A love letter to euro games?

It feels so good to play 🌀An Age Contrived again. 🥰 We’ve played and covered this game pretty extensively back when the Kickstarter for it was running last year. Now that Kickstarter has been fulfilled and the game is actually available! You could also check out the game at #SPIEL24 ! 😁

An Age Contrived offers a very unique gameplay experience, somewhat different than most euros we play. I think that is mostly thanks to the cool action selection mechanism of the game. Players have a Transmutation Device 🧮 which acts like a conveyor belt, carrying tiles. Each turn you either push in a new tile and load it up with energy tokens, or take actions, using the energy currently in your tiles. It’s all about managing your pool of energy and using them for multiple purposes. Oh, and the energy tokens are chunky acrylic pieces similar to the tiles in Azul! 🤩

As you play you will upgrade your Transmutation Tiles, unlock more energy tokens but also bind some to the game board. Each player has wildly different asymmetric abilities that they get access to as the game goes by. The primary thing you are doing is taking part in the building of monuments - and let me tell you the cardboard monuments are one of the most satisfying gimmicks I’ve seen in board games. The punchboard tiles have magnets inside them, so they stick on to the metal holders on the game board, as you build them up piece by piece. Furthermore the overall presentation of the game is beautiful, so the amazing looks match the amazing gameplay. 🥰

It’s really hard to talk about this game in a single post, as there are so many systems working in tandem to make the game into what it is, and so many fun ways to get the most out of your turns. I recommend reading our BGG post about the game that we wrote last year! 😉

Oh, and there is an expansion on the horizon, making An Age Contrived even better! Make sure to give it a look at SPIEL if you are there.