Tabletop Game Review: My City

My City

KOSMOS

2-4 Players

Playtime: 30 Minutes

Legacy games can certainly be polarizing. For those who aren’t familiar with them, these board games are played as a campaign with the same players through every session. These games slowly build up toward a conclusion of some sort. While this sounds neat, the drawback is that the board is often permanently altered by the end of these experiences with stickers and other markers. In other words, you will only play through the game one time. On the other hand, these games typically come with tons of value. In the case of My City, players will enjoy 24 sessions before they finish their legacy game.

A Brief How To Play

Players have presented a board that looks like an untouched settlement. There is a river, some trees, rocks, and tons of plains. As expected, players will use building tiles to create a settlement.

Players draw a card that reveals a building, and players will decide where that building will go on their grid. Every building has a unique shape, and there aren’t too many limitations to placing a building. Buildings can’t cross a river or stack on each other. If a player can’t place a building for any reason, they will pass and lose a point.

At the end of a game, players will lose a point for every open space on their board (At least in the first game). Covering certain rocks or trees result in various score changes too, but that will all change as players proceed through the campaign.  The board gets cleared between games, with stickers marking certain changes to the board to help players catch up when behind on score.

Pacing and Interactivity

Games of My City are brisk and are usually completed within 30 minutes. Every player has their own board, and every player makes their move at the same time. Players who have played Enchanted Forests or Kingdomino will have a good grasp on My City‘s pacing. Everyone moving at the same time leads to very little downtime, which makes the game feel great to play for those who have little patience. Games are brisk as long as players don’t have severe analysis paralysis, which likely won’t exist in this game because it feels relatively light.

If players are wanting an interactive experience though, My City won’t deliver. It’s largely a solitaire experience, with everyone simply sitting at the table and interacting with their own boards. There are no mean-spirited mechanics, so players that want to just stick to themselves and build will likely have a good time with My City.

Most interaction takes place between games when alterations are made. Typically, the losing player gets some sort of mulligan to prevent snowballing. These are enough to make an impact if players keep trading wins and losses through the 24-session campaign. If one player streaks though, the game can get out of hand quickly, and eventually there won’t be any hope for the losing player to catch up. It can be discouraging to play if there is a clear skill difference, but this is an otherwise even affair.

Replay Value

As a legacy game, the game will be replayed until all 24 sessions are complete. After that, there isn’t really much reason to go back. There is, however, an eternal game mode on the back of the boards that utilize the first 5 sessions’ worth of rules. This allows for fans of the experience to play more even after they finish their legacy game.

Unfortunately, using only the first few sessions’ worths of rules means that the eternal game is pretty shallow. It can be enjoyable, but the legacy game is really where My City gains its charm. Players will likely be better off playing Calico or another tile placement game with more depth than this one.

Theme and Components

The components in My City simply won’t astound anyone. The board and cards are pretty standard, and the art isn’t remarkable either. The buildings and settings don’t have any quirky stylistic decisions, they simply look like any other generic board game. Nothing is offensive here, but the box looks much better than the game.

Building a city is a nice theme to use, but the board getting cleared after every session does take away from the experience a little. What could have been a neat experience of slowly building a city over many years is instead a shallow theme that gives an excuse to make a tile-placement game. Like the components, the theme isn’t necessarily bad, but it isn’t used to its full potential.

My City Is Great For Fans Of…

Anyone who enjoys tile placement games should get their money’s worth out of My City. It holds up with various player counts, and aside from a minor snowballing issue, plays well with various skill levels too. Anyone who likes Calico, Kingdomino, or even Sorcerer City will feel right at home here. Just don’t expect a great eternal experience after the legacy ends.