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Northeast China, 1932: A new government has disarmed its people, and condemns assembly as intent to undermine the state.
In this troubled time, you are a respected teacher and Sifu in a Manchukuoan town. Under the watchful eye of the occupying garrison, you must fight to keep your way of life alive, lead your students to help your community, and continue to secretly practice your arts. Only one school's style will emerge from these troubled times as the most prominent...will it be yours?
Manchukuo is a worker placement game played over a series of rounds. Each round consists of a day phase, where you assign your students to tasks about town, and a night phase, where you recruit new students and train with them in secret.
The day phase works similarly to a traditional worker placement game. You'll assign groups of students to different locations, and take the action at that location to scale with the number of students you assign. Certain spaces will allow you to gather resources like food, tools, and coins. Other spaces will present opportunities for you to invest those resources back into your troubled community--either by rebuilding, or by helping families in need.
At the end of the day phase, the students you assigned to different locations on the board will count towards your influence in the area. If you have the most influence in an area, you will recruit the students in that area's residence, and then the students you assigned to that area will replace them in that residence. All other players' students in that area return to their schools.
Managing the flow of students you recruit is the key to Manchukuo's gameplay. Recruit too few students, and you may not be able to take as many actions in the next round. Recruit too many students, and you could end up drawing unwanted attention from the garrison, who may enforce extra rules for how you can assign your workers.
Recruiting students is also important for the night phase, when you'll train together. The numbers and types of students in your school determine how you can level up your disciples, who can provide big bonuses to your actions, and who can eventually be promoted to Masters themselves. New Masters can take students with them to open their own schools, spreading your reputation farther than ever before.
At the end of the fifth round, the school with the greatest reputation wins!
—description from the publisher
Spotlight Game Night REPLAY - Manchukuo
- Elegant and intuitive mechanics despite complexity
- Thematic integration of historical setting
- Fast-paced gameplay
- Engaging player interaction
- Well-designed for two players
- Can be very 'mean' and punishing
- High cognitive load ('brain-burning')
- Tight economy requires careful planning
- Navigating restrictions and oppression under an occupying force
- Chinese village during Japanese occupation
- Implicit through mechanics and flavor text
- Flotilla
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Area Control — The player with the most workers at a location recruits students, indicating a form of area majority.
- Asymmetric Player Powers — Players start with different houses and potentially different starting conditions or abilities based on their chosen school.
- Deck building (implied) — Gaining students and potentially adding them to a personal player area could be interpreted as a form of deck building, though not explicitly named as such.
- Resource Management — Players manage resources like food, coins, tools, and offerings to perform actions and avoid negative consequences.
- Set Collection — Players collect students of different colors to upgrade disciples and gain points.
- Take That — Actions can be taken that directly hinder or negatively impact other players, described as 'mean' or 'jerk moves'.
- Worker Placement — Players place 'meatballs' or 'students' on various locations to take actions.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- This makes my brain hurt though.
- simple to learn but complex game
- it's super elegant like it's very intuitive
- there's such a tight economy in this game every move matters
- it is a mean game it can be pretty mean
- this game completely cements the fact that Mike Mihail stick is an incredible mind incredible designer
References (from this video)
- The Chinese setting could have been cool.
- The worker placement element could have been cool.
- Last update was 2 years ago.
- Held up due to other project delays.
- Crowdfunding platform no longer used.
- Payment processing issues.
- Unlikely to be fulfilled.
- Worker placement with student recruitment and training
- China
- Forsaken
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Worker Placement — Players assign students to tasks during the day phase and recruit/train students in the night phase.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- Some viewers may find the following video disturbing. Viewer discretion is advised.
- So, this is not the most positive list in the world.
- I personally believe, might be a hot take, and we'll see, but I personally believe the industry wouldn't be where it is now without crowdfunding.
- I think the longer it takes to come out, the less money they have to finish it.
- It's not a pre-order system.
- The problem with crowdfunding is this goal is not true.
- I see no way in the hell that the original backer still gets something out of this deal.
- Don't take people's money if you have personal issues going on. I have zero sympathy for any of that.
- These 10 games are in my experience the outlier and not the rule.
- The last their last Their last update was 2 years ago.
- This is their latest update in 2 years.
- This was a Kickstarter scam.
- They just took the money of the backers and never delivered, just ghosted everyone.
- their latest update was five years ago.
- Don't take people's money if you have personal [ __ ] going on. I have zero sympathy for any of that.
- Cool, $1,500 is how much I would have I will be losing from these games.