- Publisher : Intrafin Games
- Designer : Fabio Lopiano, Nestore Mangone
- Artist(s) : Javier González Cava
- Players : 1–4
- Playing time : 90–150 Min
- Weight BGG : 3.81
What's this?
Autobahn is an economic strategy game that focuses on the construction of the German highway network over three periods from the end of World War II to the present day.
At the end of the second period (in 1990), Reunification opened up opportunities to further expand the network in the eastern part of the country.
As a director within the BundesAutobahn Organisation, you are responsible for the management and development of the German federal motorway system.
How do you play?
In Autobahn, each player will build a road network in Germany and try to deliver goods. The game takes place in three eras.
🔸A round in Autobahn consists of several distinct stages: At the start of each round, players have the opportunity to claim a delivery bonus if they successfully delivered goods in a previous round. Then the players choose a card from their hand and perform the corresponding action on the player board according to the location where the card will be placed.
🔸The actions are:
– Build a section of road
– Improve a section of road
– Load a truck with goods
– Build a gas station
– Unlock technologies on their player board
– Recover their cards
🔸At the end of their action, players can move their trucks if they match the color of the card played in the turn to finally deliver goods to cities. If they pass by their gas stations they will also earn bonuses. When you build or improve a road you will send an employee to the construction offices with the aim of promoting them to the different floors of the ministry for victory points at the end of the game.
🔸At the end of each era there is an administration phase. During this phase there will be a calculation of the construction budget and players will earn money according to their employees placed in the construction offices. At the end of the third era, the player with the most points wins the game.
Is it good?
Who has never wanted to build motorways in Germany?
The game has some interesting things: already we all share the construction of the road network, there is also the mechanics of the cards that we place and which determine where we will do the action on the board and we will be limited in color of map.
For example, the red card can only be used to build a road of the same color, which limits the possibility of setting up a gas station on a red road. Unless you accumulate several red cards or take a break to collect your cards, you will have to carefully manage this constraint.
The game is based on a constant quest for optimization, especially when it comes to managing the famous trucks. The challenge gets tougher here, because moving the trucks requires that their route matches the color of the card played.
Deliveries made by these trucks open up opportunities to obtain a multitude of bonuses. These advantages are varied: some are linked to gas stations, others are unlocked on the player’s personal board, or even granted during deliveries, or even during the action phase.
However, there is a downside regarding the activation of bonuses. These latter are not all activated simultaneously, some occurring at the start of the turn, while others appear during the action phase, introducing complexity into their management. This raises the question of why this separation occurred.
The administrative stage of the game requires a series of manipulations and calculations. This facet, involving offices, can seem somewhat muddled, hindering clarity as to the precise number of points accumulated.
Finally, an element that causes disappointment is the part dedicated to “deckbuilding”, although less prominently, with fairly random card bonuses.
Despite its few imperfections, this game stands out as an attractive expert experience for optimization enthusiasts.
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Review Autobahn
Positives
- The construction of the common road network
- Card mechanics
Negatives
- The Administrative Phase
- Random Deck Building
Breakdown
- Components and illustrations 8.0
- Mechanics 7.5
- Thematic 8.0
- Replayability 8.0
- Handling 7.0
- Interaction 8.5
- Originality 9.0
