Power Grid
Review by Mark Coomey

One of my more recent purchases, and a game that has received quite a lot of play of late, has been Power Grid by Rio Grande games.

The game creator, Friedmann Fiesse actually created this game a while back under the name Funkenschlag. Yes, that’s right, it was originally a German game, but basically the same game as Power Grid, with I guess a lot less chrome if you will.

The object of the game is to build a predetermined number of connections to cities on the map and at the end of the round, be able to ‘power’ the most number of these cities. If it comes down to a tie (often the case), it’s then the one with the most cash leftover out of the tied parties that wins the game.

The game consists of a map of German or USA . Gloriously illustrated, the map is broken into provinces. Each province contains a number of cities connected by power pipes.

Placed around the board are cards that depict factories that are purchased using an auction mechanism. These are used to ‘power’ the cities that you have connected to. The factories also need various resources to fire ‘em up which are placed on a resources track on the board. There 6 types of factories requiring either coal, oil, a coal/oil hybrid, garbage, uranium and a ecologically friendly factories requiring no resource! The abundance of these resources fluctuates up and down throughout the game depending on the stage of the game, and how many players are using the resources. It is entirely possible that certain resources can dry up!

So a round starts with a player putting up a factory for sale. This is then auctioned off to the highest bidder. A player can only purchase one factory per round and generally hold a maximum of 3 factories to power their cities. So as the game progresses, better factories become available, which can power more cities or power cities at a cheaper cost in resources.

Next, players purchase resources, starting with the player considered to be in worst place. (Worst being, they’ve connected the LEAST cities, with a tie being resolved by the player with the highest valued factory. That player is placed higher on the turn order track from best to worst). Players can buy up to twice the number of resources they need to power cities on their factory cards. As resources get purchased, they get more expensive to buy.

Then players build connections onto the map. To build to a city it costs a base 10 Electros and also the cost of any connections from one city to another. At this stage, only one connection can be built by any player in a given city. You can build as much as you can afford. But you have to take into account this affects your position on the turn order track. So often there’s a bid of juggling with players waiting for the right moment to make their move. The building faced is also actioned in worst order.

Then there is the power cities phase where players spend resources that is on their factories to power that number of cities, receiving cash depending on the number of cities you power up.

Then there’s a phase where player order is shuffled around depending on who has the most connections built. More resources are put on the board.. and the factories are jiggled around a bit as well..

Then it’s back to auctioning factories..

This continues until some builds their SEVENTH CONNECTION, at which stage the game reaches stage 2. From the beginning of the next build phase, two players can now build in the same city, at an inflated cost of 15 Electros for whoever connects there second. Also the factory gets a minor fiddle. Phase 3 occurs when a phase 3 card is drawn from the factory draw pile. Now 3 players can connect to a city (costs 20 electros for the 3 rd connection) and now there are 6 factories available to choose from in the buy factory stage instead of 4. Each stage also changes the amount of resources that also get restocked during the game.

Phew..That’s a big explanation of the game even though I was trying to keep it at a readers digest level.

So, the long and short? This is a great game, with a lot of things to manage..when/where to build connections, what factories to purchase, what is the worth of a given factory. There’s also a lot of jostling for position with players often trying to be in ‘worst’ position on the turn order track, which generally gives you an advantage to bid last for factories, buy resources and build first. There’s quite a lot of player interaction, a lot of fun as well. It’s quite a lengthy game that easily runs a couple of hours. But if that doesn’t bother you, then this game is a keeper that I’m sure you’ll get you money’s worth.

Here’s my rating from 1-5..5 being highest/best.

Presentation/Components: 5
Complexity: 4
Game play Fun Value: 5
Overall: 5

There are a few other games I really enjoy, which I also hope to review in the future. But this rates highly in my collection, which totals about 140 board games.