Calico: A Tabletop Tales Review

On By MitchenersIn Angela, Board Games

Guys. I’ve only played this game a handful of times since buying it, but I could very easily make this one an obsession. Calico is perfectly themed for cold weather gameplay. Who can resist a cozy evening of fun with adorable kitten tiles, colorful quilts, and real-life friends?!

In the grand scheme of board game choices, Calico is on the lighter side, but it’s still both challenging and fun. The rulebook is laid out in an understandable way, and there’s a beginner version that you can play through until you feel comfortable with normal gameplay.

Number of Players: 1-4

Age: 10+

Playing Time: 30-45 minutes

Object: Lay tiles to complete patterns and earn points by sewing the best quilt.

Rules Rundown: Here’s a link to the rules – or you can get a general idea of the gameplay for the beginner version below.

Place Millie, Tibbit, and Coconut (3 of the cat scoring tiles) at the top of the table – along with their matching mini cat tokens. Randomly place 2 black and white pattern tiles under each cat tile. (These are the patterns that each cat “likes” for this game.)

All patch tiles can be placed in the bag, and button tokens can be placed in the middle of the table.

There are 108 patch tiles:
6 different colors and 6 different patterns
Buttons are placed on your quilt if you can connect 3 tiles of the same color

Each player receives an empty quilt board. Pick out the 3 designated design goals and place them in their correct locations on the quilt board. Everyone works toward completing the same designs on his own board in the beginner version.

Empty quilt board
Goals placed. Goal 1: collect 6 unique color/pattern tiles around the top hexagonal goal tile. Goal 2: find 3 tiles of one color/pattern & 3 of a second color/pattern. Goal 3: find 2 tiles of one color/pattern, 2 tiles of a second color/pattern, and 2 tiles of a third color/pattern.

Draw 2 patch tiles from the bag and place them next to your quilt. Each turn, you will lay one of your tiles anywhere on the board, attempting to strategically place it somewhere that will help you complete your design goals. You’ll end your turn by drawing a new tile from the “market” (aka, the bag).

That’s the gist of it! There are some other components (you can receive additional points – in the forms of buttons and kittens – for connecting colors/patterns of specific quantities), but the basic gameplay truly is a simple process: draw a tile, place a tile, and replenish your tile.

Here, I’ve already played a few turns. I need to pick one of my 2 tiles (on the side of my board) to add to my quilt.
I’ll add that navy blue flowered tile to the bottom right corner.
Coconut the cat likes the “flower” and “cross” designs. Once 5 of those tiles touching, you gain a kitty!
I have more than 5 “cross” and “flower” tiles touching each other, so I earned a Coconut kitty, worth 7 points. This will be good in the event that I don’t meet one or more of my design goals.

To be completely transparent, Scott isn’t a huge fan of the theme. (I mean, what almost 40-year-old man wouldn’t think that trying to attract cats to a quilt is his idea of a good time?! Heh.) At its core, its just another drafting game, so the hubby is willing to overlook the crazy kitties for my sake. My older two kids can handle gameplay without help, but my 9-year-old loses interest if we’re playing at the 4-player max.

There is also a single-player version of the game that I’ve tested out. I give it a thumbs up! For me, this game has been solid add to my collection.

Ang’s Rating: 9/10

Fletcher thinks you should buy Calico

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