Parks Board Game Review

Parks is a route-building, resource-collection game for 1 to 5 players in 40 to 70 minutes. Two hikers travel along a seasonal trail of action spaces, collecting resources and spending them to visit US National Parks. Each hiker blocks an action space, so the order you move in and where your opponent is constantly shapes your decisions.

The artwork is from the Fifty-Nine Parks Print Series, one of the most celebrated contemporary illustration projects in the US, and it is the most visually striking game we own. The gameplay earns it.Best at 2 to 4 players. Strong solo mode with automa. Trails is the companion game worth knowing about.

Two editions exist, see our comparison post for the differences.Buy it if: you want a beautiful, accessible game with real strategic depth that works at almost any experience level.Skip it if: you want direct conflict or heavy strategy, Parks is a planning game with indirect competition through resource and space denial.

What Is Parks?

Parks is the game we show people when they ask why we take board games seriously. Not because it is the most complex game on the shelf, but because it is the most immediately striking, and because it backs up that first impression with a game that is genuinely satisfying to play.

Designed by Henry Audubon and published by Keymaster Games, Parks plays 1 to 5 players in 40 to 70 minutes. You are hiking through the seasons, moving two hikers along a shared trail of action spaces, collecting resources, sun, water, forest, mountain, and wild tokens — and spending them to visit National Parks. The Parks cards are illustrated by artists from the Fifty-Nine Parks Print Series, a real-world print and poster project that has produced some of the most celebrated American landscape art of the last decade. Every card in the game is a reproduction of a piece from that series.

We were given Parks as a gift before we fully understood what we were getting. The first time we opened the box and spread the Park cards across the table we spent about five minutes just looking at them before we picked up the rulebook. That does not happen often.

Key Game Information

Players	1 to 5 (best at 2 to 4)
Play time	40 to 70 minutes
Designer	Henry Audubon
Publisher	Keymaster Games
Year	2019 (2nd Edition 2020)
Categories	Route Building, Resource Management, Set Collection, Nature Games
Mechanics	Route Building, Worker Placement, Set Collection, Resource Management
Theme	Nature and Environment, Travel and Exploration
Complexity	Medium-light
Best for	Anyone who wants an accessible, beautiful game that works for both casual and experienced players, and particularly strong at two players

How to Play Parks

The trail is built from a set of tiles arranged in a line. Each tile shows an action space: collect sun tokens, collect water, gain forest resources, take a photograph, buy gear, or visit a National Park. At the start of the game, both of your hikers stand at the beginning of the trail.

On your turn, move one hiker forward along the trail, you can move any number of spaces but must move forward and cannot land on a space occupied by the other player’s hikers (two hikers per player, plus opponents at higher counts). Collect the resource shown on the space you land on. If you move to the trailhead at the end, your hiker enters camp and can no longer move this season.

Spending resources to visit Parks

Throughout the trail, the Parks row sits separately, a face-up selection of National Park cards, each showing a resource cost. When a hiker reaches camp at the end of the trail, that player may spend resources matching any Park card’s cost to claim it. Park cards score points and many have special abilities that activate when purchased.

The resource costs vary. Some Parks are cheap and accessible. Others require rare combinations. Gear cards, acquired from specific trail spaces, modify your resource collection and let you adjust what you gather each turn. Building a good gear loadout for the type of Parks you are targeting is the main strategic layer.

The seasons

The game runs across four seasons. After each season, the trail is completely rebuilt from a new set of tiles in a different arrangement. This means the available actions, their order, and the spaces available to block all change each round. A strategy that worked in spring may not be achievable in autumn because the trail no longer connects those resource spaces in the right sequence.

The Canteen lets you store resources between seasons, which is the game’s main efficiency decision: save water from autumn to fund an expensive Park in winter, or spend now and start winter empty. Players who ignore the Canteen tend to feel resource-starved in later seasons.

Playing Parks at Different Player Counts

1 player:Parks has a full solo mode using an automa system. Full details in the section below.

2 players:Our preferred count. The trail blocking becomes genuinely tactical because you can read exactly what your opponent needs and position your second hiker to cut them off from key spaces. Games run to around 40 minutes. The back-and-forth is the most focused and interesting version of the hiker movement mechanic.

3 players:Good. Slightly more chaotic as three pairs of hikers move through the trail and blocking opportunities multiply. The Parks row competition increases. A solid session count.

4 players:The sweet spot for groups. The trail feels properly contested and the combination of gear, resources, and Parks creates enough variety that four players rarely want the same path. Games run to around 60 minutes.

5 players:Works, but the trail gets crowded and waiting for your hikers to move in sequence can generate noticeable downtime. The game is still enjoyable at five but the blocking mechanic starts to feel more like traffic management than tactical play. Better with four.

Playing Parks Solo

The solo mode uses an automa system: a small deck of automa cards drives a simulated opponent that collects resources and visits Parks based on card draws each round. The automa is not trying to win in the conventional sense but it competes for resources and Parks cards aggressively enough that the solo experience has real tension.

The automa takes up one set of hiker spaces on the trail per card draw, which means it creates genuine blocking situations rather than just claiming Parks from the sideline. A well-timed automa draw that blocks the forest space you needed for three consecutive turns is exactly the kind of obstacle the solo mode produces.

The difficulty scales by adjusting how aggressively the automa competes for Parks and resources. For experienced players, the higher difficulty settings create sessions that feel close to a real two-player game in terms of resource pressure. For new players, starting on the lower settings lets you learn the game’s rhythms without being overwhelmed.

