Not many board games make me tired. Sankoré is the rare exception. As a follow-up to Merv: Heart of the Silk Road, it has certainly shed the reservation I felt at the time, that it was a boilerplate nu-Euro with a wonderful action selection system.

This time, Fabio Lopiano, working alongside Mandela Fernandez-Grandon, has crafted a nu-Euro that does everything at once. Too many things at once. After I prepped for its requisite second and third plays, a setup I clocked at twenty-two minutes, everybody filed in and groaned. It’s not a good sign when people are weary before a session has even started.

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