Ranking the 8 big box Lacerda games 

Thanks for doing this! It's always really nice to see people enjoying these games that we put so much work into :) My favourite is Lisboa or Kanban, depending on the day :p

Thanks for the shout out. Love you guys. Vital’s games require repeated plays to fully appreciate the beauty of each design. My focus as a developer has been ensuring timing tension, tough decisions, and rewarding good planning. Vital’s games really shine if all players at the table have wrapped their heads around the design. This is apparent if you ever had the chance to observe game development with Vital’s loyal playtesters. The semi cooperative elements you don’t care for in CO2 are present in other gems on your list like Kanban. This is what delivers great tense gameplay experiences. Thanks for doing this. I value your opinions. My favorites are Kanban, The Gallerist, Weather Machine and Lisboa but I love them all.

YESSSSSS!!!! 😁

Thank you so much for taking the time to play the games and ranking them!! ☺

CO2 Second Chance can be played fully coop, so it solved/fixed all the issues we had with the original CO2's semi-coop mode. Very satisfying Lacerda-level coop problem-solving.

Fantastic video! Seems like you had a dream weekend 🤩 Vital's designs are so good! So thematic. Its very tight but I think Lisboa is my favourite, one of my all time favourite games!

This was one of the most enjoyable "top __ board games" I have watched. It was informative and pleasant. It doesn't hurt that I love Lacerda games. I am REALLY looking forward to Speakeasy!

My favorite game is also Lisboa, the city where I live, all the public buildings are real places in Lisbon 👍

Great lists, this is a video I’ve been looking forward to you doing. I feel like there are three clear ‘divisions’ of his games for me. Top tier are On Mars, Lisboa and Kanban (all in my top ten all time). Second tier are Vinhos, CO2 and Escape Plan (all in my top 50). Third tier are The Gallerist and Weather Machine (both in my top 100). For whatever reason the themes in the last two didn’t hit home quite as much (that may change with Weather Machine as it’s still new). On the other hand I went into Escape Plan with much lower expectations as it wasn’t quite as crunchy, but found it thematically quite compelling and was pleasantly surprised. I guess Vital is a bit like pizza - even when he’s ‘bad’ he’s still pretty great. Thanks again for the content.

Great ranking. I've just started diving in to Lacerda myself. Been learning Lisboa the past few days and have On Mars up next. So far Kanban and Weather Machine have been my favorites, though I've really enjoyed Vinhos and the Gallerist as well. Like you guys say, the ranking can change at any moment!

My first Lacerda’s was Lisboa. Love it. Now I just got The Gallerist and I’m learning it. Ah, and I played Escape Plan, which it was good fun!

Your rankings are very helpful. Thank you. I recently obtained his co- designed “ BOT Factory” ( which is KanBan light). I am pleased to know you both rate Kan Ban EV higher on your lists. I purchased BOT factory with the dual hope it will be a good introduction to Lacerda, plus be a good medium light game ( by his standards) in its own right. I don’t know if I will ever purchase another Lacerda game, but probably “ Lisboa” would be my choice. 👍

Thank you for the video. Lacerda is a great designer and I love all of his Eagle-Gryphon games equally. But if I had to rank them I think it would be: 1) Weather Machine (because it's the newest one and I still feel like I'm exploring it) 2) Kanban EV (it is also newish and I would like to explore it some more) 3) On Mars (the first Lacerda I played and fell in love immediately) 4) Escape plan (I think this game is clever and has some interesting choices with managing you notoriety) 5) The gallerist (I like the 4 workers bumping each other out constantly, but the area majority is my least favorite part) 6) Lisboa (I know it's his magnum opus but I don't love it as much as the others) 7) Vonhos (I played it for the first time recently and I did not enjoy it. I have to play it some more)

Lisboa was my first Lacerda game and it remains my favourite. You're absolutely right to give credit to the rulebook(s) - for Lisboa it was both incredibly well explained and acted as a mini history lesson (which further cemented the mechanics for me). O'Toole's iconography and graphic design on the game is also, IMO, some of his best work. Images really don't do the game's visuals justice!

Yay what timing! Coincidentally Tom Vasel just named Lacerta players as part of his top five things he's tired of in board gaming on the Dice Tower today. 😂

Vital games are my absolute favorite and no other designers come close. These are luxury board games for heavy gamers. Here's my list: 1.) On Mars (keep playing it until it really clicks! It is such a rush to crush it the last number of turns with cascading actions. Epic strategy at its best.) 2.) Kanban EV (best for new comings in my opinion) 3.) Lisboa 4.) Weather Machine 5.) Vinhos 2010 6.) Escape Plan 7.) The Gallarist (I need to play this more.) The top six are in my top ten. I haven't played CO2 because I am not a big fan of coop games.

