I was skeptical. Playing a game about national parks didn’t really get me going. Not my genre. Are these parks on other planets? How many hit points does my hiker have? What drew me in was the artwork. A lot of it is from the Fifty-Nine Parks Series which I had never heard of, but am now obsessed with.
The box, and all the cardboard inside it, is very thick and feels nice to hold. It makes you think, “oooh, fancy” even though it’s cardboard. Opening and setting up the game was a pleasure. All the wood pieces come preloaded into holding trays and are exquisitely cut. The games says not for children younger than 10 but I’d maybe even push that up to 32 or 33 and this is why.
These animals are fragile. I think it’s a lesson about how our natural resources need to be handled carefully. By some miracle, none were broken. The cards are new cards and I need to get over my reluctance to damage new cards. They’re cards, they’re gonna get damaged. The parks cards are a majestic 70 x 120 mm. They’re a joy to shuffle. Then there are 4 decks of hateful 50 x 75 mm cards that thankfully only have to be shuffled once per game so it’s not another Robo Rally/Ticket to Ride nightmare, endlessly shuffling decks the size of matchbooks. The board serves only as an organizational tool, whereas the randomized trail tiles form the surface on which you actually play.
Players take turns moving their two hikers down the trail, taking pictures and collecting resource tokens in the form of Magic the Gathering style suns, raindrops, mountains, and trees. At the end of the trail players can buy gear, take more pictures, and visit parks using the accumulated tokens. It’s hard not to think of it as “buying” the particular park but you must remember that the national parks are for all of us and you don’t own it just because the card is now sitting in front of you. The game definitely stirs up a desire to visit these places in real life. Many were unknown to me. How many of the national parks can you name? That’s a fun mini-game, you could play. A donation is made to the National Park Service for each copy sold.
The mechanics are pretty simple once you get all the pieces out and set up and learn what they all do. Each individual action is easy, but keeping your eye on the big picture is the challenge of Parks. The gear, season, and canteen cards all have advantages that play off each other and the actions on the trail tiles allowing you to craft a play style suited to your particular goals. My year goal was a “Year of Gear.” 3 bonus points awarded if I purchased 10 Sun worth of gear, which was fine with me because I love gear. Additional points are awarded for number of parks visited and pictures taken. Don’t sleep on that camera. I won by 1 point largely because I took 8 snaps. The picture tokens are little tiles with nature scenes. You can select them at random or pick your favorites, it makes no difference to the game. I went mostly random but did choose an impressive moose I saw walking around in there.
Parks was designed by Henry Audubon and released in 2019 by Keymaster Games. 1-5 players. I didn’t try the solo mode, but it works well with 2, and can be completed in under an hour. It’s beautiful and inspiring and there’s not a ton going on. Just how a walk in the park should be.
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