Date: 3rd February 2006
Game played: Key Largo ( Tilsit ) BGG Id: 18289

This week, we decided to try out Key Largo, a game by Paul Randles with further development by Mike Selinker and Bruno Faidutti. The game is published by Tilsit. Here is a description of the game by Bruno:

"The action takes place on a Caribbean island, in the very last days on the 19th century. The island has long been a pirate's harbour, and it has recently be found out that there were many sunken galleons around. Hurricane Katty is due in ten days, so you have little time to hire a diver team and bring back as much sunken treasure as possible.

Key Largo is a double-guessing game, like Paul Randles' other game, Pirate's Cove. Every morning, each player secretly decide what he will do the coming day - take tourists dolphin watching, search a wreck for treasures, sell treasures at the market, buy equipment at the local shop, or go to the tavern to hire more divers and listen to the rumours. It's also a light management game, where you start with little cash and must make your money grow through fruitful investment. The winner is the richest player when the hurricane breaks through and stops all diving around the island."

The game plays pretty quickly and is a nice balance between forward planning, taking a few risks and second-guessing what others' plans might be. Mark G had a fair bit of bad luck when diving, although he was risking the deepest waters. Nige stuck to the medium waters and successfully delivered some lucrative bounty. My early game was slow and was hampered by some thieving colleague who should remain nameless (but isn't going to - Nige!) However, I had a couple of good dives and got back in contention. In fact, the result was closer than I thought but Nige was too far ahead and claimed another win.

Key Largo was very good. It played pretty quickly and everyone remained pretty well involved throughout. Tilsit is building a nice set of games in their Tilsit Editions range and this is well up to standard.

 
Player
Rating
Score
Position
Winner
Nige
7
1470
1
Garry
7
1340
2
Phil
8
1060
3
Mark G
8
970
4
Mark K
8
920
5

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