The announcement of classic board game Catan making it on to the Xbox Live Arcade split 360 users into two camps; those who rejoiced as though Microsoft had announced the second coming of Christ, and those who scratched their head and tried to remember exactly which retro game this was again. Catan may not be the second coming, but it is certainly an Arcade game worth getting excited about.
To those who are unfamiliar, imagine what classic resource-race videogame M.U.L.E. might play like as a board and dice game, and you are on your way to understanding Catan. The goal is to build your empire as quick as possible, while also carefully preventing other players from doing the same. The game begins by randomly assigning board tiles a resource and number responsible for generating said resource for any players with a settlement or city touching it when the rolled dice equals the tile's number.
One at a time, players are asked to place their first two settlements; following the rule that no two settlements can be within two spaces (or road sections) of each other. Pick great starting settlements, and you are on your way to victory. As a dummy's guide to dice theory, the game does mark the numbers that turn up on the dice most often in red, and puts dots under each number to indicate the likelihood a number will appear; with the more dots, the more likely it will show. Players gather the resource cards in the hopes of gathering them in the right combinations to create pieces for their expanding empire.
For example, one brick card and one lumber card build a section of road. The game awards points for creating settlements and cities, having the longest road, and having the largest army. The game is won when a player reaches 10 settlement points. The game is incredibly simple to learn, helped greatly here by a clever 'learn as you play' mode, but even harder to master, with players constantly trying to cut off another player's path to the longest road and most prosperous settlement locations and strategically trading, or not, with others.
Making the game all the more difficult and entertaining is the trading that takes place between players. During each turn a player rolls the dice, resulting in awarded resource cards for all players touching resource tiles with the matching number. At this point, the player whose turn it is has the option of building empire materials from existing cards, purchasing development cards, or trading for resources from other players or the board itself. Trading with the board typically will cost you four of one type of card for one of another, certainly a last-resort strategy.