What Lacerda to start with: If you have played Terraforming mars and know it well it think On Mars is not that far of a logical leap it was pretty easy to learn with the similar concepts. Own several Lacerda's but On Mars is the only one to have been played due to the difficulty to table.

Hello , Greetings from Germany. I'm a big Vital lacerda fan. however, I haven't managed to play Weather Machine yet. my previous top list looks like this; 7. Escape Plan (feels a bit like Oceans 11) 6. On Mars (6th place sounds so bad, it's not at all. on mars is a great game, but I prefer to play the others) 5. Co 2- second editon ( very thematic, difficult to master, very pretty) 4. Vinhos (a great beginner's game in the Lacerda games) 3. The Gallerist 2. Lisboa (also very thematic and well implemented) 1. Kanban (the first version, I really like the Sandra options and the shift mechanism)

had the subtitles on: "hello this is Cinema and Johannes" haha 😛

Similar list from both of you and close to mine. I think I lean towards Johannes list. Lisboa is my favorite game and On Mars breaks my brain!

I just bought my first Lacerda and I went with Kanban EV. Very excited to try it. A few other channels ranked Kanban and Lisboa as their favorites so Lisboa is probably going to be my 2nd if everything goes well.

Great list. I think my bottom three are the same. For me it's #1 On Mars #2 Kanvan EV #3 Lisboa #4 Vinhos #5 Weather Machine #6 The Gallerist #7 Co2 #8 Escape Plan

I do think that CO2 is a bit misunderstood. Full disclosure, CO2: Second Chance is not only my favorite Lacerda, but also my favorite game of all time. Semi-coop is a bit of an exaggeration, imo. You are definitely trying to win. The coop part is just making sure everyone doesn't lose due to the pollution track. When I play CO2, I don't go into it thinking we are cooperating in any other way than just making sure we are getting green power plants on the board and removing fossil fuel plants where possible, but everything else, from completing summits, gaining knowledge, controlling regions, etc. is me furthering my agenda. But overall I just love the gameplay, specifically the competitive version. I have nothing against the full coop mode, I'm just not a fan of coops, apart from I wish the rulebook was written the opposite way. The rules start out with the full coop rules and then add rules changes for the competitive mode later, whereas I wish it was fully written for competitive, with addendums for the coop. All that to say, I definitely feel CO2: Second Chance competitive mode is underappreciated, underrated, and definitely deserves more love.

Your request to get a victory point ingenuous , I subscribed

Great video! Have you tried any of the solo modes? If so, which is your favorite Lacerda for solo?

Yep, if I were going to play two Lacerdas they would indeed be Lisboa and Kanban EV. I think you are both very good evaluators of games. Plus entertaining!

Now I want to play all my Lacerda games…

This is what I call great content :) Out of curiosity: do you play with the Queen card in Lisboa?

My favourite designer for sure! + artwork from Ian and production from Eagle-Gryphon = dream games! 🙃 New Lacerdas coming to kickstarter this year, is that what you mean in the end of the video? 😲

I so wanted to love Lacerda games, despite having tried The Gallerist when I was quite new to games and totally not getting it. So last year I borrowed Lisboa from a friend a played a couple times... It just felt really dull to me! And that's many people's favourite! Do I just need to accept his games are not for me? Or should I try one more?! Most the games you guys like I like as well!

I love Kanban and Lisboa, not to mention the later's depth and completeness with such complexity! But among them only Escape Plan gives me the excitement of exploration and it's also highly thematic. Maybe I would give Escape Plan a higher rank cause its uniqueness and party game-like feeling😆! Love this episode! Looking forward to more of it!!

My list ;-) After playing 7 of them 1) On Mars 2) Kanban EV 3) Vinhos 4) The Gallerist 5) Lisboa 6) Co2 7) Escape Plan And I have to apologize for not getting the rules for Lisboa :D After 4 hours sleep that night and after playing Kanban EV and The Gallerist, my brain didn't work anymore :D

CO2 is the only Lacerda I culled. Still a good game, I'd just rather play another Lacerda instead. Also shoutout to Ian O'Toole who makes the EGG games look beautiful.

Bought, played, then donated nearly all the Lacerda games. Lisboa still reins supreme and stays in my collection (the only Lacerda in my collection today.) Brilliant game.

