Equally, the puzzle of the game comes out in the layering. Only the top view of your own personal reef is used for scoring, so adjacent doesn’t care for what height the other colours around them are. Other cards offer players a score based on height, meaning you will eventually start working upwards, placing your nicely moulded tokens on top of one another Final Score: 3.5 Stars – A solid abstract strategy game that makes a great choice for families and those looking for something on the lighter side of the spectrum. The game ends when one of the four reef colors runs out. In this case, the players total up their victory points and the player with the most is the winner. You will be building up your reef over the course of the game. Game Experience:

Personally, I thinkReefmight have the edge for me. It's slightly less cut-throat thanAzul, especially at the two-player count we frequently play at. It also scratches a bit of an engine-building itch, although it's not strictly in that style of game.Reeflooks great and plays really smoothly, and is really rewarding when you execute a brilliant sequence of turns.It’s certainly a game that I highly recommend. This sounds like a lot of patterns, and it is. This is the most difficult part of Reef to learn when first playing but thankfully there are plenty of examples in the rulebook book for each of these patterns if you find your group having difficulty recognizing them all. I actually suggest you play your first few games open-handed and that way the person teaching the game can show how each card type scores as it comes up.But the game itself? It’s classic Emerson Matsuuchi simplicity in an abstract strategy game. Reef is a pattern making, score card claiming game in 3D, using sweetie-like coral blobs in various colours to represent the growing life in the reef itself. The cleverness of the scoring makes the game a lot more brain burning than the pretty components seem, meaning this is a great game for new and experienced players alike. It's easier to explain than Azul, yet perhaps with a touch more depth. Players have a hand limit of 4 cards. So if they already have 4 cards in their hand, they must play a card instead. While Reef isn’t a game of dramatic player conflict or cooperation, it does foster a subtle, under-the-surface tension that keeps everyone engaged throughout. Its interaction is like the gentle ebb and flow of the ocean—constant, but not overwhelmingly so.

The first thing players notice about Reef is the fantastic coral pieces. The chunky and colorful pieces are the centerpiece of the game. Not only do they present a great tactile experience with the game, but they’re also very functional. While each color is uniquely shaped, they all nest on top of each other very well. We love seeing our colorful coral reefs grow.Personally, I thinkReefmight have the edge for me. It’s slightly less cut-throat thanAzul, especially at the two-player count we frequently play at. It also scratches a bit of an engine-building itch, although it’s not strictly in that style of game.Reeflooks great and plays really smoothly, and is really rewarding when you execute a brilliant sequence of turns.It’s certainly a game that I highly recommend. That's really where the similarities end.Reefis an abstract game that stands on its own as a family weight 2-4 player game. The colours might fool you into thinking the game is aimed at children, but there's actually a really neat card drafting, puzzly, three-dimensional game in Reef that we believe rivals its award winning predecessor. Let's take a closer look! Reef Gameplay

Ah, the ocean. The tranquility. The mystery. And beneath the waves, a whole universe bustles in vivid color, full of life and adventure. This is the realm of Reef, a delightful abstract strategy game designed by Emerson Matsuuchi. The game places you in the metaphorical fins of a coral reef architect, working to cultivate the most beautiful and diverse coral formations on the ocean floor. The Great Barrier Reef covers over 130,000 square miles and is home to myriad marine species. Ecosystem: Coral Reef, the card-drafting and pattern building introduces us to some of the fish, crustaceans and aquatic mammals that call the Great Barrier Reef home. In the vein of its “prequel”, Ecosystem, Coral Reef brings new mechanics and a new environment in a standalone format. Having played a fair bit of the first game, I will comment on Coral Reef both in its own right and in comparison to its predecessor for players who are interested in deciding which version to go for (although I think both are great)! How Does The Game Play Out? It’s inevitable that players will take cards that you hope to get. So you’ll have to be able to adjust on the fly. Every collection deserves a little bit of Matsuuchi, and if your tastes lean towards the abstract, then this is a great low stakes addition.Diving deeper into the game, the components of Reef are where the game truly shines, invoking the vibrancy of a coral reef in full bloom. This isn’t a game of muted tones and drab tiles, it’s a visual feast, boasting chunky coral pieces in a multitude of vibrant hues. The game’s coral pieces are durable and visually pleasing, with four different colors – yellow, purple, green, and red – and unique shapes for each. The patterns you need to create for scoring are fluid and ever-changing, leading to endless configurations on your board. The strategies that worked for you in one game may not be as effective in the next. Reef demands adaptability, constantly challenging you to find the most efficient way to score points given the current state of your reef and the available cards. Some special rules at the end of the game required forward planning right from the start to improve your score. In particular, the Blue Whale, if played, requires players to turn over an adjacent card before scoring. The turned card cannot be used in any scoring calculations but enables the Blue Whale to be counted (it gains points relative to the number of Krill in the ecosystem)! Turtles and Octopuses are scored after everything else, but importantly the Octopus has an additional power which allows players to move any card to a new location or swap two cards when it is placed in the ecosystem.

In the realm of abstract strategy games, Reef often draws comparisons to games like Azul and Splendor for their shared emphasis on aesthetics, simplicity of rules, and depth of strategy. Yet, each game carves out its own niche in the genre. Currently, Reef doesn’t have any expansions. However, the standalone game itself offers enough replayability and strategic depth to keep players engaged. Keep an eye on this space for future updates. Comparison to Similar Games Observe the growth of nature's most beautiful and exotic natural structure: the coral reef Found primarily in the Indo-Pacific region, it has taken reefs thousands of years to grow. Over that time, they have mesmerized marine life and created amazing aquatic ecosystems. Prepare yourselves to do the same... and open your eyes to the beauty of the oceans.

The thing is that you shouldn’t let that lightness fool you. Reef is one of those deceptively easy to learn but difficult to master games. One of the first places you will notice this is with the timing rules for when you play a card. In this episode, we each share the top ten items from our 2023 Holiday Wishlists. Some practical and others, not so much. puring the last round, when you must take coral pieces of a color whose supply does not contain enough pieces, take as many as you can from that supply and continue your turn as usual. A big part of playing Reef well is this long-term planning. Reef is all about strategy and planning multiple turns ahead. In this way, Reef reminds me of Chess. This is due to the fact you are going to want to plan out a way to be able to play a number of cards in a row so that they combine together to make multiple complete scoring patterns in a row. There’s also another chess-like aspect and that is watching your opponent, remembering what cards they have and predicting what they will do with them.