The Castles of Burgundy: Special Edition

Okay so, full disclosure, I already owned the original small-box Castles of Burgundy before this special edition existed, and I still bought this one anyway. That should tell you something. The base game underneath all the acrylic is one of the tightest dice-and-tile designs out there, dice drafting into tile placement into set collection, and every single turn is a real decision, not a filler one. I’ve had turns where I sat there for a solid minute just working out which of three tiles actually nets me the better long game, and none of that minute felt wasted.

The special edition production is genuinely gorgeous, the neoprene mat, the chunky acrylic hexes that catch the light. But here’s the thing nobody mentions until they own it: the acrylic hex tiles don’t have the little printed reminder text on the back that the original punchout cardboard hexes did. So if you’re teaching a new player and they flip a tile over trying to remember what a silver mine actually does, the cardboard version told them, the acrylic version just looks pretty at them. It’s a real regression dressed up as an upgrade, and I only clocked it my third play when a friend got stuck mid-turn.

The monastery tiles are the other thing, I completely whiffed them my first game, didn’t understand why anyone would bother, then went back and actually built around them the second time and realized there’s a whole strategy hiding in there that the box doesn’t sell you on. That’s the game’s real strength, honestly, it rewards a second look more than most euros bother to.

Four stars. Would’ve been five if the acrylic upgrade hadn’t quietly made the game worse to teach with.