SAGRADA (2017)

PLAYERS	TIME	DESIGNER	PUBLISHER
1-4	30-45 mins	Adrian Adamescu, Daryl Andrews	Floodgate Games

Players draft dice and place them in their 5×4 grid, following placement rules based on the Window Pattern card that they’ve chosen. On top of that, Public Objective cards sit to one side, to tease you with the promise of points if you can fulfil their devilish requests.

And that’s SAGRADA in a nutshell.

But there’s more.

It’s one of those games that starts out pretty relaxing as you draft your first dice and have a nice spacious arena before you, full of possibilities. The decision of where to place that first turn is almost irrelevant. But much like CALICO, by the end of the game you’re desperate for a very specific draft. And time and space are running out.

It’s not all luck based though as you have favors to help. Each game has three random special abilities for players to utilize, something to help when you’re stuck. Ignore placement rules, or move some dice perhaps. These Tool cards can be very useful.

But they do come at a cost. You only have a limited number of Favor Tokens to spend, meaning the timing of these Tool cards is critical.

The game is good at all players counts, with the only difference only being how many dice are drafted each round. It takes a while to get your brain around the basic placement rules, and that’s before you throw in the Objective cards that required rows and/or columns not having repeating colours and/or numbers (making the game a stressful rainbow version of SUDOKU). But you will get it eventually.

There isn’t much SAGRADA does wrong. The randomness of the dice might put people off. And perhaps a bigger variety of the Tool and Objective cards would assist with the longevity (though I believe this might be resolved in the expansions).

Overall, SAGRADA is a thinky abstract game full of colour and tough decisions. It never outstays its welcome, and it has enough crunch to see you return for more challenge.