Board Game Arena - Winter of Games #6 - Review - Biomos

 

Biomos (2023)

Players - 1-4

Game time  - 10 minutes

Easy to learn and games will be up and running in seconds

As December flies over, we reach day six of the Board Game Arena Winter of Games with a game from 2023 - Biomos. Coming in at an average of just 6.1 on Board Game Geek my expectations for this title were quite low. After a morning session playing across both two and four players games, I still find myself a little unsure of how to assess this title!

Biomos describes itself as a fast, friendly and family fun game for all to enjoy. I would certainly agree on the 'fast' part, games take under 10 minutes even with four players but I would not have used the word family to describe this title. The concept revolves around you trying to harbour life on a new planet.  You take turns drafting land tokens, and combining them together to make and claim biomes. Each turn you must take one of the five available tokens and place it on your own player board. You are permitted to move your tokens left and right each turn, but not to-rearrange the order, with the goal of making the correct combinations to land a biome card which scores you points. As expected, the larger the biomes the more points you are going to get.

One a Biome is taken a new one emerges meaning the game is ever changing with the goals and aims. There is a certain randomness introduced into the game because of this. As someone removes a Biome, it could open a new Biome a player already has, and there is no real way to control this element. 

One of your tokens can be placed in the moon, which on a minor level, allows you to move a token of that colour to anywhere on your board, but also gives you bonus points for each of that type of token you possess. Tokens never leave your board so it soon becomes clogged and with only 12 spaces the game quickly moves through a rapid pace.

For a short, sharp burst of gaming, Biomos works on one level, but the lack of depth (even when considering the advanced mode) and shallowness of the game, when combined with the randomness, makes this a somewhat unfulfilling experience. 

Would I play this again? Probably not one I am going to come back to. The only use I see for the game is a good introductory drafting game for smaller gamers just getting into the hobby, but even then you have better options.

Whilst Biomos does nothing terribly wrong, the lack of uniqueness and play becoming quite boring quickly takes away from the overall experience.

6.5/10

Pros - Easy to Learn, Quick playing, Good to introduce new gamers to drafting

Cons - Too simplistic, unsatisfying gameplayer, randomness

 Board Game Arena Winter of Games Rankings to Date - 

1st -Gift of Tulips

2nd -Oasis: A New Hope

3rd -Yokai Septet

4th -Trike

5th -Biomos

6th -Hanonmikoji