Parks Second Edition Components Overview and Impressions
Recently, Keymaster Games sent over their second edition of Parks, the popular game of traveling and collecting cards with National Parks on them by moving campers across the board, getting resources and other things. Parks generally isn’t my favourite experience, but I’ve always disliked it because it felt really disjointed. This new production might solve that issue for me, but only time will tell. Let’s take a look!
As with any Keymaster Games production, Parks Second Edition looks phenomenal. Regardless if you get the base version or the deluxe version, the quality of the components is superb. I previously purchased Harvest from Keymaster via a Kickstarter campaign, and I was thrilled by the product I received. For those who backed Parks, or are getting it from their favorite local game store, they should be equally as excited.
What this won’t be is an exhaustive list of the differences between the first edition of Parks and this new release. When I remember, though, I will note the differences.
First and foremost, Parks Second Edition includes a board that will hold almost everything you need to play. Gone are the days of the disjointed tiles you flips and layout each round. While there are minor gameplay changes because of the very static board layout, I think I’ll prefer this way over the original – I guarantee you others will disagree. Still, the board is wonderfully detailed and easily highlights where tokens, cards, etc. should be put. One of my pet-peeves about the original Parks release was all the different piles of components all over the place – this feels much more cohesive.
The wooden pieces from the original game were fantastic, and the pieces in the second edition are just as good. There have been some design changes, but overall I would argue the quality is similar., if not a bit chunkier in the second edition. When cardboard is used in this production, its a nice thickness, and although you won’t be handling them often, it’s nice to see good quality components being used even if the cardboard tiles just sit in a pile in front of you (pictures) or on the board (location tokens).
This version of the game also includes player boards, and while not necessary, it again highlights the more cohesive feeling of this edition. The player boards do incorporate a slightly different gameplay element when it comes to canteens, but also have storage spaces or the 12 resources you can carry forward turn-to-turn. Is the backpack with the 12 spaces a necessity to play the game? Absolutely not, but it does help visually see how many more resources you can hold.
The original Parks did come with custom trays for holding all the pieces, and I’m glad to see those trays return for the Second Edition. That said, the entire box is now much larger than the original, and has a complete insert for all the game’s components, cards and boards. I always found putting the original Parks back in the box a bit of a chore, so once again it’s nice to see an upgrade that will benefit me personally in this release.
Ultimately, though, what strikes me the most when unboxing Parks is how much brighter and vibrant everything is. While you would associate a National Park with darker colours – woody browns, mossy greens, etc. – it doesn’t translate well to a board game. I think the brighter board and components only highlight the experience further, and increase the fantastic table presence as well. The new art on all the included cards is also great to look at, and again, provides a very cohesive feel to the entire package.
Cohesion is the name of the game here, and Keymaster has done a great job of making Parks feel like a game released in 2025.
Article By Adam Roffel
