Why Puerto Rico 1897 Makes Sense

In October 2022, Ravensburger will release Puerto Rico 1897, a new version of Andreas Seyfarth's classic game, with the setting of the game being shifted in time and with you, the player, now representing a Puerto Rican farmer.

[wolflarson]

Well said and in good faith unlike many of the discussions I've come across on this subject that is often more about creating villains.

[RandomPerson-ndey]

It makes sense that they'd remake make it to be less offensive as their goal is to make money. I typically don't complain about things being offensive but have made the mistake of putting a game on the table with a theme others didn't like.
That's just awkward...
The game was "Black Orchestra" and one of the players has Jewish ancestors. I figured they'd like it for the goal of trying to remove a certain historical figure. He saw the iconography, knew of the people you play as in the game, and didn't like it. No problem. I apologized, explained my logic to why I thought he'd enjoy it in the first place, and we played something else instead. It was a honest mistake with no ill intent.

At least they're not purposefully misrepresenting a time period by pretending something people find offensive was not what it was in reality.

[guandjs]

Thanks for the video. I think you presented the issues really well. I know to keep it neutral, you put all of these topics on an equal footing but I think people need to keep in mind that disagreements about topics about one’s core identity (race, gender, disability, etc) can be much more painful than those on other interests a gamer has. Well done, overall!

[Javiermn]

As a State-Side Puerto Rican with family on the island of Borinquen i appreciate that you highlighted this with the background info.

[fjvaras]

The argument about the accuracy is completely out of the line.
Since when is "inaccurate" to say that the people of Africa and South America were enslaved?? Maybe I had bad history teachers but for what I know, that's exactly what happened.
No one is complaining about the accuracy of the game. They are complaining because it is about slavery. And because the players have play the part of the bad guy, who exploid their slaves as if they were resources instead of people. Which is something horrible, but historically accurate.
Following your example of the weapons in Undaunted North Africa, what Puerto Rico is doing is replacing the weapons with whater guns because the people feels bad knowing that there was a war...

[ganAlexander]

I think we are in SENSITIVE times, with more awareness about race, history, ...

But i feel everyone needs to CHILL.

& i am not a Caucasian. I am a Chinese & my part of the world was under colonisation.

Back to the topic. It’s not possible to offend no one. E.g. colour of meeple can be racism. Hence If you are not comfortable with a certain theme or something, you can don’t play the game, voice your opinions, but don’t get overly upset about it. It’s just a GAME & it’s intention was to have FUN & never to offend anyone.

[pilotvc]

Imhotep also loosely involves slavery, with the construction of ancient Egyptian structures. I wonder if this will be next to get a re-theme?

[brianphipps]

You did a great job explaining both perspectives and the spectrum of thought which, as you mention, applies to many games (and products). Sometimes there are unintended connections, while others may argue they were intentional. It’s good to have discussions about games in the way you describe. What I feel is wrong is when people then make them into personal attacks like “you’re willing to play (or accept) this game because you are a colonizer, racist, etc, etc. “
Also, the other Lord of the Rings movies are awesome and worth watching! 🙂

[richhutnik]

I want to know what tweaks are done to the gameplay. Rebranding and fixes are useful. I want gameplay lending to expansions.

[crosscutgames]

Good job, WEM. I might very well pick up this new version as my old one is worn out and old!

[luizcosta]

Very well said, not only from Puerto Rico but from several other games. Good job and congratulations.

[juanlamet]

"tokens are coming on ships". At that time period ANYONE who traveled to Puerto Rico came on a ship. Airplanes had not been invented yet. Just sayin'

[a.j.alorro]

One thing that bothers me aside from the implicit nod to slavery from the original version of Puerto Rico was highlight crops like corn and indigo, instead of historically more significant agricultural output in cotton, rice and cacao. I know in Jamaica, Barbados, the Virgin Islands and Trinidad and Tobago indigo production was a major agricultural cash crop, where in the US, South Carolina and Louisiana (Georgia somewhat) relied on producing plants for this blue dye, but from the literature I have encountered, I haven't seen a rich historic account of indigo industrial production being crucially important to the Puerto Rican economy, let alone around San Juan, which both features indigo as an important commodity in their namesake games. If the Puerto Rico 1897 is mechanically the same but presented more historically accurate, wouldn't indigo be replaced by another more historically important cash crop? Or by necessity needing to keep indigo for the sake of using blue barrels to break the color monotony of dark brown, light beige, tan and yellow barrels (without the blue, this is literally a very brown Euro) for the more historically important export crops?
I think Ravensburger missed an opportunity to tweak the game mechanics different or subtle ways (See the new Amun-Re, Madeira CE, Yedo Deluxe Master Set, La Granja Deluxe Master Set, Stefan Feld's City Collection). Small scale family farms prevalent for the era as mentioned by both Eric and Jason, would have some unique buildings specific for the era like banks to provide loans at a cost from production as repayment or fluctuations in the labor market affecting the profitability or some way to leverage technologies of the era to generate more efficiencies in crop yield, irrigation or pest mitigation. Additionally, simple weather events (implemented like in Snowdonia) such as drought, hurricanes, which result in flooding and rise of salinity in the soil would affect agricultural production. I guess if we are doing a cosmetic revamp to be historically accurate, then some mechanical aspects should change as well. The irony switching to small scale farmers of course, is the current reality of Puerto Rico is, despite it's rich agricultural history celebrated by this game, the actual modern populace is far more dependent on imported foodstuffs than those home-grown, primarily for export markets. If another game developer had been consulted refining this modernization overhaul, like a Vital Lacerda, we would be treated to micromanaging every aspect of the 1897 family farm to eke out enough tobacco or later sugar to survive another growing season. Now it would sound like Agricola (okay maybe Vinhos) but with a Caribbean twist. It's not as far fetched of an idea like New Frontiers aka Race for the Galaxy the Board Game inspired as Puerto Rico the card game but set space, to sanitize any link to actual history and only offend those who find lucrative alien and uplift gene worlds a challenge to their religious world view. I guess we can just stick to Kites, just go where the wind blows.

[chuckm]

If the only reason for the new edition, as Eric seems to suggest for the last third of this video, is HISTORICAL ACCURACY, then it would seem the game could have been reissued with one change: delete the word "colonists" in the rule book and substitute the word "slaves."

If I choose to play a game set in a specific historical time period, by the way, I don't impose my own morality on the game. I try to "live in the moral skin" of the character I portray in the game, whether I agree with their views or not. THAT'S what people generally mean when they use the phrase "it's just a game." They are well aware of the dichotomy between their own morality and the morality of the world they inhabit.

[shortydancer]

Only watched the first LotR movies? Who are you?

[teen-at-heart]

Thanks for the very good argument for (more or less) acurate representation and explaining so well and nicely (and “unaufgeregt” - a German word) why it is important to people and why that doesn’t need to ruffle any feathers with people for who it’s not important. :)

[juanjovazquez]

Independent just before 1898?? 😂 Where is the accuracy in this new version? Just because Perez was in?

[joaojotta]

Great take on the story and reason behind this new version of the same game. 👍

[CarlosLopez-xirq]

I was never and will never be embarassed by this game. Basically all this idea was intended to shame the orginal game, which was and will ever be a piece of art. So I have my edition, I'll, keep it and I let the ashamed and schocked who projected so much problems on a simple boardgame buy the new edition... I will not... Anyway we know how much BGG likes to do virtue signalling...

[stephengroves]

Nicely argued. It makes me wonder why you would theme a game on a particular topic and then misrepresent it. I am disappointed when I see this in a game and then worry that the sloppiness in representing the theme may also be in the gameplay ie bad first impression.