The Royal Game of UR - A Review

After playing the Royal Game of Ur, I've written up my opinion on the game.

Game Board

While the original gameboard consists of a 4 x 3 area of squares and a 2 x 3 area of squares, connected by a bridge of 2 squares, i played on a board where the 2 x 3 area of squares were instead a 1 x 6 long bridge.

Rules

Each player starts with 7 counters. The objective is to get all 7 counters down to the end of the board. If you land on top of another players piece, the opponents piece must be removed back to the start of the board. The exception to this is the flower tiles. If a player lands on a flower tile, they have another go. If a piece is on a flower piece, no other piece can go on that square, and it can not be taken while it remains on the flower tile.

Gameplay Opinions

As i didn't play on the original board, my gameplay experiences may differ from the original.

The game started off rather fast paced, as neither me or my opponent could get a piece to the second flower tile before being taken. After about 15 minutes, my opponent had not managed to get a single piece to the end, while i had only managed to get 1 to the end myself. This was mainly due to the dice rolls being, the majority of the time, quite low. This resulted in a choke point near the start, where almost any dice roll would result in a piece of the opponents being taken. After a further 15 minutes (30 minutes total), i had managed to get another 2 piece out, and my opponent had managed to get 1. At this point, we realized that this version of the game was only supposed to be played with 5 pieces, which explained the rather slow-paced nature of the game so far. By not allowing the next 2 pieces out from each player back on the board, the game pace quickened and I won the game about 5 minutes later.

Final Opinion

The game is very similar to Ludo or Frustration. While their is mainly luck involved, there is a small element of skill. Its also quite satisfying when you land on a flower tile 3 times in a row and still take one of the opponents pieces.

Score: 6/10.