I love a trip to the beach, the surf and the sand is such a great relaxing experience that I will always go back to in the summer. When we lay down the towels, put up the umbrellas and get out the cooler the day lays ahead for a lot of fun options. My first choice is always to grab the shovel, bucket and start building a sandcastle. Today we are going to take a trip to the beach and see who can build the best one!
Sandcastles is published by Pandasaurus Games and designed by Alex Cutler. The artist is Gica Tam. The game plays 2-6 players in 20 mins.
Overview:
Sandcastles is a tile-drafting and tile-laying game for 2–6 players, ages 8 and up. Over 15 rounds, players build a sandcastle within a limited 5 × 5 grid, placing tiles to create scoring combinations and collect points. Highest score wins!
Gameplay:
Shuffle the sandcastle tiles and place them face down in a central supply. Each player takes a starter tile and places it in front of them. The starter tile marks the bottom center of their 5 × 5 building area. Choose a starting player. The starting player rotates clockwise after each round.
Each round, the starting player draws a number of tiles equal to the number of players and keeps them face down in a stack. The starting player reveals the top tile and chooses to either take it or pass it to the left. Each player who receives the tile makes the same choice. Once a player takes a tile, they are finished drafting for that round.
The remaining tiles are revealed one at a time for the players who have not yet selected a tile. The last player must take the tile offered to them. After selecting a tile, each player adds it to their castle. Sand tiles must be placed within the 5 × 5 grid and either sit on the lowest available level or directly on top of another sand tile. They cannot be suspended in empty space. Tiles cannot be rotated and must remain in their intended orientation.
Sky tiles are placed in the top row and float at the top while building your castle. At the end of the game, they drop down onto the highest sand tiles in their columns. Play continues for 15 rounds, with each player adding one tile per round. After the final round, players score their completed castles. Add all feature points and bonuses together and the player with the highest total wins!
Impressions:
We love tile games, and Sandcastles is a great addition to that style of games. It’s a game that will get to the table really quickly with instruction and teach, we found that both new and seasoned gamers could pick it up quickly.
This is a great game for families, the play isn’t hard to decide and the limited column choice of 5 gives you simple but thoughtful placement choices to make. Inexperienced gamers and younger players enjoyed the game because it didn’t overwhelm them with the play.
Overall this is a great new addition to the games from Pandasaurus and one that will have a place in my collection for some time to come. So grab your shovels and buckets and lets get to the beach and see who can build the best sancastle!
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