The Great Tour Family Board Game Review Age 8+ Sent by Tactic

The Great Tour: European Cities really caught my eye instantly. Packaged in a beautiful box with 1950's style illustration, this is a gorgeous game with wooden playing pieces and a real feel of something special. Suitable for 3-6 players aged 8+, we've been sent a copy for review by Tactic.

Inside the box contents are just as impressive, with a large game board, rules, several sets of cards and press out tokens, as well as small wooden coaches and buses.

The aim of the game is to travel around Europe collecting visits to different countries as you go. These are represented by tokens and count towards your score at the end.

To travel around the board, players take up to 3 Route cards from the pile each turn, and collect them until you have enough to complete a route. Some cards are free travel, some are labelled with a city and can only be used on routes which include it.

Tickets show the trips that you need to attempt, and run between cities on the map. They are different lengths, and require different numbers of route cards to complete, longer trips earning more points for end scoring.

You can try to complete any trip shown in the 3 active tickets on the table, and you can see which routes are coming up, to try to plan ahead. You must have enough route cards for your chosen route, and among them you have to include cards representing both the departure city and arrival destinations.

Once you have your route, move your coach and buses into position on the board. We all got the hang of The Great Tour instantly. The little coaches and buses are quick to move around the board and quite pleasing, especially when you cross the board with a long journey. You can never 'fly' from one destination to another though - you must always travel using route cards.

Our scoring was pretty equal, so no real benefit for age or experience during the first few play throughs, except maybe for strategy regarding upcoming trips. It's a lot easier if your end destination also happens to be somewhere you can leave from next round. Of course your opponents can unknowingly scupper that - and often do.

We did have a couple of times when there was a bit of a stalemate. 3 players all had the cards to complete one of the upcoming routes, but couldn't complete an active route, so just kept taking cards. I think it's probably very realistic. No bus driver wants to drive from Berlin to Vienna empty if they can help it...

A game takes around 45 minutes to an hour, so you will need to commit some time, but it's very relaxed play and a nice way to spend the evening together. The more you play, the better you'll get at planning ahead and spotting possible routes, and no two games will be the same. There's definite longevity.

A really nice game which does have you dreaming of European cities and jovial bus drivers, and won't cause any controversy among players. Perfect for a relaxed Winter's evening games night with family or friends.

The Great Tour: European Cities is available to buy now rrp £29.99 but at the time of typing massively reduced on Amazon to £9.87! Affiliate link with Prime postage below:

We were sent our copy of The Great Tour: European Cities game for review. Amazon links are affiliate, which earns me a few pence 'thank you' if you buy through my link, but never costs a penny more! It helps keep us going....