Wilmot’s Warehouse

• Designers: David King, Ricky Haggett, Richard Hogg
• Publisher: CMYK 
• Players: 2-6
• Age: 8+
• Time: 30 minutes
• Played with advance copy provided by CMYK, played at least 15 times with prototype
• Amazon Affiliate Link: https://amzn.to/3LQdc7R

So, what if I sat down at a game table with you, and asked you to play a game.  Where we’ll place 35 tiles, one at a time, turning each one facedown after placement.  And then at the end, we’ll have to cooperatively remember where each of those tiles were placed?  You’d jump at the opportunity, right?  Yeah, I’ll admit that I was skeptical at first – but after playing this game multiple times, I find that gets better and better with time.

The original Wilmot’s Warehouse is a video game – “Wilmot’s Warehouse is a puzzle game about keeping a warehouse running in tip-top shape. You play as Wilmot, a hard working warehouse employee tasked with pushing, sorting and stacking a variety of products. Over time more and more truckloads of these products will arrive, gradually filling up the warehouse. How you arrange them all is entirely up to you – organized by color, type, the Dewey Decimal System, or some wild format that only you understand – it’s all good! Just remember where you put everything, because when the service hatch opens, you’ll need to find the things people want quickly, in order to earn the coveted Performance Stars required for all manner of labor-saving upgrades.” 

This boardgame version uses the same IP and graphics of the video game, but it is more about organizing things in your warehouse AND remembering where all the things are. There are 150 different possible things – each with a tile and a matching card.  All of the tiles are mixed up in the bag, and then you draw 7 tiles for each of the five days in the game.  (If you don’t want to see anything before playing, I’d recommend placing all the tiles facedown in the box and then drawing randomly).  On the final four stacks (because Mondays are so bad they don’t need any extra things making them complicated), place a idea card on top.

The board is an empty 7×7 grid, and the first tile is always placed in the center space of the grid.  On a turn, the active player draws the top tile from the current stack and then shows it to all players.  Then the team discusses what the art on the tile might represent and then decide where to place the tile.  All tiles after the first must be placed orthogonally adjacent to a previously placed tile (well, unless there is an Idea rule that tells you otherwise).  

So how to remember where you put things?  I suppose if you have a savant in your group, you just remember.  But, for us normal people, use the tiles to develop one or more stories using the art on the tiles as the touchpoints.  

Take this tile:

What could it be?  Maybe it’s a pair of lungs.  Or perhaps an insect from above – and you’re seeing the wings.  Or it’s the footprint of a deer in yellow snow.  Maybe it’s two almonds on a cafe table.  I’m sure there are plenty of other things that it might mean to you.   Place the tile and then flip it facedown.  Hope you remember what it looked like!  

OK, the next tile comes out, and everyone decides that it must be an insect – a bee in fact – because the next tile shows a cross section of the beehive.  (Yes, normally, the first tile would be flipped over, but for the purposes of this example, I’m leaving them face up).

The story gets a bit more concrete with the next tile which is clearly a drop of honey coming out of the hive.  (Again, the first two tiles would normally be facedown at this point).

But, don’t forget that the tiles can be interpreted in multiple ways, and the order that the tiles come out can wildly alter the story.  What if we drew the tiles in the opposite order?  In this case, the group might decide that first tile is a nicely painted Easter Egg (of course placed upside down than in the first example).  The next tile is obviously the palette of watercolors that the kids used to paint the egg, and the final tile shows the outline of the painted eggs being hidden on the lawn.

Same three tiles, but widely different stories.  Either way, as you build the story, you’ll more easily remember what all the pictures are and where they are placed.  And, of course, there will be lots of laughs and enjoyment out of the group activity of defining the tiles and building the story.

Continue this process until the stack for the day is done.  Then, it’s time to move to the next day, and the first thing you do is read the idea card which was placed on top during setup.  This card will provide the group with a special rule which will be in effect for the entire day.  There are two different levels of difficulty which is denoted by the artwork on the back of the tile.    Examples of the rules are:

• Each player may only say 3 different words per tile
• Before looking at it, place the tile facedown first, then reveal it.  Players can then discuss how to remember the location
• Everyone but the active player gets to look at the tile, after discussion, it is placed facedown so the active player never sees it.

