It’s that time of the year when people post their “best of” lists, looking back over twelve months of releases.
I will be the first to admit, though, that I haven’t played enough 2022 releases to feel qualified to declare any game the “best” of the year. As a matter of fact, I question almost any “best of” list in any form of media. There are far, far too many games, music, movies, etc. released in a year for any one person to be able to play/hear/see enough to select any one the very best.
There is also the problem of bias and taste. A person who loves large gatherings and party games will have trouble looking objectively at a chit based war game. Someone who loves Gloomhaven may not especially like roll-and-writes.
That’s why I am only willing to name my FAVORITE game of 2022. It’s the one that fits into my wheelhouse of taste in gaming and brought me the most fun and the biggest challenge of the year.
For me, it’s Charlie Bink’s Trekking Through History, a relatively simple game (currently a weight of 1.86/5.00 on Board Game Geek) that has a number of decision points to find the best way to optimize your points.
How to Play
At its core, Trekking Through History is a card drafting game to try and assemble the longest chain of historical events, based on their dates, with each successive card farther along in the timeline. In one game, you will assemble a number of these chains with points given for the total length.
Where the game gets its decision points is in the number of other ways to score during your time machine treks. You get to choose among six cards that include the event’s date, an amount of time you will spend in visiting that event and “rewards” you will receive.
Above, you would receive one person and one innovation experience token. In addition, depending on the position on the selection track from which the card came, you will receive an additional token. Below shows that the Marie Curie card would also get a progress token.
These tokens are placed on your itinerary board from the top to the bottom. You choose a new itinerary each of the three days of the game and you have just twelve hours in time to fill as many spaces for occasional points.
In the board above, placing the person token would give you three points, the progress token an additional three points and the innovation token would not score anything for now; however, if you can obtain one more before the end of the day, you will get the chain of three tokens that gives you ten points.
Which brings us to the concept and manipulation of time in the game. While the basis of the game is time travel over many years, there is also the three days that the game plays and the twelve hours of travel within each day.
As previously mentioned, each card you draft has a time designation on it showing how long the “stop” takes. In the case of the Marie Curie card, it was three hours. You would advance your pocket watch three hours on the clock which indicates not only how long you have left in your game but also the playing order. The player farthest back on the clock takes the next turn so, in theory, you could draft multiple cards before an opponent gets another pick. In addition, when more than one person is on an hour, the one on top goes next.
Time can be manipulated with the use of “time crystals” which you get as rewards on certain cards and in spaces on your itinerary. During any turn, you can turn one or more crystals in to shorten your trip by an hour each. This can get you additional draws or stop you from overshooting the 12 o’clock hour (you receive three bonus points for finishing your day right at 12).
There is also a way to delay advancing your current trek in the form of ancestor cards. These cards have no date on them, take three hours of time and only reward one wild chip; however, it allows you to pause things while allowing better cards to come up in the display which might allow you to lengthen your trek.
Once all players get to 12 for the day, all of the cards are removed from the track and the next day’s cards are dealt out for selection. After the third day, the game ends, points are totaled for each trek, bonuses from itineraries and hitting 12 on the clock, and a single point for every leftover time crystal. The player with the highest score wins.
Components
The components for the game are great, from the giant clock and the chunky pocket watches to the plastic time crystals. The cards are not only large and beautifully illustrated, but on the opposite side, there is historical information on each of the events depicted.
The tokens collected are a good, thick, plastic and they are placed in a plastic tray that easily keeps everything separated. The play board is a neoprene mat that easily rolls and stores in the box.
I have two minor complaints. They could have chosen more distinct colors for the tokens, especially with the green and blue which look very similar in anything but the brightest of lights.
In addition, there could have been more time crystals included. In our two-player games, we started to run low towards the end of the game (OK, we are hoarders). I can’t imagine that there will be enough for a four player game.
In Conclusion
Trekking through History is a fantastic game that should be easy enough to play with the inexperienced board gamer yet provide enough decision points to satisfy the more experienced person. The components are a showcase for what is so special about the current gaming environment and, with additional text on the back of the cards, you just might learn something while playing.
Rating: 9 out of 10
