Review: The Aquicorn Cove Board Game (Renegade)

Cooperative play, the challenge of balancing conservation with development, plus possibly the cutest meeples ever seen on a game board—all of that adds up to The Aquicorn Cove Board Game experience from Renegade Game Studios.

The game brings to life the world of Katie O’Neill’s 2018 book, Aquicorn Cove. Players assume the roles of four of the book’s main characters: Lana, Mae, Florian, and Andrew. Working together, you must gather and grow food, repair and expand the village, and care for the reef, which is home to the magical Aquicorns.

Let’s take a look at the top five things you need to know to keep your village prosperous, the reef healthy, and the Aquicorns happy.

Flowing with the Seasons

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Game play follows the four seasons. It begins in spring, with nice bonuses for planting crops (more about that in a moment). Summer gives you a smaller planting bonus, while fall is harvest time. We’ll talk about winter later. (Ew, winter.)

The game proceeds through two years (eight seasons), and then closes with an epilogue. After finishing that final turn, you look up your reef and village scores on a pair of charts in the back of the rules to tell the story of how well you did in the game.

Character Decks Mix Options

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Each player has a three-card hand drawn from their unique character deck. Some cards let you do multiple things in one phase (like gather food and clean pollution), while others make you choose between options.

Each deck reflects that character’s skills through a different mix of option icons. Players need to watch the icons closely, because some of them add pollution to the bay when players take that action. (More about pollution in a moment.)

Playing Cards, Taking Actions

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Seasons play out in seven phases that represent the activities of daily life. The seven phases are listed in order across the bottom of the game board, with spaces for player cards.

The season begins by drawing an event card, reading it, and placing the card in the space matching its phase number.

Players look at what’s happening in their game, discuss the options available in their hands, and play one card each onto the corresponding phase spaces. Then they work through the phases step by step, taking actions based on the cards they played.

Feeding the Village

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During each season except winter, players need to feed the village. Fishing and gathering provide food immediately, while planting sets up a bounty for the fall. Player cards govern both gathering and planting, giving specific amounts of food from each action.

Fishing is more random, and it drives a big part of the game. The Head Fisher (that turn’s first player) draws tiles from the fishing bag. The bag contains multiple tiles for several types of fish, along with some empty nets, pollution, and, depending on reef health, a few magical Aquicorns.

The fisher draws one tile at a time. If it’s pollution, it goes into the bay and immediately lowers the reef health by one. Aquicorn tiles give players a bonus card for that turn. Fish and empty net tiles go onto the fishing boat; fish tiles give food, while empty nets just take up space.

The fisher can draw tiles until the boat is full or the players agree that they have enough food. But if you draw too many tiles, you might overfish a species, which takes fish tiles out of the game and reduces your score during the epilogue.

Helping the Reef and the Village

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There’s a beautiful strategic tension between the health of the reef and the growth of the village.

Pollution affects the reef’s health. Too much pollution prevents the reef from healing and also keeps the Aquicorns away, which means fewer helpful Aquicorn tiles in the fishing bag.

When the storms of winter arrive, they can damage buildings in the village, possibly causing more pollution in the process. But the health of the reef directly affects the power of the winter storms. A healthy reef means wimpy winds, but a polluted reef brings dangerous arctic gales.

Players can spend actions each turn to clean up pollution or repair damaged buildings, which prevents more pollution during the storms. They can also add new buildings to the village which provide bonuses that make each turn a little easier.

Verdict

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There’s a lot to love about The Aquicorn Cove Board Game. The game beautifully weaves its story into tensions that keep players engaged.

Like most cooperative games, the biggest challenge is balancing competing demands against limited time and resources, while also communicating and working as a team.

The key tension is between the prosperity of the village versus the health of the reef. You need to spend actions growing the village, but you also need to keep the reef clean so the winter storms don’t damage everything.

The Aquicorn Cove Board Game offers plenty of possibilities that keep replays fun, while seasoning things with just enough randomness to make each turn surprising. Thanks to the engaging art and delightful theme, it’s especially recommend for families, but any group of gamers will have a great time playing.