Samurai (Board Game)

Samurai the board game is a fascinating strategy game from the brain of Reiner Knizia. With deceptively simple mechanics, it is more reminiscient of thinking games like chess, Bridge and Go than modern-day titles like Yahtzee.

Set in ancient Japan, players must use tiles that represent religious, military and agricultural influence in order to collect as many Buddhas, hats and rice squares as possible. The map and bits are first-rate, while the scoring mechanism is genius. The score of the player is the number of bits he has least of, so that balanced collecting will always beat a single-resource monopoly.

There's no question that Samurai is a modern classic, and will provide hours of fun to players who enjoy a deep strategy board game with a terrific theme.

For other medieval games, try Hammer of the Scots, Carcassonne - The City, Shadows over Camelot, Citadels, Domaine.

If you're a fan of Reiner Knizia, you may also like Tigris & Euphrates, Ra, Modern Art, Taj Mahal, Amun-Re.

We'll be posting more information about Samurai, such as strategies, rule overviews, a review or two and more. If you can think of something we should include, or there's anything you'd like to tell us about board games, boardgames, a board game or a boardgame, drop us a line at borgamo@gmail.com.