Don’t worry it’s all laid out on your Travel Journal. Moving a single space costs 1 pound, moving two costs 3 pounds, etc. Movement is done by spending Pounds, with the number of spaces you can move costing exponentially more for each space per turn. Take the win conditions: Be the first to travel around the world and get back to London….after discarding your three police rumor cards…and make sure you have less than 10 British pounds left when you arrive. It’s not a golden age “we’ll learn as we go” game but an introduction to “Let me explain the rules before we start.” Not overly complicated by any measuring stick, it is a family game before “family game” became Kickstarter for “Well, your gaming friends certainly won’t play it with you.” It is a racing game with frothy head of math and bits of fiddly floating at the bottom. The game itself is a modern day trip down memory lane…if that makes any sense. Of course, it is actually what is inside the box that matters. And check out the illustration of the old fashioned hot air balloon! You know the one I’m talking about, the hot air balloon that Phileas Fogg never sets foot in even once in the novel? What?!? No Hot Air Balloon and his name is Phileas and NOT Phineas? My whole world is a lie. What you can’t really see is the foil stamping and cut-outs that really make it pop. Speaking of the snazzy box, you can see the box art in the review image.

I just saw $18.00, Jules Verne, an Iello logo and a snazzy box. Not that I knew any of this when I picked it up.

It has been re-published and retooled dozens of times over the intervening years and the latest incarnation is Around the World in 80 Days. Way back when, in 1979, the first ever Spiel de Jahres winner was a title called Hare and Tortoise. Traveling the boardgame world for less than $20.00

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