The Road to Rome

If you're looking for some old-fashioned boardgame fun as a change or a break from the electronics craze, The Journeys of Paul Historical Strategy Board Game, produced by Cactus Games Design is a really good family game to try. (Cactus is the company behind Outburst, Scattergories, and Redemption RPG card game.)

I picked up the game a couple of years ago but didn't really opened it until this past week. I thought it was great that someone decided to create a game based on Paul's missionary journeys, but I wasn't sure something as "low-tech" as a boardgame would create interest in today's kids.

Well, I was wrong. My three children, Anne (11 years), Joy (8 years), and Nathan (6 years) had fun playing by themselves. They kinda learned the rules as they played. After watching them go at it for awhile, mom and I got down and dirty with them and took off on the journey from Jerusalem through Asia Minor to plant three churches and be the first to reach Rome.

Sad to say, even with my seminary background and my pedigree as a minister, I failed to win both games we played as a family. Mom and Joy were the first to get to Rome to "get imprisoned" (since that's what happened to Paul in the Bible). Nathan said he won too, because he was the last to get imprisoned, and he built six churches, three more than the required. He's really getting the hang of this "church planting."

The game's pacing was slow. Before we knew it, we had played over an hour. It took about ten minutes to finish each round (two minutes average for each player), with all the declaration of the move, checking the Event card, and then coming up with a strategy to move or build churches. I love the concept that in order to build a church, you had to build at least seven cell groups. You could also appoint a deacon to help protect and guide the church. (Although I think in the Bible a presbyter (elder) fulfilled that role). You can also trade cards but sometimes that doesn't help your cause.

The map of the Mediterranean Sea is excellent. What would be interesting as well would be some trivia cards that provide more information (historical or geographical) about the ancient cities and tell of the modern city equivalent.

There's another review of the game on the web at RPG.NET.