Cardboard Corner: Review of Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico... what’s to be said that hasn’t likely been said a thousand times already? One of the most popular board games of all time, I know I walk a path many before me have walked in writing this review. What do I hope to offer new Puerto Rico (2002)--to command a fresh voice relating how good it is? I don’t know, let’s see.

A competitive Euro game, Puerto Rico sees 3-5 players building their own colonial plantation on the island nation, trying to be the most efficient/successful in doing so (i.e. victory points!). Each player starts with an empty plantation (game board), and slowly but surely choose which crops to grow, where to assign their workers, and which buildings and businesses to invest in, all the while managing which crops and resources are shipped back to Europe for profits. Do you want to run a corn empire? Maybe be a coffee magnate? Or do you want to spread your risk and profit from both or more? When no more workers are left to be assigned, victory points are tallied, and the player with the most, wins. There is another layer of detail to each of those points (types of crops, building types, action selection, etc.), but overall that is a description of the machine driving the game.

The metaphor coming to my mind when thinking of Puerto Rico is thus clockwork gears. On every turn, each player has the ability to move the game state forward in their favor. Money here, workers there, shipments here, harvest there, and so on. The question is, where to apply pressure such that the biggest gear turns for you and the smallest for your opponents? Be the person to most consistently turn the gears in your favor, and you win.

It’s not easy. Some decisions are straight-forward, particularly toward the end of a round when only a couple of the action options remain. Toward the beginning of a round, however, is when the pressure is on to make the best decision. Selecting workers will allow you to fill desperately needed positions in your coffee mill, but doing so might give an opponent the opportunity to ship tobacco back to Europe without your harvest onboard, therefore leaving you unable to profit. Is it worth waiting, or should I jump the gun and ship tobacco so that my opponents lose out knowing I will lack workers later? What would I, and what would they gain from that? All interaction indirect, players need to be good at evaluating board state, needs, and potential earnings to be successful. Not the heaviest game out there, but definitely brain-burny…

I think the aspect which has allowed Puerto Rico to sustain the immense success it has in the twenty years since its release is the balance between meaningful decisions and streamlined gameplay—the fact both exist simultaneously. Players’ decisions have major impact but rounds are smooth and fluid. ‘Simple elegance’ is likely an overused cliché, but in the game’s case it’s 100% true. When finishing a game there is a quiet but very real sense of satisfaction if you come out on top given the sustained brain power you invested to bring a strategy to fruition, and if you just lost, there is a real, perhaps-not-so-quiet desire to play again, particularly if by just a few points. Inherently positive in reflection, the brain reflects on how things could have been done better, that is, rather than self-criticism about which mistakes were made (unless of course it was an egregious error late in the game, brain smoke having clouded thinking).

I have to look really hard to find something I dislike about Puerto Rico. The only thing coming to mind is the number of victory point counters which come with the game (at least my version). In the final couple of rounds players need to track virtual victory points as there are usually not enough cardboard tokens to go around. Why more could not have been printed, I don’t know. Out of the box, there is no 2-player variant. But I wouldn’t call that a drawback; it’s simply a result of the design, take it or leave it.

In the end, I guess I don’t have much new to add to commentary on Puerto Rico except to be yet another voice in praise of the game. Managing to be both complex and simple, there are multiple layers of gameplay to be discovered. The better player inevitably coming out on top, luck plays an extremely small role. Art and aesthetics are simple and functional; this type of game doesn’t need anything spectacular or dazzling before the eyes; gameplay is its success. If you haven’t played Puerto Rico and consider yourself a fan of the think-ier, more Euro side of board gaming, do try. Even if you ultimately dislike the game, it still provides a baseline experience upon which many, many other games measure themselves against elegant simplicity.