Board Game Review – Hotel Tycoon

A couple of months back we were contacted by Esdevium Games, they asked us if we would like to start reviewing board games on the site. Naturally we said yes as we do both enjoy playing the odd board game and I’ve always wanted to start playing more, but have just never got around to it.

So you can expect to see more board game related content popping up.

The first board game up for review is Hotel Tycoon.

The objective of Hotel Tycoon is to completely bankrupt your opponents (insert evil laugh here) as you build up an empire of hotels to rival the Las Vegas strip.

A little pre warning on this one, building the hotels can take you a little while as there are quite a few, so I would advise putting aside a little bit of time before you plan on playing just to get that bit done – and maybe use some glue on them because some of them don’t stay together all that well. Also, you may not think it, but they do all fit in the box – there is a routine to packing them away!

Once you’ve assembled your hotels it’s time to start playing.

The crux of the game works in a very similar manner to Monopoly – work your way around the board collect money and build hotels as you go.

How do you build hotels then? Well, spread out on the board are various money suitcases or the ‘buying space’, when you land on one of these you have the opportunity to buy any of the hotels adjacent to that space – including ones other players might already own if they haven’t built on it yet. I had one cruelly stolen from me during my game.

Once you own the plot of land you can start to build your hotel, but only by landing on the planning permission spaces – the little construction hats, you’ll then have to roll a die to see whether you’re granted permission to build. Be careful though as you can be charged double rates if you’re unlucky with your roll, but there is also the chance to get them for free… so, win some lose some I guess.

Each hotel has various buildings and stages to it and as you might imagine each one costs more to your opponent when they land on it. Once you’ve built all the building components you have the option complete it by adding recreational facilities which bump up the price of staying a little more.

Making money works by other players landing on entrances to your hotel which you can place on spaces that aren’t already taken by another entrance, you can also only built one per trip around the board. You then ask your opponent to roll the dice to see how many nights they will stay at the hotel and charge them according to the prices on your title deed card. Pretty simple really!

Whilst playing our first game I started to feel like it was going to go on for ages because we kept landing on each other’s hotels and only charging small amounts at first. Then all of a sudden within about one and a half rounds and a few sixes rolled on nights stayed, I was out… just like that (there were only two of us playing). It took us over an hour to get through our first game, but I think that was partly due to still getting used to it. With the addition of a few more players I feel like most games could last around an hour and possibly go quicker in some instances.

I have a lot of fond memories of this game – well a slightly different and older version of it. Back when I had just left school me and a couple of friends went through a stage of playing this a lot… and I mean a lot, like, up until 2am playing it… I know what you’re thinking – it’s not the typical thing you imagine teenagers doing at 2am in the morning, but we loved it. So getting to play it again is great.

It’s a fun game and is very easy to pick up and I can see it being a lot of fun for a small group to play casually or for a family to play too – however I think the more hardcore board game fans will probably want something a little more in depth and challenging. Whilst there is a small amount of tactics to be applied to Hotel Tycoon i.e. placement of entrances in relation to opponent hotels etc…it is mostly down to the luck of the dice. If you’re a fan of Monolpoly I think you could get a lot of play time out of Hotel Tycoon too with its accessibility for pretty much all ages and quick learning curve.

Hotel Tycoon is available to buy from Amazon for £24.99

-Will