Go Outside (PARKS)

PARKS (2019) + PARKS: Nightfall Expansion (2021)

Designed by Henry Audubon

Art by Fifty-Nine Parks Print Series (more info here)

Published by Keymaster Games

PARKS, shouting emphasis not mine, has been on my radar for some time. It has been a perennial example of board game eye candy since its release in 2019. I am skeptical when the art and components for a game are main recurring compliment I hear about it, as has been the case with PARKS. Let’s get it out of the way now: yes, this game is gorgeous. The art, the production, the GameTrayz, the insert. Everything is impeccable.

When I finally found a copy, as it seems like it is tough to find, I was surprised by the games relatively small size. After reading a review that damned it with faint praise, is there really anything worth visiting here?

Lowdown (How to Play--in a Nutshell)

At its heart, PARKS is a worker placement/set collection game. BGG also lists a host of other mechanics, but there are at the core of the game. On your turn, you’ll move one of your two workers hikers forward on a track of action spaces as far as you like and take an action on an empty space. You’ll use these basic spaces to generally gain or convert resources that you’ll eventually use to purchase (aka visit) National Park Cards from the general display, and the setup of action spaces is different depending on the game. You have a few options that allow you to break some rules, like a Campfire Token that allows a once per round placement of one of your hikers on an occupied action space, the Gear Cards you can acquire that give you special abilities, or the Canteen Cards that also allow you to activate unique bonuses when you gain a water resource.

Your actions in the game, and acquisition of resources, should be steered by your end game scoring cards, here called Year Cards. The Year Cards are fairly straightforward, like giving you points for visiting a certain number of parks with a pine tree or mountain logo, for example. There is also a Camera Token used wherein you can “take a picture” (ie gain a point) by spending any resource as long as you have the camera.

At the end of the game, most points wins.

The PARKS: Nightfall Expansion adds a few small things to the game, primarily Tent Tokens that are seeded to the action spaces and can be used in place of the action space itself. Once you take a tent, you place it on one of the additional available spaces that are set at the start of the game, giving you more options. The expansion also brings new Year (end game scoring) Cards and new Park Cards.

Tea for Two (Scaling for Two Players)

Unlike many worker placement games, PARKS does not do much to mitigate changes in player count. In four and five player games, an additional starting action spaces is added to the mix, but that’s about it. With two players, you’ll have substantially fewer problems in terms of getting blocked from spaces, and with higher player counts, there are no additional uses of your campfire token, it’s still one and done. Purchasing from the market is more susceptible to “hate drafting” (even if this isn’t really drafting), because it’s pretty obvious what someone’s end game scoring condition may be, with either the base or expansion cards, so beware the hate draft.

Mad Season (The Bad Stuff)

The allusion to hate drafting above is indicative of slightly larger problems here depending on how you like to play your games. As I mentioned previously, I am a tactical player, and as such, I typically make the decisions on my turn based on the current board state, rather than a predetermined strategy that I put in place turns earlier. For lack of a better word, I find this more fun. Long-term planning, to me, seems to sap some of the excitement. For many players, however, long-term planning is where the big satisfaction comes from in board games, and especially in board games that skew heavy.

PARKS is not really that kind of game, although there are moments here that you’ll feel like you need a strategy. Yes, PARKS is on the lighter side, but it has a lot of decision space baked into its design. The simple use of two hikers rather than one gives you much more leeway in terms of planning and execution. That being said, so much of what you think you should be doing is working on your Year Cards’ end game bonuses. A long-term planner would argue this is what you are supposed to do.

In that way, PARKS is a little deceptive. The Season Cards are really not that lucrative in terms of points. Here is a picture of four Season Cards from the base set:

Points-wise, there not much at stake here. There are ways to get more of these, and it’s easier with the expansion, but each of these cards only gives you two or three points for what could be a fairly substantial amount of work to achieve. Long-term planners may be seduced by these cards, which appear to give the game more structure and strategy than it actually has. Kathleen was seduced by the Year Cards on more than once of our playthroughs, and she paid the price. Her main takeaway from these plays, then, was frustration. This didn’t bother me because of my playstyle, but it is absolutely something to be considered. Side note: these issues I have with the Year Cards are still present in the new cards the expansion brings.

