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When I first read about Nostra City, I thought it would be a "take that" game that i could like; I was a bit put off by the art. Well finally the art works for me, and Nostra City is much more than a "take that" game. I love it.
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The art and the board layout are nicely done. While Nostra City is mostly a game played with cards (but not a "card game" in its usual acceptation), the board is definitely needed to keep track of things, and look very nice.
To nitpick, there is not perfect fit for card sleeves, and the cards do not sport that linen finish that I prefer.
Rules
The rules are clearly presented, with enough examples.
However, one might ask quite a few questions about some cards. To be fair, the rules are clear and these problems are solved by a strict application of the rules even if it might appear off at first, but a faq would have been welcome.
Theme
The theme is very present, even though violence might be a little too subdued for some. Think "The Sopranos" and you'll be on spot.
The mechanics reflects both the usual mafia businesses and the trial of the godfather quite aptly.
The game
As I wrote in my introduction, the game's description and rules seem to describe a "take that" game and the game can be played simply like that.
However, it is actually a very clever game mixing several tried mechanics under the guise of a card game.
The game happens in six turns, each turn being a month in the trial of the godfather; the underboss players must both expand the business and try to corrupt the jury.
Each month is divided into four phases, and in each of these the player will send one or more of his lieutenants to act, so it's a bit of a worker placement game with two remarkable differences: the first difference is that this allotment will take place accross the phases, and the second is that each of the lieutenants has a specialty, a power that is activated when he is performing his usual business or that needs a separate, ad hoc activation.
The first phase consists in collecting money; each of the lieutenants owned by the player can start to gather money on a player owned turf, with one activity among drugs, girls, gambling or racketing. The player takes random cards with varying amount of money and corrupting power (either corrupting jury member to vote for innocence or guilt), one card for the number of turfs he does business on (with a matching icon) among his own and other players' turfs. Then he distributes the money, one money card for each turf thusly exploited, or, if he does not and keep the money for himself, he shows disrespect and the offended player(s) take one vendetta card for each missed money card.
The second phase is a secret auction hapenning after a discussion between the players; that is when you can expand your territory by acquiring new turfs, and when you recruit new thugs to expand the number of actions you can take. You can also buy marks of status and respect, which do nothing to improve your business, but with earn you respect points, which are very few and determine the winner (things like a yacht, a movie star mistress, or an authentic sicilian birth certificate) Some players will get nothing and thus will feel disrespected, so they will get a vendetta card.
The third phase is the corruption phase when the available lieutenants will be used to corrupt the jury.
The fourth phase is the cleanup phase.
The vendetta cards are used following the instructions on the cards.
At the end of the third month, a first trial occurs; the banknotes are tallied and the culpability marker is moved along the track representing the jury; initially it is put in the red (guilty) part of the track and the players must do their best to put it in the blue (innocent) part of the track (unless they are undercover agents - more about that later).
After six month the final trial occurs and, if the godfather is innocented, the player with the most respect wins the game.
Unless of course the godfather is found guilty; then the winner will be decided among the FBI agents. You become an FBI agent if you draw one of the two snitch cards in the vendetta deck. There is also a pair of cards with the unique role of raising suspicion; the attention to detail in this game is very high.
I make it sound like it is mostly a take-that game wit a co-op element and it can be certainly played withot second thoughts.
However, by explaining a strategy of the undercover FBI agent, I hope to convince you than there is much more to that game.
When you are an FBI agent, you quickly realise that your best bet is to have a second FBI agent on the table; the way to achieve that goal is of course to make sure that all the vendetta cards got distributed, without taking too many yourself (because you could get the second snitch card).
Take heed that the stack of money cards is quite thin, and that when the re-shuffle card appears, more vendetta cards are distributed. Your aim is to control the number of available money cards low, so bid low and keep money cards between turns.
Also, sow dissension so that vendetta cards become valued. You'll find that people with a low respect might also be wanting to collect many vendetta cards in hope to change side, so disrespect them a lot!
There are also two respect points cards attributed to the player with the largest street presence, the biggest sum of money (which is quite stressful because choosing to keep money to that end is a delicate decision) and the most (unplayed) vendetta cards.
