"I liked this one. I think it is my second favorite in the series after Le Havre, and this works well with a wider range of players. I wasnt as fond of the "Alhambray" aspects of the game, where you have to make things fit on your playerboards, but I think with repeated plays that wouldnt bother me anymore."

"This game does something I have always hoped Laget might do, which is to make the trade mechanism from Mare Nostrum into a free-standing card game. It works very well, has several paths to victory, and offers a lot of challenge. It also uses a new card selection mechanic that is somewhat reminiscent of my game Armorica."

"This is the stand-alone expansion to 51st State. Players can now attack each other to a limited degree, which they could not do in the base game. Both versions of the game are a lot of fun, and the new version has much nicer components. I wish the New Era had reduced the fiddlyness of the first edition though, as this puts off a lot of my gaming friends."

"Having played this twice, its not bad. Its reasonably fun. But 10 turns is long for this kind of game, and the strategy doesn't really build across the game. The hand management (banking cards you choose not to spend) is counter-intuitive; and if you don't do it the game becomes ridiculous, buying cards you will never get out of your deck. It really needed a regular trashing mechanism."

"Not a ton of strategy, or card drafting for that matter. I'd play it again to get a better sense of it."

"Gift from Eric, good, want to play it a few more times before i settle on a rating. He could have done this game with less pieces."

"Way too longa, for what it isa."

"Good game. The "mancala" inspired rondel is a very original mechanism, and adds some interesting challenges to mapping out your actions. Aside from that, the feel of the game is kind of like a Reiner Knizia game (Ra, Amon Re) on a much larger scale. Less favoribly, a lot of the challenge comes from giving players an unreasonably large menu of options, including multiple ways to achieve the same resource, like Vinhos and De Vulgari Eloquentia but better than those."