to unlock and goals to achieve. Play well gamers.



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