Seikatsu

In Seikatsu you work together with the other players to build a shared garden between your pagodas.  To do this you place tiles containing flowers and birds or small koi ponds on the board until it is filled scoring points by placing birds next to others of their kind (birds of a feather flock together after all) and by having the ‘best view’ from your pagoda at the end of the game.   The game is for 1-4 players ages 10 and up  (works best with 3 in our experience) and plays in about 30 minutes.

Each turn consists of 3 simple steps, players place one of their two tiles on the board, score as needed, and draw a new random tile from the bag (if any are left).  This continues until the last tile is placed filling the board.  When all of the tiles are placed players score points on their perspective of the board and the players get to look back at what they created together.  

On the surface the game appears very easy but once you start playing you learn that there is more to it than meets the eye.  The game contains a unique scoring system that allows you to score points off the tiles depending on your perspective but also allows players to score during play.  During the game players score points by placing bird tiles next to birds of the same type and creating flocks of similar birds.  At the end of the game players score by having rows of like flowers from their perspective.  This allows players to get different amounts of points from the same tiles which adds a level of complexity to the game that we all really enjoyed.

The game components well all well made and helped put the game over the top.  The artwork was amazing and fit with the theme beautifully.  In all this game was beautifully made and will be finding its way back to our table often.

 

Wynken’s Thoughts:  

I liked this game, I loved that you were able to make points with the birds when placing tiles but also had to watch where you placed them because of the scoring at the end of the game.  This game was a little confusing for me the first time but after that I got good at it and learned how to figure out where to put my tiles for the best score.  I liked being able to score points off tiles that other people had placed and that we were all able to get a different number of points off the same tiles.  

8/10

Blynken’s Thoughts:

I liked this game a lot, I enjoyed playing the green player (bamboo pagoda) and that the koi fish counted as any color bird and flower.  My favorite part of the game was scoring points at the end with the flowers and figuring out how to place my tiles in a way that they didn’t score as many points for the other players.

9/10