Century: Golem Edition – An Endless World Review

Although they are known to be incredibly approachable and newcomer-friendly, dipping into the Century series can be confusing for the uninitiated. Which ones are part of the same series? Which one is just a variant of the game you already own? Which games can you mix and play together? However, this series has one important trick up its sleeve that makes diving right in absolutely worth it: any Century game can stand confidently on its own legs, getting others in the series and mixing them together is just a bonus.

This too applies to Century: Golem Edition – An Endless World. A re-imaging of the third game in the series Century: A New World (the similar naming is not at all confusing…), it takes its somewhat pastel-like spice trading theme and bedazzles it with gems and incredible looking golems, while leaving the gameplay untouched. 

Century games all have the same core mechanic: you start with a bunch of gems and throughout the game, you will be getting more gems and transforming them into other colours to buy victory points. So, depending on your playstyle, different games from the series might appeal to you more: the first one if you like card drafting, the second if pick up and deliver mechanic is more your style. However, integrating the gem-generating engine building with worker placement in An Endless World was possibly a superior idea to all.  

It creates gameplay that makes player interaction key, as they all compete for the same spots and work together – or even against each other – to unlock more spaces on the board. Yet it still maintains the feeling of freedom to transform your gems however you want to, while various bonus point tokens encourage more competitive gameplay. It samples the flavour of the whole series perfectly, giving you a taster of the core mechanics, themes and strategies in a game that is both perfectly self-contained but also easily fits with other games in the series. It may be the last game in the series, but it could be the first
to try. 

ALEXANDRA SONECHKINA

PLAY IT? YES

Designer: Emerson Matsuuchi

Publisher: Plan B Games

Time: 30-45 minutes

Players: 2-4

Ages: 8+

Price: £39

BUY YOUR COPY HERE

This feature originally appeared in Issue 52 of Tabletop Gaming. Pick up the latest issue of the UK's fastest-growing gaming magazine in print or digital here or subscribe to make sure you never miss another issue.

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