Meander

From: De Speelstijl List Price: $75 Players: 2 Playing Time: 10 minutes  Type of game: Abstract Strategy Skill level: 8 Complexity: 1  Reviewed by: Peter Sarrett, Issue 26, Summer 2001

I normally don’t review games from small publishers unless I can give the game a strong recommendation. I’m making an exception in this case because Meander is such an oddity. I was disappointed with the gameplay but still love the concept, and some readers are likely to want a copy simply because of the game’s tactile quality and unique reliance on physics.

Meander is an abstract tile-laying game for two players. Each player attempts to create paths connecting two opposite edges of the board. That board is really a tray into which the cast resin tiles are placed.

The tiles come in four path configurations (cross, double bends, and two kinds of shunt) in which all four sides of the tile have an exit. The first tile begins in the middle of the board. The remainder of the game has players drawing a tile at random and adding it to the board, touching an existing tile in any direction. When the board fills, the real test begins and the laws of physics are invoked.

Each player places five marbles along his edge of the board, then lifts that edge to create a slope. One by one, he sends his marbles down the slope and through the network of paths created during the game in the hope of seeing them emerge on the opposite side. If his opponent has done his job well, however, the marbles might get shunted to the side or trapped in the gravity well of a cup-shaped curve with no exit. Once all five marbles have met their fate, the other player lifts his edge and tries his pathways. The player with the most marbles on the opposite edge of the board wins the game.

Meander is simple enough for a child, while offering tactile pleasures for adults. The whole affair is quite large— each tile is 2.25” square and the tray measures almost sixteen inches across— and of exceptional quality. The tiles feel great and manipulating them evokes memories of playing with building blocks and other youthful toys. But Meander isn’t a toy, it’s a game— and sadly, it’s a game that falls short of its promise.

Gameplay feels remarkably like Metro and similar connection games. The putative twist, of course, is that gravity and physics effectively impose one-way arrows on pathways as they’re created. The disappointment was in how rarely this seemed to matter. We hoped to see marbles zipping across gaps, leveraging momentum into unexpected feats of derring-do. The reality is far more prosaic. Marbles snake along predictable courses which rarely differ from the shortest path one might navigate though a flat, gravity-independent board. The unique application of physical laws within a game context drew me to Meander, but it turns out that the laws of physics are as soporific here as they were in high school.

If I were looking for a two-player tile-laying connection game, I’d go with Metro over Meander. But of course, Metro is flat. If the toy factor is intriguing, Meander may be for you. Just be sure to follow the instructions (which include a good number of game variations) and give each marble a very soft push— otherwise it can cross over into adjacent channels rather than entering the one directly beneath it, which kills much of the game’s tactical challenge.