Finish the five different stacks to fully stock the warehouse.  Then it’s time to meet the customer onslaught.  For reasons that the rules don’t make entirely clear, all of your customers come in the same 5 minute span after Friday’s work is done…  

Take the full deck of 150 cards and split them up amongst the players so that everyone has approximately the same number.  There is one card for every possible tile in the game.  Have someone start a stopwatch on their phone and then when the clock starts, everyone starts flipping through the cards in their stack.  As you find cards that match the tiles in your warehouse, place the card on top of the tile in the right location.  Be sure to look around the table as you might find a card that was missed by someone else.

When all of the tiles have a card on them, stop the timer.  Now, flip over the tiles to check if the correct card was placed on top.  It’s probably helpful to repeat the constructed story as you go.  Well, it’s more fun anyways…  If you’re good, all the cards will be on the right tiles.  If you make a mistake, add a ten second penalty to your time.   Try to get the best time!  Or if nothing else, try to make sure to do it in under 5 minutes.

So, on so many levels, this is a game that screams not for me.  It’s a memory game.  It’s a cooperative game.  It’s a game with random event cards that screw up how I want to play the game.  It’s a game that doesn’t really have a win or loss condition.  But yet, I love this game and continually want to play it.   

There’s just something so enjoyable about building the story and laughing at all the good ideas that the group comes up with.  I’ve played the game dozens of times, and I’ve surely seen all of the different tiles multiple times.  That being said, I’m still surprised that our group finds new meanings to tiles even after all the repeat play – so much of it is driven by the story, and those moments of epiphany are what make the game so enjoyable to me.

Though it seems unlikely, it’s rare for our group to even make a mistake with the cards on the tiles.  It’s so amazing how easy it becomes to remember the tiles after you tie them together with two or three stories.  Usually it’s impossible to keep all the tiles in a single story, so figuring out how to branch the stories is key when you get a tile that doesn’t fit your current narrative.

This game is one that allows everyone to participate and it really is a joy to play.  I love using it as a closer to game night where we can have a game filled with laughs as we cooperate in having fun.  It’s also perfect for non-gamers – as the game can be explained in about a minute with a few examples (just like I did above).  

Wilmot’s Warehouse should release in August and I expect it to be available at Amazon and other similar sites.

In fact – it is available – here is an affiliate link!    https://amzn.to/3LQdc7R

Thoughts from other Opinionated Gamers

Joe Huber (1 play of the advanced copy): Unlike many, I’m not bothered by memory games, and in fact I even enjoy memory elements in games – unless it’s trackable “hidden” information in something that’s not supposed to be a memory game.  Wilmot’s Warehouse therefore was up my alley, and unsurprisingly was a hit for me.  But not because of the memory elements – they are, in truth, the least memorable aspect of the game.  Instead it’s the story-telling aspects of the game that captured me; in my one play, we actually connected nearly all of the tiles into one story about an elephant.  And that activity was – memorable.  (Months later, I still remember the ball the elephant was balancing on, the targets it was trying to squirt with its trunk, and so on.)  I’m not sure I need to own this – cooperative games aren’t really my thing – but I still look forward to playing again.

Tery N (2 plays of the advanced copy): I generally do not like games like this at all. I don’t love memory elements and I don’t love deduction. I am not a fan of party games with group think elements, either. And yet, somehow, I like this one.  Quite a bit, in fact. I had a great time playing this both times. Like Joe mentions, I think it is the storytelling aspect that draws me in. We laughed really hard during both plays, but aside from amusement that storytelling also really helped with remembering what was where.  

Ratings from the Opinionated Gamers

• I love it! Dale Y, John P, Eric M, Taylor R, Erik Arneson
• I like it. Joe H, Tery
• Neutral.
• Not for me…