Game Review: Bohnanza

If you haven't played Bohnanza before, it's definitely worth giving it a try.  Right now it is one of our favourite games.  It doesn't take too long to play, it's easy to learn, and since the rules vary slightly depending on the number of players, it is just as enjoyable with two players as it is with seven.  And that's not true of many games!

To play, all you need is a deck of Bohnanza cards.  The basic idea of the game is that you "plant" different kinds of beans (represented by cards) in your "fields", stacking cards of the same kind on top of each other.

This picture shows a game a couple of rounds in.  Each player has beans planted in their two fields.  A typical round involves each player planting beans and trading beans with the other players.

If you decide to "harvest" a field of beans (or are forced to because you have to plant a new kind of bean), you collect coins depending on how many beans you collected in that field, and the value of the kind of bean you are harvesting.

For example, in this picture I was harvesting a field of 4 black-eyed beans, which was worth two coins.  I flipped two of the cards over to show the coin on the back and put them aside to represent the two coins I had earned.  The rest of the cards went into the discard pile.

Of course, there are many other rules and parts of the game that I have not described, but that is the general idea.

Bohnanza is a great family game, and is an excellent choice for a games night or as a way to pass time.  We are definitely glad that we added Bohnanza to our collection of games!

Have you played Bohnanza before?  Do you like it?  What other card games do you enjoy?