Today's review is for a game that's been around for many years: Tsuro. It's an abstract game where you're placing down tiles and moving pieces along the paths on the tiles. The winner is the person who can stay on the board the longest.

Let's take a look!

The Components

1 Game board

35 Path tiles: Each tile has a different configurations of paths on it--with two exits on each side of the tile.

1 Dragon tile

8 Player stones

The Gameplay

Each player receives three random tiles, and then the start player places his or her Player stone on one of the starting marks around the board. When it's another player's turn, he or she will place the stone on a starting mark and begin.

Each turn consists of three actions:
1. Play a Path card.

2. Move Player markers.

3. Draw a new tile.

You choose any of the three tiles in your hand and place it next to your own Player stone. Then you move any stones that are now connected to that newly placed tile down the path to the end of the path on that new tile--starting with your own stone. Finally, you draw a new tile. As the game progresses the draw pile will run out, and the person who can't draw a tile gets the Dragon tile to show who will get to draw a tile as soon as one's available.

How will new ones become available? If, through the movement of Player stones, someone is moved off the board, that player is out of the game, and that player's tiles are shuffled back into the draw pile. Also, if two Player stones run into each other, both players are out.

The last player standing wins the game.

The Verdict

Firestone--Here's perhaps the best praise I can give Tsuro. I was recently away on a business trip and my wife texted me that my 7-year-old had taught her Tsuro, and that, "I like that game!" Trust me. For her to take the time to text me that she learned and liked a game is the highest praise.

Jeremiah--Yes my wife, kids, gaming group, and the teens I've played Tsuro with have all had an equally enjoyable experience with the game. That is such a rare and great thing!

Firestone--It works great as a nongamer game. The rules are simple. There are real choices to make. And the whole thing takes 10 minutes to play. And it looks nice, to boot. I've played with as many as 6 players, and it actually shines at those higher numbers. (And that's rarely true with games.) Higher player counts break out the knives early, and people are getting in each other's way and sending friends off the board. But in 10 minutes you can set up again. It's great.

Jeremiah--It's true, the more players there are, the quicker it gets interesting! I've played with high numbers and with low numbers, and when there are only 2 or 3 players it's a race to the middle to start messing with each other.

Jeremiah--The aesthetics of the game are great too. It looks really nice, and adds to the pleasure of the game. And the components just feel nice!

Firestone--Definitely! It's the sort of game you could leave out on a coffee table, luring visiting, unsuspecting nongamers to their DEATHS! So to speak.

The Final Verdict

Firestone's Final Verdict--Tsuro is a fast and fun family and nongamer game that fits in any collection. It's beautiful, has easy-to-learn rules, and is over in 10 minutes.

Jeremiah's Final Verdict--Tsuro is the perfect filler game but also a great main event for the night you don't have a ton of time--one play-through is never enough! We love this game!

Theology of Games would like to thank Calliope Games for providing review copies of Tsuro. This in no way affected our opinions of the game.

Thanks for reading!