The previously green foliage turns to rusty rustic tones of yellow, red and brown. Slowly, these colorful leaves also become detached from the fingertips of the trees to swirl toward the ground damp by rainfall. It is autumn. Now you may be thinking “Lightning, weird Daan, it’s not autumn at all yet, mien jungske!” You are right, of course, because it is, after all, still May during the writing of this incoherent prose. If you read on, you would find out that I am not talking about our current season, but about the game Fall which, as the title suggests, takes place during autumn.
As I mentioned, in Fall, autumn has arrived, so it is up to two players to work together to create a beautiful tableau full of typical autumn scenes. Think of the fox preparing the fox den for winter, the robin picking some seeds, the hoopoe getting ready to migrate to warmer places, and the toads and mushrooms showing their heads above the damp ground.
Although players work on the tableau together, Fall is not a cooperative game, but a highly dynamic and interactive competitive game between two players. At the beginning of the game, each player receives a trio of cards with secret objectives that earn the player points at the end of the game. Players receive points for the foxes, birds and flowers in the tableau, but it is likely that players’ goals will cause some friction. Indeed, players will intentionally and unintentionally thwart each other in order to score points and prevent the other player from scoring points, as they will slowly decipher each other’s goals. Players will also receive points for mushrooms they have appropriated depending on the height of the mushroom.
During the game, in 12 rounds, players will place 4 tiles (pieces of the tableau) in each round and collect (and possibly place) tokens (birds, foxes, toads). Each turn, the active player takes one of the four open tiles with the tile next to it. They place the tile adjacent to or on previously placed tiles. Colors on the tiles must match. Tiles show pieces of flowers and which chits players can place on the tiles. When players place mushrooms, they must also place a personal wooden mushroom meeple to show that it is theirs. Mushrooms allow players to block a tile to ensure that no new tile is placed on it.
Once the four tiles and tokens are distributed, four new tiles and tokens are placed and the next round begins. After 12 rounds, the scoring takes place and, of course, the player with the most points wins.
Fall is an intelligent and challenging puzzle. Because players work together on the tableau and have different, divergent goals in the process, the course of the game is extremely dynamic. The course of the game is simple, but the puzzle itself is complex in a comfortable way and therefore well suited for two players who want some depth.
