IKI: A Game of Edo Artisans Board Game For Ages 14+

Product Information

When you build a shop, you add one of your little Kobun meeples to the card. If you use your own shop, not too much happens, other than getting the action on the card. If someone else uses your card, however, then your artisan – for some reason – moves up a space on the card, and a space closer to retirement. Retired cards get added to your player board, and there are bonuses on offer if you manage to collect retired folks of different card colours. I’m the firestarter! There are a lot of components and tokens but first thing’s first, make sure the board is on the correct player count. The 2 player board has fewer stalls and doesn’t have an extra Nagaya. Before each turn you place a mon for workers that weren’t taken previously. Then you reveal four new workers. The rondel, for example, isn’t the usual kind. Instead of choosing how many spaces you’ll move around, you claim one of the places at the top of the board which allow you to move 1, 2, 3, or 4 spaces. If someone else claims the one you want, tough. You can spend the aforementioned sandals to add to your steps, but never go fewer. Towards the end of the game when players are looking to claim the valuable buildings, there’s a real race on to get the necessary resources, and those distance choices become hotly contested.

There are other ways to get iki, for example through certain workers gaining experience in their stalls. There’s also the Nagaya (a set of stalls) harmony bonus at each payday but I’ll go into that later. Set Up Aside from workers, buildings can also be put in the stalls. Once a small boi is placed there they can’t be removed, so it’s a long term investment. Some of the buildings have ongoing effects so sometimes it’s worth it to get one early. Others will only score you points at the end.

Final thoughts on Iki: A Game of Edo Artisans

If you build a building, you pay the resource cost and place it in an empty stall. You don’t do business with buildings and they can be burnt down in fires. Nagaya Harmony Bonus

I really like the two player variant and alternative side of the board. It is a different game offering different strategies but I’m equally pleased to play it at two as I am at four. Iki really does work at two, three and four players quite brilliantly. Throughout the year there are some special events including payday, fires and the changing of seasons. You have to move the exact number of spaces that was determined, however if you have any sandal tokens you can use them to move forward as many extra steps you decide to use. Iki was originally released in 2015 with very different artwork and this recent re-release has jazzed up the graphics and tightened up some of the rules. I love the new artwork so I’m a big supporter of that, but from what I gather the core gameplay is the same. You’re competing to gain the most iki (effectively victory points), which come from a variety of different actions like getting sets of workers, buildings, sets of fish and tobacco pouches to name a few. The artwork of the fish and tobacco items are also very nice.There’s one fewer Nagaya in the 2 player game. And the worker in the middle stall of each Nagaya can be interacted with from both spaces adjacent to it. End Game Scoring I love this game so much, in fact, that it’s hard to find anything negative to say about Iki. The only thing that I feel could be better is the rule book. While it’s laid out in a way that makes sense, it still leaves a lot to be desired. There were a few times that questions arose mid-game and finding the answers to those questions was not the easiest thing to do. The turns go by so rapidly that it would often be my turn again before I’d found the answer that I was looking for. But, at least the answers were there even if we did have to hunt for them and even if the hunting occasionally caused the game’s pacing to lag. At the end of the game, points are gained for a number of areas such as diversity in characters recruited, buildings constructed, fish tokens and pipes/tobacco pouches. Above is a brief explanation of how Iki plays. There are several aspects of the game not covered but hopefully, this gives you enough of an idea as to how the game works. Final Thoughts There is a lot to think about when playing Iki, it is this streamlining of options that makes the game so interesting, and so, so good. The point salad approach to end game scoring with various set collection and bonuses to consider, provides the strategy to make Iki a board game worth returning to, time and time again. It features on my 2022 10 x 10 challenge for exactly that reason.

The board is double-sided, to pare the game down for two players. While two player is good, it’s at its best with three or four players. The extra competition for the shop spaces, and the extra choices with each turn, really bring the game to the boil. It’s so nice to see so many different, lost skills and jobs represented too. Hiring a puppeteer, Buddhist sculptor – or my favourite – the trumpet candy peddler, isn’t something you get to do in many games. Iki is a wonderful light to mid weight euro game that gives your brain a good workout. The game length to decision space is spot on. The game length is around 60 to 90 minutes and for that time you have varied and interesting choices as well some tense gameplay moments and enough time to execute a strategy. The winner is the player with the most Iki at the end of the game, which is a philosophical concept of the Edo period believed to be the ideal way of living among the people. Game Overview Once I finally got the game to the table, I became even more enamored. At first glance, Iki didn’t seem much different from a hundred other games I’d experienced before. But that feeling of sameness soon passed as the game’s intricacies revealed themselves. Subtly complex, like the lines of a well-written haiku, Iki’s inherent beauty becomes apparent the longer you contemplate it. Here’s What You Need To Know

What it’s like

At first glance, Iki seemed like a very unassuming game, or at least it did to me. Recruit some characters, move around a board and gain some resources/money etc. There didn’t seem like much to the game. But I will admit when I am wrong and I was so wrong on this one. Iki is a wonderfully deep game with a lot of interconnecting parts and tough choices. Yet there is a feeling of elegance to the gameplay.