Mint Works Review – The Chaperone That Shut Down My Engine

I’ve played small box games before, but Mint Works introduced me to microgames. All of the complexity of modern board games being stored in a tin meant for mints.

This shocked me to my core. All of this time I’ve just been eating my Eclipse and Altoids. When instead I could have been creating a hit new board game.

Regardless, the release of Mint Works could have been smoother. Entering the market before the rise of ButtonShy’s wallet games. When competition in this space was so low anything new or novel became a must-have.

And why wouldn’t it?

The promise of a good game, the size of a lamington, sold at USD 10 was too good to pass up. Even in today’s board game landscape, it’s intriguing. However, it begs the question, when do you need a pocket-sized worker placement game to play?

Minty fresh gameplay

In Mint Works, you’ll be placing wooden mints into various action spaces. The number one rule is don’t eat the mints. The number two rule is to be the first to collect seven victory points.

This is done by collecting mints and spending these mints to get plans, and then spending these plans to construct buildings. It’s a straightforward loop that you’ll repeat more times than a learner driver stuck in a roundabout.

Regardless, Mint Works keeps your interest by limiting your supply to the pocket candy, and action spaces to place them. As such, you’ll spend a lot of your time jockeying over action spaces and working out the best time to place your mints.

Given these restrictions and the game’s end condition, Mint Works is a pocket rocket of a board game. Turns are over in a flash, and before you know it someone’s scored seven points and you’re packing up.

Sour aftertaste

Unfortunately, as mints are the only currency in the game, Mint Works boils down to who can earn the most mints in the shortest amount of time. So there aren’t too many interesting decisions outside of figuring out how best to get mints NOW!

Only now and then do you lift your head to see what buildings are in the marketplace, and whether or not it’s better to go for points. Or, more mints.

Still, even with the shallowness of strategies, the tactical decisions of getting mints are enjoyable. You get the feeling of playing a larger worker placement or engine-building games like Project L or Raiders of the North Sea. Where each turn your economy increases allowing you to do more things. Albeit on a smaller scale.

However, like a bad employer, it fails to pay you for the work you put in. Knowing when to end an engine builder, is perhaps the most difficult part to judge a game’s design. And here, Mint Works gets it wrong. Ending just as you feel like you’re finally about to get somewhere.

I’ve never been cock-blocked harder by a board game. As such, win, lose or draw, I ended up angry at the end. All I wanted to do was run my engine one or two more times. But no, Mint Works shut me down harder than the chaperone shut down T-Spoon’s Sex on the Beach at my seventh-grade dance. Leaving a sour taste in my mouth.

Do we need micro games?

This is the question that Mint Works kept asking me. It’s a fine game, straightforward to a fault. But even if this was my favourite board game of all time, would I ever be in the situation where I needed to carry around a game, just in case the moment struck?

A younger version of me would have said ‘Yes! Of course, you would.’

But now, with over a decade in this hobby, my thinking has shifted. Board gaming is no longer a core part of my identity, but a part of it. In the event I find myself needing to fill a 20-minute gap I can have a conversation instead of reaching for a minty tin from my bag.

So within the niche of pocket board games, Mint Works is wonderful. But take away this niche and Mint Works falls into the same arena with all my other board games.

And in that case, it’s found wanting.