The town of Scoville likes it hot! Very hot! That means they love their peppers – but they're too busy eating them to grow the peppers themselves. That's where you come in.
You've been hired by the town of Scoville to meet their need for heat. Your role as an employee of Scoville is to crossbreed peppers to create the hottest new breeds. You'll have to manage the auctioning, planting, and harvesting of peppers, then you'll be able to help the town by fulfilling their orders and creating new pepper breeds. Help make the town of Scoville a booming success! Let's get planting!
A round of Scoville consists of a blind auction, which determines player order, a planting phase, a harvesting phase, and a fulfillment phase. Each round, the players plant peppers in the fields. Throughout the game, the available opportunities for crossbreeding increase as more peppers are planted. When harvesting, players move their pawn through the fields, and whenever they move between two planted fields, they harvest peppers. If, for example, they harvest between fields of red and yellow peppers, they crossbreed those and harvest an orange pepper. Harvested peppers are then used to fulfill the town's peppery desires!
- flow feels natural and organic across player counts
- high interactivity via the share board and auctions
- excellent production values and artwork by Vincent Dutra
- expansion module and solo mode included
- replayability through complex breeding options and wiggle room
- breeding chart can be overwhelming and mathy at first
- initial setup may feel dense and difficult to parse
- agricultural product production, pepper breeding
- peppers farming and cultivation
- operational and strategic with resource-driven decisions
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Auction / Bidding — players bid to acquire contract opportunities and resources during the share board phase.
- auctioning — players bid to acquire contract opportunities and resources during the share board phase.
- breeding and planting — players breed peppers using a chart to generate new pepper varieties; optimism and risk in options.
- end game bonuses — one-time abilities that can shift endgame points and provide a strategic boost.
- endgame modifiers — one-time abilities that can shift endgame points and provide a strategic boost.
- harvesting and selling — players move a farmer on a board to harvest peppers and fulfill contracts for income.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- the flow of the game is really nice and actually feels really natural to what you're doing
- it's a very interactive experience throughout
- Scoville really is hot stuff
References (from this video)
- chips are tactile and appealing
- engaging risk-reward core idea
- not seen as highly commercial
- costly components (chips) and oversized box
- tedious payout/change intervals
- pushing your luck with chips
- abstract gambling-themed play
- experimental
- Dominion
- Agricola
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Push Your Luck — risk-taking decisions with chips representing resources
- pushing-your-luck — risk-taking decisions with chips representing resources
- Resource management — managing chips and timing your payouts versus costs
- resource/expense management — managing chips and timing your payouts versus costs
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- if there was a formula for creating a board game that sells it might look a little bit like this in this video
- the two things combined are going to generate a successful product
- idea well essentially we're talking about the core concept of your game, the hook
References (from this video)
- Sounds like fun
- Scoville spiciness theme
- Cooking competition
- Farm
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Collection and cooking — Plant, crossbreed, harvest and sell and cook your peppers to win the chili festival
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- We love trick taking games
- This game is so much freaking fun
- I adore GMT games, they are becoming one of my favorite game publishers
- If you remember Vast Crystal Caverns is in my top five games of all time
- We bloody love it
- We can't stop playing
- It's a blimp game not a train game
- That's just work
- I don't think I want to play it
- I'll get it eventually
References (from this video)
- high reputation on BGG cited in discussion
- strong artwork and theme
- enjoyed by the presenter in the past
- could be crowded by other similar titles in collection
- not guaranteed to stay in every future rotation
- pepper farming / culinary competition
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- hand-management — players manage a hand of cards to assemble dishes.
- push-your-luck / drafting — draft ingredients and try to assemble high-value dishes while managing risk.
- set collection — collect pepper cards to complete recipes and earn points.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- you are a pepper farmer
- this is eclipse this is a four second dawn for the galaxy 4e game that i have actually played
- i'm teaching alex this
- i'm so excited that i now know how to play this game
- it's a tile laying game where you're laying out a map
References (from this video)
- tightly themed, tactile peppers
- engaging decisions
- some players may find it punishing if unlucky
- spicy peppers and production
- pepper farming and recipe creation
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Resource management — manage peppers to complete recipes and gain points
- set collection / card drafting — build a pepper farm by drafting and playing peppers
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- it's not a sprint it's a marathon
- representation matters so i want to see that
- wear a mask, social distance
References (from this video)
- Classic game being revived
- Possible changes to improve gameplay
- cooking
- peppers
- agriculture