Review: Incan Gold

The Big Picture: Incan Gold is a light push-your-luck game with an Indiana Jones-esque theme that is suitable as a nice filler for serious gamers and as a mainstay for family gamers. Essentially, you and the other players search through ancient Incan ruins for treasure, trying to avoid all manner of traps and dangers along the way. Incan Gold, designed by Alan R. Moon and Bruno Faidutti, is an American remake of the game Diamant. The game supports up to 8 players, and plays in about 20 minutes. Its short length allows for multiple rounds to be played back-to-back, and given how fun the game is, you will be hard pressed to resist doing so.

The Details: Each turn, every player is forced to make a choice: “Do I stay or do I go?” While that might sound a bit simple (and it is), the decision is oftentimes agonizing, and hence the brilliance of the game.

You see, every turn, a card is flipped up from the deck to reveal the next room in the ruins. Of the 30 cards in the deck, half of the rooms contain treasure, while the other half contain hazards. The treasure cards have a number on them, ranging from 1 to 17. When a treasure card is flipped up, the players divide the treasure on the card between them equally, with the remainder being placed onto the card. With a small treasure card, or a large number of players, this can sometimes result in all of the treasure remaining on the card. Sounds easy so far right?

If a hazard card is flipped up, things get interesting. There are 3 cards for each of 5 types of hazard – snakes, spiders, falling rocks, flames, and monsters/natives/unga-bunga men (it is fairly unclear from the picture exactly what it is). The players are o.k. the first time a hazard is flipped up, but when the second hazard card of the same type is flipped up, the round is over and all the players who are still in the ruins lose all the treasure they have earned for the round.

The key decision, indeed, the only decision, that the players make is whether or not they wish to continue venturing into the ruins (and possibly find more treasure) or to leave the ruins and head back to camp – securing the treasure they have already earned. Once a player leaves the ruins, he is out for the remainder of the round. While venturing further into the ruins is more dangerous (given the increasing likelihood of being killed by a hazard), the rewards are greater as the treasure is divided among fewer players. On the other hand, choosing when to leave is just as important as choosing whether or not to leave in the first place. That’s because when a player leaves, he takes all of the leftover treasure on the cards that could not be divided up evenly the first time around – provided he is the only player leaving. If more than one player is leaving on the same turn, they divide the leftover treasure again, and leave the remainder behind. Thus, it pays to leave by yourself.

A twist that the designers added to this version of the game is the presence of artifacts. Each section of the dungeon has one artifact card shuffled into the deck. If claimed, it is worth bonus points. When it is flipped up, it remains on the table, tantalizing the players. In order to claim an artifact, a player must leave the ruins and pick it up on the way out – but a player may only claim an artifact if he is leaving by himself. This adds another level of tension to the “Is he leaving this round?” guessing game that each player goes through in his/her head at the beginning of each turn. After all, if you leave at the same time as another player, neither of you will get the treasure – often to the delight of your opponents who are still in the ruins!

As the cards are flipped up, they form a board (of sorts). The “board” serves no purpose other than to keep track of the leftover treasure and which hazards have been overturned. Once all of the players have left the ruins, or the second of the same type of hazard has been overturned, the round ends and a new round begins – the cards are all gathered up and shuffled back into the deck. Any players that left the ruins (i.e. were not “killed” by a hazard) get to “bank” their treasure by hiding it under a tent and adding it to their score; any players that remained in the ruins and perished must forfeit any treasure they accumulated during that round. Yet, for some unexplained reason, explorers that perish in one round may participate in other rounds without difficulty. Perhaps each player has a team of adventurers, or perhaps there are several clones for each adventurer? In any case, at the end of 5 rounds, the treasure each player found during all of the rounds is added together, and whoever found the most is the winner.

The components are simple but effective. The cards are of standard stock and nicely colored. The treasure pieces consist of plastic gem-shaped bits in three colors – turquoise, obsidian, and gold. The treasures have different values, but they can be freely exchanged during the game to “make change” and serve as a points tracker. The 4 pages of instructions feature numerous pictures and adequately explain the rules. Everything fits into a small 8″ x 8″ x 1″ box, greatly enhancing portability. The only qualm I have with the components is the tents. The “tents” are actually cards that are folded in half. Yes, that’s right, this board game actually tells you to bend some of the cards that it comes with. I have never played a board game that forced you to damage some of its components. Despite this, the tent cards are adequately illustrated and, to be honest, quite functional. Nevertheless, I have doubts about the longevity of such a cheap money-saving measure, especially in light of the components in the original Diamant game (the original game came with nifty cardboard treasure chests that the gems were stored in). Aside from the tents, the components are fine.

Analysis: I really like this game. It is everything a push-your-luck game was meant to be. Every turn is an agonizing decision, as each player is faced with the ever growing temptation to go for it. The theme really adds to this feeling. After all, it is one thing to just be chasing numbers (as in a game like Can’t Stop); it is quite another to imagine yourself exploring ancient ruins in pursuit of valuable treasure! Not only that, because when players leave they clear the board of the leftover treasure, the incentive for the remaining players to continue to venture into the ruins increases. Additionally, the possibility of leaving at the same time as another player adds one more reason to say “heck with it, I’m going in!”. Moreover, because the game is played in multiple rounds, it pays to be a little risky and ‘go for it’ at least once or twice during the game (or more, if you like to live dangerously). Thus, the game does a nice job of encouraging players to push their luck, sometimes rewarding them with loads of treasure, and sometimes rewarding them with disaster (and laughter from their opponents).

Because the players decide whether they are going in or leaving secretly (and simultaneously), no one can be quite sure of what the other players are doing. This adds to the tension, as players glance nervously at each other, trying to discern who is going to ‘chicken out’ and bolt back to camp.

One of the best things about this game is its simplicity. It is easy to teach and easy to learn, for gamers and non-gamers alike. Even children can learn the game easily (suggested age is 8 and up, but a 6 year old can play it just fine). Every person I have introduced the game to has picked it up without any difficulty.

Moreover, because of its short time length it can be played multiple times back-to-back. Typically I end up playing at least 2 or 3 games of it whenever I break it out. Additionally, the artifacts and the inherent randomness of the deck allow for considerable replayability.

What do I NOT like about this game? The aforementioned “tent” issue notwithstanding, there is little to say that is negative about this game. Perhaps the only thing would be the lack of any real long-term strategy. There are plenty of difficult tactical decisions (one each turn, to be precise), but it is basically impossible to formulate any comprehensive, overarching strategy. Of course, that is not really the point of the game. This game is supposed to be an easy, quick, exciting game with difficult decisions every turn. It is not supposed to be a deep, engaging, thoughtful brain-buster.

The Bottom Line: This is an excellent game, worthy of nearly every collection. Gamers will like it as a nice, quick-paced and exciting alternative to more thoughtful, drawn-out strategy games. Families will enjoy its simple rules, fun theme, and light-thinking turn-to-turn excitement. It is appropriate for medium groups (3-5 players) but is also one of the only games that works just as well for larger groups (6+ players). Thus, it makes a great party game. And while I’ve never tried it, I’m pretty sure you could adapt it into a pretty good drinking game. In the end, this game is downright great, and I highly recommend it.

9/10.