Board Game Arena - Winter of Games 2023 - Review #4 - Hanamikoji

 

Hanamikoji (2013)

Players - 2
Game time - 10-15 mins 
           

Day four of the Board Game Arena Winter of Games 2023 brings a game that is currently ranked inside of the Board Game Geek  all time top 250 and a game that was certainly on my radar - Hanamikoji. In essence, Hanamikoji is a two-player card game in which you are trying to impress 7 Geishas to win.

The first thing to mention about this game is how impressive the art work is and how nice it looks on screen on the BGA version. I imagine in the physical edition this looks sublime. The theme, as with many of these card games, ultimately has  no real impact on the game but makes nice visuals as you are deciding which card to play.

The gameplay revolves around taking 4 actions per turn, all of which make the game feel a little disengaging to me. Your four actions are Secret, Gift, Discard and Competition. You MUST use each one of these actions once and once only per round. Secret involves stashing a card in a pile that will then be played at the end of the game, Discard involves getting rid of you card, Gift involves you choosing three cards (one of which your opponents takes) and competition involves you deciding on two sets of pairs of cards, one you play, one your opponent does...but the choice is always with the opponent.

The premise of the game is original, fun and on the face of it sounds like it is something I would enjoy at a tactical and strategical level, but after a few sessions playing the game, I am afraid I cannot seem to engage with it. In two-player games I enjoy a sense of engaged, intensity and involvement and I really feel Hanamikoji missed the mark on all three. I feel a lack of influence in the game with so many choices being left to the opponent, and a certain lack of control over proceedings. When good plays happen I missed out on the satisfaction as I tend to think it was more luck than skill based.

Victory then doesn't feel as satisfying and I felt during my play session I kept going to try and find a way to enjoy this, rather than playing on as I was enjoying.

Hanamikoji therefore comes in as my first real disappointment of the Board Game Arena Winter of Games 2023. I would like to try it in person to see how the dynamic changes but I can't imagine me going back to on BGA until when, or if, that happens

5/10

Pros - Visually stunning, unique. quick to play

Cons - Feels disengaging and random