My ranking: Haven't played - C02 - very little interest in semi-co-op, maybe I'll try solo one day. 7. Escape Plan 6. The Gallerist - and this is still a top 50 game for me overall 5. Kanban 4. Vinhos 3. Weather Machine 2. Lisboa 1. On Mars Would happily play any of them any time. Really looking forward to Inventions. What was the hidden gem you mentioned that uses the Kanban worker placement?

I love all these. Unfortunately everybody in game group don't want to take time to learn.

Vinhos 2016 for me! It is in my top 25 games of all time! The Gallerist ranks lowest. I find it more frustrating than fun. I wonder how it would be with fewer players though. Lisboa is very fascinating though I am utterly terrible at it! I want to play it again. I haven’t played any other Lacerda’s.

Kanban & Lisboa deserve on the top-list position

Somehow not very keen on Vinhos, yet. Would the Gallerist be a good place to start for Lacerda's games? That's the theme that sits well with everyone who is keen on playing :)

Would your list change if you're thinking on best 2p Lacerda's?

I've only tried Vinhos out of his games, I found the mechanics interesting, but for me personally I felt it didn't allow me enough turns to get into it before the game was over, and that felt like a big letdown. I don't mind tightness in games, but I have to say limited amount of turns is probably my least favourite form of tightness. I don't know if that is just Vinhos or if this is a tendency with his games overall, but I will probably not get a chance to compare them since his games are just so expensive (the copy of Vinhos I tried was the 2010 one since it's what I could second hand for a decent price) and I don't want to shell out what I could spend on 2-3 other games on something that I have no way of knowing if it's even my wheelhouse. I've heard all the praise, but after actually getting my hands on and trying out one of his games, it's made me just more skeptical.

I don't agree that Escape Plan is any easier than his other games. In fact, it's anti-thematic nature makes it one of the harder games to learn in ny opinion. It just doesn’t make sense. I do agree that it is his worst (and the only one I actually think is bad). 5: Escape Plan (4/10) 4: Gallerist (7/10) 3: Kanban EV (8/10) 2: Co2 (8/10) 1: Lisboa (10/10)

One of the biggest 'holes' in my game collection is the lack of a Lacerda game. I really need to remedy this.

My number 1 is weather machine, kanban ev, escape plan and on mars. I only have 4.❤

I like the bank mechanism in Vinhos 2010 ... but the expert tiles are sorta broken in that version.

on mars is all my all time fave game, thank you for making this video. However, I also love Escape Plan! Idk why folks dont love it, it felt very Lacerda to me. My ranking is 1. On Mars 2. Weather Machine 3. Kanban EV 4. The Gallerist 5. Escape Plan 6. Vinhos 2010 Havent played Lisboa or CO2 yet

I know I'm in good company when we have the exact same taste in Lacerda games. I could probably get rid of everything other than Lisboa and Kanban EV and be completely satisfied. I want to like Weather Machine more, but as you say, it's just too "same-y" and I can get the same vibe from those other two if that's what I'm looking for. Having said that, it's hard to want to get rid of it because it's so pretty and the components are so amazing...

About half of ourpodcast loves Lacerda's and the others avoid them because they melt your brain. We all have our different favourites but I agree Lisboa is an elegant masterpiece of a game (JP) but others in the pod are The Gallerist (Adrian) and Weather Machine (Davey's). We've been also lucky to preview Inventions: Evolution of Ideas and that's going to be a cracker, interesting game.

Mine have bounced around a bit over time, but of what I've played, it's currently 1. Kanban 2. Lisboa 3. On Mars 4. Escape Plan 5. The Gallerist

A ramblings video on Vinhos 2010 vs 2016?

Lisboa is my favorite too

in which number would be Inventions? 😮

You need to play the New Version of Vinhos. Then it is like Gallerist with the weight but without the extra turns. So then it is the Starting Lacerda for new players. For CO2 i really like the new second Chance. But you have to do some tweaks to the game. Bgg - Lacerda hinself wrote sonethibg to this. Then it is a very cool competetiv game. With some cooperativ components.

I did not play Escape Plan, CO2 and Weather Machine. Same top 3 than Johannes without order. Eventually, The Gallerist is the one I mastered better ❤ 😉

My ranking of the Lacerdas - On Mars > Kanban EV > Weather Machine > Vinhos > Lisboa. I haven't played The Gallerist, CO2, or Escape Plan. Lisboa just didn't click for me, I do want to give it another try with a different teacher and see if that improves the game/experience for me.

Escape plan is so underrated...... How many plays do you have? :)

Which one works better solo?

Did you rank Lisboa?

And now with Inventions, your're going to have to redo this video!

I think Co2 Second Chance is way better.

kanban is much nicer compared to lisboa

It’s so hard to rank some of them….

1st