Azul is the Spanish word for blue. While there is some blue in this game, the name remains somewhat obtuse. Thankfully, the gameplay more than makes up for it. Azul sets you up as mosaic tilers looking to tile a wall… or something – to be honest, the theme is not the strongest and this is very much an abstract experience. But that doesn’t stop it from being a beautiful one. The tile pieces in Azul are gorgeous. They look like fancy starburst sweets and feel great in your hands. During set-up, you will lay down a number of round cardboard tiles representing the factories where you pick up the tiles you need. Onto each of these, you place four random starburst tiles. On your turn, you may take any number of those from the factory, as long as they are the same colour. Those left are moved off the factory into a central pile. From that point on you may also take any number of the same colour tiles from the central pile and if you are the first to do so, you lose a point and get to be the first player next time around. Once you have your tiles, you place them on to one of five staging areas. Each of the five staging areas has a different amount of spaces (from 1-5) and each can only hold tiles of one colour at a time. At the end of the round if one of these staging areas is full, then you can move one tile from that area to the corresponding row of the mosaic, discarding the rest. This is the only way you can discard tiles without penalty – should you take more than you need/can place then they will give you negative points. You score points for placing tiles into your mosaic for each row and column of tiles you add to, counting your tile in both directions. You’ll also get bonuses for rows, columns and filling all five spaces with tiles of one colour. Azul is a fantastic drafting game that looks great on the table and appeals to almost everyone I have played it with. Both Azul and its sequel, Stained Glass of Sintra, offer easy-to-learn games that are not lacking in depth and planning. They would make great games for beginners and old hands alike and are the perfect gaming gift. Younger players may find Stained Glass slightly easier to understand but there isn’t a huge amount of difference and you can’t really go wrong with either! Player Count: 2-4 Time: 30-45 Minutes Age: 8
