Bohnanza

Today's game review is of the 1997 release, Bohnanza.  For 2-7 players, it takes 45 minutes.

Overview
Holy Beans, Batman!  In Bohnanza, your goal is to earn as much money as possible by planting bean fields and harvesting them for maximum profit.  There are eleven different varieties of beans in the game, and each field (you'll have 2 or 3 at any given point in the game) must contain beans of the same kind.  Once you plant a certain number of beans, you can harvest them for the amount of money indicated on the card (which varies based on number and rarity of beans).  Turn them in when the time is right and plant more to keep the money rolling in!  But beware- you must do something with all the cards in your hand, and that might mean you have to harvest your bean fields before they're ready, for little or no profit.  So plan carefully, and trade with other players when you can to keep your fields growing!

Each bean card has a title, a number near the bean showing how many of that variety are in the deck (generally, the fewer there are, the more valuable), and a range of values at the bottom that show you how much money you get when you harvest a certain quantity.  For example, there are 22 wax beans in the deck, and you need to harvest 11 of them to earn 4 gold (or 9 to earn 3, 7 to earn 2, 4 to earn 1).  There are only 10 black-eyed beans in the deck, and therefore you need to harvest only 6 of them for 4 gold.

varieties of beans (image from here)

The big thing to remember is you cannot change the order of cards in your hand- you must maintain the order in which you draw them.  You'll see why in the next section.

Simplified Gameplay
Each player starts the game with two bean fields.  On your turn, you perform the following steps:

1. plant bean cards
- You must plant the first card in your hand.  Ideally, this will match a bean you're already planting and you can add to that field.  If not, though, you must plant it in a new field, even if that forces you to cash in an existing field.  You can plant an additional card (the next in line), too, if you want, but no more than that.

2. draw, trade & donate bean cards
- Draw the top two cards of the deck and place them face-up for all to see.  You can entertain trade offers for them (or cards in your hand) or use them yourself (or even donate them if you'd rather do that than take them into hand).

3. plant traded & donated beans
- You must immediately plant any beans you received in step 2 through drawing, trading and donating.

4. draw new bean cards
- Draw three cards (keeping them in order) into your hand.

You can harvest your fields at any time, turning them in for the money indicated (the backs of the cards are used for monetary tracking).  Once per game, you can spend 4 gold for a third bean field, giving you more options.

Whenever beans are harvested, they're put face-up in a pile next to the draw deck.  Once the draw deck is exhausted, the harvested bean pile is shuffled to make a new draw deck.  Once the draw deck has been exhausted three times, the game is over.  Players harvest any remaining fields and add their total gold to determine the winner.

Review
This is a nice little game.  It's a fun theme with lots of trading/interaction necessary.  Maintaining card order in your hand takes some discipline and is an interesting twist, forcing you to make decisions you may not have otherwise (since you have to play the first card in your hand on your turn).  Overall, this is a winner, best played with more players (6-7).

Rating: A