🍁 A Good Year — comfort, strategy, and risk under a blanket

⭐ 20/10

Players: 1–4
Play time: ~60–90 minutes
Difficulty: Light / Medium
Game type: Family / Strategy / Dice Placement
Mechanics: dice allocation, resource management, long-term planning, controlled risk

🎯 What is this game about?

Who doesn’t love slipping into something warm and comfortable, sinking into a cozy armchair, holding a mug of hot tea with honey, ginger, and cloves — a good book in hand, the crackle of firewood in the fireplace in the background?
That’s exactly the feeling A Good Year captures — and exactly what it tries to give you.

The game takes place in Maple Valley, where animal families welcome spring, fully aware that true rest will come only in winter. For now, it’s time to prepare. Over eight rounds (months), you plan your household’s work, gather resources, cook, knit, craft upgrades, and create small comforts that will eventually turn your home into a true zone of coziness.

This is a game about the simple truth that comfort doesn’t appear out of nowhere — it has to be planned.

🧺 How does gameplay work?

A Good Year cleverly combines worker placement with dice management. Each round, you send family members to various action spaces — but not all information is available upfront. Some dice, crucial to the effectiveness of your decisions, appear only later. In some locations you collect resources; in others you convert them into upgrades, and finally into comforts that score points and directly influence the quality of your “good year.”

This is not a game about one brilliant move. It’s about flexibility, foresight, and adapting to changing circumstances.

🌿 Why does this game work so well?

– Theme and mechanics fit perfectly.
Uncertainty, planning, and limited control mirror real-life preparation for the future.

– Cozy, but not trivial.
Warm artwork goes hand in hand with decisions that can be surprisingly demanding.

– Dice create tension, not frustration.
Randomness exists, but you always feel in control of your choices.

– Solo mode is fully fleshed out and very satisfying.
The rules barely change, and the experience becomes pure comfort gaming, complete with a charming end-game summary.

– Wooden resources make a huge difference.
With the wooden components, the game becomes almost therapeutic — the weight in your hand, the sound of tokens being placed, full-on hygge.

🎨 Atmosphere and production

A Good Year is simply lovely. The illustrations feel like pages from a beautifully illustrated book, the meeples are charming, and the whole presentation invites you to slow down and stay at the table a little longer. It’s one of those games that could just as easily live on a coffee table as part of your décor.

💀 Any downsides?

This is not a game for people who:
– dislike planning,
– can’t stand risk,
– want full control over every single move.

☕ My impressions

A Good Year is a game you sit down to like you would to a warm cup of tea. I wouldn’t play it every day, but I return to it with pleasure — especially in autumn and winter. It doesn’t shout, rush, or push you forward. It gives space for mistakes, planning, and small joys — and it does so with quiet consistency.

✨🧀🍞 Cheesy Joke Corner

A Good Year teaches that the best evening build is:
a board game (7 points) +1 point for every additional board game (it stacks! 🎲) a blanket (comfort bonus) a fireplace (permanent passive effect 🔥 a teapot (regeneration each round ☕)You don’t win with points. You win at life. 🍂🛋️

🎯 Final score: 20/10

Warm. Thoughtful. Cozy. A game that reminds you a good year starts with good decisions — and just a little bit of risk.