Finally, for me, this game is too expensive. Yes, it’s gorgeous and the production is top-notch. But really, this belongs in the $35-40 price range. As it stands, it’s $49. Nice productions are great, but there is some unnecessary extravagance here. For example, it has a custom-made and colored metal first player token and the rulebook is linen finished. The experience should be more in line with the price point, and this feels a little disproportionate, honestly.

One Big Holiday (The Good Stuff)

If I played this game with someone else like me, it would be a very fast, cut-throat experience. On your turn you simply move a worker and do the action. Incentives are sprinkled throughout, especially in regard to when you move a hiker off the path to the trail’s end and choose a bonus, but really the game is very simple. Like a game like Everdell (albeit less so), there is a feeling of escalation here, especially considering the trail lengthens each turn. By the end, the round isn’t substantially longer, but you have the feeling that you can get more done, especially if you have a favorable placement of certain tiles in the random distribution.

The speed of play here is welcome, though. Tactical players should be able to rip through a play of PARKS. With AP prone players, it will bog down, however, and the longer the game goes, the more it may threaten to overstay its welcome. This hasn’t happened for us in our two-player games, but I’d be cautious to play this with the full complement of five.

While we’re speaking of “time,” my favorite part of this game is utilizing your two hikers and their individual places on the trail to stall. PARKS for me is a question of when. You can always visit (ie purchase) a park card at the trail’s end, but depending on the round’s setup, another tile allowing this action will be seeded somewhere along the trail, as well. Utilizing your hikers smartly should allow you to visit two parks per round, at least, and more than four if you’re particularly lucky. Another space allows you to copy an occupied space, which opens up more opportunity for getting those park cards if you budgeted your resources well. 

Its this board manipulation and stalling that can be so satisfying. You always need to move a hiker, but which? Moving one instead of another in hopes a space you want will open up is like a mini game of chicken with your opponent. Have a favorable trail setup and market of Park Cards? You may have a banger of a round. But remember, you seed the action spaces randomly and are purchasing boons out of markets seeded by drawing randomly from a deck. A firecracker of a round could just as easily turn out to be a dud, or to be more specific, an exercise in frustration.

Humbug Mountain Song (Final Thoughts)

I am very surprised how much I enjoyed playing PARKS. My natural gamer inclination for the last year or so seems to move naturally towards mid-weight euros and wargames, of which PARKS is neither. Light games tend to frustrate me, because I want more strategy than the game has to offer. Something about this works for me, though, and I think that rather than trying to min-max my resource management and gear it towards the Year Cards, I just try and do as much as possible when I play PARKS. In this case, the lightness compliments the not wholey satisfying scoring mechanic. My mindset is to simply buy everything I can afford, regardless of what it is. Of course I try to meet my end game goals, but unlike Kathleen, I don’t ever feel beholden to them, nor do I go out of my way to meet them. If I can do it, great, but I am very aware that buying a four-point Park is a better idea than pulling out my hair over finding a park with a mountain on it.

I see the criticisms levied at PARKS, especially in terms of its lack of points rewarded long-term goals, but based on how I play, it’s not a bad thing. We’ve only played this game maybe four of five times, and I would be curious if the excitement of its trail worker management mechanic would get stale, but at the moment, I am quite enjoying it. 

If you’re like me, it’s worth it, especially if you can find it on sale. If you dislike tactical games that have oddly-weighted (a grumpy person may say “misleading”) scoring, this may not be your bag.

Parks
by Henry Audubon

A lovely, family-friendly game that has something for nearly any gamer. Not the best fit for a die-hard strategist, and the price point is slightly higher than it needs to be, but a lovely production.

Recommended.