Designer: Ted Alspach

You are an architect. Your boss is certified nuts. But he’s rich! So I guess you’ll just have to deal with his insane, nonsensical building requests. Hey, this actually reminds me of working in the games industry.

Each turn, players purchase new castle extensions, and attach them to their castle. Players are trying to make their castles meet certain victory conditions, but each player also has some secret objectives they may be trying to meet as well.

Interesting Mechanic: Crazy Castles. The best part of this game is that players will end up building a lot of castles that are just absurd – staircases that go down and then straight back up, for example. Or ampitheaters right next to a butchery. This game is surprisingly fun, mostly because all of the castles end up will be so absurd.

Bonus Interesting Mechanic: Price Setting. When players buy new rooms, they don’t pay the bank. One player sets the prices for each of the rooms, and players pay that player. Doing well in the game depends on you correctly figuring out what pieces players are chasing, and figuring out how to make them pay top dollar for it without chasing them off.

Castles of Mad King Ludwig is a tidy little building game that usually elicits a few laughs. It does get a little repetitious and players with fat fingers are less enamored with manipulating some tiny pieces, but it’s a good game for ‘just beyond gateway’ level gamers.

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(Photo Credit: Smashface)