Bag of Games

Stone Age, designed by Bernd Brunnhofer (Michael Tummelhofer) is another game of resource gathering and managing workers just like in games such as Caylus or Agricola. Players control prehistoric communities who are competing for resources. They develop them by growing their societies larger, discovering tools and growing food supply. Winning player has most efficiently developed his/hers society. Simply put the goal is to gather the most victory points around the table and you get them by increasing population, gathering resources to build huts and establishing richer culture. This means you’ll be having multiple paths to victory, which always is a nice addition to the game. In Stone Age, the balance between luck and strategy is just right and makes it fun game to play.

The visuals and material used in the game are very good looking and well made. The art by Michael Mendez is delightful. We could say that the strong theme of the game is in synergy with interesting game mechanics. The pieces included are just fun to play with. The game supports two to four players and the game takes about 60-90 minutes to complete. Of course, the first game is a bit longer cause you learn the rules. One round includes three stages: 1) Place your cavemen to the board, 2) Use actions where the cavemen do the actions according their place at the board and finally 3) Feed your people.

Placing your cavemen
The first phase in the round is placing your people the board. In the beginning you’ll have five people and according the places at the board they’ll breed, do hunting, gather resources or create tools. The tick is to understand the value of the cavemen and the resources you have. Having too many cavemen too soon can end up in disaster when it is time to feed your people. So you’ll be wanting to send cavemen to places where they benefit your society the most.

Actions
Depending where your cavemen are on the board, you’ll gather resources (such as wood, stone, gold, brick) or do actions according to it. You may build tools which will add modifiers when you go gathering resources. Resource gathering happens with the help of dice thus modifiers can be a nice addition. First you count how many cavemen are i.e hunting and according to their number, you get that many dice to use, then you add the modifiers and make your roll. You can also build huts or acquire civilization cards (and gain victory points) if you have enough resources to pay for them. There are three different ways to gain points. You can build huts to instantly gain victory points according the value shown in the hut or you can gain points at the games end by certain combination of cards. One option to gain victory points is by multiplying particular area of the game (let’s say you have constructed lots of huts) with the amount specific civilization cards (which show the amount of workers). The juicy bit is to choose strategy according your gaming style.

Feed your people
No community survives without food and in Stone Age it has only one purpose.:Feeding your cavemen. If you cannot feed them, you’ll lose resources or worse; victory points. Once again,according to your strategy, there are different ways keeping your people fed. You may want to build sustainable platform by increasing your food production OR you can go hunting when you need. The choice of feeding your people will affect other aspects of the game and can make big difference!

The feeling of the game is actually light strategy, but the reality is rather different and shows that the game has depth. One nice addition is that there is just enough chance to give little surprises during the gameplay. Just enough, but not too much. Let’s say it is in delicate balance for my liking. It would be unfair to say that the winner in Stone Age is chosen randomly since this IS a strategy game. One which requires focus. I enjoy the fact that players are active almost all the time and there isn’t big delays waiting for other players. It creates a captivating feeling  so you won’t feel bored and the game steadily moves forward. The thing is, I cannot imagine anyone who could not play this game. It is simple, it is deep enough, you can play it with two players and it is not too serious. As a whole, I like the game very much and I recommend it to everyone. 4/5

PRO’s
Quality
Strategic
Engaging

CON’s
Lack of five player support