Drinky Drinky
United States
Indy/STL
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I’ll start out by saying this is one of my favorite games and I am obsessed with worker placement games. When people say you have played one worker placement you have played them all, to them I say if I like worker placement why not keep playing them especially if they have a mechanic no one else has.
I find that Fresco has remained popular for primarily two reasons, the mechanic works and it feels like what the game is trying to accomplish. Some would call this phenomena “theme”. During the game every action I take actually feels like I am somehow trying to restore the paint in the Cathedral. The other aspect that makes Fresco popular is I can take a worker placement euro like this and get pretty much anyone to play it. More importantly I can also get non gamers to not only play Fresco, but understand the game and come back for more. Because no matter how good a game is, it doesn’t matter if you can’t get anyone to play it.
So I will spare you some of the things you read in the initial reviews and relay more of what I have found from a year plus of gameplay with Fresco.
Play after 1 year:
After 1 year I can still rope in people to play this game, ‘veterans’ and new players alike. Here are some things I have discovered after 1 year plus of Fresco:
New players are OK with using all the paint colors in the game, in fact it should be the de facto standard of the game. But some newer players are not OK with the bishop’s favor. They feel it adds too much of a large swing of power in the game. They tend to overlook it when they are trying to take their first euro game in. I recommend not using it on someone first plays unless you feel your players are comfortable taking it all in. The portraits are generally accepted at minimum.
Buying big paints you might as well put your paint in plain sight, being there are only 6 total pink and brown paint cubes, even novices know who owns those cubes and how many are out due to the lack of numbers in the paint supply.
People really like the mechanic of score determining bidding order of when to wake up during the game to set price of paints, turn order, and painter mood.
Fresco seems to reward waking up late and buying leftover paints cheaply. You will still need to make a bid on buying “more paint” so you can keep up with the amount of paint required, but the ability to hoard your cash will tend to push people over the top for the win. Holding off on painting for the first few rounds will allow you to make the first choice in sandbagging bids and staying behind for choice bidding in a 3 or 4 player game. Hold back too long and what you want to paint may disappear. Fresco tends to reward holding back at the beginning, when the game should allow for a method to reward all strategies, as long as they end up in a balance. This is why I say the game rewards sandbaggers and late sleepers. We had also played a variant where instead of every 2 coins = 1 point, we instead tried every 3 coins = 1 point. This seemed to work a bit better and make painting the primary point acquisition.
It is maintaining your capability though the start and mid game, not necessarily your score that will help you win. This is why holding back during the game some will help you win.
Allow new players to draw paints from the drawbag, this gets them involved and it is a relatively easy task. It helps them feel more involved.
New users and people who are not gamers for some reason feel comfortable with the art theme of Fresco and can handle a worker placement game. It is not too “geeky-intimidating” for them like playing something medieval themed or essentially playing hexagonal roulette hoping their grain fields produce. Everyone feels interactive and gets the premise of the game. The theme is really welcoming to non-gamers to pick up a game such as this.
The components have held up great after all this time, with all of the plays this game has under its belt, the pieces and board have held up spectacularly.
Fresco requires some table space, if you don’t have it you will have at least 1 or 2 people able to see around other people’s player screens.
Fresco 2 player game is pretty solid more a game of keep away every other turn. Even though the “ghost player” Leonardo comes out painting quick, he tends to lose steam at the end of the game, especially with not being able to participate in the last round. (Fresco Glaziers changes this greatly, to the point of ridiculousness). Also certain paints are not available from the draw bag.
Fresco 3 player is the least optimal mode of the player options (but still great) I'll play a 3 player game in a heartbeat. 3 player games have more of a Mexican standoff feel. You can still block other players and have it be effective. But paints seem to be more lacking, some are not in the paint draw bag.
Fresco 4 player is the favorite of the bunch. In this game you have to choose to block or stymie other players at the risk of your capability. Where in the 3 player game you can keep 2 players in check, with 4 players you cannot keep all the other players at bay at once. You need to make decisions that enable you since there are plenty of good paint choices and options for 4 players. You can close a shop to thwart one player but usually another player is completely unaffected by it and will end up passing you in capability (not necessarily score). It feels like a much more satisfying game of the player options, this helps with all of the paint being available to draw.
