My wife and I tried out the two-player variant as posted on the Alea website. She had never played Puerto Rico before but joins my gaming group once in a while for some Euro gaming so she was not totally new to the concept. I ended up being the first Governor. Note: unlike the three-player game there is one Prospector in the game.

First player disadvantage seemed really clear as she scored 6 victory points in the first two rounds. While I was still busy setting up my island she was shipping corn with bonus points. I could have taken the Craftsman and the Captain myself to reduce her point total, but by denying her points I would also have slowed down my own build up.

She had corn and indigo for most of the game with some tobacco and additional corn later on. The corn plantations didn't come out of the bag until late in the game. I had indigo and tobacco with some sugar and coffee later on. As soon as the corn came out I jumped on it, especially as I had build the only hospice (in the two-player variant there is only one violet building of each type).

She bought the harbor early on, and given that there are only two ships we had to go for the warehouses. I planned on focussing on just a few commodities, but for the first time in five games (two five, one four, one three and this two player game) I ended up having all. I choose not to buy the factory though as money didn't seem scarce in our game.

Most turns saw production and shipping with me trading once in a while (my early tobacco brought in a fair sum of cash). I was able to shut her out of the trading house as she only had corn and indigo for most of the game. To balance the cash flow she took the Prospector card quite a few times.

Her harbor generated a steady stream of victory points. In the end she had 30 points in chips, 7 points in customs house bonus and 14 points in buildings. I had only 25 points in chips, 7 points in fortress bonus (just one colonist short of eight, I should have taken the Mayor as my last action) and 20 points in building (money did pay off...) so I squeezed by by a single point.

Had she been more proficient in the trading she would probably have slapped me.

Final layout:

Hers
City: small indigo plant, large indigo plant, tobacco storage, harbor, small wharehouse, customs house Island: four quarries, one indigo, one tobacco, three corn

His
City: small indigo plant, small sugar plant, tobacco storage, coffee roaster, small market, large warehouse, wharf, hospice, fortress Island: one indigo, one sugar, two corn, two coffee, two tobacco, one quarry