In Chinatown, you're a rising tycoon in 1960s New York, tasked with building the most profitable business empire in the city. The game is a masterclass in negotiation, where smooth talk and the ability to strike deals are as crucial as strategy. You start by randomly receiving land plots and different types of businesses (represented by tiles). The trick? For your businesses to truly flourish, you need to connect tiles of the same type within a single city block, and to do that, you'll have to negotiate extensively!

Each round, players receive new plots and business tiles, but the distribution is entirely random. This means you'll rarely have everything you need to form a complete business. That's where the fun begins! You'll need to talk, bargain, trade plots, trade businesses, and even make promises to get the right tiles and adjacent land that your opponents possess. There's no fixed market, so the value of each item is determined by your ability to persuade others. A plot that's useless to you might be the treasure another player needs, and vice versa.

At the end of each turn, your businesses generate money, but complete and connected businesses pay significantly more. The goal is to accumulate the largest fortune over six rounds, all while managing your investments and trying to anticipate your opponents' moves. It's a game where human interaction is at the heart of the experience, and each game is unique, depending on the personalities at the table. Chinatown is the second title in Alea's acclaimed 'Big Box' series, living up to its reputation for deep and engaging games.