Hey guys, it's Filip from Project Cardboard and today we're taking a look at
Photosynthesis, a two to four players strategic game of planting, growing and
harvesting trees. Let's get right into it!
 
In 'Photosynthesis', players are competing
to grow their trees as high as possible
before harvesting them to earn victory
points. The board setup includes every
player placing one small tree in
consecutive order on the outer space of
the map until every player has placed
two small trees in total. Then, the
lifecycle of a tree begins by planting a
seed which can be planted from any tree
already present on the board. If its a
small tree, a seed can be planted one
tile away. If it's a medium tree, it can
be planted two tiles away, and, for the the big tree, you've
guessed it, a seed can be planted three
tiles away. Players consecutive would
take turns in which they can play as
many actions as they can as long as they
can afford them. The actions are planting
a seed, as we've mentioned, growing a tree,
buying from the shop, or harvesting a big
tree. Planting a seed costs one light
point. The cost of growing a tree depends
on how big the tree is. Here you can see
the costs for growing from a seed to the
biggest tree. Buying from the shop also
costs light points as shown here on the
left-hand side of the spot. Harvesting,
the last action, allows you to harvest or
cut down a big tree for four light points
and collecting a victory point token
depending on the richness of the soil
the tree is on. For example, if the tree
is placed here and I harvest it, I'd pick
this token, matching the leafs number and the
richness of the soil. So, how do you
collect light points? Well there is a Sun
and the Sun rotates as rounds take place
starting from this location. Then, the
trees that are hit by the Sun are
collecting light points,
hence the 'Photosynthesis' name of the
game. The number of light points they
collect depends on how big the three is.
For example, a small tree collects one
point. A medium tree collects two and
the biggest tree collects three points. There
is a catch though! Trees also cast
shadows depending on where the Sun is. So,
if the Sun is here
we need to imagine that the shadows are
cast in this direction, thus, small trees
cast shadow one tile away, medium trees
2 tiles away and big trees cast a shadow of
three spaces away. Everything that's
inside the shadow doesn't collect any light points. There's an exception in
this case and that's if the tree is
bigger than the tree in front of it, both
trees collect light points as they're
both hit by the Sun. Let's see some
examples here: if the Sun is here, the
blue player would collect two light
points for this tree but would not
collect anything from this tree as this
tree is inside a shadow of this tree. The
green player would collect one point
from this tree as their three is too far
away from this players tree that's
casting a shadow on these two spaces.
However, the red player would receive
nothing as they're three doesn't get any
Sun. When the Sun takes three rotations
around the map, the game is over and the
player with the most victory points is
the winner. There is also an advanced
variant but I will leave that for you to
discover when reading the rule book,
which you should before playing a game
as it's really short and concise.
'Photosynthesis' is a very fun, strategic
game that is actually very easy to learn
but has a lot of depth into it.
There are countless strategies and ways
to play and your gameplay will depend on
what type of a player you are. You can
block other people's trees, you can focus
on getting light points, or focus on
growing as many trees as possible. Maybe
you'll try to just grow a couple of
trees to their maximum height and focus
on strategic key points on the board,
such as this one. No game will be the
same and your move will also depend on
what the players before you decided to
play. The game looks gorgeous on the
table and any type of player can quickly
pick it up and start playing in no time.
There is an economic part of the game as
well which blends in a very good with
the environmental setting and that is,
when to spend and when to save light
points. They're always transferred to the
next round but you can never have more
than 20 and at the end you earn bonus
victory points depending on where your
light point marker is set. There is also
a strategic planning when buying stuff
from the store because anything you
remove from the board, for example when
you grow a small tree into medium one,
you return the small tree in the bottom
most space in the shop. If you can't do
that because the space is occupied for
any reason, the tree is out of the game
forever. There is a lot going on and you
need to keep attention throughout the
whole game. So that's for 'Photosynthesis',
thank you so much for watching and if
you like my content feel free to
subscribe and like this video or even go
beyond and become a patron on my Patreon
profile by pledging one or two dollars
per month. It would mean so much to me.
And that's all for today, see you soon,
this is Filip and I approve 'Photosynthesis'.
