Quattuor Reges, is a 2 player, head to head, chess style game, designed by Gauthier Fourcade. In this abstract strategy game, the player pieces represent cards from a deck, between 7 and the Ace, in the four suits. Each player controls two of the suits, either as the red player or the black player.
The goal of the game is to get an Ace, King, or Queen to your opponents back line for the victory.
The method of capturing pieces is based on a circular value, rock-paper-scissors style method. Aces can capture all Faces (K, Q, J), Faces and Higher Numbers can capture the small number pieces, but then any small number pieces can capture an Ace. Then there are specific rules for each group, creating a circle of winning values.
All of your pieces can come 2 spaces in any direction, but cannot jump other pieces, except for the 9, that moves 3 spaces, and the 8, that moves 4 spaces, and the 7 that moves 3 spaces, but can also capture the Jack. The finally ‘trick’ is that a player can move two pieces on their turn, but they have to move one from each suit, so it’s important to position you pieces well.
The tutorial was once again done by Nekonyancer and was well done. It allowed the player to activate and manipulate the board while teaching the concepts. Once the basis concepts were taught, as it’s an abstract strategy game, they also taught a little bit of strategy to consider.
This is not my kind of game. I don’t enjoy chess at all and this is very similar vibes. While I do enjoy abstract strategy games that do things different, this one is just too close to chess, the movement rules are varied enough to be hard to remember as a beginner, then the values that beat other values needs constant reference. While a reference card is easily accessible, it didn’t really help much.
The number values that more further seems arbitrary. On Board Game Arena, it shows you where you can move when you click a piece and even where your piece is in danger if you move there, but in a physical version, you don’t have those kinds of features.
This is also the kind of game where someone with superior knowledge of the game very easily stomps a person trying to learn (much like my previous experiences with chess). If you like chess variants, this might be for you, but it’s definitely not for me.
I am rating this one at a 3/10 on Board Game Geek. Based on the BGG scale, this is generous and rates it as “Bad – likely won’t play again”. I definitely won’t be playing this again, but I’m also not going to slam a game based on my personal preferences. I don’t know that I think that the gameplay is Awful or Very Bad (which are the 1-2 options), it’s just not my kind of game and I won’t be revisiting it.
If you’ve played it or you do give it a try, let me know what you think!
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