Books of Time Components Overview

When Board & DIce asked if I wanted to review Books of Time, I was pretty excited. Although we were talking about their upcoming title, Windmill Valley (which I’m pumped for as a Dutch Canadian) , that game isn’t quite ready yet for public consumption. So, with the knowledge that Books of Time was in the mail, I hopped over to Watch it Played to learn how the game worked, and by golly was I shocked and impressed by how the game looked. Now that I have my copy, was it all glitz and glam for the cameras, or is there something really impressive here? Let’s find out!

It’s impressive. I think I just broke the cardinal rule for getting folks to read your article, but I’m stating the facts early. Books of Time is an impressive production, with fantastic page quality, great punchboards, and a whole whack of solid two-ring binders! Yes, you heard that right. This game, which is all about making books, comes with a ton of little two-ringed binders that you put together. I’m here for it.

There are 1000 different ways Board & Dice could have gone about creating this game – we could have made stacks of cards, where players would have two side-by-side stacks representing the backside of one page and the front side of another. That would have been easy, that would have worked perfectly fine, but it wouldn’t have popped. Including the binders and allowing players to freely flip through their books to see what symbols they have, abilities they have, etc. feels so good, and the production made that happen.

The worry here, of course, is how well these binders will hold up with constant opening and closing. They don’t have those little tabs like bigger school binders do, so you are always yanking and pulling on the rings. It’s hard to say. I’ve played it three times at this point, and obviously (as you would expect) the binders are like they were for game number 1. I feel like even over a few dozen plays things are going to be OK, but it’s not something I can say with certainty. They definitely feel good, I will say that!

The binders are created by smashing a bunch of beautifully detailed and wonderfully produced cards in between two thick pieces of cardboard, one piece acting as the front cover, and the other as the back. The cards have nice, large iconography that makes playing the game and knowing what you get each turn really easy. I appreciate that.

There is an additional book that maps each turn of the game, and provides players with one of two bonuses. So not only does it track where you are in the game, but it also requires that all players can see the two open pages so they can choose their bonus. To make this more accessible, Board & Dice have included a cardboard lectern in the box, and while you will need to build and take it apart each turn to fit everything back into the box, it’s a great way to prop the book up at an angle for all to see. Again, brilliant production, which is equal parts thematic to the game, and useful.

Overall, the production quality here is top notch. Everything looks great and feels great. I was a bit worried about shuffling the pages included in the game, since you cannot sleeve them efficiently (since you need the holes to put them into the two-ringed binder). But after a few games, that worry is gone as the cards are more than adequate for the experience. I’d say if you love a well produced game, Books of Time from Board & Dice is sure to impress!