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cvlw
United States
Charlottesville
Virginia
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I have an objective and a subjective appreciation for La Citta. Objectively, I am comfortable saying this game is aesthetically gorgeous, wonderfully designed, and plays like a game should. My subjective view…well, you see, I’m a political philosopher and theorist by training. So when I see mechanics in a civilization and resource game like Voice of the People, my attention is going to be piqued. La Citta is a current favorite and I am glad to have acquired a copy as a gift from the other half of cvlw. In brief, this is a game that engrosses players who value autonomous decision making and enjoy seeing their decisions made manifest in surprisingly compelling ways. What follows is a review for the game from a 2-player perspective. There are very few modifications made for the 2-player version so I am quite comfortable in saying that my opinions here likely hold across most play ranges. The copy reviewed here is the German Kosmos edition.
THEME
Unlike games like Pillars of the Earth or Glory To Rome that build the gameplay around a central narrative, La Citta is premised around the idea that you are an Italian prince who initially founds 2 cities and who wishes to expand those cities which will ultimately lead to competition with other princes. A simple if not shallow premise. However, the lack of pretense to a narrative allows players to appreciate the game for what it is: a resource management and civilization building game. It’s possible that some may find this unsatisfactory but once a game of La Citta gets underway, chances are you’ll barely remember even what kind of prince you are – you will simply be interested in developing the right structures and infrastructures to maintain a healthy population. However, because there are pressures such as the need for certain buildings in order to surpass certain population limits and, subsequently the need for food to feed citizens, every decision in La Citta counts. But let me not get ahead of myself.
AESTHETICS
La Citta is a beautiful game. It somehow captures a certain authentic artistry that I rarely see in games. Everything from the box art (man it’s pretty) to the action and Voice of the People cards are rendered in vivid colors and illustrations. The only other game I own with cards this nicely rendered is Pillars of the Earth. One thing that I found quite amazing is that the game probably comes with probably 100 very small sculpted plastic citizen figures. I once took a moment to look at these closely, and much to my surprise there are actually different kinds of citizens. Moreover, the level of detail is refreshing – no wood cutouts here (sorry Pillars). When you place a citizen on a building tile and then look at the whole board grow in population as the game gets underway, you’ll likely appreciate the time taken to make a game at this level of detail.
Additionally, the game is quite hefty. Everything from the box to the board to the landscape tiles are of a nice sturdy stock. When you unfold the board, you feel the weightiness of it right away. If there were one complaint about the board is that the landscape tiles and the surrounding landscape areas on the board do not match the level of artistry as the rest of the game, but they function well.
SOME DISLIKES
Before I proceed to gush over the game, I should maybe state some weaknesses.
1. Beginning with what was just above stated, I would liked to have seen a little more artistic effort put into the landscape tiles.
2. The board for La Citta can get a little busy and, if a game heats up, a bit difficult to get a grasp on what’s what upon a glance. The first part about this revolves around maybe the game’s only design flaw – though the modeled rendering of the citizens is excellent, they are all in the same color grey. What this means is that when you look at the board, the only way to tell which city is which is by locating the only color coded hint – the castle – and following along to where it’s connected tiles end. Once you play a few times, it’s not that big a deal but it’s more work than necessary. I understand the game is due for a translated reprinting – I think the publisher and designer would do well to include the citizens in 5 colors. Although migrations will mix the colors, there will still be a dominant color in each city. This, I think, would actually add the idea of diversity in migrant communities – upon looking at cities that have successfully attracted “outsiders” one would visually see the effects of migrations. This would also add a heightened sense of political authenticity that the game already achieves in other aspects of its design.
3. What follows from this is that the building you build can be a bit hard to distinguish at a glance. Since the building tiles are flat and citizens are placed on top of them, the only way to quickly tell what’s what is by locating the colored arches of different buildings. Again, one gets the hand of this fairly soon, but nonetheless it can be a bit of a nuisance.
4. Last, make sure you shuffle the politics cards and Voice of the People cards well. A game can have the wind taken out of its sales when you turn up groups of the same cards. This may sound intuitively obvious for any game with cards, but since the decks are not that substantial in La Citta it gains in importance all the more. If in the first 2 rounds you first turn up 3 culture cards and 1 health card and then 3 health cards and 1 culture card, you already are disincentivized from building corresponding structures since that alone will represents 1/3 of the deck. This is not a flaw in design but rather an aspect of the game that deserves special attention from players.
Now, on to the good stuff.
THE POLITICAL THEORY OF LA CITTA (and how you play the game)
La Citta puts you in a position to determine what will ultimately make your city prosperous and how to maintain that prosperity. One thing to be appreciated about this game, at least to my mind, is that prosperity is not synonymous with how much money you bring in. Rather, the person that wins is the person who is able to first initiate and then support both population growth, both organically and by attracting citizens of nearby cities.
