Rebirth is a game from the mind of Reiner Knizia, arguably the most prolific board game designer of all time. With over 700 published games under his belt, Rebirth proves he’s still got plenty of fresh ideas in the tank. It plays like classic Knizia with simple rules, clever depth, and just the right amount of player interaction, walking the line perfectly without falling into “multiplayer solitaire” or “take that” territory.
The first thing you’ll notice is how striking this game looks. Having demoed it at UKGE earlier this year, the size and technicolour aesthetic turned the heads of passers by reliably all weekend. The colours are vibrant with lots of green and blue and splashes of yellow and pink. As you add tiles, castles and cathedrals, you feel like you’re adding to the world in a very satisfying way.
The components are very well made too, especially the aforementioned buildings, though the game doesn’t come with a way to store any of the hundreds of tiles and buildings so it’s worth buying 5 drawstring cloth bags (one for each of the different colours and 1 for the Ireland components which I’ll talk about later). Freezer bags will do if you’re more frugal like me.
The gameplay is incredibly easy to get into, having played it with gamers and non-gamers alike. The rules click after just a few turns, and it’s super accessible. We have a house rule to speed up gameplay and I wouldn’t play without it as it literally halves the game time. Each time a player lays a tile, they pick up their next one so they can consider their next move while the other players are taking their turns. I’d highly recommend this rule because if you do then you’re looking at a game that’s around 30 mins for 2 players and 45 mins for a group of 3-4.
The replayability is also one of Rebirth’s strong suits. The randomly drawn scoring goals and multiple ways to score points with your tiles mean you’ll never play the same game twice. But when you do get sick of the base game, there is a whole other side of the board with extra component pieces and rule variations called Ireland (the default side is Scotland).
If you like games that are easy to learn, beautiful to look at, have hidden depth and incredible replayability, then this one’s definitely worth your time because Knizia has knocked this one out of the park.
