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Welcome! is a card game from Japan. Players are trying to be the most successful mayor, attracting new businesses to their town, or lose the next election! The game turns on being able to build up a company and also be the only player appealing to that company. Players do this by card drafting and bluffing, openly or blindly, until a final reckoning.
The game has a simple deck of 80 cards and a start player marker. Played over two rounds, each round has four turns, and players take simple actions to improve their chances of re-election.
The deck has 8 Tourist cards (orange), 12 Software (yellow), 12 Hotel (purple), 12 Merchant Ship (green), 16 Airlines (blue) and 20 Motors (red). Each card shows the number in the deck, so all the orange Tourist cards say 8. With three players, the yellow cards are not used.
On the back of each card is a handshake. Players are trying to convert company cards they collect into handshakes. Most handshakes collected by the end is the winner.
The deck is shuffled, a line of 5 cards is dealt up, the companies players are trying to attract. Players are dealt 9 cards each, and each selects 3 to pass to their neighbour once. The neighbour looks at them, and the passed cards then go into a deck shuffled up. This Round deck goes next to the line of companies.
Now players choose two hand cards in secret and place them face-down. When everyone has chosen, these Appeal cards are turned face up. At the end of the round, after four turns, these Appeal cards will divide up the company cards evenly between players, turning them over into handshakes. So the players are trying to place Appeals such that they are the only mayor attracting that company at the end of the round. If more than one player has the same Appeal card out, the cards are divied up by proportion.
During the round, players may add one only Appeal card (limit is 3), or make swap a new Appeal card in (face-up or face-down) sending the old card to the company line, or may turn one card horizontal as a Challenge. Once each player has taken one action, three cards are dealt up from the Round deck to the line. If a player had chosen a Challenge to match any of these, their Challenge card becomes a handshake for them. If it didn't, it is discarded from the game. The start marker moves on and play continues with another action.
After four turns, all Appeal cards are shown, and the line of companies is divied up. Collected cards become handshakes, uncollected remain for the second round, with the Appeal cards being added to the company line.
The second round is played over in the same way and the player with the most handshakes at the end is the winner.
The first edition was home-made by the designer in only five copies. The second edition was a full edition and the 3rd edition was only a straight reprint, although marked in the rules as a 3rd edition.
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