Review: Fromage

Introduction & Overview

The dawn of the 20th century. You are cheesemakers in a French village, striving to craft, age, and sell artisan cheeses. Your journey will be a symphony of passion and dedication as you work to create the most prestigious fromagerie with the most coveted cheeses in all of France.

This is the premise of Fromage, a design by Matthew O’Malley and Ben Rosset (both responsible for games such as The Search for Planet X and Between Two Cities). It was first published in 2024 by Road To Infamy Games in English following a successful crowdfunding campaign. The artwork was illustrated by Pavel Zhovba (Formaggio).

It is published in Spain by Asmodee (the game is relatively language-independent, although the structure tiles feature text explaining their effects on the back, in addition to the rulebook). It accommodates 1 to 4 players, with a suggested minimum age of 14 and an approximate playing time of 30 to 45 minutes. The MSRP is €49.99. For this review, we used a copy of the Spanish edition by Asmodee, kindly provided as a review copy by the publisher.

Important: if you already know the game and/or are only interested in my opinion about it, you can go directly to the Opinion section. The Content and Mechanics sections are especially intended for those who do not know the game and prefer to get a general idea of how it works.

Components

Inside a two-piece cardboard box (lid and base), measuring 29.7×29.7×7.2 cm (a standard square box akin to Ticket to Ride), we find the following components:

Main Board composed of 5 pieces (cardboard)
12 Board Mats (cardstock)
2 Resource Trays (plastic)
4 Player Boards (cardboard)
36 Order Cards (43×66 mm)
12 Workers (3 in each color) (plastic)
60 Cheese Tokens (15 in each color) (wood)
32 Structure Tiles (cardboard)
36 Fruit Tokens (cardboard)
36 Livestock Tokens (cardboard)
36 Structure Tokens (cardboard)
8 Extra Resource Tokens (cardboard)
6 Customer Tokens (cardboard)
Rulebook

How to Play

Fromage is a game set in early 20th-century France, where each player takes on the role of an artisan cheesemaker competing to build the most prestigious fromagerie. The game is played on a rotating board; at the start of each turn, players only retrieve the workers that the board’s rotation has brought back facing toward them. After this, everyone takes simultaneous actions in the quadrant facing them, choosing between Making Cheese (placing a cheese token and a specific worker based on the type and desired aging) or Gathering Resources (fruit, livestock, orders, or structures). Time management is critical, as crafting more valuable cheeses (Bronze, Silver, or Gold) means the worker will take more board rotations to become available again. Resources allow players to activate structures to boost efficiency, use fruit for special recipes, or manage livestock to produce extra cheese via the milking action without occupying workers. Once all actions are completed, the board rotates 90 degrees clockwise, aging the cheese and presenting new opportunities. The game ends when a player places their last cheese token; victory points earned from cheeses in the various areas (Festival, Fromagerie, Bistro, Villes), remaining resources, and fulfilled orders are tallied. The player with the most points is declared the winner; in case of a tie, the tiebreaker goes to whoever crafted the greatest amount of cheese.

Key Concepts

Let us start with the Main Board, an assembly formed by four quadrants arranged around a central resource supply. Each quadrant represents a distinct village location: the Festival, the Fromagerie, the Bistro, and the Cities, where players compete for prestige. At the end of each turn, the entire board rotates 90 degrees clockwise.

The game includes a set of Mats that slot into the main board quadrants. These inserts adapt the quadrants to the player count and offer two sides with different complexity levels: Side I for introductory games and Side II for seasoned players looking for fresh challenges.

Each player has their own Player Board, serving as the management hub for their personal fromagerie. It organizes gathered resources across various spaces: a basket for fruit, pastures for livestock, and a construction zone for structures. One of the most crucial sections consists of the four unique structure abilities integrated into each board; unlocking them grants players permanent benefits or endgame scoring bonuses that allow them to customize their engine. For livestock, each player has four barns to process extra cheeses, whereas fruit is spent whenever making cheese with fruit or jam.

Order Cards represent the demand of France’s most discerning patrons and serve as a vital source of victory points. Each order specifies two conditions that the player must fulfill: a specific type of cheese (Soft, Hard, or Bleu) and a particular aging level (Bronze, Silver, or Gold). The moment you place a cheese token on the board matching the requirement, you can instantly complete the card and move it to your scoring area.