After the landscape tiles have been laid out and castles have been placed, each prince begins with a population of three thousand citizens (1 miniature equals 1,000 citizens) for each of his 2 castles. The game is played over the course of 6 years so that by the end of the 6th year there will be a dominant city indicated by a burgeoning population and a diversity of kinds of buildings.
Now, from the point of view of political theory, what is intriguing about La Citta is the way it simulates the ebb and flow of populations and the decisions faced by sovereigns in choosing between various aspects of infrastructure, income, and city planning. This will be explored below because this is the core of the game. Before I go on, I don’t want to portray the game as a simulation. Nothing of the sort. However, with the simplified aspects the game offers, it somehow does imbue the playing experience with a sense of development; and, when the voice of the people demand an attribute you can’t provide and you watch your citizens migrate to a neighboring city, don’t be surprised if you feel genuine disappointment in your ability to lead. Here’s how the game plays.
1. change start player
2. place Voice of the People (first card face up, rest face down)
3. obtain income from quarries
4. population growth (each principality gains 1 figurine)
5. 5 political rounds (combination of action cards and politics cards)
6. reveal Voice of the People
7. migrate according to VotP if applicable
8. feed your populations
- Resources and the city (Steps #1-4, 8)
In La Citta you need to be cognizant of your access to and ability to acquire resources. Various land tiles indicate varying amounts of food that they will yield (between 1-3 tiles) and whether they can provide gold for income (mountains). What I like about La Citta is that simple proximity will not guarantee resources – you must build the structures that allow you to obtain them. Moreover, where these tiles are placed will determine first, what direction you grow your cities in and likely if you are bound to run up against a competing territory. Placing a castle automatically allows you to gain food tiles if it is next to a field. For instance, if your castle is next to a 2-tile field, you instantly acquire 2 tiles. If you place a farm right next to that castle, still having access to that field, you get 2 more food tiles. Now, the nice thing about the design about La Citta which makes sense is that your food tiles are counted in aggregate across all your principalities. If one of your cities is much larger in population but another produces more food, that food is distributed across all the population in step 8. This step captures the danger of overexpansion of a political territory. There are ample stories in history, especially during wars where the appropriation of resources in one manner affected a territory’s ability to feed it’s population. Moreover, each year, as one might surmise, your population grows some – by another 1,000 to be exact. This is a good aspect of the game since regardless of whether you get successful migrations in your direction, there is always slight population pressure that you must be sensitive too, often a political reality for all but shrinking states such as Italy. In La Citta, even if you successfully satisfy what the people demand, in the end, one still needs to feed them. At the end of step #8, you count how many citizen figures you have; if that number is greater than the value of your food tiles then you need to return some of those citizens to the supply. Likewise, if those citizens were the sole occupants of any buildings, that tile is removed. Call it municipal downsizing.
Income works similarly. For every quarry next to a mountain, you gain 1 gold in income each round. If your quarry is between 2 mountains, then you obtain 2 gold. Gold is important in step 5 as some political cards allow you build larger buildings or grow your population for fixed amounts of gold.
Similarly, since the Voice of the People is previewed during these early steps, you will have slight indication about what kind of structures you might want to build. With one voice card faced up you’ll see that this year the people demand more culture – or at least this is one of their demands. This nicely captures the fickleness of politics and the calculations a leader might make since it is entirely possible that later in the round it turns out that the people actually want education and you “misread” the signs from the public. It’s an aspect of La Citta that helps the game transcend mere randomness. This mechanic is a good example of where mechanics meet theme in an appropriate way.
- “If you build it, they will come” (steps #5)
These steps are where the game shines since your decisions here and the “reactions” of the people will make manifest your ability to successfully grow your political community. Step #5 is comprised of 5 political rounds – think of each action as one of a few important political choices a leader has to make in a fixed period of time. During this step, each player, in turn order, either chooses to play an action card or chooses one of the available political cards (7 are laid out each year) – think of this dynamic as leading with an eye towards matching the political acumen of nearby leaders and possible political contenders for the hearts and mind of your own people (and vice versa). Action cards provide one of three options: collect 2 gold, build a simple structure (farm, market, fountain, quarry, school, or statue), or start a new city. These cards are very useful since they allow you to build your infrastructure at a low cost and then to begin to build up various attributes of your city for low cost. Moreover, the ability to collect gold will facilitate doing other things later in the round such as building high level buildings such as a palace.
