Publisher: Days of Wonder
Designer: Serge Laget
Artists: Miguel Coimbra and Cyrille Daujean
Year: 2011
Players: Two to five players
Ages: 8+
Playing time: 60 to 90 minutes
MSRP: $50.00
I’ll begin by saying that Days of Wonder certainly knows their audience. From such titles as Ticket to Ride and Small World (and to some extent, Memoir ’44) it’s obvious that the main push of a great many DoW releases are for light, fast moving games that can be finished in a relatively short period of time. Each game has just enough flavor and strategy to keep most gamers satisfied and coming back for more while other gamers scratch their heads wondering what the fuss is all about. This seems to be DoW’s mantra and Cargo Noir definitely slides right on into that niche.
The object of the game is to purchase various Victory Spoils by trading in contraband cargo that is collected by visiting ports and trading at the Black Market. Whoever has the most Victory Points (through the Victory Spoils) at the end of the game is the winner.
The board is broken up into ports and, as in Small World, scales according to the number of players; if playing with fewer than five players some of the ports will be closed off leading to more competition for those ports that remain. There is also a Black Market (in Macao) where players can either trade a cargo from their warehouse for one in the Market or draw a random cargo from the cargo bag. Next to the Black Market is the Casino where the player may place a cargo ship to receive two gold coins.
The game lasts eleven turns for the two or three player game and ten turns for four or five. Each player begins with their crime family card, which is also their six slot warehouse and includes a breakdown of the turn sequence. They receive seven gold coins in which to bid on cargo and also three ships (which are essentially your actions) in which to send to the numerous locations.
Each port has anywhere from one to four cargo slots while the Black Market has eight. These slots are randomly seeded with cargo tiles from the cargo bag to begin the game. There are nine different types of cargo consisting of fourteen tiles as well as five “wild” cargo tiles. No one cargo is more or less valuable than the other.
Each turn is broken up into three phases. On the first turn of the game each player simply performs the third phase of their turn and all turns thereafter have all three phases carried out in order.
Resolve Ship Actions – This is where you’ll collect cargo or gold, depending on what locations you committed your ships to the previous turn. Cargo is bought from ports and traded or drawn from the Black Market. Gold is received from ships located at the Casino.
If your ship has the most gold bid for that port you receive all the cargo that is in that port and turn over all the gold you bid to the bank. If another player has outbid you then you’ll have two options: A) Raise the stakes so that you are now the high bidder and wait until your next turn in the hopes of collecting the cargo or, B) Abandon the port –taking your gold with you – knowing that you can’t return to that port later in the turn. If the other players are still vying for the cargo on your next turn you may place a ship there once again and involve yourself in the bidding all over.
Trade Cargo for Victory Cards – You take cargo you’ve collected and trade that in for victory cards. Cargo of the same type, collected into sets, are worth more but you don’t have to sell sets in order to receive points to buy victory cards. On your final turn you can add whatever remaining gold you may have to your cargo (each gold is valued at one cargo point) to make you final purchase of cards.
These Victory cards can be smuggler bonuses which add more cargo ships to your fleet (you begin with three and can have as many as five), add additional Warehouse Spaces to store cargo (you begin with six slots and can have ten), or create Syndicates which allow you to receive two gold coins if you abandon a port to an opponent.
You may only have a maximum of two of each type of smuggler bonus cards and these cards cost more in cargo points than you’ll receive in victory points at the end of the game but that evens out because they grant you that above mentioned bonus during the game.
Victory Spoils cards representing yachts, dive bars, villas and such are worth a victory point total equal to their cargo point cost. These cards don’t add any bonuses but there is no limit to how many you can own outside of the number that come with the game.
The final Victory Spoils are unique cards, of which there are only six individual cards that are worth a few more victory points than their purchase cost. These cards also act as a tie breaker so, if players have the same score at the finish, the person with the highest valued unique card is the victor.
The final phase is Sending Ships – You’ll send your ships back out to the different areas and bid gold for each port you place a ship, in order to purchase the available cargo. Cargo goes to the player who has the most gold bid for that location so you’ll want to keep an eye out for how much gold your opponents have (or will likely have following their first phase) and bid accordingly to dissuade them from entering that same port.