Oh and I forgot to talk about the FBI,NYPD and IRS cases cards which require collaboration to get rid off but earn respect points at the same time.
This game is full of details that you can genuinely just use as theme bits, but if you give them a second thought, you'll see how these parts fit in a coherent whole and will make you want to come back just to try something new.
Conclusion
An obvious suggestion would be to play the game while listening to an Italian opera, but the game play is so enthralling that you won't hear it anyway.
I have not tried all the famous Essen 2009 releases yet, but Nostra City will be a though game to better in this year's crop.
Not only Nostra City manages to mix a few game styles gracefully, but it can be played on differing levels, adapting to its audience.
Nostra City might be a little more complex than the usual card game but achieves much more. In my opinion, it also sports the absolute best traitor mechanism in a game; it is simple, streamlined, there is no special rule when you are a traitor; unlike Battlestar Galactica for example, it is also designed from the start to be perfectly enjoyable and challenging without a traitor!
The mix of strong theme, cooperation, competition, resource management, treason, negociation and wit makes this game really shine. I am curious to see how the game shall be received when it gets translated.
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Brian M
United States
Grand Ledge
Michigan
Tasteless Brute
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Awesome review. I hadn't heard much about this game before but now I definitely want to try it out.
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Thank you. I forgot to mention that the game is quite cheap, too. So if I mislead you, you only get one single vendetta card.
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Yoki Erdtman
Sweden
Södertälje
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Very good review. I wanted to play this at Spiel '09, but never had the chance. I love the designer duo's first game Cold War: CIA vs KGB, and the theme of Nostra City sounds very cool. Your review make the game sound like a lot of fun.
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James & Sharon Derbyshire
United Kingdom
South Ockendon
Essex
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Cool review, thanks.
I saw this game recently at a friend's house and just loved the art and concept immediately.
The one thing that worries me is how it scales with fewer players. Are you, or anyone else, able to comment on the best numbers?
Thanks
James
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I've tried only the 3 and 4 player game. The 3 player was interesting, but we had more fun with 4, and I expect the 5 player game is nice too.
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Just to let you know :
I'm using the Fantasy Flight card sleeves, and they seems perfect for theses cards ;
And they are probably the best quality card sleeves too.
You just need the Grey ones ( Standard card game ), and the Yellow ones ( Mini american board game )
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Very nice review.
HavocIsHere wrote: I've tried only the 3 and 4 player game. The 3 player was interesting, but we had more fun with 4, and I expect the 5 player game is nice too.
I've also tried this with 3 and 4 players and 3 player was "decent" but it seemed to work better with 4. I'd also guess that with 5 it can be nice.
It was discussed in the other review where I point out that there's not so much of cooperation in this game. Maybe when you agree to get cop cards away from the street, but it's still mainly about figuring out "how I can win the game" rather than try to collaborate with the others.
Fbi snitch only brings new aspect to think about (making certain that the verdict is innocent if you aren't a snitch), but that's more like one additional element - not something that would make the game more cooperative.
In my opinion, calling this game semi-coop (or coop) is misleading as players always have their solo victories, and there's no roses for second or 3rd players.
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The cop cards are certainly a factor, but cooperation is definitely needed to have the godfather innocented.
Of course the feel is definitely different from other coop games since there is only one winner in Nostra City.
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HavocIsHere wrote: The cop cards are certainly a factor, but cooperation is definitely needed to have the godfather innocented.
Of course the feel is definitely different from other coop games since there is only one winner in Nostra City.
Placing couple of "godfather innocent" bills doesn't rank high in terms of "coop" effort.  Sure you *can* do that, but it's more about thinking:
- am I going to win? (thus I should help make godfather innocent)
- is that guy winning anyway (thus I should make sure everybody loses... or try to turn into a snitch).
Due the fact that there's one winner, I don't think it's very cooperative. The "making godfather innocent" is not done for cooperative purposes - it's done for your own sake.
And... everybody else can decide to stop doing that. To ensure that "okay, if I'm not winning - so will nobody else". So bottom line is that maybe getting godfather free requires effort together - but nobody is requiring you to take part in that effort.
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Posted Thu Nov 19, 2009 8:52 am
