by Justin Difazzio
On its surface, Container sounds like maybe the most boring theme anyone could make a game about. Make containers. Sell containers. Buy containers. Ship containers. I fell asleep twice just typing that. And yet, I gave this seemingly brain-deadening game a try and backed it during the recent Allplay crowdfunding campaign. Now obviously if I backed it, I must have thought there was something to enjoy there. You’re right. The description of the game intrigued me, and I’ve always wanted to play this one because of one part of that description: The economy is player driven almost 100%.
That one tidbit made me pause, consider what that meant, and shake my head. It sounded like total chaos. But there are guardrails. The game puts a lower and upper limit on how you price your containers. But that’s about it. Auctions can go as high or low as you want.
“Auctions?” you ask. Yes. You’re sort of at the mercy of what people decide your containers are worth. Let me explain how the game works.
Every player is going to be making shipping containers in a couple of 5 different colors, pricing those containers for other players to buy to stage in their port, and then hoping they sell. Meanwhile, everyone is taking those containers they purchase from each other’s factories and putting them in their own ports, setting a price, and hoping someone sails to their port and purchases those containers to put on their ships. And those ships loaded with up to 5 containers? They get sailed to Container Island, where they are offloaded into someone’s scoring pile. But whose?
Remember the auctions I mentioned? Any time someone sails their ship to Container Island, an auction is held for the entire contents of that ship. Everyone but the person whose ship it is chooses money cards from their supply and places them face down. Once everyone has decided how much that ship is worth and placed money cards (including two $0 value cards to bluff with) facedown on the table, they’re all revealed and the person who bid the most (with ties going to a small side auction) gets to place all those containers in their holding area on Container Island. The money goes to the seller, and an equal subsidy from the bank goes with it. Sell $10 worth of crates, make $20. Neat!
The twist comes in here. What if no one decided it was worth more than a couple measly bucks? The player who spent all that time and money gathering containers and sailing across the (probably) Kraken-infested seas is gonna be super mad! What would incentivize anyone to bid more than a few bucks? Well, the player whose cargo is on the auction block (instead of taking the money from the highest bidder) can simply match the amount of the top bid and take those containers for themself, placing them in their own scoring area. So everyone is encouraged to bid a reasonable amount, or that person might get exactly what they need to score big.
See, at the beginning of the game players get a card that tells them how much each color of container is worth to them. And you may have guessed that all those cards are different. Good for you! And that’s where the economy is born. I might want red crates because they’re worth $10 apiece to me at the end of the game. You might want yellow crates for the same reason. Since the person with the most money at the end of the game wins, each player is determining what different shipments of crates are worth to them.
So collect all the crates in your top color that you can, because that’s how you win!
Oh, wait. One more thing. At the end of the game you have to throw away all of the color of containers you have the most of. So if I collected 8 red crates and 3 yellow, that $80 in red crates I was supposed to get ends up in the ocean, and I end up all wet.
Now, there’s a little more to the game than that, with some side auctions and buildings and a whole expansion I won’t even get into. I have to admit that, thematically, it still sounds like a complete snooze. But what do I think of it?
It’s a lot of math.
It took us 3 hours both times we played it.
You will inevitably miscount your actions and screw up a great idea with some awful timing.
Sometimes you just get outbid and there isn’t anything you can do about it.
It’s hard to control.
But holy crap did I love it!
I haven’t figured it out yet, honestly, which is why this is just a first impression and not a full review. None of the 5 of us who played it was sure that they were doing the right things, and that made it even better. We made containers. We sold containers. We bought containers. We shipped containers. And we smiled the whole time we did it.
I didn’t win. Not even close. The second game I had to throw out 2 containers of my highest scoring color, leaving me with 2 containers total in my scoring area, which is BAD. But somehow I still came in second place because I just lost SO MANY AUCTIONS so I kept my money. Somewhere in all the waves, both on the ocean and in the market, we all found a way to connect, laugh, and screw each other over for fun and profit. Container is a winner in my group, and I think we’ll be playing it a lot more in the future.
