Thames & Kosmos My City | Family – Friendly | Legacy Board Game | Kosmos Games | 2 to 4 Players | Ages 10 and Up | Award Winning Designer Reiner Knizia , Blue

Fun. I love learning the rules through each chapter of the legacy game play. My family looks forward to our weekly routine. The best part is that once we've finished learning all the rules through the legacy game play we can continue to play.

Like most legacy games, this has the obvious disadvantage of the learning process built into the game. Even if you get crafty and don't modify the playing pieces "permanently" as directed, you'll still have the KNOWLEDGE of what comes next the next time you play the game, if you try to play the legacy version a second time. So you might say, well, this is an expensive game that you only get to play 24 times! Um yeah, some people play their games more than 24 times. But it turns out that is pretty rare. And should you wan to play more, there is a perpetual version included, too, that you can return to again and again. But really, the legacy functionality is what puts this game over the time. Think you got it all figured out? Well, the foundation of what matters and how you play is going to change a little (or a lot) between each play of the game. So you gotta be on your toes, ready to learn and incorporate a little something new each time, and enjoy the learning as you go process. This has a few cool features: You don't need to learn the whole game at once. You just need to learn the rules for the basic game at first, and then you need to learn or unlearn one or two pieces of the rules each game thereafter. You never get bored with the game playing the same or the same player using the same strategy every time because it plays differently each time and the strategy that worked best the last time may not work best or even at all the next time. -- And what about the game play itself? It is smart. Like lots of other games from this designer, sometimes it feels so abstracted from the source (city building in this case) that it is a puzzle and optimization game and not just thematic. But not in a bad way. It is FUN and the theme works well, and players that don't care about the theme can treat it as a very smart abstract game if they want.

I bought this game because I thought it would be like a Sim City version of Agricola. Then I read the instructions and was intimidated by the 90 minute game play time. It doesn't really take 90 minutes, especially in the beginning and for the "eternal" game play. Here is the game play without giving away any spoilers (I hope). The game is on a grid pattern with tetris shaped buildings. The object is to place all the buildings on the grid in a pattern that leaves the least amount of "green space". This is the "Tetris" part. There are color groups along with shapes, so there are bonus points for grouping the colors together. This is the "Dr. Mario" part. Along with this there are "chapters" and "episodes" - each episode adds a new challenge that builds on top of previous challenges, meeting these challenges gives additional bonus points above the colored buildings and the least open green spaces. Each episode takes 15 to 20 minutes, this is mostly due to the length of time you allow the players to place the buildings. So it could be fast or long depending on how strategic everyone is and how long it takes people to be strategic. The best part is this game is designed to be played over 8 or so chapters and at the end of each episode the winner is given 2 tokens and the 2nd place a single token. What about the 3rd and 4th? well - they are given stickers to place on their board that may provide additional points in later game play. For example - you lose points for open "green space" so in some cases the 3rd and 4th may be given stickers the cover the green space so they have less chances to leave them open. In another example, some challenges provide 3 points, the 3rd and 4th were given a sticker that enabled them to get 5 points for meeting the same challenge in later episodes. This has the effect of not allowing a single person to run away with all the points on every episode, which keeps it challenging even if you are an adult playing with teens and pre-teens. I would totally recommend the game as it takes about 5 minutes to learn the mechanics and is an easy 20 minute game for whenever, like Blokus.

One of the reasons this game is great is that it has both a legacy game and a repayable game in one! My group is working through the legacy game currently and it is great. Not too complicated, easy to learn and easy to teach. Not super competitive but still retains a little player interaction (especially the legacy variant). I highly recommend to anyone who wants a breezy repayable game, or those who want a light legacy game. Note: Not for the hard-core eurogamer

This game is so fun to play with a few friends. It’s on the cheaper side of legacy games, which is great, and is a good mix of luck and strategy. Highly recommend for those who like board games.

We are a board game family and this is among our all-time favorites. My City has two clever play options—legacy and eternal. Legacy is an ongoing campaign (preferably with the same set of players) that builds in complexity revealing new and exciting game elements over multiple play sessions. This option is only played through once because the players’ boards are incrementally, somewhat permanently customized along the way. The legacy game has 24 episodes that will take about 18 hours to complete at 45 minutes per game. In contrast, the eternal option is a stand alone game that has most of the game elements of the legacy option and is played as a single game in one sitting. This option can be replayed over and over—hence the name eternal. An eternal game takes about 30-45 minutes for 4 players. Essentially, the game is a Tetris-like strategy where your lay different shaped and colored pieces to maximize board coverage and configuration for max points. One of the coolest elements of play is everyone plays on their respective boards at the same time so it’s equally fair (i.e. their isn’t any disadvantages to order of play like in most other games). Setup, play, and scoring are all very straightforward. Replay ability is high. Bottom line: Massively fun strategy game that essentially removes getting lucky/unlucky and rewards planning and forethought.

This legacy game has 18 rounds, but each one changes things slightly based on your previous performance. Quite fun (and frustrating!) to try and plan out your city and make adjustments as the cards are turned.

We bought this when I was pregnant during the Texas summer. I felt so trapped indoors and really needed stuff to keep busy and have fun. This game we started playing in the evenings as a little date and connection time. It’s really fun and a great start and stop game.