Seven Wonders Lovers: Let's Babble about Babel

One of the presents under our Christmas tree in 2014 was an expansion for one of our favorite games, Seven Wonders. We like Seven Wonders so much that we snatch up any expansion that comes along. Seven Wonders: Babel is the latest of those.

If, and when, you buy this beauty of a box, you'll find that there are actually two expansions within. The Tower and Projects. Here's what you get.

That's a lot of stuff, and, as is usual for this game franchise, the components are top of the line: sturdy and gorgeous.

As recommended in the rules, we played each expansion separately to begin with. And we liked each, for different reasons. The Tower allows you to play tiles that affect all players at once. Some effects are good, providing things like a free textile or resource, and some are bad. I, for one, was hammered by the tax levied on building blue cards.

Projects reminded us a bit of the barbarians in Settlers: Cities and Knights. In that game, everyone has to band together to fight off the barbarians or suffer the consequences. In Projects, players band together to complete a building project. If it succeeds, bonuses are given out. If it fails, those who didn't participate suffer the consequences. It's all fun stuff, and makes Seven Wonders more interactive between all players, not just those on either side of you.

That was all good, but then we decided to take it a step farther. An epic game with all expansions--Babel, Cities, Leaders and the Wonder Pack.

Here are some of us after the fray. Do we look a little dazed? Let's just say it was a bit much.