Here we are again talking about one of the clichés of gaming themes: the land of the Rising Sun, where noble Samurai raise their swords for their lord, furtive Ninjas attempt coups d’état, and for some unspecified reason you have to stay on the ground to eat: I am of course talking about Japan.
Tradition and innovation mix between pagodas, comic shops, robots and age-old rituals. Perhaps it is precisely this almost dystopian mix that makes us love this country so much, or perhaps it will be the sushi and sake, who knows.
The fact is that as soon as someone draws, with pastel shades, the image of faces with almond-shaped eyes and backgrounds full of cherry trees, the antennas immediately go up and the hype goes through the roof.
Usually, we talk about games that wink at the fights for dynasties, filled with diplomacy and battles (yes, I’m talking about you, Rising Sun), but sometimes you come across management and strategy titles.
Devir knows the theme well and some time ago it came out with a brain destroyer of considerable weight, which bears the name of Bitoku: between carps and Japanese elves, new attempts are made to become the new Guiding Spirit of the colorful woods of the Rising Sun.
And then comes this small, softly colored box, with a large, clean building on the lid. You open it and it’s like entering a black hole of tokens, meeples, cards and boards. How they managed to fit hundreds of components into such a small and harmless container is still a mystery to me.
We are talking about The White Castle, of course; a title that has had enormous success all over the world. And after I played it, I understood why.
This game contains everything that a good German must have: from worker placement, to resource optimization, to carefully planned combos. All in less than an hour of play and in just 9 rounds. Practically, a brain-breaking filler to be eaten before or after the main course, to warm up the muscles without falling into the banal.
Set up, play and put back, ready for the next title. Would it be awesome, wouldn’t?
But no! Because the setup is devastatingly long for a title lasting less than an hour: we’re talking about setting up a game board with a bunch of cards and tokens to guarantee an always different setup, putting resources of various kinds and types around the table and then, last but not least, prepare the player boards. And once the game is over and the winner is proclaimed, comes the most difficult challenge: putting everything back into that tiny box.
We couldn’t accept this situation, and our organizer for The White Castle was born, which we are truly proud of. In a few simple containers, everything will be ready and, above all, everything will be back in the box at the end of the game with a flush closure, even with the sleeved cards. We didn’t leave a millimeter free, but the result is an interior design worthy of Marie Kondo. Seeing is believing!
Because when a castle needs to be built, you need a good foundation, like our setupper, to make it solid and unassailable. Sayōnara disorder!
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