Game(s) Played:
Through The Ages
Review – Through The Ages
This Game Is… …:
Essentially a civilization building game but for the sake of conformity, let’s call it a Euro boardgame since it involves workers, resources and an economic engine that needs to be more finely tuned than my acoustic Yamaha with a crack down its neck.
It’s a downright nightmare to tune and goes out of sync every 10-15 minutes, just like Through The Ages
The objective of the game is to have the most Culture Points at the end of the game. This can be achieved by building cultural stuff that ranges from Temples (Ancient Era) to Fast Food Chains (Modern Era) whilst all the while dodging enemy bullets, minimizing corruption, tackling unhappiness and researching to build the Death Star (Alright, alright, ICBMs just doesn’t sound as cool).
You’re the one man government in this game
Through The Ages caters for between 2-4 Players and typically takes approximately 180 minutes (with minimal AP) to navigate through the full game. There is no Player elimination but surprisingly, the rulebook does include a clause for Players to “honourably surrender” and retire from the game. I suppose there are occurrences of half played games due to mutual Player consensus or emergencies but its specific inclusion in the rulebook is a preliminary indication that you can & probably will get so royally screwed that you want to wave your white breeches on a stick and call it a day.
What Do You Get In The Box?
Through The Ages comes with the following items in a box not much bigger than the size of an A4 and about 2-3 inches high (that’s a really tiny box for a lot of gaming goodness):
– 1 Gaming Board
– 4 Player Boards & Player Summaries
– 8 Decks of Cards (to denote Technology, Wonders, Leaders etc. from various eras)
– Tonnes of cubes & mini cylinders (to represent resources, workers, actions etc.)
Yes, when I say mini cylinders, they are really, really mini
How Is It Played?
Each turn Players push off cards from the Card Row and add new cards to it, very much like the conveyer belt at the sushi bar except the unwanted dishes are dumped, never to return again. The cards are each civilization’s gateway to the future comprising of technologies, wonders, leaders, military units & entertainment centres from the ancient to modern era.
Just imagine a black hole at the end of the line
The Player then proceeds to the external policies phase by consulting Mr Left Brain & Mr Right Brain on whether to explore new territories, wage war against another Player, send Ethan Hunt on a covert mission impossible or forge a pact with the table bully. There is also always the option to just twiddle your thumbs.
Sometimes I just want to twiddle my thumbs
Then comes the blissfully torturous part of Through The Ages – fine tuning the economic engine of your civilization (internal management). The following is an excerpt of the typical Through The Ages Player’s thought bubble:
"I need to build another temple to boost my culture per turn, let’s see, I have sufficient resources *check* Now I need to hire a worker to be the priest of the temple *Argh!* I have enough food to hire the worker but if I do I won’t have enough happiness and there will be riots in the streets and production at the mines will stop *Breathe* Okay, I need happiness then, but BLAST it, that’s exactly what I was going to build my temple for, hold on a second, is that a GLADIATOR ARENA I see there on the board? Maybe instead of another temple, I can build an arena which gives more happiness! Oh snap, it costs 7 science points to research and I am only generating 3 science a turn which means unless I recruit more scientists, I’m going to have wait another 3 turns before I can build the arena *Ding!* More scientists then! Wait, what’s that? My government policy only allows a maximum of 3 scientists in employment?! @#$!%^"
You’d wish you had eye implants
The above is typically what happens when parts of your economic engine were mistakenly forgotten, reminding you of the time you forgot to tune your guitar after your 6 year old brother tried playing Monkey Wrench on it the night before. The cool part about the whole thing is that for every obstacle thrown a Player’s way, a good Player can usually find a way out of the mess, either through a bonus from hiring a new leader, building a wonder, playing one time shot in the arm bonuses or demoting an ineffective swordsman to a gladiator. It is like navigating an asteroid belt, each hurdle may present another subsequent hurdle but each one you pass brings you closer to your objective.
Where’s that darn floating McD’s stop?
Once the Player’s worked out what he needs to do and in exactly what order, the Player proceeds to gain additional science & culture points, produce some food & resources, pay for upkeep with food & resources and passes his turn to the next Player.
What I Think About The Game?
Gameplay:
Through The Ages
Quality:
This is probably my biggest beef with this wonderful game and it is that the game should have been bigger, in every physical aspect. Each square on all manner of score tracks in the game is designed to accommodate 1 single cube when the game is meant to be played by up to 4 Players, the cards are possibly in the tiniest dimensions in the history of boardgaming and the mini cylinders are only half the size of the cubes! The board design is utilitarian at best but the card illustrations are actually pretty decent, so that pretty much is the only saving grace of Through The Ages in terms of component quality.
Affordability:
Price ÷ Recommended No. of Players ÷ [Game Length (hour) x No. Times Game is Played in a year]
I got mine at a discount for my birthday (thanks BGC!) but I’ll calculate this based on the average pricing of the local retailers as below:
RM210 ÷ 2 Players ÷ [3 (hours) x 2 times a year (2011)] = RM17.50 per game
Inflation’s making the price of everything go up but RM17.50 per game is pretty steep. That’s the equivalent of a movie ticket and 1 regular combo of popcorn & a drink here in Kuala Lumpur (even then I have my doubts) or roughly the equivalent of 12 movies with grub for the total package.
Hmm haven’t done any movie reviews lately
Is This Game For You?
My wife often comments to the buggles (non-boardgaming community) about the strangeness of bggs (boardgamegeeks) and why they find torturing their brains an enjoyable pastime when life as it is, is pretty taxing on the brain cells. Whilst her statement might be leaning on the side of over-generalization, it is particularly true for Through The Ages.
To truly appreciate the design of this game requires you to actually enjoy putting your mind through the Olympic 40,000m marathon with hurdles. Not to put you off, but you should know that you are investing into a heavy game for which there may not be as many gamers out there who enjoy this particular flavour of coffee.
Nevertheless, Through The Ages is thoroughly enjoyable even with only 2 Players, and in fact may be best played with only 2 Players. So if you can find someone who enjoys civilization building or games with similar brain burn as Troyes, you’re in for some really fun times. I only have two wishes after finally procuring a copy and completing a full game of Through The Ages, (1) they had better not publish a better looking 2nd edition or I’d be torn between loving/killing the publisher (2) won’t it be EPICLY AWESOME if someone (Sid Meier *hint hint*) includes some of the technologies in Through The Ages in the next instalment of the Civilization series?
The slang of today always includes epic and awesome
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