In Isla Dorada, the players are a group who have crash landed in Columbia in 1934 in a strange and hostile land.  The group must travel together each collecting treasure and gold along the way as well as trying to fulfil their destiny (well, secret destiny card).

The core gameplay is that the players bid to decide which way to go from each location.  When a player makes a bid, they say which route they will take the group if they win.  The winner of the bidding must pay their bid in cards that match the route (Kamel cards to travel along sand paths, Yak cards to travel along mountain paths, etc.and some other cards such as wild cards) so each player’s cards will limit what they can bid on different routes.  There are a few other items like Bigfoot and the Leviathan that can block routes, rivers that are one-way routes and so on too.

The locations the group visit during the game affect what treasure the players can earn so players all have their own agendas on where the group should go.  Each location visited has a marker placed on it so I think the locations visited are also connected to fulfilling their destiny cards (which are worth points at the end of the game) but the rules don’t mention much about what destiny cards actually say or require so I’m not too clear on that.

The gameplay of a group trying to make each other go in different directions sounds like a lot of fun and quite unusual.  The artwork looks charming and lavish too.  The game is being published by Funforge who released the superb looking and humorous racing game Pony Express last year (and it looks like FFG are releasing it in the US).  Bruno Faidutti has designed a wealth of games with a diverse range of game types.  When he creates something new, I’m always interested to find out what it’s like.  This time Isla Dorada has been designed along with Alan Moon, Andrea Angiolino and Piergiorgio Paglia too.

With all these factors combined, I’m looking forwards to trying it out.  (You can read the rules here.)

James.