Waterfall Park: Do you have the fiber… of the Negotiator?

Hello, this is Claude Poirier. We are told that a suspicious “individual” was seen taking over an “ice cream” stand on the third floor of the amusement park, between the haunted house and the carousel. We suspect he might be tempted to use it to extort a sixth-floor business from his mother-in-law to complete his bowling monopoly. This individual being likely to gain a lot of points thanks to this dishonest transaction, he is therefore considered dangerous for the other players around the table. 10-4.

In Waterfall Park , you play as entrepreneur-investors wishing to develop an amusement park built on an artificial island. As the game progresses, you will become owners of “land” spread over the different levels of the island, and also of businesses that you can build there. As the competition is very strong on the island of Waterfall Park , you will absolutely have to negotiate with your neighbors to obtain the necessary space to complete your businesses and generate interesting income. Will you negotiate in good faith? Will you try to put yourself in an advantageous position to force your opponents to accept your ridiculous offers? Will you be ready to give up a lot (too many) things to be able to complete your first floor cinema, which you have been dreaming of since the start of the game? So many questions arise in the lovely chaos of a game of Waterfall Park !

How it works ?

Waterfall Park is played over four rounds. At the start of each round, players receive a choice of “land” cards drawn at random. They must select a certain number of these lands (variable depending on the turn and the number of players) of which they become owners and where they place an (empty) base of their color. Once land has been acquired for the round, players are then given a number of tiles representing different businesses or attractions to build on the island. They place the tiles in front of them, so that they are visible to the other players.

Then, we negotiate! Players can exchange anything they want: empty land, built businesses, business tiles to build, money, promises... there are no constraints limiting what can be exchanged (and no rule that requires you to keep your promises)! This negotiation phase is the heart of Waterfall Park : players must try to acquire enough adjacent land to build and complete their businesses. Indeed, each type of business requires between three and five adjacent tiles in order to generate maximum income (victory points). An incomplete trade will also generate income, but far less than its completed version. As land and business tiles are distributed randomly at the start of each turn, it's a safe bet that one of your neighbors has something you need, and vice versa...

When the trade phase is over, players can build the businesses they have on their land. You must carefully plan the place where you build, since if it is allowed for a business to change ownership during negotiations, it cannot under any circumstances be demolished... Construction is therefore optional: unused business tiles can be saved for future rounds. However, empty land brings in nothing… not even a meager penny! In a game that only lasts four turns, we will try to quickly start collecting our precious coins!

Once the businesses have been built, we move on to the income phase: each player receives money for the built businesses that they own. The bigger the trade (several adjacent tiles), the more it pays! When the income is pocketed, we move on to the next round, and the game ends after the income phase of the fourth round. The richest player wins (hello, capitalism)!

Graphics and hardware

For those who have been following the wonderful world of board games for a long time, the mechanics of Waterfall Park may give you a feeling of déjà vu... It is in fact a reissue (or rather a redesign) of a older game by the same designer (Karsten Hartwig), Chinatown , published by Z-MAN in 1999.

Graphics-wise, the improvement is unequivocal: Waterfall Park is an adorably colorful game, which makes it significantly more inviting and festive than its predecessor (editorial note: it's crazy, it looks like board game illustrators have discovered the existence of colors somewhere between 2004 and 2007). The illustrations of the tiles, without particularly standing out for their originality, are completely honest. The colors and shapes make it easy to distinguish them on the board.

The material is of good quality and pleasant to handle. The cardboard tiles are quite thick, and the plastic bases indicating land ownership remain in place thanks to the small holes made in the game board, a much appreciated addition in a game where, due to the importance of the location of the tiles, it would be very annoying to accidentally move pieces! Waterfall Park also offers a storage system to speed up the setup of the game (you know how I looooove tidy boxes, see my post on Heat!) Only small problem: you have to store the box horizontally, at risk of having to sort the change at the start of each game (which I learned the hard way, twice rather than once... me who puts away my games like I put away my books: vertically!)

