Euro fans, here's a treat that won't cost you a thing. Goa, Rudiger Dorn's revered 2004 game of spice trading and ruthless auctions, has just arrived on Board Game Arena, free to play in your browser. If you've only ever seen the name whispered in "best out-of-print euros" threads, now's your chance to find out what the fuss is about.
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Start organising for freeGoa drops you into the 16th-century spice race, where rival trading companies bid for plots of land and then develop along five progress tracks that let you ship faster, harvest more, and grow your colonies. The squeeze comes from the auctions. You're regularly forced to bid up the very tiles you need, handing your rivals the cash to outpace you in the process. It's elegant and tense, and it has long had a reputation as a game where a quiet plan beats a loud one. Goa earned an International Gamers Award nomination back in 2004, and it has aged better than most of its shelf-mates from that era.
Dorn is no stranger to a podium. He went on to win the Kennerspiel des Jahres in 2014 with Istanbul, and his catalogue runs from the dice-chucking Las Vegas to the tile-laying Karuba. This Board Game Arena version, published in its current edition by Quined Games, went live on 3 June, so you can learn the ropes at a pressure-free online table before deciding whether to track down a physical copy. If it clicks, it's a cracking one to bring to a strategy night with your group.
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Find events near youSources: Board Game Arena | Wikipedia