The core element of the game is the Workers. Each player has three workers, each associated with a specific cheese type: Soft (white), Hard (yellow), and Bleu (naturally, blue). When placed on the board to make cheese or collect resources, their orientation indicates when they will become available again—namely, when the board rotates and the workers point directly back toward the player.

Cheese Tokens represent the physical footprint of your artisan production. Whenever you take an action to make cheese, you place a token in an empty board space and position a worker on top of it. Unlike workers, these tokens stay on the board until the end of the game, cementing your influence in the cities, your presence at the festival, or your dishes in the bistro. They are the primary scoring mechanism, as their relative placement and the majorities you secure with them will decide the ultimate winner.

In addition to the printed structures on the player boards, players can customize their engine setup using Structure Tiles. At the beginning of the game, players draft these tiles to place them over the printed abilities on their player boards. Each tile displays the number of structure tokens required to unlock its ability.

Fruit Tokens allow cheesemakers to innovate with their traditional recipes. These tokens are stored in the basket on the player board and are needed to access specific cheese spaces marked with jam or fruit icons. When spent, the token is moved to the corresponding area. At the end of the game, you will score victory points equal to the number of fruits used for cheese multiplied by the number used for jam.

Livestock Tokens help accelerate production, representing the animals that supply the milk for your dairy creations. These tokens are placed in the barns on the player board, allowing you to place an extra cheese during the round without using a worker. Each barn can only be used once per game.

Finally, we have Structure Tokens, which represent the materials required to upgrade and expand your business. They are used to unlock new abilities on the structure tiles. Filling the required slots with these tokens permanently activates special abilities that can grant extra resources, ease cheese production, or provide valuable victory points at the end of the match.

That is enough to get started.

Preparación de la Partida

Select the 4 board mats corresponding to the player count and insert them into the appropriate quadrants of the main board.
Assemble the 4 board quadrants in any layout and place the central resource supply in the middle, oriented randomly.
Position the board so that each player has a quadrant facing them; in a 2-player game, players sit across from each other at opposite quadrants.
Place a customer token at random into each quadrant within the Cities area of the board.
Shuffle the order cards, split them into two roughly equal decks, and place them in the resource trays alongside the resource tokens.
Set the resource trays at opposite ends of the table so that all players have one within easy reach.
Each player chooses a color and receives:
- A player board to place in their play area.
- 15 cheese tokens.
- 3 workers.
To determine starting resources, each player looks at the central resource supply and takes 2 resources matching the quadrant to their left, plus 1 matching the quadrant directly opposite them.
Deal 4 structure tiles to each player and conduct a card draft: each player selects one tile to keep, setting it aside, and passes the remaining tiles to the player on their left. Repeat this process until 4 tiles have been chosen. After drafting, each player chooses which of the selected tiles to place onto their player board and over which slots.

We are ready to begin!

Game Flow

A game of Fromage is played over an indeterminate number of turns executed simultaneously.

During each turn, all players must perform the following steps:

Retrieve Workers. Each player checks if any workers are pointing directly toward them on the board; if so, they return them to their personal pool, making them available for the current turn.
Perform Action. The player takes one of their available workers and places it on an action space in the quadrant facing them. There are two options:
- Make Cheese. The player picks an empty cheese space in their current quadrant and places a cheese token from their supply on it. Next, they place the worker matching that cheese type (Soft, Hard, or Bleu) on top. If the space shows a fruit or jam icon, they must spend a fruit token from their basket, moving it to the designated space (you cannot make a cheese requiring fruit or jam without an available fruit token in your supply).
- Gather Resources. The player places an available worker on an empty space (1, 2, or 3) within the central resource supply quadrant facing them and immediately takes the indicated number of resources (Structures, Livestock, Fruit, or Orders) from the supply tray.
Rotate the Board. Once everyone has completed their actions, the board is rotated 90 degrees clockwise.

A new turn then begins.

At any point during their turn, a player may take the following bonus actions:

Milk Livestock. Move the required number of Livestock tokens from pastures to a milking parlor to immediately place a bonus cheese of that type in the current quadrant without using a worker.
Unlock Structures. Place Structure tokens into the scaffolding slots on the player board to unlock unique, permanent abilities for the rest of the game.
Fulfill Orders. If you craft a cheese that fulfills the type and aging requirements of one of your face-up Order cards, you may complete it immediately, placing the card into your completed orders pile.