Conclusion:
Fresco is still a favorite of mine, and even though it may not be a heavy or top 100 game (yet), I can more importantly get anyone to enjoy this game and have it maintain its replayability. So if you have not played or looked at Fresco you should give it a shot especially if you are trying to ingratiate new non gamers. If the My Little Pony Hide and Seek event taught us one thing, rank is a fleeting and sometimes manufactured thing that can caue us to overlook some real works of art.
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Dundy O
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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Very nice review. Your look back at one year of playing this game with gamers and non-gamers will be used by others who are considering buying this game or have played it once or twice (like me) and wondered about it's long term playability.
Thanks a bunch!
I love this game in the limited times I've played it and have hoped it would have lasting power. 
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Adverb
United States
Framingham
Massachusetts
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Thanks for the nice review. Your obvious enjoyment of the game, coupled with your assessment of its suitability for different player counts, has inspired me to give Fresco a second look.
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Kevin Garnica
United States
Buena Park
California
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Thank you for a very thoughtful review. I've always "believed" in Fresco and I, too, love worker placement games. Fresco is a great all-around game!
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Doug Click
United States
Blountville
Tennessee
Nothing to see here
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Nice review. I love the way you describe new players' reactions to the game. Thanks!
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The Dave
United States
Brooklyn
United States
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This is almost exactly the review I would write if I were so inclined. I bought this game almost one year ago to the day, and my feelings echo yours. This is the game that jump started my gaming habit, but more importantly it's brought at least three people into my gaming group that weren't gamers before they played it.
Fresco strikes an amazing balance of being deep enough for gamers, but being theme-rich and accessible for newbs.
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Jeremy Frank
United States
Austin
Texas
The sun is a mass of incandescent gas, a gigantic nuclear furnace, where hydrogen is built into helium, at a temperature of millions of degrees.
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Great review, I really like to hear about how games hold up after many plays. What is your opinion of the Glaziers expansion (modules 4,5,6) - how essential is it, and do you play with all the expansions?
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R. Eric Reuss
United States
Arlington
Massachusetts
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Quote: You will still need to make a bid on buying “more paint” so you can keep up with the amount of paint required, but the ability to hoard your cash will tend to push people over the top for the win. Holding off on painting for the first few rounds will allow you to make the first choice in sandbagging bids and staying behind for choice bidding in a 3 or 4 player game. Hold back too long and what you want to paint may disappear. Fresco tends to reward holding back at the beginning, when the game should allow for a method to reward all strategies, as long as they end up in a balance. This is why I say the game rewards sandbaggers and late sleepers. We had also played a variant where instead of every 2 coins = 1 point, we instead tried every 3 coins = 1 point. This seemed to work a bit better and make painting the primary point acquisition.
We found exactly the same things while playing the basic game, and also tried boosting the coins => VP ratio as a fix. I was somewhat disappointed that the game seemed to require a "stay in last place so you can choose your (late) wakeup time, then surge to first on the final turn or two" strategy.
But... the "sandbag and sleep late" phenomenon crashed and burned (or rather, the players relying on it did) when we added the three in-box expansions.
Our suspicion is that The Bishop's Favor is what makes the biggest difference: it strongly rewards early-game painting, and rewards targeted painting (which makes buying last at 1 coin slightly less good). The portrait cards are also relevant: some of them are quite good, and they'll tend to go to the first two players in initiative order, which penalizes those waking up late.
The brown/pink paints make scores a bit higher on average, which makes cash=>points slightly less viable, but I think they had the smallest impact.
Having played it both ways, now, I feel like the game with the three expansions is the fully-balanced game, and that they're called "expansions" mostly to ease the learning curve / avoid intimidating new players.
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Give Me Gas In My Ford
United States
Elkhart
Indiana
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Vanilla Fresco, or even Fresco with a couple of the expansions thrown in, isn't as accessible to new gamers as something like Ticket To Ride, but it's close enough that if you find yourself sometimes playing with more casual gamers, OP is right and this is a perfect game for your collection.
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