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Looking at Days of Wonder's publishing record to see who's designing all these hits, three names stand out more frequently than others: Alan R. Moon (Ticket to Ride), Richard Borg (Memoir '44, BattleLore) and Serge Laget, co-designer of Mystery of the Abbey, Shadows over Camelot and Mystery Express and solo designer of DoW's forthcoming Cargo Noir, which hits stores in March 2011.
Cargo Noir puts players in the role of "families" – i.e., gangsters – who want to profit from goods they acquire for a price from ports around the world. The more goods of the same type they can assemble – or conversely the wider variety of goods – the more they'll earn, which is profit they can put toward buying yachts, night clubs, a bank or even their own principality. Some purchases – collectively dubbed "the smuggler's edge" – provide protection from others who want to intrude on your turf, an additional action, or additional warehouse space to hold the ill-gotten gains. All of these purchases are worth victory points, and the player with the most points at the end of the game wins.
Game play is simplicity itself. At the end of each turn, you place your ships in one of three types of locations: the casino, the black market, or a port that holds 1-4 randomly drawn goods. If you travel to a port, you need to make an offer for the goods by placing money under your ship. At the start of a turn, you earn two money for each ship at the casino, draw a random good or swap goods at the black market, and collect goods (or not) in the port, paying the money you offered. The exception in a port is if another player has placed a ship and offered more money; in this case, you either take back your ship and money or put more funds in the offer, pushing the "stay-or-go" decision back on the opponent. You then have an opportunity to sell goods and buy things.
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