If there’s one thing this Disney loving girl enjoys, it’s a good amusement park!

Honestly, is there anything better than walking around Magic Kingdom park with a Mickey pretzel in hand? No, no there’s not. 

So you can imagine how excited I was to play Meeple Land! In this brand new strategy game from Blue Orange Games you’ll get the chance to build your own amusement park! Given a plot of land and a whole host of possibilities you can make sure that your own guests can walk happily through your park with a pretzel in hand on their way to the next attraction!

What is Meeple Land? 

Meeple Land is a tile placement, resource management, theme park building game for 2 to 4 players. Each player will attempt to build the best amusement park, filled with unique rides and attractions, with plenty of space to accommodate guests. The player who builds the best amusement park wins!

How do you play?

Meeple Land plays over the course of four rounds. At the start of each round, players are given a specific number of coins so they can purchase attractions for their park, while earning extra income for each guest they successfully place inside their park.

Players take turns purchasing tiles featuring different attractions, rides, and amenities to place in their park. You’ll build on your 6×7 grid where you’ll attempt to match the paths on each attraction to the tile you placed before. You cannot build attractions off on their own with no connecting paths. All tiles must connect to previously played tiles. 

Each attraction can hold a specific number of guests in specified colors. Some attractions can accommodate more guests if you connect that attraction tile to a specific type of service tile. (Food, restroom, gift shop) Doing so allows you to place more guests on that tile, thus earning more money for the following round.

When you are out of money or choose to stop, you then select the van full of excited guests eager to visit your park. You place any guests you have spaces for inside your park, while those you cannot accommodate at that time must wait outside the gates. 

When all players have taken a van full of guests, the round is over and the next round begins. 

At the end of the fourth round the game is over. Players use the provided score sheets to tally their scores. You earn points for each unique attraction you placed and each number and type of guest that visited your park. Then you subtract points for each path that was cut off and each guest left waiting sadly at the gates. 

The player with the most points is the winner!

What do we think?

I had a feeling that I was going to enjoy this game and I am so excited that I was not let down! Meeple Land is absolutely fantastic. I find a lot of enjoyment from the pleasant tile placing and the building of my theme park. It feels a bit like I’m a teenager again spending hours at the computer happily playing Roller Coaster Tycoon. I lived for that game!

Meeple Land fits perfectly in the spot for players who are ready to advance beyond the gateway games and want a friendly introduction to games with a bit more meat. 

Because despite its bright, happy, family style art, I’m happy to report that Meeple Land has some meat to it! Yet it’s designed in a way that is easy to grasp so you can play it with the whole family! Our daughter Alice (8) absolutely loves it and does a great job playing! (While all kids are different, eight years old is probably the youngest I’d recommend going on this one.)

While the game itself is straight forward, (buy a tile, lay a tile, place a meeple) you really need to think through your moves so that you aren’t left with a ton of guest you can’t place or dead end paths that bite you in the end. Those negative points really add up, so you have to plan ahead!

Yet the game requires that you remain flexible. You can’t guarantee that the tile you feel you need is going to come out, so you need to be able to design your park with the resources you have available. Maybe you can’t accommodate all the yellow and pink meeples that you were hoping for (those two meeples are worth 2 points at the end rather than just 1) so you have to adjust! 

There are some great mechanics in this game!

Meeple Land packs together a couple of different game mechanics really well. First, it’s a fun tile placement game on its surface. Placing your tiles and connecting your paths to form routes through your plot of land is very fun and reminiscent of games like Carcassonne. But it’s more than just a tile game! 

You’re also managing resources! Often we think of resources in the form of clay, water, iron, etc. But in Meeple Land, your resources are your guests! Each round you are given a van full of guests that you must the accommodate for in your park. If you manages these “resources” successfully you’ll earn more money! Fail to build attractions that allow your guests to experience your park and they’ll sit outside doing nothing for you. 

Lastly its also an economic management game. You are given a small number of coins to start, so you have to use them wisely to purchase attractions that won’t break the bank, while also making sure that they help get your guests into the park itself so they generate more cash for you in subsequent rounds. If you do this well, hopefully by the final round you’ll have created a money making machine so you don’t feel strapped for cash! 

These three mechanics work so well together in this game, mesh perfectly with the theme, and create an immersive experience for the players!

Theme

They did an excellent job with the theme here. I love how you really do feel like you’re building a theme park. Plus all of the point systems make complete sense within the theme. 

You are benefitted by having unique attractions, no one wants to go to a theme park where all they have are three merry-go-rounds and two rocket coasters!

I also love that since you are trying to build a successful amusement park, you earn points for having the most people in your park enjoying it — not for having the most money at the end. 

The art and style of the game is really lovely and brings a really nice feel to the game. It’s bright and happy making it fun seeing your theme park come to life as the game progresses. 

Components

Everything in the box is top notch! Just what I’ve come to expect from Blue Orange Games. 

The tiles have a nice thickness to it, the meeples are all cut really precisely, and the score sheet helps keep track of everything you need to in order to get your final score. 

If you end up playing this one a lot, you may want to laminate four sheets so you don’t run out, but since they’re double sided, you’ll probably be fine for a good long while. 

How does it play with two? 

Meeple Land makes for a great two player game. In many ways the game itself feels like a solitaire experience. There is no way for another player to sabotage your park. However, there is some key player interactions that comes from two of the game’s main areas:

1. Tile selection.

If your opponent takes the tile you were really hoping for, that’s just too bad! Sometimes you might want to wait to purchase a prime tile, but if you wait too long it could cost you. 

2. Guest Selection

Once you are done purchasing tiles for the round, you select your van full of happy guests. This is a key moment of the game because you should have been buying tiles planning for specific guests. If your opponent finishes before you, they might take the guests you were planning on, leaving you with others that you can’t place. This part of the game can lend itself to fun tension. You may want to end your turn early so you can get the guests you need, or else you’ll be watching in anticipation hoping they take something else. 

The player interaction that exists in Meeple Land is smaller than other games, but still brings a fun tension to the game without it ever feeling unfriendly. For me this is a must in family games.

Summary

Meeple Land is an excellent “next step” strategy game for any one looking to dive deeper into the world of modern board games. 

I absolutely love how it packages resource management, economic generation, and tile placement into a friendly, immersive experience that, thanks to the modular design is extremely repayable. No matter how often you play this game you’ll never build the same park twice! 

After multiple plays, Meeple Land was an instant add to our shelf and one we highly recommend checking out! It’s easy to learn, has a well developed theme, and is a great strategy game that a wide range of ages can enjoy. 

A special thank you to our friends at Blue Orange Games for sending us a copy of Meeple Land for review! As always, our thoughts and opinions are our own. 

If you’d like to purchase a copy of Meeple Land for your home, click here!

Game Info:
Title: Meeple Land
2-4 players Ages 8+
Designer: Cyrille Allar, Frederic Guerard
Artist: Tomasz Larek
Publisher: Blue Orange Games

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