Ad Acta!

A game for 2-4 wannabe civil servants who keep an overview when things turn difficult.

Age: 12+.
Length: ca. 45 minutes.
price: 17,50 EUR plus package and postage.
The 1. edition (500 copies, numbered, October 2002) is sold out.
The 2. edition (1,000 copies, December 2002) is sold out.

The ultimative game for everybody who always wanted to be chief of staff and have everybody work for them.
Sometimes it can help to have people to come in for debate, use dextrose or order a special delivery - as long as your own files arrive just in time. Who cares if other people's files end up in the shredder - unless the ministerial president suddenly turns up for a visit. That is when you actually need to start working ...

Das Spiel:

A day in public service is just the usual stress. People in town hall try to steer things, while the treasury tries to not hand out money. The environmental office does not want to help the job office build new buildings. Of course everybody works as fast as they can, files are delivered along the chain of command every minute. Some files, however, can be sped up by special means - calling a colleague, requesting special delivery, or using dextrose for extra energy. Your main aim to actually register your files on time. Be aware that files that are late end up in the shredder ...

Players command town hall, treasury, job or environmental office an try to register and close their own files. Unfortunately, the others have to deal with them, too, which often leads to delay.

Zubehör:

A board with the central registry and the delivery carriage

Four desks with in- and outbox

66 cards, of which

28 Files from 4 offices
24 action cards
6 cards "closed"
4 rules overviews
4 blank action cards
1 bag of paperclips  (endorsements)
1 stamp (first player marker)
12 wooden chips (dextrose)
8 markers for victory points and pencil-sharpening-points in four colours
1 marker for the delivery carriage (for the 2-player-game)
rules
Overview "in the bureaucratic maze"

Kommentare:

Your can find several reviews of "ad acta" online. Enclosed you find a commentary I loved:

"Dear Andrea,

my kids are great fans of Ad Acta. However they changed the rules a bid. My elder son loves endorsing files so much, that he works on every file no matter where it comes from. The younger did not process one of his own files because he suspected that it was about nuclear energy - which he does not approve of!!"

Video-Interview online: Scott Nicholson interviewsd me at the Gathering of Friends in April 2006 and made me do strange things with paper clips while explaining Ad Acta. Mehr Infos gibts hier (auf Englisch).