Bella Vista Review
Advert: this game was gifted by Hachette Board Games UK, this has not affected our opinion.
It is probably my love of the PC game SimCity, that has made me more than a little partial to a city-building game. Growing up as a digital city planner has translated to an analogue enjoyment, albeit not in my actual vocation.
Despite the plethora of titles in this genre there is a new kid on the block, Bella Vista designed by Bruno Cathala, let’s check it out!
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Setup
Build a city base out of the tiles in the box, there are some suggested set ups in the rule book for places like London and New York, or I’m sure you could create your own. Shuffle the Zoning cards and place them on the Offer Board, Shuffle the contract cards and reveal four. Then randomly pick one Height and one Grouping bonus card.
Give each player their buildings and twenty coins. They will also need their eight Construction cards. These need to be shuffled and three cards then drawn.
Finally, randomly decide player order by placing the starting cards below the Offer Board.
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Gameplay
The aim is to make the most money by the end of the game. You get one coin for placing buildings next to lower height buildings, and three coins if your building is strictly taller than all adjacent buildings, or if it is totally isolated. You will also total your coins from completed contract cards and for the Height and Grouping Objectives at the end of the game.
You will have the opportunity to place all your buildings over the course of the game. For all but the last few turns, you will have three buildings available to use on your turn, represented by three cards in your hand. These are drawn from a shuffled deck. In variable turn order you can bid for priority, spending more coins means you can place sooner and possibly fulfil contracts or grab prime real estate ahead of your competition. However, the height of the building placed dictates the turn order for the next round, with the shorter building choosing priority first in the next round.
Each round, there is a building restriction revealed that states where you can or cannot build. These range from placing in certain coloured zones, to not building next to a river or park.
Once everyone has placed all their buildings, the game ends and final scores can be tallied.
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What it’s like
Bidding for turn order is a clever mechanic. As coins are points, it pays to be frugal at the right times and splurge when necessary. This is coupled with which height building to play as shorter buildings will get first pick in the next round, but are unlikely to get coins for being the highest in a group.
The zonal restrictions are also interesting and can really hinder fulfilling the contract cards, making the priority of placing your building first on some turns even more important. I like how there are more zonal restriction cards than required, so you can never be too sure what is coming out next. There are plenty of contract cards too, which means predicting exactly which ones will appear is impossible. That can add a little bit of luck to proceedings as a player may have inadvertently completed one already when it is flipped later in the game.
There is some nice tension in the game and you feel like you are making decisions when you choose your building and bid for turn order, but this doesn’t completely mask the luck factor. Which cards you draw, the contract cards, and the initial turn order can play a bigger part than some might like.
I prefer this one at its full player count of four and won’t reach for it as often at two or three players. This is because I enjoy the anxiety as the board gets full and you want to maximise points. At four it all just works that little bit tighter and for me, better.
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Table Presence
This is a board game with a beautiful view, they should’ve probably called it that instead of using some random foreign words! The table presence with the prebuilt 3d buildings with unique art is something to behold. It really does look magnificent, especially at four players when all the coloured buildings are in play.
Not many board games come with a drawer in the box, but that is exactly what this one offers to store the buildings in. On the side of the compartmentalised interior is a diagram showing how to pack the buildings away. This is much appreciated and makes tear down less of a chore. The bit above that stores the base tiles and money is a little less well designed and it is tricky to place the tiles in a way that doesn’t cause a little lid lift.
The rulebook was good. I made a bit of a rules gaff on my first few plays. I know ultimately I am to blame for this, but I find all the multicoloured paragraph backgrounds makes it easy to miss key information, when they are probably intended to do quite the opposite. In the rulebooks defence, all the information is there with illustrated examples.
I must reinforce however, that most people will be delighted with the components in the box!
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Final thoughts on Bella Vista
Offering such extraordinary components straight out the box is certainly commendable and having a great storage solution for these is fab. The looks are mirrored with some fun gameplay too.
Bella Vista is quite a straight-forward game and is definitely on the lighter side. However, the game offers some awkward decisions to think about, which makes it all the more interesting.
Key Facts
Number of players: 2 to 4
Board Game Review Recommended Age: 10+
Publisher’s Recommended Age: 8+
Playing Time: 35 minutes
Setting Up and Take Down Time: 5 minutes
Designers: Bruno Cathala and Andrea Mainini
Publisher: Hachette Board Games UK
RRP: £37.00
Summary
A gorgeous game production is layered upon a light Bruno Cathala design. This creates a beautiful and streamlined board game best played at four players.
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Artwork and Components
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Complexity
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Instructions
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Interaction
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Value for Money
Overall
Pros
- Fantastic production
- Buildings are prebuilt
- Bidding for turn order
- Accessible gameplay
Cons
- Best at four players
- Luck of completing contract cards
- Putting the tiles away in the box
Buy Bella Vista
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Reviewer’s Note
For clarity: we don’t get paid for our reviews. However, we were kindly gifted this game by Hachette Board Games UK. We have tried not to let this affect our review in any way.
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