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Lead the Netherlands into the Industrial Age in the latest version of the cooperative classic! It is the dawn of the Industrial Age in the Netherlands. For centuries, the country has relied upon a series of dikes and wind-powered pumps to keep it safe from the constant threat of flooding from the North Sea. But this system is no longer enough.
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Like it but the game has some design issues which keep me from loving it. Everything about this production is beautiful, except they filled a map with tiny regions that are not very user friendly. Gameplay is either a walk in the park or ridiculously hard. There's no middle way, and this my main complaint about this game: it doesn't have a steady build up of tension. Rather, there's no tension at all and then all of a sudden you lose. Just like that. The reason for this: - Basic goals are very easy. - Extra goals are extremely hard, especially if you draw more than one. - Water cubes run out very rapidly. I've had games where we lost on turn 1 because too many cubes had to be placed during setup! - You rarely run out of cards, hence, no tension. - The balance between cube management and card management is distorted. Still, I very much like all the 7 roles, all of the events, the water flow, the pumps etc. If you can finetune the difficulty, look past the map and don't mind losing on turn 1 once in while, this game is very solid. Otherwise it's either boredom (too easy) or frustration (too hard). Despite its shortcomings, I find it more interesting than Pandemic but less pleasant than Fall of Rome.
camidon
Definitely my favorite pandemic. Many different variable setups to explore. I really like the theme. It uses the base mechanics of Pandemic and does something new and interesting. Very strong. Wife and kids enjoy this.
Akado
"Rising Tide" must be Dutch for "Snowball Effect." An interesting take on pandemic, where outbreaks constantly happen and require careful management. And, like all elegant solutions, careful management is very fragile and prone to sudden and inevitable betrayal. There's more depth here than with regular pandemic, as long-term elements (ports and pumping stations) are available from Turn 1, and also with how the removal of dikes is quite meaningful later in the game. The unfortunate part is that new players won't know which dikes are "better" or "safer" to remove, and the rules do have a typo about water flowing. That being said, this was an interesting game and I would play it again, but the complexity takes it beyond an entry level game and that means I don't need to own it, as I have other not-quite-entry-level games I would rather play. It's also very fiddly, with windmills always removing a cube but water always pushing out more cubes.