River
Towns

River Towns (2025) is a world-building puzzle about strategically constructing towns and districts along river banks to score points. Play involves placing Tetris-shaped town pieces in a limited grid to coordinate their shape and colour to maximise points earned. It stands out for how the challenge evolves to become increasingly strategic.

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The game is organised into sets of levels with differently shaped grids and river routes. Points are earned by placing town pieces on either side of river banks, aiming to create large same-coloured districts. The rivers divide the space and make it harder to build but also offer more points when building on their banks. You're aiming to score enough to earn gold tokens and unlock the next set of levels.

As you progress, more ways to score points are introduced, such as regrowing trees and looting gold mines. The grids become larger, but you also have more pieces to place - to the point where beating the level becomes as much of a challenge as scoring big.

The result is a cute puzzle game where the key is utilising every possible way to score points rather than just focusing on one. The towns you build are vibrant and full of life, adding to the satisfaction of perfectly constructing each district.

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Our examiner, Thom Robertson, first checked River Towns 6 weeks ago. It was re-examined by Jo Robertson and updated 5 weeks ago.