Parks solo is a well-designed experience. It is one of the better solo modes we have played in a game at this weight, not just a box-ticking afterthought but a system that makes the game genuinely engaging when you are playing alone.

Components and Production Quality

Parks is one of the most beautiful games ever made. That is not hyperbole. The National Park cards feature original artwork from the Fifty-Nine Parks Print Series, a collaborative American illustration project that pairs established artists with National Parks to produce original poster artwork. The series has been exhibited in galleries, sold as limited-edition prints, and featured in outdoor and design publications independent of the board game. Every card in Parks is a reproduction of a real piece from that series.

The effect on the table is extraordinary. The Park cards are individually illustrated in different styles — some use bold graphic design, some watercolour, some geometric abstraction — and all of them are immediately beautiful. When you fan them out to see what’s available this season, players who have never touched a board game before pause and look at them. This happens every session.

Everything else matches the standard the artwork sets. The wooden resource tokens, sun, water, forest, mountain, wild, are chunky and distinctly shaped. The metal campfire first-player token is a genuinely premium component in a way most games do not bother with. The gear cards are clear and well illustrated. The trail tiles are thick and durable.

The insert is well-designed and keeps everything sorted for setup. First setup takes around 15 minutes. Subsequent games take about five. There is a second edition that revised some component quality and added a canteen token redesign, see our full edition comparison post at letsplaygames.uk/parks-1st-edition-vs-parks-2nd-edition/ for the full breakdown of what changed.

The artwork is not decoration. It changes how people engage with the game. We have introduced Parks to players who were sceptical about sitting down to a 60-minute board game and watched them spend the first five minutes examining the Park cards before the rules explanation. The game earns that attention.

Expansions and Other Versions

Parks: Memories (2021):The first expansion. Adds memory tokens that players collect by revisiting Parks they have already claimed, providing bonus points and abilities. A lighter addition that does not change the core flow significantly. Worth knowing about but not essential for most groups.

Parks: Nightfall (2021):Adds a night trail mode where you play an extra season after the standard four, with more difficult Parks and modified rules. Increases the challenge for experienced players. Worth picking up if your group finds the base game too comfortable after many plays.

Trails (2021):A standalone companion game from Keymaster Games using the same artwork and a related theme. Players hike shorter trails, collecting animal tokens and earning badges. Plays in 15 to 20 minutes for 1 to 4 players and is significantly lighter than Parks. Not a replacement but a useful companion — good for shorter sessions or for introducing the Parks aesthetic to groups who are not ready for the full game. Uses the same Fifty-Nine Parks print series artwork on a different card set.

1st vs 2nd Edition:Two editions of Parks exist with differences in component quality, graphic design, and a small number of mechanical tweaks. If you are buying new, the 2nd edition is the one on shelves. For a full breakdown of what changed and which is worth buying, see our dedicated comparison post: letsplaygames.uk/parks-1st-edition-vs-parks-2nd-edition/.

Digital Versions

Parks does not currently have an official Board Game Arena implementation or a dedicated digital app as of mid-2026. Given its visual nature, a high-quality digital implementation could be excellent, but none exists officially.

A Tabletop Simulator mod is available on Steam as a fan-made implementation. The artwork is reproduced in the mod and the rules are accurate, making it a workable option for remote sessions with friends. It is not an official release, but for a game where the visual experience is part of the appeal, seeing the Park card artwork in a digital format does translate reasonably well to the screen.

If You Like Parks, Try These

Wingspan: The most natural companion recommendation. Engine building with a bird theme, stunning artwork, strong solo mode, accessible rules. Similar in tone and audience to Parks. A game for the same shelf. Full review at letsplaygames.uk/wingspan/.

Cascadia: Tile placement with a Pacific Northwest nature theme, the closest Parks gets to having a mechanical cousin. Similar accessibility, similar visual language, strong solo mode. Plays 1 to 4 in 30 to 45 minutes. Full review at letsplaygames.uk/cascadia/.

Trails: The companion game from the same publisher. Lighter, faster, same artwork range. Good if you want the Parks aesthetic in a 15-minute game. Mentioned above in the Expansions section.

Tokaido: A journey game where players travel along the Tōkaidō road in historical Japan, collecting experiences and encounters. Similar peaceful competitive structure to Parks, you are making a beautiful journey while quietly denying space to others. Lighter than Parks.

Isle of Skye: For groups who liked Parks’ scoring variety and want more direct competition. Tile placement with an auction mechanic, Scottish highland theme. A little heavier than Parks but a good step up for groups who want more edge.

Final Thoughts on Parks

Parks earns its reputation. The artwork is the most immediately impressive in our collection and it is backed by a game that has genuine strategic depth without requiring significant experience to enjoy. The hiker movement creates real decisions. The resource management has texture. The solo mode is actually good.

What the game does not do is provide heavy strategy, direct conflict, or significant mechanical complexity. If your group wants those things, Parks will feel too light. The competition is indirect, blocking trail spaces, racing for Parks, and the whole experience has a calm, considered quality that some groups will love and others will find frustrating if they expected a fight.

For everyone else: Parks is one of the few games we always say yes to regardless of how many times we have played it. The trail is different every season. The Parks cards change the available scoring paths every session. The artwork makes even an unsuccessful session feel good to look at.

It is one of the best-looking games ever made. It is also a good game. That combination is rarer than it should be.

One sentence verdict: Parks is the most visually stunning game we own, and it earns that shelf position with a genuinely satisfying hiking-and-resource game underneath the artwork.

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