The interesting political aspects of La Citta begin with the political cards. These are split into two kinds. Those which allow you to build more attractive buildings. The political aspect of this revolves around whether to use funds to anticipate satisfying the voice of the people or whether you think it is actually in the people’s interest, whether they realize it or not, to have more food and means of income. These decisions are not trivial – every choice in La Citta counts and will have an impact on how the city develops, particularly when you come within close proximity to a competing city, for even if your city is more attractive in the way the people want, it means nothing if you do not have the food infrastructure.
The second kind of political card is the one I most appreciate from a conceptual point of view. These reflect various cycles and dimensions of political life. For instance, there is Closeness to the People. Should you choose to use this as one of your 5 political maneuvers, you will be privy to what the people will demand that year – you and you alone get to turn over 2 of the 3 face down Voice cards. What is very interesting about this mechanic is that while it definitely elevates your chances of accurately accommodating them that year, (if the cards have been shuffled well) there is still the chance that you get it wrong or that there is actually a tie between two demands. This is a compelling aspect as the political will of the people can become apparent to some leaders if they take the time to simply ask, but that is not to say they are always asking the right people or enough people thus always putting them at risk of being one step behind. Ostensibly, this is meant to allow you to make choices as to what structures to build since migrations are predicated upon which cities meet the attractiveness requirements. Other cards such as Golden Times allow you to use one political opportunity to increase your population by a certain number depending on whether or not you are willing to pay for extra citizens. Cards like Bread and Circuses allow you, as the politico, to artificially increase the attractiveness of your city along of the three relevant dimensions by varying levels. You may realize that building that palace is not within your budget, but you are able to persuade some contractor to place a temporary cultural attraction (i.e. amplifying the attractiveness of a statue) in your city. It may be just enough to keep your citizens or maybe even win some over.
- Distributive justice (steps #6-7)
After players are done jockeying for position, the people make their voice heard – think of this as the election after the debates. Politicians think they have their finger on the pulse (or that they are good at wagging the dog) and the people take it to the streets and let them know what’s what. During step #6 you will turn over all the Voice cards. Majority wins – if you have 2 education cards, 1 health, and 1 culture, the people have demanded education that year. It is entirely possible that their desires are split evenly, in which case both dimensions will count for step #7.
So, how do you know if you’ve been a competent leader this year? Each building tile has 1, 2, or 3 arches in either the color white, black, or blue (hospitals have one black and one blue). White represents whether that building contributes to your cultural attractiveness; black represents education while blue represents health. Now, it is to be noted that people in society have more interests than these, but I find that these three do represent the most basic needs of any society.
To this point in the game, hopefully you have invested in different kinds of buildings – but this is where it gets interesting for spreading your bets widely will not be useful but neither will building only one kind of building. This is where smart management comes up – in one turn it is possible to build 2 simple buildings of one type, get some gold and build a higher level building of the one of those two types or even of the third and keep rebalancing these allocations.
Migrations are what makes or breaks your city vis-à-vis your opponent. When the voice of the people has made itself heard – let’s say they demand education – each player counts the number of black arches in their respective cities. If 2 players’ territories are within 3 tile spaces of each other, whoever has the majority of education attractiveness points attracts 1,000 citizens. One figurine may not seem like much but, unless you have been storing people up in your castle, it is likely that one of your structures will need to be demolished, shrinking your city materially and from the point of view of population. If your opponent has 2 of his or her cities within striking distance, then losing 2,000 citizens really hurts. However, if you’re the winner of these citizens, do not be so quick to rejoice for you need to meet some requirements. You can only have more than 5,000 citizens in a city if that city has a market – people do need to buy goods; trading doesn’t cut it anymore. You can only have more than 8,000 citizens if you have a health infrastructure such as a bath or fountain – overcrowding will destroy the health of any territory once public health resources breaks down – a main reason the Black Plague was a plague. Last, you need to feed your citizens – did you build enough farms recently. If not, did you make the political maneuver of obtaining a Rich Harvest which for that one year doubles your food production? If not, then your success is a mixed blessing if not a curse, for if you are unable to feed your population at the end of the 6th year (ostensibly when your city has reached a point of viability) you are penalized as many leaders would be if they were unable to provide basic services by that time (you are also unable to use Rich Harvest this year).
At the end of the 6th year, players earn points for each 1,000 citizens. Besides the above penalty, there is a bonus if players have managed to build one of each kind of building in a city. If you can do this in two cities or more, you get the bonus for each of those. What is deeply interesting about this is that it allows players to back off of growth for growth’s sake and focus on pure development of the city’s attributes. But think about this – this only presumes that you are able to isolate yourself for if another city begins to close in upon you, not having enough cities leaves you in a delicate place should some of them leave due to emigration meaning that structures will come down just as fast as they go up. In actual society, no group can choose to be so inwardly focused without being concerned about competition. Looking at some of the Scandinavian welfare states, it is unfortunate that it is highly likely that within a decade or two, there will need to be serious choices as to whether resources that go into excellent healthcare will not be used to support private enterprise for the simple reason that global competition for capital and talent will necessarily put them in such a position, for not even a welfare state can provide welfare with little income, but income in any society is almost always predicated upon competition and markets.
