Tzolk’in Board Game Review

I absolutely love to play game and I am always looking for a board game review of fun new games to try so I’m excited to share the latest game I was able to try. Tzolk’in is a worker placement game with a unique rotatable gear aspect. I was thrilled to have a chance to review Tzolk’in.

Tzolk’in Board Game Review

Tzolk’in has a lot of really unique elements to the game play. When I first opened up the game I was really impressed with all the different pieces that came with the game, especially the really neat looking crystal skulls. The game is themed around a Mayan Calendar and uses gears to advance your workers throughout the game to offer you a variety of different choices with better bonuses the longer you leave your worker on the board. It’s not as simple as leaving your workers to sit, though, as each turn you must either place new workers or remove some of your workers. Thus, you have to weigh out the benefit of when to place and when to remove your workers and try to time out your turns with your goals.

The rulebook is long with tons to read because there is so many different elements that come together to build this game. You have the different gears, the temple track, a technology tree, and buildings you can build. This makes it hard to know for sure what the best strategy is your first time through the game. The first game, I spent just really learning and understand all the different elements to the game and how they can work together to help you plan out your future moves. This game is really cool once you get towards the end of your first game and future games when you have everyone playing with you understanding the different parts to the game and how to play. Because of all the different choices, sometimes people get stuck trying to analyze and count out their turns which can take a little bit of time but generally turns are really quick each turn just consists of either placing or removing your workers and taking any applicable action based when you remove a worker.

I really loved the way the gears made me think long term and try to create a plan. This added a really different and fun feel to the game. If you like worker placement style games and can get past the initial time you’ll need to spend learning the different tracks of each area of the board then Tzolk’in is a really fun game!

Tzolk’in is published by Czech Games which is a game publishing company that brings great board games designed and developed by Czech game designers to the international market. Tzolk’in was released in late 2012 and is available at your favorite game stores and on Amazon. The game is recommended for ages 13+ and can play with 2-4 players. It plays in 60-90 minutes.

I received a copy of Tzolk’in in exchange for this post. The opinions expressed above are my own. Any claims should be verified on the sponsor’s site. I hope you enjoyed my Tzolk’in board game review