Le Havre

After a long time, Uwe’s little monster finally came back to the table. It was one of the few of his games I had not played recently, mostly because I had worn it out on the iPad years ago. This time we began with a teaching game for three, so that I could refresh myself as well, and I followed it with two late-night sessions in its digital form.

At its core, Le Havre has you choose actions, collect and convert resources, use buildings, and organize your economy so that you do not fall behind. A round is not simply a matter of taking the obvious thing and moving on: you have to watch what has accumulated, what you need immediately, and what will keep you afloat in the rounds ahead.

Interaction mainly comes through the shared action spaces and buildings: other players’ choices change what remains available and when it is worth making your move. That is what I like about its pace. You need to calculate a little as the game unfolds, without feeling as though you are following a completely predetermined route.

It is not a perfect game, and I am not going to present it as one. But it is thoroughly enjoyable and, for me, it has a clearly better tempo than the comparable Ora et Labora, which I find more rigid. In any case, Le Havre stands well above quite a few modern titles that come to the table and leave without leaving much behind.