Chichen Itza - City Collection - Classic
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The sun sets on the Mayan empire. The seals are broken. Legendary beasts emerge from the pyramids — and every choice you make weighs like an altar stone.
What it's about
A dense eurogame in the shadow of the pyramids
In the heart of Chichén Itzá, beneath the great pyramids, the ancient seals have broken. Sky serpents, jaguar spirits, legendary beasts — all emerge to claim the mortal world. And the sacred city will not fall without a fight.
Chichén Itzá is a eurogame by Stefan Feld, the ninth chapter in Queen Games' City Collection. Six rounds, four actions each per round, a 4x4 action grid where the first to choose pays less than those who come later. This is where it all begins — timing, blocking opponents, calculating costs.
Move your troops, invoke the favor of the gods, power up the four gears on your player board, confront creatures with dice, and reclaim villages, temples, and ruins. At the end of each round, objectives are checked. At the end of the game, whoever has orchestrated everything wins. Pure, dense, ruthless Feld.
In each round, the first to choose an action pays less than everyone else. There's no neutral move — every choice you make takes something from someone else.
The secret of Chichén Itzá in one line
Feld gives you 24 actions in the entire game. Every choice excludes others. The winner is the one who can orchestrate, not just calculate.
From the game experience
Chichén Itzá
Queen Games includes a solo mode in the base rulebook. The experience remains typical Feld — pure optimization, personal puzzle — and only loses a touch of the "first to arrive pays less" tension, which is more ruthless between two live players.
FrogScore · FroGames editorial rating · based on rules, BGG, and play sessionsWhat you control
The tools of command
4 Actions per round
A 4x4 grid of action tiles. Choose, pay, act. Each action can only be taken once per round by each player.
4 Personal Gears
Your board has four gears to power up. Each unlocks different abilities — build your point engine.
Legendary Creatures
Sky serpents, jaguar spirits, legendary beasts. You face them with dice — and every victory is worth points and benefits.
God Cards
Gain divine favor. Some effects are immediate, others unleash bonuses at the end of the game. Your gods decide a lot.
At the end of the game, you'll count points and discover that a move in round three decided everything. It always happens with Feld.
A game in five moments
What happens at the table
Not the rules. The experience.
The grid is revealed and silence falls
16 action tiles placed in a 4x4 grid. Randomized costs at the top and side. No one moves any pawns yet — everyone is reading the map, looking for combinations, calculating where the first player will spend less. The game begins in the silence of reading.
The first timing conflict
Someone takes the action you wanted. Now you pay the high cost. Or you give up and choose the second best — but whoever comes after you will pay even more. Every choice shifts the balance. The game has already begun, and no one noticed.
The dice against the beast
You've deployed troops, powered up the right gear, invoked the god. You roll the dice against the legendary creature — and defeat it. Points, bonuses, your plan works. For a turn, you feel invincible. Then you look at the other players and realize they're building something worse.
The round where everything clicks
There's always a round in every Feld game. Your engine starts, the gears synchronize, objectives unlock in a cascade. Five actions become fifteen points, then twenty. The table goes silent. Someone says "okay, how did you do that?" — and you wouldn't even know how to explain it.
Scores are tallied, you find out who really won
Sixth round finished. Points are tallied for objectives, end-game gods, collected crystals, controlled territories. Often, the player who saved a reserve for the last move wins. Everything is packed back into the box and someone says "next time I'll do things differently."
How to play
The flow of each round
Six rounds, four actions each. You learn in the first game — you master it after the third.
Place the four cost indicators along the edges of the 4x4 grid. Each action tile has two possible costs — a low one for the first player to choose it, a high one for subsequent players.
In turn order, place your marker on a free tile. If you are first, you pay the low cost. If you come later, you pay the high cost. Each tile can only be chosen once per player.
The action activates: you move troops, upgrade gears, draw a god card, fight a creature, claim a village. Each action can trigger combinations with already upgraded gears.
At the end of the round, the marker advances. When it crosses a symbol, the corresponding objective tiles are checked. Each satisfied objective is worth points at the end of the game.
