Yokohama

Yokohama

Build an assistant network and guide your President through Yokohama, using people and buildings to strengthen trade, technology, orders, and public achievements.

Yokohama supports 2–4 players; community best: 3 players; playing time: 90 minutes. A WANGO browser trial has not been confirmed.

Background & introduction

Yokohama puts two to four merchants in competition for fame in Meiji-era Japan. This page uses the Synapses Games 2024 base rules: randomly arranged districts form a shared city where players dispatch assistants, move Presidents, collect goods, build shops and trading houses, and fulfill export orders.

Assistants both connect the President’s movement route and strengthen actions at the destination. After an action, assistants there normally return to hand, changing the network. Shops and trading houses remain as lasting support, so a lucrative action also reshapes the next journey.

Technologies change personal rules, orders convert goods into rewards, and country icons provide Foreign Agents and final sets. Construction, order replenishment, and Church or Customs assistants can all trigger the ending, making timing as important as immediate production.

Core rules & scoring

  1. Setup: Remove the specified districts and management boards for 2/3/4 players, arrange the city randomly, and add building tiles, five-power bonuses, and three achievements. Prepare technology and order markets. Keep warehouse pieces separate from available pieces, and take starting assistants, shops, goods, money, and one chosen order. In two-player games, block marked Church/Customs spaces with an unused color.

  2. Turn sequence: Take additional actions, the main action, then additional actions again. Additional phases allow any number of eligible orders and achievements and at most one Foreign Agent across the whole turn. The main action places assistants, moves, performs an area action, takes a five-power bonus, optionally builds, and recovers assistants.

  3. Place assistants: From hand, place up to one assistant in each of three different districts or two in one district. Do not use warehouse or management-board assistants directly. For every assistant placed in a district containing opposing Presidents, pay each relevant opponent one yen. Assistants cannot enter the Canal.

  4. Move the President: From hand, place directly at a legal destination; from the city, move through adjacent districts containing your assistants. A normal destination needs your assistant and no opposing President, and you cannot return to your starting district. Passing opposing Presidents costs one yen each. The Canal has its own paid crossing rule.

  5. Power and construction: Your assistants, President, shop, trading house, and the Station each contribute one power at the destination, capped at five. Resolve the corresponding area effect. A five-power action takes any remaining local bonus. At four or more power, build one shop or trading house from hand; each player may have one shop per district, and only one trading house is available there overall.

  6. Recover or withdraw: After an area action, return all your assistants there to hand, leaving buildings and President. Alternatively, at movement, return your President and any district assistants to hand, excluding management boards. Skip the remaining main-action steps but retain the second additional-action phase.

  7. Trade and technology: Production districts yield copper, silk, tea, and fish. Ports supply orders: keep at most three and never discard them for space; pay the required goods to complete one. Laboratories buy technologies using power plus optional money/imported goods, with no duplicate titles and an extra charge from the fourth onward. Card text can modify general rules.

  8. Achievements and agents: Place an assistant from hand to claim a qualifying achievement; first place pays more, and each is once per player. Each matching country-icon pair across technologies and completed orders can earn an available Foreign Agent. Flip an agent to act in a district with your assistant but not your President, resolving action, bonus, construction, and recovery while ignoring opposing-President fees.

  9. End triggers: A player builds all four trading houses or eight shops, order replenishment cannot fill the market, or either Church/Customs board reaches 5/5/6 assistants for 2/3/4 players. Count blocking unused-color assistants in two-player games. Complete the current round, then play one complete final round.

  10. Final score: Add Church first/second bonuses of 6/3, Customs 8/4, technology total-production ranking 10/5, and country sets. Sets of 2/3/4/5 different countries score 2/4/8/12; each icon belongs to one set. Unused agents and imported goods score one each, every two yen scores one, and every three trade goods scores one. In two-player games, the dummy competes for Church/Customs majorities and has a fixed total production value of 7.5 for technology ranking. Highest total wins; ties favor earlier order starting with the first player.

Rules & gameplay questions

Is this the original, the 2024 edition, or Yokohama Duel?

This page uses the Synapses Games 2024 base game for 2–4 players, including its two-player setup. It is not Yokohama Duel, and the two included mini-expansions are not assumed part of base play.

Does a shop let my President cross a district without an assistant?

Normally no. Movement paths and destinations require your assistants; shops and trading houses mainly contribute power. Specific technologies can change movement, and the Canal has a separate crossing rule.

Does returning my President to hand remove all additional actions?

You still have the second additional-action phase. Skip only the area action, five-power bonus, construction, and recovery steps. You may also retrieve any assistants from districts, but not management boards.

Can I use one Foreign Agent in each additional-action phase?

No: the limit is once across the whole turn. Its area must have your assistant but not your President. It can contain an opposing President without a fee, after which you recover your local assistants normally.

Does reaching the Church or Customs threshold end play immediately?

No. Finish the current round through its last player, then play a complete final round. The 2024 two-player threshold counts unused-color blocking assistants; these also represent a dummy player competing for final majority bonuses, with fixed total technology production of 7.5.

Rules & introduction sources
Edition
Synapses Games 2024 base edition for 2–4 players, using the publisher’s current Dropbox English rules, including two-player blocking and dummy-player scoring clarifications. Excludes setup differences unique to the 2016 edition, Yokohama Duel, and the two optional mini-expansions on the final rules page; not a complete district/technology catalogue.
Introduction source
BoardGameGeek

WANGO editorial

Yokohama · Game parameters
ParameterRecorded value
BGG overall rank (snapshot)#158
Complexity Weight3.27 / 5
Best player count (community)3
Player range2–4
Playing time (minutes)90
Core mechanismsContracts · End Game Bonuses · Grid Movement · Modular Board · Network and Route Building · Set Collection · Variable Set-up · Worker Placement · Worker Placement, Different Worker Types
Chinese publicationUnconfirmed
WANGO browser playNo confirmed WANGO trial
Year published2016
Suggested age14+

BGG statistics are stored snapshots, not live rankings. Source checked:2026-09-27

Player questions

What is the best player count for Yokohama, and can I play online?

Yokohama supports 2–4 players; community best: 3 players; playing time: 90 minutes. A WANGO browser trial has not been confirmed.

How complex is Yokohama, and which mechanisms does it use?

Weight: 3.27 / 5. Mechanisms: Contracts · End Game Bonuses · Grid Movement · Modular Board · Network and Route Building · Set Collection · Variable Set-up · Worker Placement · Worker Placement, Different Worker Types. Chinese publication: Unconfirmed.

Where can I learn Yokohama?

No rule guide, strategy article or WANGO trial has been confirmed for this record.