Evergreen, the evergreen?
Gen Con is coming up this week. Unfortunately we aren't there this year, but it does mean that SPIEL is happening soon too! 🥳 We decided to revisit some games we bought last year at SPIEL with the #RoadToEssen hashtag - to see whether they held up or if they were just the cult of the new. And starting out this series, let's look at 🌳Evergreen🌳 first (though we actually bought it at GenCon22).
Evergreen is a really cool gateway game 😊 - everyone is planting and growing trees on their own planet board, trying to make big forests that get as much light as possible, and also trying to focus on the most fertile biomes. This is one of those easy to learn games, where after just a few turns you start to notice the depth of strategy behind your decisions. 🕵️ So I think it's fun for both gamers and non-gamers alike.
On your turn you just pick a card, do an action in its depicted biome, plus do its special action - in an order of your choice. 🧐 Basic actions allow you to plant saplings or grow one into a small tree, or grow a small tree into a big tree. Special actions could also give you lakes and bushes with their own special effects.
The spatial aspect of planting is really fun! The challenge stems from the game’s contradicting goals: ☝️ you want to have a big contiguous group of trees because you score them every season, however photosynthesis of trees is also a source of points, and trees next to each other could block the sunlight. To this you add the fact that the sun keeps moving around every season, and the final cherry on top is how every card not drafted by anyone gets added to the fertility zone, raising the endgame value of big trees in a particular biome. 😮 So deciding which card to take, which to let slip into the fertility zone, then which actions to actually take can be a joyfully crunchy decision! 🙃
Another strength of Evergreen is how amazing it looks: both the beautiful art on the cards and the little treeples themselves are awesome! And you get much needed double-layer boards. To summarize, this is a purchase we didn't regret, as this is a wonderful lightweight game with the right amount of challenge! 🎖️
