VERITAS BOARD GAMES

💭 Designer:
Reiner Knizia

🎨 Artwork:
Francesco De Benedittis

🏢 Publisher:
Horrible Guild / White Goblin Games

🗓️ Year:
2023

A beautiful residential area and a house with an unobstructed view... and then suddenly there is a five-storey building in front of your front door. I don't think anyone would be pleased about that, but fortunately the world of Sunrise Lane is only fictional.
In this family game, players build houses on the game board. Build as many as possible and stack them up, because that's how you score the most points!

How to play Sunrise Lane?

By stacking houses, of course! In Sunrise Lane, players place houses in their player colour on the board by playing cards. The higher your stack of houses, the more points you score: you multiply the number of houses by the value shown on the square (plot) to determine how many points you get for your building action. In addition, at the end of the game, players receive points for how well they have performed in the four bonus areas and for their largest cluster of plots. The player with the most points wins the game.

Setup
The board is placed in the middle of the table, each player chooses a colour and receives the houses in that colour, and the cards are shuffled. Players are then dealt three starting cards and the game can begin.

Gameplay
When it's your turn, you have two options:

• Build:
  Build a house or park on an empty plot adjacent to the central plot or another plot on which a house or park has already been built. You build a house by playing cards in the colour of the plot on which you want to build. If you have several cards in that colour, you may play them simultaneously to place a stack of houses (maximum 5 high). Once per turn, you may build a park. Parks are tokens that cover a single plot. You do not score any points for this, but it allows you to “skip” plots and continue building adjacent to the park. After building, take one card from the draw pile and your turn is over.
• Draw cards:
  If you do not want to or cannot build, you may also choose to take two new cards from the deck. There is a hand limit of five cards.

The game ends when a player has two or fewer houses left. The current round is completed so every player has had the same amount of turns.

Scoring points
During the game, players score points when they build houses or stacks of houses. For each house, you receive as many points as there are dots on the plot on which you have built. So if someone builds a three-storey house on a plot with two dots, they receive 3 x 2 = 6 points.
After the game, players' scores in the four bonus areas are calculated. In the two blue areas, players receive points based on the tallest house, and in the two red areas, based on who has built on the most plots. Finally, players receive points for their largest connected group of plots with houses in their player colour.

What do I think of Sunrise Lane?

Rules and Gameplay
The rulebook is only four pages long, and one of those pages is just an example of a round. So the game has few rules, and the concept is also very simple: play a card and place something on the board, or draw new cards to increase your chances of building something better on your next turn.
However, the small number of rules does not automatically mean that the game is easy. It is easy to understand, but to play it well and tactically, you will need to keep your attention with the game. Players can block each other by interrupting groups of plots, and cleverly placing park tokens can earn you a lot of points. Will you choose to take more cards and increase your chances of getting more cards of the same colour (and being able to stack higher)? Or is it better to continue building to prevent an opponent from snatching the plot you had your eye on? In addition, you should also keep an eye on the bonus areas and try to rack up some extra points there at the end of the game.
Stapelstad is a fast-paced game and, thanks to its quick setup, it is also very suitable for playing several games in a row. Fortunately, it is fun enough for that, even though you do exactly the same thing every time with exactly the same goal. For example, the game does not offer any other goals/ways to score points at the end of the game; the bonus areas are depicted on the game board and therefore always remain the same. Board game enthusiasts looking for more challenge and variety may be better off skipping Sunrise Lane.

Theme and Artwork
The game itself does not really have a theme; it is more of an abstract game. Players build stacks of houses, and you could imagine that they represent construction companies that have to comply with the municipality's zoning plans (as described in the flavour text in the rulebook). But ultimately, you're just scoring points; those houses could just as easily have been blocks, and it wouldn't have made any difference...
...except that the stacks would probably fall over more quickly. At least the plastic houses in the four different player colours stay upright, even if they are not all equally stable and straight. That shouldn't spoil the fun, because it looks really nice (and you're not allowed to stack more than five houses on top of each other anyway). Personally, I would have chosen different colours, but that's just my opinion.
The cards are of excellent quality, although I find it a pity that every card is the same per colour; it would have been nice to have more different buildings. Admittedly, you don't really look at them during the game, because only the colours are important. The game board is quite compact, which is nice because it takes up little space on the table. Moreover, the colours of the dots are easy to distinguish, even under false light.

Who is Sunrise Lane suitable for?
This game's appeal lies in its simplicity, quick setup and appearance. I think most people will be intrigued when they see all those cute little houses stacked on top of each other on the game board.
Sunrise Lane is particularly suitable for players who don't want to think too much about their turn, but still want to try to achieve the best possible result. Since players are only allowed to have five cards in their hand and the options are therefore limited, the thinking time will never be very long. This keeps the pace of the game nice and fast. You have to like this. If you are someone who gets more satisfaction from planning far ahead and figuring out the puzzle that a board game presents you with, then Sunrise Lane is not what you are looking for. If you want to have a fun evening playing a game with friends or family, then Sunrise Lane is highly recommended.
I think it's a really fun and simple game, even though I personally like a bit of a challenge. Every now and then, we take Sunrise Lane out of the cupboard and have a lot of fun placing the houses. However, it's not a game I would want to play every week.

⭐ Score: 7 / 10

This review is not sponsored and does not contain any paid promotion;
it is solely a personal recommendation.