Game End

The game ends immediately at the conclusion of the turn in which any player places their final Cheese token. Players then proceed to final scoring:

Festival: 2/4/6/9/12/15 points for each cluster of 2/3/4/5/6/7 orthogonally connected cheeses. If a group contains more than 7 cheeses, each additional cheese grants 5 points. Remember that pre-printed spaces act as wild spaces for all players.
Fromagerie: 2/5/9/14/20 points for having at least one cheese across 2/3/4/5/6 shelves. In addition, each cheese placed on the rightmost shelves awards its printed bonus points.
Bistro: Players determine how many tables are occupied by two of their own cheeses. Based on this number, each cheese scores points according to its aging level (0/1/2/3+ tables award 0/1/2/3 points per bronze cheese, 2/3/4/6 per silver cheese, and 4/5/6/9 per gold cheese).
Cities: For each region, check which player holds the majority of cheeses to score points based on the color and player count depicted on the token. In the event of a tie, the token is flipped and tied players receive the reduced value (in a 2-player game, tied players receive zero points).
1/3/5/8/11/14 points for having completed 1/2/3/4/5/6 orders. Each additional fulfilled order grants 4 bonus points.
Points equal to the product of fruit tokens spent on jam multiplied by fruit tokens spent on fruit cheeses.
Endgame scoring bonuses unlocked through Structure abilities.
1 point for every 2 unused resources (order cards, livestock, fruit, and/or structure tokens) remaining at the end of the game.

The player with the most victory points is declared the winner. In case of a tie, the victory goes to the player who crafted the most cheeses. If the tie persists, the victory is shared.

Variants

Solo Mode. The player faces off against the Corporation, an opponent that manages no resources and uses no workers. At the start of each turn, it acts first by drawing an order card to place its leftmost available cheese token into a matching valid space within your current quadrant; if multiple options exist, you choose the placement. The Corporation ignores fruit costs on special spaces and, if unable to place a cheese due to a lack of valid spaces, banks the Order card to score it later. The end of the game is triggered when either participant (the corporation or the human player) depletes their cheese supply. The Corporation’s final score is determined by the highest value revealed on its cheese track, earned Customer tokens, and 3 bonus points per Order card stored on its board. Higher difficulty levels introducing additional restrictive rules can be used to scale the challenge.

Personal Opinion

Medium-weight Eurogames centered on producing a specific craft or commodity tend to resonate strongly with the general board gaming public. It is a theme unlikely to cause controversy and one that most players readily understand and relate to.

There is no shortage of examples. For wine, we have Viticulture (check out its tocho-review here); for coffee, Coffee Rush (check out its tocho-review here); for spirits, Distilled (check out its tocho-review here); or for chocolate, Chocolate Factory (check out its tocho-review here). All of them are mid-to-light-weight designs that, while not necessarily revolutionary, enjoy a warm reception within the hobby.

Today we examine one of these titles, specifically focused on crafting and distributing cheese. It is time to see how Fromage performs on the table, but not before thanking Asmodee for providing the review copy that makes this extensive breakdown possible.

In Fromage, players step into the shoes of master cheesemakers striving to achieve the highest possible renown. To do so, they must craft different types of cheese and deliver them to various destinations, such as the local fromagerie, the trendy bistro, shipping them across France, or showcasing them at regional festivals.

To accomplish this, players deploy one of their three workers—each specialized in a specific cheese type (soft, hard, or bleu)—to resolve one of two main actions: gathering resources or crafting a cheese. The twist lies in the main board being divided into four sectors, with each player only able to act in the one facing them.

Resources are essential for bolstering different facets of your strategy. Fruit is required to produce certain cheeses and will yield points at game end based on the cross-multiplication of tokens used for jam versus fruit cheeses. Livestock allows you to churn out extra cheeses without spending workers, structure tokens unlock abilities on your player board, and orders elevate the point yield of your produced cheeses.

Producing cheese simply involves placing a worker on an empty cheese space within your current sector, ensuring the worker matches the required cheese type. From there, each quadrant features unique scoring patterns: spatial connections, set collection, majorities, or pairs.

Consequently, Fromage plays out through simultaneous turns, meaning players cannot directly interfere with one another during action execution, since each person is restricted to placing a worker in an open spot within the sector directly in front of them.

Afterward, the board rotates ninety degrees, placing each player in front of the sector previously occupied by the neighbor to their right (except at lower player counts, where some sectors remain untouched on certain turns).

Where direct friction does emerge is through the temporary lockouts caused by worker commitment. Depending on which space you choose, the worker will remain locked on the board anywhere from 0 to 2 turns. Naturally, actions that tie up a worker for two extra turns offer higher yields than those allowing you to retrieve the worker immediately for the following round.