Finally, the rulebook is brief, clear and effective (the game is simple and very easy to learn; you therefore rarely need to refer to it).

So… what do we think?

If there's one thing I've learned throughout my gaming journey, it's that it's important to provide the right games to the right players. If the most comfortable players willingly indulge in any playful experience, regardless of its nature and complexity, we must admit that others are reluctant to dive into a game whose theme or mechanics do not suit them. do not question. And the most difficult of them might even go so far as to ruin the gaming experience for everyone. (As such, I remember a game of Arkham Horror , a cooperative game, where the most horrifying and terrible thing we faced was not the tentacles of the unspeakable Cthulhu, but the attitude of a player who viscerally hated playing as a team. Needless to say, the game was long and quite unpleasant.) In short, we simply have to learn to accept this sad reality: not all games are made for everyone. world; it is better not to force the hand of the recalcitrant too much.

Like many games that rely largely on discussion and/or negotiation (like Bohnanza! or group deduction games like  the Werewolves of Thiercelieux ), the pleasure you will experience in Waterfall Park is directly proportional to the open attitude and goodwill of the players gathered around the table. Negotiating with someone who hates negotiating is more of an ordeal than a parlor game, let's be honest. The game could also make you discover how stingy and stingy your father-in-law is (“Donaldaaaaaaa, I said: no bowliiiiiiing!”). But no. I invent. I'm kidding. Everyone has an exceptional, generous (insert eloquent throat clearing here) father-in-law. In short, this is my little warning: prepare your play partners with the idea that, to have fun, you will have to play the game and cooperate a little, even if it is a competitive game!

By adequately preparing the ground for the players, I tested Waterfall Park in two stages: first with children (10 and 15 years old) then with adults (4 players). And both times, everyone loved it!

I was afraid that, despite the limited number of turns, the game would drag on forever and the negotiation phase would go in circles... but no! Everyone (even my youngest) quickly understood the relative value of land and businesses, and most rounds of negotiations were conducted amidst laughter and cordiality. The more the game progresses, the tighter we negotiate... especially when more than one player covets the same location on the board, which leads to overbidding (which of course delights the owner of the land in question). The game often creates funny situations: for example, a player proudly retains a strategic piece of land to increase its value in the next turn... only to finally find that no one needs it anymore, and that he is now stuck building a sad house of clowns all alone in the middle of his opponent's lucrative bowling alleys! And then suddenly, the game is over, and we find ourselves discussing together the good and bad moves, and this exchange which could have completely changed the course of the game...

Waterfall Park is a dynamic game that encourages maximum interaction between players (isn't that the very essence of a board game ?) Although there are certain strategic choices to make (which terrain to choose, which businesses to build and where, etc.) there is also a good dose of luck, notably in the allocation of land and businesses at the start of each round, which makes it a family game that is perfect for players of all ages and all levels. This is also what distinguishes it from the previous version, Chinatown : the game has been refined, simplified and shortened, which seemed to me a good thing, but which will not necessarily please fans of the original.

WE love…

• The relatively short duration of the games (30-45 minutes, depending on the number of players)
• The dynamism of the game and its very social side
• The simplicity of the rules and game mechanics (no worries, we play!)
• The colorful graphics of the board

We like less…

• The chaos that can sometimes reign during negotiations, since everyone plays at the same time (some may like that! On our side, on the other hand, we had to order speaking turns, because the children were all speaking one by one). above the others!)
• The absence of a lid on the token container;
• The strokes of bad luck that sometimes occur when drawing our terrain cards (but to limit the impact of luck, we could easily integrate a card selection mechanic ( draft ), even if it means taking two minutes more each turn!)

WATERFALL PARK

Rest Production

3-5 players
10 years and over
45 mins

-Mast

For the French version: https://www.asdesjeux.com/products/waterfall-park-vf

For the English version: https://www.asdesjeux.com/en/products/waterfall-park-va