FINAL WORDS
Thank you for staying with me this far. I can go on for some time about this game, but I’d like to wrap up with concluding, directly gameplay related thoughts.
We play La Citta as a 2-player affair and love it. The play area is shrunk and there is always a constant fear that one player will close that distance gap before the other is ready to compete. This is a really immersive aspect of the game since you really sit there trying to decide what is best for a given territory. Should both be competitive territories or should you isolate one making it a food and income powerhouse while the other territory is the cultural and educational mecca?
La Citta plays tightly with 2 players and while I would be interested to add more players to a session, there’s actually a possibility I’d enjoy it less. In this game, you actually want to stop and think about what you want to do, and I imagine that with more than 3 players, play time increases significantly. When it’s just the two of us, the game runs about 75 minutes but you’d never know it.
We were very fortunate to acquire this game from a BGG seller who also provided a great translation of the rules and a great player aid. I hope that when the translation is released that this game garners all the attention it deserves. As I close the review, I feel that I’ve omitted an important observation or feeling on the game. Maybe it’s the accomplishment of the design that you are responsible for something more important than plastic figures. Or, maybe it’s the way you find yourself thinking more politically than you realize in countering your opponent’s development choices. Chances are, though, that it is simply this: good games always keep you playing because they provide an experience that seems fresh no matter how familiar.
We rate La Citta a 10.
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Thanks for your insightfull review!
La Città is also one of my preferred games. Your review captures very well the "spirit" and atmosphere of this game!
Let me just add a comment on playing this game with more than 2 players:
It is just about 30 minutes for each player playingtime, that must be added, when playing this game! With 5 players this means for me, tehre is too much down time! But I really think this game shines with 3 or even 4 players. It gets even more complex, because different players bring different styles of play to this game and therefor the princes of the other cities may be agressive, passive, selfish, or protective. It just gets more headspinning! WOW, what a game! I just want to play it again now!
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cvlw wrote: 2. The board for La Citta can get a little busy and, if a game heats up, a bit difficult to get a grasp on what’s what upon a glance. The first part about this revolves around maybe the game’s only design flaw – though the modeled rendering of the citizens is excellent, they are all in the same color grey. What this means is that when you look at the board, the only way to tell which city is which is by locating the only color coded hint – the castle – and following along to where it’s connected tiles end.
not sure about the old english release, but in the "old" french version from Tilsit, the citizens were colored differently for each player... hopefully they will do the same in the english reprint
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cvlw
United States
Charlottesville
Virginia
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That's good to hear as this sounds to me like a sensible option. People may be concerned about the figurines used for Special Attraction points but there's an easy solution to that - you used some neutral sixth color that everyone will recognize as special to the gameboard.
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Daniel Corban
Canada
Newmarket
Ontario
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Jay has already mentioned that the figures included will be identical to the original release since they have leftovers from the first printing.
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Tim Fiscus
Germany
Landstuhl
Armed Forces Europe (AE)
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This is an excellent review/treatise and has helped me quite a bit in my decision about purchasing the upcoming reprint. GG coming your way!
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Chris Fawcett
United States
St. Louis
Missouri
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unity wrote: not sure about the old english release, but in the "old" french version from Tilsit, the citizens were colored differently for each player... hopefully they will do the same in the english reprint
They did not, so I'm thinking of painting up the citizens in each of the player colors. What was the figure count for each color? Do the four "special" figures for each player need to be a different color?
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J. S.
United States
Manhattan Beach
California
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I just wanted to write a quick note to say that this is the review that made me purchase this game.
This review conveys such passion. I just had to get this game.
Thanks for you effort.
Last night I opened the box, punched out all the pieces and played a solitaire 2 player game (removing the polling cards). I played 3 rounds just to understand the mechanics. I have to say that, so far, I am very happy with this purchase. The game is fun, beautiful to look at and rich with theme.
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Brad Musil
United States
Shawnee
Kansas
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HuckmanT wrote: This is an excellent review/treatise and has helped me quite a bit in my decision...
I second this--excellent synopsis and review. This game wasn't even on my radar (surprisingly, I hadn't ever even heard of it) until I stumbled upon this; now it's in my collection
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Posted Fri May 11, 2007 3:57 am
