Calimala Review
Advert: this game was gifted by Alley Cat Games, this has not affected our opinion.
A board game around the culinary preparation of squid is an unusual theme. Pondering that was when I looked up Calimala online and realised I was thinking of Calamari. Calimala is quite different. In this board game you transport cloth from Florence and build its glorious cathedrals. Some might say a less unusual theme, but who knows these days!
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Setup
There is a board to unfold and ensure you have the correct way up depending on player count. Various tiles are placed on this for scoring and actions. This can pretty much be done randomly for variety each game, although there is a suggested set up for actions on your first play. Give each player: cubes, buildings and workers, as well as their own player board in their chosen colour. It’s easy to miss the fact that these boards have a coloured banner in the corner! Scoring markers are placed on zero.
Reveal one scoring card face up for everyone to work towards. Then dish out two scoring objectives to each player, they will keep one. Although these remain secret to other players until the end, all players have a chance to score points from these. Finally, find a selection of action cards as per the rulebook, and draft these in reverse player order.
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Gameplay
The core mechanic of the game is placing a worker on a space between two actions and carrying out those actions, all with the aim of scoring the most points. What makes this feel a little unique, is that worker placements benefit other workers already on the same space. Meaning they also get the benefits from those actions. If they can’t utilise these, they get a random action card that they can use later.
However, only three workers can ever be on the same space, so future placements bump off the bottom worker and triggers the next scoring event. These bumped off tiles also settle tie-breaks going forward. It is beneficial to have your tiles bumped off as tie-breaks happen quite regularly.
White tiles act as two workers, so you get a one-off double bonus, but do not get activations thereafter.
The actions available are to gain resources, use resources to build workshops, boats and trading houses, deliver resources to help build cathedrals, create a sculpture, or deliver cloth.
As well as the benefits of triggering other workers, you can upgrade a few actions too. Such as building boats to transport fabrics, or building a workshop to produce more cloth when you take that action.
Players will be doing these actions while keeping an eye on what scoring conditions are coming up. These include things like delivering the most fabric to a certain city, or adding the most bricks to all the cathedrals. These all work in a straightforward area majority way, if you have the most you get the most points.
Once someone has played all their tiles, or all objective tiles have been scored, the end game is triggered. After which, the final scores are tallied, in-game points are added to the objective scoring cards chosen at the beginning of the game. The player with the most points wins.
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Two player variant
If you are playing with the two player variant, workers in a neutral colour have to be distributed in the setup as per the rulebook. You also get more objective scoring cards.
Two player games are ever so slightly different to the above as you have neutral workers. These activate as per normal, but help mix up scoring by creating a third player. The kicker with these is that you can only place a neutral worker where there isn’t one already, so you could not be able to use them. Missing out on maximising the benefits of these is likely if you aren’t careful.
Also, there are intervals in the game where you play and discard objective cards from your hand for end game scoring.
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What it’s like
Calimala offers some really interesting decisions to ponder over. Placing workers that benefits others hurts. If they have more workers there than you, they get more rewards than you do, and sometimes that is still too beneficial for you to ignore.
The way placing workers triggers scoring also factors into your thinking. Sometimes you want to rush something to score, other times you are desperately hoping for one more round before it does.
Competing for scoring cards and working out your opponents’ quirky decisions to try and cash in on their secret objectives, as well as your own, is a fun element of the game.
Calimala mixes all the above together in a seamless way offering a very good brain workout over the course of the game.
I’m not sure on totally randomising the action selections as it can create hotly competed for spaces, whereas the suggested starting locations for these does feel a bit more balanced. Action cards are a bonus, but whether they align with your tactics is a little luck dependant.
Generally moves are pretty quick, or certainly seem it, but perhaps that is because you are also invested in other people’s turns as you are hoping they will trigger your workers. It slows understandably at higher player counts, but does work well. At two players, the variant is surprisingly good. I would certainly play it at two quite happily, but I probably wouldn’t rush to buy it, if I thought I was rarely going to play it at three or more as that is where it plays best.
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Table Presence
Ian O’Toole has adorned his signature style on the aesthetics throughout this new version. It is however still quite beige, and my first impressions were that it all looked a bit cubey. Playing it, I now revel in the beige! The cubes all make perfect sense and couldn’t have been trumped with any other component. I’ve grown to like the styling more with each play and understand it is reflective of the era.
The components are good and the iconography throughout is clear and easy to explain.
Generally the rulebook was great and mostly clear. The linen finish throughout and foil highlights on the cover are magnificent. However, I found myself wrestling with it to establish whether the white workers are considered one or two for triggering scoring as they had two workers on them and are thicker tiles. After delving into the subtleties of the wording we concluded they only count as one.
Tiebreaks are common. The third tie-break condition is so ridiculously worded, I had to check for designer comments on the BGG forums for a solution. For the record, and in case you are struggling, Lopiano translates “Most recently placed Worker placed earlier on Scoring tiles” far better with “If two players have the same number of seats in the council, the player that first reached that number of seats wins the tie”, that would have been better in the rulebook for sure!
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Final thoughts on Calimala
So is Calimala cut from a different cloth? Well it probably is, the worker placement mechanic has a lovely twist that is very satisfying. This triggering scoring, adds another nice dynamic. I can certainly see why it warranted a second edition and the presentation has been significantly improved, although I never played the first edition, I believe this is definitely the version to go for.
I don’t often say that I have enjoyed a game at all player counts, but this is an exception. Sure, it has a sweet spot at 3-4, but I wouldn’t turn down a game at 2 or 5 either. Calimala is a really clever game that I have enjoyed very much.
Key Facts
Number of players: 2 to 5
Board Game Review Recommended Age: 14+
Publisher’s Recommended Age: 14+
Playing Time: 90 minutes
Setting Up and Take Down Time: 5 minutes
Designers: Fabio Lopiano
Publisher: Alley Cat Games
RRP: £54.99
Summary
I have really enjoyed playing Calimala. The unique action selection is really satisfying to think around and everything else feels quite seamless.
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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
- Action Selection
- Scoring Activations
- Good at all player counts, but best at three and four
- Keeps you engaged
Cons
- Luck of the Action cards
- Triggering benefits for your opponents
- Scoring can come round too quick
- Wouldn’t want to regularly play at two or five player
Need more games?
If you already own Calimala and enjoy it, or are looking for other inspiration, you might also like these similar games:
- Concordia
- Raiders of the North Sea
- Wishland
- Keyflower
Buy Calimala
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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 Alley Cat Games. We have tried not to let this affect our review in any way.
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