PLAYED FOR YOU

Kulami

The Game of Glass Beads

You place marbles into a board made up from 17 small boards of different shapes, and you try to conquer as many boards as possible by achieving a majority of your own marbles there.

The boards are laid out to your liking; you can either form a closed square with a width of 8 dents = squares on each side or you can lay out an irregular shape, for which the length of a side cannot exceed 10 dents. Each player chooses a color and receives 28 marbles. Then players alternate in placing a marble into a free dent. The starting player places his first marble anywhere on the board. The dent with the marble determines the possible spots for the following move: The marble just defines two rows by forming their intersection. But this is not all by far, because you cannot place your marble on the same tile as the previous marble, and, from the third move on, also not on the plate with the previous marble but one. These rules are valid throughout the complete game; the two boards used in the two previous moves are taboo. The game is scored when all marbles are placed or no marble can be placed correctly anywhere. In a basic scoring you simple score each board; if you have the majority you score the number of your marbles on this board for points. For experienced players you can award bonus points for the biggest connected area in a color or for complete rows that are longer than 5 marbles.

This is another true Steffen game! My first reaction is “elegant” and “good”, the next one “tricky”, then “challenging”. Kulami is another Steffen tidbit for fans of abstract 2-player games.

Players: 2

Age: 9

Time: 20+

Designer: Andreas Kuhnekath

Artist: Steffen Mühlhäuser, Bernhard Kümmelmann

Price: ca. 29 Euro

Publisher: Steffen Spiele 2011

Web: www.steffen-spiele.de

Genre: Abstract placement game

Users: With friends

Users: For experts

Special: 2 players

Version: de

Rules: de

In-game text: no

Comments:

Abstract game

For two players

Needs concentration and quick re-thinking

Compares to:

Ennea and other placement games with a changing board

Other editions:

Currently none

Chance (pink): 0

Tactic (turquoise): 3

Strategy (blue): 1

Creativity (dark blue): 0

Knowledge (yellow): 0

Memory (orange): 0

Communication (red): 0

Interaction (brown): 3

Dexterity (green): 0

Action (dark green): 0