The Estates

The Estates is an interesting pure auction game, in the vein of my beloved Industry. In a rare moment of synchronicity, we played it at the same time as the people from Yafka; they were impressed, while we were not quite as taken with it. It is not that the game lacks good elements. I am simply not sure those elements will show up in every play, especially a first one.

At its core are auctions with a closed pool of money and one-round bidding. Players confront one another directly over whatever comes onto the table, with available cash limited and every bid carrying weight. The interaction is entirely in that auction pressure: who bids higher, who holds back, and who forces everyone else to spend.

Compared with Industry, where you can more or less build a bidding strategy early on and stick to it, things are more fluid here. The situation can be overturned right up to the final round, which is theoretically very appealing. In practice, though, I am not sure that tension always comes through clearly, particularly when everyone is still finding their way around the game.

My main issue was our five-player game. At that count, the gameplay feels rather leaky to me and ultimately breaks the game. I would like to see it scale better: perhaps more money at five, one or two additional companies, and another set of three cubes. I do not consider it a bad game, and I would gladly play it again—just not with five people.