If you are looking for a fun and easy to learn game for all ages, and one that will not take all night to play, we suggest you pick up a copy of Lanterns!  You can play with 2-4 players, but we played with just the two of us.

The harvesting time is over, and it is now time to celebrate by decorating the lake with beautiful and colorful lanterns! Players gain honor by decorating the lake, and the player with the most honor at game's end wins!

Was this game easy to learn?

After reading through the directions only once, we were off playing! This game was very easy to learn, but that does NOT mean it is easy to win. We actually played twice, and both times Jane lost! You really have to think before placing your tiles, and Phil was a lot more thoughtful in his placements. There is a lot of strategy in each move you make in order to gain honor, as you will read in the next section.

How is it played?

There are 36 lake tiles to place in the game to form the lake, with the lanterns floating on top. Each tile has four sides on it showing lanterns of different colors. There are also 56 lantern cards, in seven colors, that players can collect. For the two-player game only five of each color are used.

Each player starts with three lake tiles in their hand. A starting lake tile is on the table to begin the game, which shows red, white, blue, and black lanterns on it. The player facing the red side starts the game. Each player also receives one lantern card in the color that they are facing (e.g., the player facing red receives a red lantern card). In the two-player game, the draw pile of lake tiles is only 16 tiles, and the rest go back in the box. The more players there are, the more tiles are in the draw pile.

Last, there are dedication tokens, which the players are trying to earn. Each dedication token depicts honor points, and how to earn that honor. There are three ways to earn honor: collecting all seven colors of lanterns, collecting four of one color, or collecting six lanterns in three different colors (three pairs). Some of the tokens have three or four dots on them, which denote using them in them in the three or four player game, so we took those out of our game play. You can also earn favor tokens throughout the game, which act as a currency.

On each players turn they can do each of the following three actions (in order) with the third action being mandatory:

Game play continues until all the lake tiles are placed on the table, then each player receives one more turn to do action one or two and then the game is over.  Whoever has the most honor points at the end wins the game!

How was the timing of the game?

You can definitely play this game in under an hour. We highly suggest playing multiple times for a tournament style of play. After playing twice and losing twice, our two out of three did not actually make it to three for Jane.  However, we will play again and Jane is determined to win!

If you are looking for more game reviews for two players, check out our show on You Tube – Table for Two Show – and find us on Facebook under “Table for Two Show” or @tablefortwoshow on Twitter!