Thames & Kosmos | 692384 | Imhotep - Builder of Egypt | Family Board Game by Thames and Kosmos | Toy of The Year Finalist | Parents Choice Gold Award Winner | Spiel Des Jahres-Nominated | Ages 10+

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You might have heard the name from the 1999 film The Mummy, but in this game, Imhotep isn’t the Bad Guy! Currently, given that I’m writing about them on top of another game’s review, I’m doing a real bad job of being patient, but that’s just how things work in Busytown. The real star of the show comes from the multiple tile types and how they are all used in different ways along your “player board” area. Our ultimate guide to board game cafes has everything you need to know about what a board game cafe is, or how to find one in your area! Players gain points by not only having the most of their stones at a building site, but by having stones placed in specific arrangements at the building sites.

As you add stones, the player’s owner may choose which stone goes to which pyramid, and then gains the bonus. You must constantly watch what your opponents are doing, all while planning your own route to victory. Imhotep has been out in Germany for a couple of months, but it didn’t generate much buzz on this side of the pond until it was nominated for the Spiel des Jahres . Over six rounds, they try to transport their stone blocks to end up in the most valuable positions at five construction sites: pyramid, obelisk, chamber tomb, temple, and market.Having a ton of your stones on one ship isn’t necessarily a bad move, but it sets you up for potential negative consequences, because an opponent can pull that ship of yours and dump it onto a spot that won’t earn you as many points. In each turn, you must weigh your options for getting your own stones into place and thwarting your opponents' placement plans.

The next round then begins with the next round card indicating the ships used and new market cards put in play.To be fair, this shouldn’t be a particularly big surprise; none of you were Imhotep in the base game, either. Here, however, it can feel sort of soul crushing at times as your grand design gets trampled on again and again and again and you start falling way behind everyone else on the scoring track. And most of the time you won’t even have all four workers out at once, since there is a constant ebb and flow of people on the board (more on that next).