However—and this represents my main gripe with the design—this interference primarily impacts the resource sector. The action spaces there do free up once workers return, and it can be frustrating to miss out on gathering a desired amount of resources simply because another player’s pawn is squatting on that spot. By contrast, in the cheese sectors, every worker leaves behind a permanent cheese token that blocks that space for the remainder of the game.

This is the trade-off for a brisk game pace; because turns are simultaneous, games fly by in a flash. Actions are atomic, and even on turns where you resolve structure combos or activate barns for extra cheeses, downtime for other players remains negligible.

One might suspect that this boils down to just another pattern-building game. That might be true if not for the defining element that shapes each player’s developmental arc: the structures. At the start of the game, every player receives a personal board featuring pre-printed structures that can be activated using structure tokens (one of the four core resources).

Once completed, these structures unlock diverse effects, ranging from immediate perks and recurring bonuses to passive benefits and endgame scoring. The brilliance is that, beyond these innate spots, players draft four additional tiles with alternative abilities during setup. After this brief draft, players choose which of these tiles to overlay onto their personal boards to customize their engine.

Thus, the crux of the match lies in how effectively you chain these effects to generate strategic synergies. The downside? Unless you are drafting pure endgame scoring bonuses, the optimal route is to unlock these abilities as early as possible, pushing players toward repeatedly gathering structure tokens in the opening rounds.

Still, that is the price to pay for letting players commit to an engine-building strategy before the first turn even begins. Given how swiftly the game plays, it never feels overly punishing. When everyone at the table plays at a brisk pace, a session of Fromage wraps up in just over thirty minutes, much like titles such as Kingdom Builder (check out its tocho-review here).

Overall, it is a very solid medium-weight offering that keeps players engaged as they maximize the varying opportunities presented across the board. Diversifying too broadly is rarely advisable, as scoring scales progressively—placing two cheeses in the same sector is usually far better than scattering one cheese across two different areas. That said, it is not a title to overplay; while it allows for varied strategic paths, it does not offer boundless depth. If your shelves are already packed with top-tier medium-weight Euros, Fromage might struggle to replace your existing favorites.

When it comes to scaling, the game fares wonderfully thanks to its simultaneous structure, offering nearly the same gameplay feel at two, three, or four players. It is true that at two players—despite sectors adjusting via the included board mats—maintaining control is slightly easier since a full board rotation only reveals one or two rival cheeses. At four players, a sector might accumulate three or more new cheeses by the time it rotates back to you, demanding a more tactical approach.

Replayability is bolstered by the blistering pace, short playtime, and the variability introduced by the structure tiles, which let players chart their own developmental route from turn zero. In fact, the initial setup alone (which dictates starting resources) can nudge a player toward one distinct strategy over another.

Production quality is solid across the board. The punchboard components have good thickness and clean die-cutting, with the four interlocking main board quadrants standing out in particular. A turntable or lazy susan mechanism to rotate the board smoothly without dragging it across the table would have been a welcome addition. The wooden bits boast good density and classic silhouettes, while the plastic pawns do their job well—though players moving quickly might occasionally forget to retrieve a worker. A contrasting color on the back of the pawns would have made it easier to spot when a worker is facing a player. The included resource organizer trays make table setup quick and painless, and the rulebook is clearly written and easy to navigate.

Visually, the illustrator’s work brims with distinct charm. The artwork feels detailed and evocative, reminiscent of classic storybook illustrations. The fine, defined line work—reminiscent of etching or dip-pen ink drawings—works remarkably well, building volume and shading not just through palette choices, but through cross-hatching and fine lines that give depth to mounds of cheese and rustic textures. It is visually delightful.

And let’s wrap this up. Fromage is a snappy, dynamic design blending simultaneous worker placement with a rotating board that drives clever time-management mechanics for worker recovery. Matches flow at a brisk pace as players optimize their dairy output. The highlight is the engine customization via structures, providing satisfying strategic synergies and constant optimization tension without bogging down the experience in rules overhead. While the opening moves can feel a bit scripted due to an early rush for construction resources, and the overall ceiling does not reach groundbreaking depth, its seamless flow and satisfying scoring engine make it a remarkably capable medium-weight Euro. A straightforward, engaging design for anyone seeking satisfying gameplay without unnecessary fluff. For all these reasons, I give it a…