Nyakuza is a route-building, auction game.

Title: Nyakuza

Year Published: 2025

Designer: Reiner Knizia

Publisher: CMON

Players: 2-4

Game Time: ~40 mins

Set-up Time: ~3 minutes

Ages: 10+

Theme: Warring clans of cats in Japan.

Mechanisms: Auctions, Route-Building.

How to win: Be the first clan to build all of your stalls and the grand market.

Game Description

Nyakuza is a competitive game for 2-4 players. Each player is the head of a Cat Yakuza Clan, vying for control over the fishing industry. Get ahead of the competition! Bid for Boats to go out and net the freshest catch in the Bay and establish your seafood Stalls before your rivals. The first Clan to build their Grand Market Stall wins the game!

How to play Nyakuza

Learn how to play Nyakuza in a quick and concise way.

Main Mechanisms

We start with auctions which happen every turn and determine the number of boats you get and turn order so it’s pretty key.

The other mechanism is route-building, connecting up those spaces on the board.

USP

This is a reskin of a game from 2014 called Orongo so not much unique here, it’s literally been done before!

Theme

I like cats and Japan and it’s the second game in my collection with a theme like this alongside Neko Syndicate.

Setup & Rulebook

Setup is easy, there is very little to do before the game starts.

The rulebook is very light and easy to follow.

Components & Artwork

The components are OK. The boats are nice as is the board, tiles, bag and most of everything else. The stalls need assembly and come with clear stickers to stick them together. The trouble is they don’t stay in a rectangle shape.

The little art there is is quite good especially the cats on the screens.

Ease of Teaching

The game is very easy to teach. Of the 3 phases, only the ‘build a stall’ phase has any complication to it. The rest are straight forward.

Everything is open information so players an be talked through their options if they need help.

Similar Games

I’ve already mentioned Orongo.

We need to look at Rebirth and Cascadero which are also route-building games from Reiner Knizia.

A friend pointed out it has Chinatown vibes due to the auctions and tile placement.

Nyakuza Review

Positives

A good looking game.

Easy rules keeping turns quick.

It’s a fun challenge with 4 players on the tight board.

I enjoy the theme…

Negatives

…even if it doesn’t come out in game play.

Not much variability for long term attention grabbing.

Nyakuza Round-Up

A decent game, lets see what I think after more plays though.

Rating

I give it 6/10