I was first introduced to Hotel Tycoon back at Dream Toys last November and I wasn’t convinced. I don’t know what it was about the game but it just didn’t appeal to me however the more I heard people talking about it the more I wanted to have a go myself. Hotel Tycoon is not really made for my family as the girls are both well below the recommended age limit of 8 plus but with a little bit of help they soon got the hang of it.
In fact they didn’t just get the hang of it, they absolutely thrashed us. By the end of the game all the adults were bankrupt and the girls owned four resorts each!
The game is simple in concept, you buy land, you build on the land and then you charge people to stay on the land. The best part comes because of the permit dice. To build on the land you have to obtain a permit and this is all based on chance. You could end up being able to build all of your hotels in one go for free if the dice allows you too but then you could also have to pay twice as much as they are worth to do so. By adding the element of chance it really enabled the girls to get started quickly and we were soon paying them rent each time we passed their resorts.
When you buy some land you need to try and build on it as soon as possible because if someone else gets the opportunity to buy it from you it will cost them a lot less than you paid for it. Another element of chance is how many nights you have to pay for when visiting someone else’s resort, this can get very expensive especially if they have lots of hotels and there entertainment facilities in place too.
All in all this was a great family game that was fairly easy to understand, unpredictable and lots of fun. However watch out for sneaky children buying your land at half price and then bankrupting you for staying in their resorts!