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Phil Walker-Harding is a master at reducing game rules / mechanisms to their core concepts. A perfect example of this would be Sushi Go which is often used to teach drafting / set collection as the rule set is so simple to understand (and it doesn’t hurt that the game is awesome as well).
In Cloud City from Blue Orange Games he has turned his attention to a city / bridge building game and once again reduced the rule set and gameplay loop to a very easy to understand and play experience.
Real Estate
For a small box the weight is surprisingly heavy but when you open it you realise why. The main thing taking up ‘real estate’ is the city buildings that come in three colours / sizes (blue is smallest, green is medium and brown is tallest) and are very solid plastic pieces.
You also receive a tray which holds all of the tiles used to lay your foundations for your city as well as 93 walkways / bridges (31 of each colour). The box holds everything in place very well and to start playing all you need to do is take the lid off and find the starting tiles. I do wish less plastic had been used but I understand that it gives rigidity to the buildings that may have been lacking if they had been cardboard.
We Built This (Cloud) City
Set up is easy. Everyone is dealt a starting tile which you place in front of you on the table. You then place buildings matching the colours of the squares on the tile (so a blue building would sit on a blue square etc). You are then dealt a hand of three tiles which you keep secret. Finally a drafting pool of three tiles are placed in the middle of the table face up.
On your turn you place one of your tiles from your hand orthogonally next to your existing city and then place buildings on that tile according to the colour of the squares. In a three or four player game your city must be constructed in a 3x3 grid of tiles whereas in a two player game your city will be constructed in a 4x3 grid of tiles. This means that you only have eight turns in a three / four player game and eleven in a two player game.
Once you have placed your buildings you may build bridges / walkways between buildings of the same height. Each height has the same amount of bridges (noted by their colour) and they come in various lengths. The longer the length of the bridge the higher the points provided. Each building may only have two bridges attached to it and bridges cannot be built over empty spaces where tiles have not yet been built.
Frustration comes from not having quite the right tile to place and having to change your plans on the fly. Even more frustrating is if you block one of your smaller buildings with a larger one meaning you can no longer use that building to complete a bridge later on. The whole experience feels like a solitaire puzzle of trying to build the best city with the only interaction coming from the drafting.
At the end of your turn you then draft a new tile either from the three face up in the pool or the top tile of the deck. If one is taken from the pool you replace this from the deck and place it face up.
Cloud City continues until all players have completed their city. The player with the most points on their bridges wins. Ties are broken by the player who has the most points on their blue bridges, then their green bridges and if it is still a tie then all tied players win.
So you have finished your first couple of games and you may be wondering if that is all there is to it and thankfully the answer is no.
Variations
The game includes ten special request cards which are scoring objectives. The game recommends you use just one of these per game but says you can use two if you want to make the game more exciting. I would suggest always using two after your first couple of games. This really increases the tension whilst playing as they are often a race to complete the most of something or to build in a certain way. I definitely preferred the game once we included these cards.
A Bridge Too Far
I like Cloud City but I am worried that the re-playability is not there. It is nice to see your city go from nothing to completed in just eight turns (eleven if you are playing two player) and it looks amazing on the table as you cross bridges under and over each other but with the limited number of scoring objectives and the drafting being the only real interaction between players it is not a game I will be rushing to play time and time again.
Which is a shame as the core concept is enjoyable and it looks amazing on the table when your city is completed. I will still introduce it to other people as it is a very pleasant way to spend 30 minutes (including the teach).
That concludes our thoughts on Cloud City. Do you agree? Let us know your thoughts and tag us on social media @zatugames. To buy Cloud City today click here!
