Carcaasonne is a simple but difficult strategy board game to master. You basically have some simple, straight forward concepts that are complicated by the moves of a fairly aggressive AI, or players. The most challenging aspect of the game is counting the farms, and even though the game tallies those for you, sometimes I am a little confused by the -negative totals... although what i think it is is doing is adding the points and when you don't "win" the farm area, it takes them away again instead of giving you zero.

Some things to note. We've had off again on again issues with connecting to the server. For the first few weeks, I wasn't able to do so at all. Then, I was able to sign on but then someone else wasn't able to. We've had simliar experiences with Direct IP, and trying to figure out ports. A lot of the support for this game is not in English, but you can find some assitance online.

The server, at times, doesn't seem very busy but the games do not remain listed as they are being played. At anytime of time, I find people coming and going form the online community, although, again, not many speak English or speak a little. This is not a problem! Once they realize you do not speak German, I believe, you can still be invited to a game. You don't need a lot of cross talk to enjoy this game.

Some other things to not about this game. There is no AI available for online matches. There is for hot seat and, of course, single player. There are multiple editions to play in, and you have to be careful about placing your piece. Don't worry, it won't let you make an illegal move but there doesn't appear to be a way for you to pick up the piece again or rotate it, after it's placed, if you made a mistake.

I love the music, although it's a short track, and you can have your music play instead.

This plays just like the actual board game, which I own, except it tracks points for you, Nice!, and has a fairly stripped down but functional UI.

I had heard a lot of good things about this game, but I had not played it myself. I picked it up, thinking there would be some sort of tutorial or a help section to tell you how to get started. Nope. You're thrown right in. The help in the game consists of "This is the game screen" and "This is replay." That's about it. No obvious information about what the tiles do, how scoring goes, or how to change the orientation of the tiles while you're playing. You can customize the rules to different editions, but if you don't know what the editions are, that doesn't help either. There are a lot of websites that give you strategy for the game, but some in-game help would be nice.

The game itself seems to play well. At higher levels, I get beaten down soundly, which is what you would expect. You can customize the AI to put more weight on various ways of scoring (cities, roads, farms, etc...)

A feature that is sorely needed (at least, for a newbie like me) is an "Undo" button, in case you put the tile in the wrong place or orientation. A "Place your tile here" suggestion would also be nice. There is a replay game, so you can watch previous games that you have saved.

If you know how to play the game already, this is probably a wonderful pickup. If you're interested in learning, you can pick it up, but don't expect much help from the game to learn how to play.

The game itself is excellent, but it has some bugs, which are fairly minor. One benefit this game has over the 360 version is that you get the expansions 1-3, which is something you don't get on the 360. The bugs are a graphical glitch that occurs on one of my laptops (guessing it's video card related, the laptop that has issues is NVIDIA, the other is AMD), and you have to enter a serial for MP, though no serial is given. Just entering anything for a serial seems to work.

Another issue is that the game doesn't have any sort of tutorial, and the AI is quite vicious, so there's a harsh learning curve.

I'd say the game is worth $10, though a better deal if it goes on sale eventually.

Warning do not install to the default location, if you do you will not able to save any games or your profile to Disk. Install in a location outside of Program files.

Now on to a review of the game itself this not only has the base game and river tiles it has the first 3 expansions rules can be fully customized to suit your style of play. AI is brutal on higher setting. No tutorials ingame. It expects you to be familar with the rules of the boardgame. Apparently made around 2001-2002 and discountinued in 2006 hard to tell homepage is in Dutch Manual for GG version is in English and the game can be switched to a number of different languages so no problem there. Excellent Version of the Boardgame would be a 5/5 except for installer flaw.

A faithful (if somewhat uninspired) adaptaion of the boardgame including the additional content from the very first expansion sets. The AI is surprisingly challenging and plays extremely destructively. The game does have some minor compatibility issues with modern systems, though.

Buy if you're short on human opponents and love the board game, otherwise I'd say you can give this one a pass.