We’re taking a look at the beautiful card game Floriferous in this review!
As spring approaches you may be wanting to spend time among the beautiful flowers, arranging lovely bouquets for your home. Players will be able to do just that in this relaxing competitive card game.
Overview of Floriferous
Floriferous is played over three rounds divided into five turns.
Each turn, a player moves one step through the garden by moving their pawn onto a new card in the next row. The card the player selects is taken into their personal scoring area.
There are four types of cards players may select.
Flower cards
Arrangement Cards
Sculpture Cards
Desire Cards
Players earn points at the end of the game for how well they were able to meet the conditions of their arrangement and desire cards with the Flower cards they collected during their trips through the garden.
Turn order is determined by where a players pawn is in the garden. If you chose the top card, you’ll go first on the next turn, the player in the second row will go next, and so on down the rows.
Once players have walked through the garden and there are no more cards remaining, the round is over. At the end of each round, players score Bounty Cards. These cards are not collected and are able to be scored by all players. If you satisfy it in the first round, you will earn more points than if you satisfy the bounty in the second or third rounds.
Some cards in the garden will have stones on them. The player who collects the most stones will be awarded the Cup of Tea at the end of the game.
Players them deal out more cards to fill the garden rows for the next round.
Game End
Floriferous ends after all three rounds have been played.
The player with the most victory points is the winner.
What Do We Think of Floriferous?
Floriferous is a beautiful, relaxing card game. This is exactly the style of game I’m looking for on those evenings where I just want a quiet game to wind down with or on lovely mornings to enjoy over breakfast.
I love how easy Floriferous is to teach to new players. It is quickly grasped in just a handful of minutes. A large reason for this is how players get to choose how their flowers score at the end of the game by drafting scoring (desire) cards. With simple iconography, it’s a breeze to interpret the cards and how you can draft flower cards to maximize their score.
This is also what makes Floriferous so replayable. The scoring is different every game and what worked well for you last game may not be as fruitful on the next depending on which flower cards are available. Attempting different sets and combinations each game keeps it feeling fresh even after many plays!
The art is absolutely striking. When we’re playing it never fails to stop passers by who immediately reach for the cards to examine. You could easily make this game into an art piece for the home.
Is Floriferous too Similar to Herbaceous?
Fans of Pencil First Games might recognize Floriferous as strongly resembling Herbaceous, another beautiful set collection game we’ve reviewed.
While the games are similar in both appearance and mechanics (set collection,) we feel that they are each unique enough that both games can be a benefit to your collection.
However, if I were to play devils advocate for a moment and only choose one to play, I would select Floriferous. It combines the set collection challenge so beautifully with the strategic choice of choosing agency that I find it to be incredibly interesting. Sometimes you have to choose to forego a good card because you don’t want to be lower in the turn order for the cards you can see later in the garden.
I’m a sucker for when a game lets players choose how much control they want over what is available. (See: The Whatnot Cabinet)
For the sake of balance though, Adam said he would choose Herbaceous if he could only keep just one.
In short, they’re both good so you can’t go wrong!
Floriferous Review Summary
Floriferous is the style of game so many people are looking for: it is easy to learn, beautiful, and strategically interesting. This is the perfect game to enjoy solo or with a friend over a morning coffee. The design of Floriferous creates this soothing, calming feeling as you play while the strategic elements keep it interesting no matter how many times it graces your table.
To pick up a copy of Floriferous, click here.
Find this and all our favorite games on our Amazon Storefront.
A special thank you to our friends at Pencil First Games for sending a copy of Floriferous for review. As always, our thoughts and opinions are our own.
Game Info:
Title: Floriferous
1-4 Players Ages 14+
Designer: Eduardo Baraf, Steve Finn
Artist: Clementine Campardou
Publisher: Pencil First Games
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