Fromage

 

The Game

Fromage is French and it means cheese. So this is a game about making cheese. The quirk about this game is the rotating game board. It is divided into four segments. On your turn you can only do things in the segment facing you. Your opponents perform actions at the same time, but in their own segments. Once everyone is done, you rotate the board, and you get a new segment facing you. 

This is a worker placement game. You have three workers who make white, yellow and blue cheese respectively. You place them on the board to do stuff. The more powerful the action, the longer they stay at the spot. If you send them to do long tasks, you may find yourself having no worker to assign on your next turn, because they are still busy. Many things you do will let you place a cheese marker on the board. These score points in different ways when the game ends. The game ends when one player uses all his cheese markers. 

On your turn you can place at most two workers, one to collect resources, the other to make cheese. Making cheese means placing your cheese marker on the board, permanently claiming a spot. Each spot is associated with a specific cheese type (white, yellow or blue) and a grade (bronze, silver or gold). To claim a spot you must use a worker of the matching cheese type. The grade is an indication of how valuable a spot is, and how long your worker will be stuck there. Usually the higher grade spots will give you more points. 

The four segments are like four different mini games. One segment has tables with two spots each. Every cheese placed is worth points but the more fully claimed tables you have (i.e. claiming both spots), the higher the value of every cheese. One segment is a map of France divided into six regions. You place cheese to exert influence over the regions. Every region is scored at game end, giving points to those with the most influence. You still get points if tied for most influence, but it is much lower than if you are the sole winner. 

One segment has multiple shelves, each giving a different benefit. Your cheese score additional points at game end when they occupy multiple shelves. The last segment is a grid and you score points by having cheese on connected squares.

You have a player board where you keep track of your resources. Building materials you collect can be used to construct buildings, which give you special abilities, like scoring bonus points based on certain criteria, and having a personal worker placement spot. Livestock you collect can be converted to specific cheese types and placed on the board. This is a way to place more than one piece of cheese on your turn. Fruits you collect are needed for some spots on the board which require some special cheese which contain fruits. Cards you collect are missions you can complete to get more points. 

The Play

There seem to be many rules, but they are all simple. It’s like playing four simple games at the same time. Planning how to use your workers can be a little tricky, because you only have one for each cheese type. If there is a particular spot you want to claim two turns in the future and it’s a blue cheese spot, you’d better make sure your blue cheese worker is freed up by then. 

There is competition at all four segments. You will be fighting for spots. Sometimes you want to claim a spot just for the sake of denying an opponent, even if it doesn’t help you much. You want to somewhat focus on a few areas. Generally the nature of scoring is the more you invest in an area, the bigger the returns per cheese. Having some focus is better than doing everything evenly. 

You have to watch your opponents. You need to have a sense of how soon the game will end, and plan accordingly. This is a game which requires some planning ahead. You have to plan the jobs for your workers, so you have to consider the other segments which are not in front of you, not just the one you can act in now. 

The Thoughts

Fromage puts a fun twist in worker placement. Each of the mini games aren’t particularly exciting, but the overall package is an interesting experience. There is no directly attacking your opponents, but you can certainly be nasty by blocking the spots they want. Most of the game is open information. Everyone can tell what you want to do. I played the digital implementation of the game. I’m sure it would be even more fun with the physical copy. You get to play with a lazy Susan. This is a light strategy game which will work for families.