So what’s to like about Cargo Noir?
The components are excellently presented! The artwork, by Miguel Coimbra, is top notch with a bit of a Disneyesque feel to the proceedings. The map pieces and cargo tiles are of good thickness and should be able to hold up to repeated play. As far as rules are concerned, the seven fully illustrated pages are clearly laid out and easily digested. There are examples of play included as well so no more than one or two runs through the book are needed to be ready to give the game a go. As far as the theme, outside of the artwork it does seem a bit tacked on as this design could easily be transported to just about anywhere. It’s not as if you immerse yourself in ’50 noir at the head of a crime family. That’s not a knock on the game whatsoever as there are tons of titles out there that don’t transport you to the time and place in which they’re set.
As far as gameplay, the bidding mechanic is nicely integrated so you don’t feel as if it’s a typical auction taking place for the available cargo – although that really is what’s going on – and you can bluff opponents somewhat and also tie them up waiting for cargo if you have enough ships or gold to devote for a turn. There’s also enough of a “take that” flavor to give the game a little edge but not so much where anyone’s going to walk away with hurt feelings – although sometimes you almost feel like you’re playing a game of chicken when it comes down to winning a port. If you keep an eye on what your opponents have (or will have) available to bid you can cut down on that whole “chicken” aspect though.
I will say there are a couple of things that I thought could have used a bit more tweaking in the design though.
First off, I think that collecting sets of alike cargo is undervalued in the design. It seems as if going to the effort (especially if you’re trading in cargo at the Black Market) and the cost in gold to collect the same kind of cargo isn’t equal to the payoff you receive when you cash them in. In more than half the games I played (and I played ten games with anywhere from 2-5 people) at least one person sort of bailed on the whole idea of trying to get matching cargo and just started sending most of their ships to the Black Market to blindly draw cargo from the bag. This turned out to either be a winning strategy or locked up second place. There was nothing fishy or sneaky about this strategy but for a game that is at heart about bidding for cargo it’s odd that you could win without having to engage in much bidding at all.
Certainly just a slight change to the cash in values would have fixed this.
Second, I have a bit of an issue with the first player remaining the first player throughout the game. What this breaks down to is that if you’re in a five player game and you’re the fifth player, you will never be anything but the fifth player. You would think there would be some advantage in the bidding if you go later but, due to the fact that you wait until the next turn to collect your cargo, anyone you outbid in your turn will still have a chance to up the stakes in their turn. This isn’t a big deal in a two player game but as you add more players the people going later in the turn just seem to have a harder time making a run for a win.
Somehow I think that something was left out of the rules allowing for the first player designation to rotate around the table. Honestly, there’s even a first player cardboard stand up ship to designate who the first player is and I think it would be odd to include that if only one person was always going first. Maybe I missed this rotation in the rules somewhere …but I doubt it.
One last thing I will mention as a critique is that out of the 25 cargo ships included in the box, four of them were missing the smokestack/bridge sections. The ships are in two pieces that have been preassembled and I’m assuming they should all be the same. Of course I received a review copy (Cargo Noir doesn’t hit shelves until March) and this in no way impeded my enjoyment of the game or effects the overall score of the game. In fact I only mention it because just two days ago I went out and bought Memior ’44 and when I opened it up, one of the Allied artillery pieces was missing.
This isn’t anything huge as I already know I just have to contact DoW and they’ll take care of it right away.
When it’s all said and done, Cargo Noir is the exact kind of title you’d expect from Days of Wonder: Clean gameplay, great presentation and components, easily digested rules, and enough fun little hooks to make you and your friends want to play a second time, right after finishing the first.
Does Cargo Noir reinvent the wheel? Of course not…
I’m certain that plenty of gamers won’t be interested in a release like Cargo Noir simply because it’s lighter fare and it won’t appeal to people who want a much meatier experience. There isn’t enough under the hood (or maybe I should say in the hold) that’s going to peak their interest. Yet Cargo Noir isn’t made for them, it’s made for the vast majority of gamers out there who like to play something to completion in an hour or so while being entertained and enjoying the company of friends.
Folks who enjoy Ticket to Ride and Small World will certainly want to book passage on Cargo Noir.
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