You would think that the Wild West would be a perfect theme for a game. However, very few games have been made about the western times in America, and even fewer have captured the true flavor of the times (short as those times were). Two game released recently have done the theme justice, and are fun and thematic. One is the great game Bang! and the other is Way out West. (WOW).

So is this western game worth our time? The short answer is yes, it's a fun "German" style game with a lot of dice rolling thrown in.

First, a short description of the game

The board has five cities on it, ranging from the small town of San Antonia to the large city of Deadwood. Each city has three to six spaces for buildings, and four to seven corrals for cattle. Each of the three to five players is given two black wooden discs, twenty five dollars (cardboard counters) and a pile of cardboard tokens in their color. The game takes place over 12 rounds. Players bid for the turn order in each round.

Each round players go in turn order, placing one of their wooden discs in an action box at the top of the board, taking the action. As there are a limited number of boxes, some actions can be taken only a few times. A list of actions follows, with the number of action boxes and prices listed.

Buy a cattle token (3 - $1) - Purchase one or two cattle tokens in a corral in one town. Cattle have some deployment restrictions.
Buy a cowboy (3 - $1) - Put one or two cowboys in any town. Cowboys have no deployment restrictions.
Build a jail (1 - $3) - Put a jail in a town, giving the player control of the sheriff of that town. All buildings have a limit of one per town, and each player can only build two buildings in any one town.
Build a store (1 - $5) - Put a store in a town, giving that player money for other player's cattle in that town.
Build a railroad (1 - $20) - Put a railroad in a town, doubling the money value and point value of all cattle there.
Build a bank (1 - $10) - Put a bank in a town, giving the owner more money.
Build a hotel (1- $7) - Put a hotel in a town, giving that player money for other player's cowboys in that town.
Build a stagecoach (1- $3) - Put a stagecoach in town, giving that player money whenever a player puts cowboys in that town, or moves cowboys to that town.
Place a farmer (1) - Once a game, each player can put a farmer in a corral, removing the cattle counter there.
Move a cow (1) - Move a cow from one town to another.
In a five player game, there are extra spaces to buy a cow, a cowboy, and initiate a fight.
Move a cowboy (3) - Move an indicated amount of cowboys from towns to other towns.

Gunfight (4) - A player can initiate a fight wherever he has cowboys. He can rob a bank, rustle other players' cattle, take over another player's building, or kill a farmer. The two players' cowboys fight a duel. Banks and trains automatically have one defender. The owner of the jail has a "sheriff" who can also get involved in the fight. Each player rolls a die for each cowboy in the fight. Every "5" or "6" rolled kills a cowboy on the other side. The side with fewer cowboys fires first. If both sides have equal cowboys, combat is simultaneous. Combat continues until one side retreats, or until one side wipes out the other side - winning the target (replacing cattle counters or buildings with own color or removing farmer). The winner of each gunfight gets a Wanted" counter.

After turns 3, 6, 9, and 12, income is earned. Each player gets $2 for each cattle they own (unless a farmer is in the same town, in which case they only get $1, or if there is a railroad in town, in which case their income is doubled). Each player gets $2 for every other players' building in a town where they have a bank, $1 for every other players' cattle in town where they have a store, and $1 for every other players' cowboys in town where they have a hotel.

At the end of the game (after round 12), points are totaled up. Each player gets one point for each cattle token they own (-1 for a farmer in town, *2 for a railroad). Each building a player owns is worth points equal to the size of the town it resides in. Whoever has the most money gets five points, whoever has the most wanted counters gets four points. Whoever controls each town (most cattle + buildings) gets points equal to the size of the town. The player with the most points wins! Ties remain ties.

Some comments on the game

1). Components: Way Out West has a very nice, sturdy box. However, there is no place to put all the different counters. You'll have to bag them all up, with different bags for different the different player tokens. The tokens are nice quality, although I would have preferred little plastic cowboys for the cowboys. But I'm sure that would have driven the cost of the game up. Using coins for money is always a big plus in my book, especially when they are in different colors and sizes for the different denominations. The board is nice, with a desert background. All the components fit the theme very well.

2). Combat: I have to mention that WOW has some of the most erratic combat in a game, ever. It's very risky to attack anyone, yet the rewards are rather good. Sometimes it's better to attack with fewer men, just to get the first shot. Yet I've seen battles where five cowboys will attack three and roll all misses, while the three cowboys kill 3 of the five, and then go on to win victory. Fighting is so chaotic that you cannot base any solid strategy on it. You have to keep cowboys in any town, and hope that no one attacks you. In our games, the jail was the first building bought in every town, because everyone wanted to control the sheriff in every town - as that was a big advantage in fighting. Getting wanted posters is a nice touch, but the four victory points is not that big of a swing in the final point counting, so it's rarely an incentive for people to attack.

3). Stab your neighbor: Don't expect to play a peaceful, non-aggressive game here. After some initial placements, things are going to get nasty. Playing a farmer in someone's corral can really mess up their strategy and greatly annoy them. Winning an attack can greatly turn the tide, giving you more buildings in towns, and stealing cows. However, like most games of this type, attacks usually invite wild reprisals, and grudges can be made in this game. Also, in games with more players, it's fairly easy to pick on the guy who was just shot up by someone else. It's really easy to beat up the guy in last place, and for that player - the game can lose a lot of its luster.

4). Buildings: Some buildings, like the jail, are built right away. The others are also built, but two - the bank and the railroad are rarely built. This is for two reasons. One, they are both expensive, the railroad ludicrously so. The bank's second reason for not being built is that it is such a big target, and if someone robs your bank, you could lose a huge pile of your money. The railroads second reason is that the benefits of a railroad rarely compensate for the cost of the bank. I've seen both buildings built, but rarely so.

5). Theme: This game just reeks of theme. As the cowboys face each other, shooting each other for no reason, we started really getting into the cowboy spirit. Yes, you can play the game as a serious tile-laying game, but the wacky combat just immerses the game in theme. Everything fits, and the game certainly doesn't feel like the theme was just plastered on. Robbing banks, rustling cattle, crooked sheriffs - it's all here!

6). Fun Factor: And because of the theme, I have to say that the game is fun. If random, crazy combat turns you off, don't try the game. Because of how erratic the combat was, I stay out of it, or try to get the odds stacked really high in my favor. But if you are looking for a game full of Western flavor, then this is one of the best - and you'll have a lot of fun. The game itself is full of strategic decisions, so it's not all theme.

7). Time: The game plays quicker with 3 players - and is actually a very good three-player game. But even with five players, the game should finish within 90 minutes. The game can bog down if a player takes a long time to consider his choices (there are quite a few!) But gentle (or loud) reminders should keep the game running smoothly.

8). Rules: This is my one negative comment on the game. I really dislike the rules. They are written in very small type on a 4 pages, and are very difficult to go through. They aren't hard to understand, but because of the difficulty in finding rules meant that we made some crucial mistakes the first time we played. The game is easy to teach, but isn't that easy to learn from the rules without making mistakes. Pictures and colors would have helped a lot in the layout.

But despite the rules, the theme makes this game a real winner in my book! The combat is a stranger to European games, to be sure - but this combat is strange to games with combat! So, unless you don't like a good old fashioned spaghetti Western, I highly recommend this game!

For more Vasel reviews, go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/koreaboardgames