Last Lantern
- Board's Eye View
- 25 minutes ago
- 4 min read
Last Lantern, from Wonderful World Board Games, is a game involving tree-dwelling fauna and forest fireflies. It's a fully cooperative polyomino tile-laying game for 2-4 players designed by Jérémy Ducret, Gricha German, and Anthony Perone, with art by Zingco Kang and Yuan Momoco. The game features cute woodland creature meeples and rather appealing chunky lanterns. These are used by players to simultaneously indicate, without prior discussion, their choice of which polyomino tiles they want to take.
Players are using polyominoes to build a continuous path from their side of the board to a line on the opposite side. They can only lay tiles in their own corridor, tho' they have overlap lanes with their neighbours where either can place. If they leave any unfilled squares behind them, they have to fill those spaces by drawing firefly meeples from a bag. Black firefly meeples represent extinguished fireflies, and if at any point there are four of these out on the board then it's game over: the players have all lost. When a player crosses the line for victory, other players finish their turn and then fireflies are drawn from the bag to fill any still unfilled squares. Players collectively win if at least one player has crossed the line and there are fewer than four black firefly meeples on the board after all the squares have been filled.
Players turn the wheel on their lantern to make their choice and if all have chosen different colours, they each take the corresponding animal meeple and its adjacent polyomino tile. If there is any duplication tho', players need to decide between them who will take the polyomino and/or the animal meeple. When this occurs, there will be one or more polyomino tiles left unclaimed that round. These have to be placed on a special 'path astray' track on the board, and if that track reaches the end then that too is a lose condition for the players. When you place tiles out on the 'path astray' track you also add extinguished fireflies to the bag, so increasing the likelihood of black fireflies being drawn...
Of course there may be a temptation to 'game' the lantern choice process; for example, by players always choosing the next colour on their lantern wheel. Do that in a three-player game and you may end up with some sub-optimal polyominoes to place out on your path but you'll never get lumbered with any tiles going to the 'path astray'. Clearly, tho', pre-determining your choices in this way is contrary to the spirit of the game.
The animal meeples contribute a set collection element to the game. When you have a set of the core game animals, you can cash it in to remove a previously unclaimed tile from the negative track, draw five fireflies from the bag and replace them with five yellow fireflies, or take and place a two- or three-square filler tile. The latter can be used to cover squares that have been filled by fireflies, so it can be a way of removing black fireflies from the board. For a four-player game you add in wolf meeples and their additional polyomino location. The wolves aren't used as part of the set collection but a pair of wolves can be exchanged for any other animal meeple.
The set collection mechanic makes the game relatively easy to beat. It reduces the impact of duplicated lantern choices and can ameliorate sub-optimal polyomino tile placement. It can even make it easier for players to predict each other's most likely lantern choices: for example, when you know that another player just needs a rabbit to complete a set.
If and when you find Last Lantern too easy, WWBG have you covered. The game comes with some components (for example, other colours of firefly) and decoration on tiles that aren't used in the basic game. The game box also contains an envelope containing six 'Challenges': additional rules that step up the difficulty. The envelope is sealed and carries a Spoiler warning, so we won't go into further detail here. Suffice to say, you'll find the Challenges appropriately challenging. And they definitely add to Last Lantern's replayability.
Last Lantern plays slightly differently at each different player count. For example, with two players and a choice of three polyomino/animal locations, you're much less likely to duplicate your choice but you will always add a tile to the 'path astray'. To compensate, the game comes with overlays for reducing the length of the path players have to build in a two- or three-player game.
Last Lantern is a light easy-to-play family-friendly game that plays in around 30 minutes. Because players are making their selection without prior communication (and assuming you're not 'gaming' the game by making pre-arranged choices) Last Lantern is largely immune from the 'alpha player syndrome' that often adversely affects cooperative games. In this game it isn't so easy for one player to domineer and instruct everyone else on their actions. You can, however, use your set collection bonus to benefit another player, so parents playing with younger children can offer them help by donating them their tiles.