Why it's different from other Feld games
Six reasons to choose it
Dynamic costs that reward timing
The first to choose pays less. It's not just management — it's managing others' time. It forces you to think about what they will do before you move.
Combat with dice
Feld adds an unusual element for him: direct confrontation with creatures by rolling dice. Real tension — and no certainty that the perfect plan is enough.
Four gears to orchestrate
The board has four abilities to upgrade. You can specialize or balance — each configuration changes how your turn plays out.
Always different randomized setup
Of the 21 available action tiles, only 16 are used in each game, arranged randomly. Costs change every round. No setup repeats.
Detailed Mayan setting
It's not a reskin — Queen Games worked on Markus Erdt's art and theming. Pyramids, temples, sky serpents, jaguar spirits: the atmosphere works.
Feld at his best balance
Weight 2.86 on BGG: not as overwhelming as heavy Feld games, but dense enough to provide real decisions. The sweet spot of his career.
How to win
Points from six different sources
Feld doesn't reward those who excel at one thing — he rewards those who manage not to neglect anything. Winning means orchestrating parallel paths until the last round.
Victory
- Legendary creatures defeated in combat
- Areas controlled among villages, temples, camps, and ruins
- Round objectives completed at the right time
- Heroes present on the board at the end of the game
- End-game god cards and collected crystals
Defeat
- You focused on only one path, neglecting others
- You too often paid the high cost by coming in second
- Your gears never synchronized with each other
- Round objectives expired without being completed
Chichén Itzá is Feld at his most pleasant balance. Deep without being overwhelming, tense without being frustrating. A eurogame that rewards those who can read the table.
Frequently Asked Questions
Chichén Itzá FAQ
Where does Chichén Itzá stand among other Feld games?
It falls into the mid-range of Stefan Feld's output. With a BGG weight of 2.86, it's not as heavy as Bora Bora or Trajan, but it's denser than Carcassonne: Hunters and Gatherers. The action selection mechanism with dynamic costs is one of the freshest ideas in his career in recent years. If you know other Feld games, you'll recognize it immediately — but with an extra twist on timing.
Do I need to have played the others in the City Collection?
No. Each game in the Stefan Feld City Collection is independent. Chichén Itzá is the ninth installment but can be played first. It only shares the editorial format with Hamburg, Amsterdam, Marrakesh, and the others — not the mechanics. Each title in the series is a standalone game.
Does it play well with two players?
Yes, very well. The "first come, pay less" mechanism makes the two-player game particularly cutthroat: every action you take is an action your opponent will have to pay a high cost for, or forgo. In three or four players, the competition is diluted a bit — but remains central. The sweet spot is probably three players.
Do the combat dice make it too random?
Not particularly. Feld uses dice as a source of tension rather than decision — upgraded gears and god cards allow you to modify rolls, add dice, reroll. A solid strategy remains solid even with a few unlucky rolls. But the element of unpredictability exists, and it is intentional.
How long does the first game really last?
The indicated duration is 60–120 minutes. The first game tends to be closer to 120 minutes due to the time spent reading the initial board — there are many actions to evaluate. From the second game onwards, it drops to under an hour and a half. It's not a lightning-fast session, but not an epic either: it fits into the time of a long dinner.
Is it available in Italian?
This is the City Collection Classic edition, in English. The game is relatively language-dependent — the god cards and some objective tiles have text. If you're not comfortable with English in a game, consider waiting for a possible Italian edition or preparing printed translations.
Chichén Itzá is a competitive eurogame for 2–4 players (ages 12+, duration 60–120 min, BGG weight 2.86/5) designed by Stefan Feld with artwork by Markus Erdt, published by Queen Games as the ninth chapter of the Stefan Feld City Collection. Main mechanic: action selection with dynamic costs on a 4x4 grid — the first player to choose pays less, subsequent players pay more. Six rounds of four actions each, dice combat against legendary Mayan creatures, four personal gears to upgrade, god cards, variable round objectives. Mayan setting with the siege of the sacred city by sky serpents and jaguar spirits. English City Collection Classic edition. Available on FroGames.it.
Chichen Itza - City Collection - Classic
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