Meeple on Board Rating
Be the first to review this product.Board Game Geek Reviews
Be the first to review “Pakal”
You must be logged in to post a review.
You must be logged in to post a review.
Pakal is a real-time sliding-puzzle game in which each player has a 4×4 grid filled with 15 blocks, some of which have a solid color on them and some of which are clear.
Each round, an objective card is revealed, then players slide their blocks in their grid, trying to show only the symbols on that card in their grid and hiding any other symbols from view. If you do this before time runs out, you can grab one of the available scoring blocks, then move your token on the scoring track to the next such symbol on the track. Thus, the quicker you solve the puzzle, the more likely you are to grab a block that advances you the farthest.
Whenever you cross a red line on the scoring track, you must replace a colored block in your grid with a clear one, thereby making it more difficult for you to solve objective cards in future rounds.
Ages | 8+ |
---|---|
Players | 2 Players, 3 Players, 4 Players |
Play Time | 20m |
Designer | Luca Bellini, Luca Borsa |
Mechanics | Pattern Recognition |
Theme | Action / Dexterity, Puzzle, Real-time |
Publisher | Cranio Creations |
jgoyes
2022-03-30 Initial Rating: 5.0 (March 2022) Pakal was an utterly unknown game for me (which is unusual these days, I don´t know much about new games but I know at least their names), due to this, my desire to play it wasn’t very high, but some friends were having a good time playing the game, so I finally played it and I had a lot of fun doing it! Pakal is a fun real time game. Pakal´s rules are very easy to teach, you can do it under 1 minute. Playtime is around 15 minutes. The game´s components are very well done, and the art is also good. It is a very colorful game. My only grip is that I CANNOT sleeve the square cards, or they wouldn’t fit in the player´s boards. This is a shame (for me) because these cards do suffer a little during game play. I need to see if I can stomach this or not. Gameplay is fun and frantic. Pakal is a real time game and I love those. The goal is to reach the end of a track. Each turn, players need to solve a puzzle tile that is drawn at random. The tile shows 3 icons, and you have to match them in your board. You need to have exactly the 3 icons, to do this you have to slide plastic tiles (some transparent, some opaque) until you finish it, or the time runs out. If you do finish it, you still need to race to take a tile in the center of the table, the icon on this tile represent how much you will advance in the track but if you choose one of the icons shown in the puzzle tile you won’t advance. I do like it a lot and I enjoyed it. The game also has a timer app (or at least I think it is only a timer), but the first time I played the game the app distracted me as I thought it was going to do something else (other than keep the time). If a player has a good memory, he has an advantage as he can remember where the icons are on his player board, but I don’t mind this, in fact, I love games in which memory is a factor. Just like some people are great at dexterity games, or strategy games, I like that there are games in which having a good memory pays off. It’s just another skill (like having good dexterity). The replay value seems low as the game feels exactly the same with each play, still Pakal is a fun game to play from time to time. Best with 4 players. Bottom line, Pakal is a fun family game and one I like enough that I will probably purchase it in the near future. It has great components, and its gameplay is rather novel (at least for me). I have never seen boardgames with this kind of sliding puzzles and I had lots of them as a child. It can be a great introduction game. Current Rating: 6.0
lexay1415
Speed sliding puzzle dexterity game. It was fun, the music in the app makes the experience even more enjoyable. Balancing out the number of transparent tiles is key.
Uthsavi
Quick, almost no explanation needed. Always a blast, super fun and competitive. Recomend using the mobile app to set the clock.